In the good old days, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were watching a John Wayne western together when Blair said:
“Look. I bet you £10 (Ed: or in today’s money, £10 billion) that John Wayne is going to ride his horse over that cliff!”
Brown said: “You’re on. I bet he isn’t …”
Then Big John did ride his horse over the cliff ……
Brown held out a wad of notes to Blair … “Fair enough, ” he said. “You were right again.”
Blair replied: “Well, you’d better keep the money; I was playing a trick on you; I’ve seen the film before.”
Brown replied: “So have I. I just didn’t think he’d make the same mistake twice ……”
PS Yes, why kick a man who is down (and out), but the supposedly-clever former British Chancellor and then hapless Prime Minister Gordon Brown has left Britain with a £170 billion debt burden that will – according to the new government coalition – take a decade of pain to put right.
And his party STILL has the gall to complain about the danger of “cuts”. You couldn’t make it up.They just don’t get it. There is NO WAY to avoid a GREAT DEAL of SELF-INFLICTED pain.
A dream that, perhaps, one day politicians will be truthful.
British General Elections are always fascinating occasions. On the one hand they are deadly serious. Mrs Thatcher’s win in 1979 set up the country for 18 years of Tory rule with massive changes and frequent social conflict whose effects are still felt today.
It was either a total social and economic disaster or a great leap forward into modernity depending on your point of view. Her victory of course also consigned Labour to 18 years of impotent pfaffing about in the political wilderness.
But on the other hand they always cause a great deal of hilarity to the student of human behaviour, as day after day nonsensical, fatuous, spinladen pronouncements are made by those desperate to get their hands on power.
And these pronouncements of future intentions (often delivered with the word “pledge” attached – as if that were somehow more weighty than “promise”) are often based not on reason or good planning but on how they will go down with the public!
And amazingly, they often seem to be made without any great thought about the consequences. Brown has got some stick only today because he promised (or if you like “pledged”) that there would be no VAT imposed on the Simon Cowell charity record for Haiti, yet EU rules prohibit such gestures and so the Treasury is having after all to charge VAT and is now promising to pay this back with increased aid as a workaround.
Foot in mouth - again!
The increased aid could have been given in the first place without his headline-grabbing “pledge” to make it VAT-free.
As ex Chancellor, Brown should have KNOWN that removing VAT from individual items on a whim is not allowed, but he clearly spoke without thinking, the headline-potential of declaring the record VAT-free being irresistible.
Gordon Brown has also got himself into “another fine mess” by trying out a variation of his trick of the 1994 election.
During the pre-election campaign then he solemnly pledged NOT to raise income tax. No, not he. He was not the man to steal the public’s hard-earned cash by raising income tax; that would be most unsporting.
Meanwhile the poor old honest and hopelessly-naive spinfree Lib-Dems promised to put one measly pence onto income tax to pay for more education. Naturally, in the election they got slaughtered as wild spenders. You couldn’t make it up!
As for Gordon Brown, he kept his word. Income Tax remained as untouched as the virgin snow. But he had a cunning plan; as soon as he got his hands on our money, he vastly raised National Insurance (NI) instead. It actually comes down to the same thing, but of course the SPIN was different. That was how Brown’s management of our finances began, and so it has gone ever since.
Well, it’s hard not to repeat a winning formula, as many crooks have found out to their cost. Putting up National Insurance of course (even if this time you TELL the people you’re going to do it) can be sold as much more socially responsible than simply putting up income tax. The former can be spun as essential to pay for hospitals, pensions and the like whereas the latter seems more often like Robin Hood in reverse. The silly thing is that it’s ALL MONEY TAKEN FROM OUR PAYPACKETS, so what difference does it make?
Well, to the wage-earner, none at all, but to the employer quite a lot, and this is where Brown is batting on a sticky wicket. Increasing National Insurance certainly IS a “tax on jobs”. Let’s look across the English Channel ……
They have a VERY high level of NI (French = “charges”) in France. The result is that:
Employers bend over backwards NOT to employ anyone; it is so expensive.
Productivity in France is very high (higher than in the US – fewer workers than in many other countries do the same amount of work).
Unemployment is also consistently very high.
In Denmark it is much cheaper and easier to hire and fire people than in France. Oh Dear! Horrible, nasty, capitalist, Denmark and wonderful, caring, socialist France!!
Errmmm … No, actually; unemployment in Denmark is usually around 4% (I just checked; it is TODAY despite all the economic chaos just 4.1%) and in France endemically nearer 10%.
Rocket science it ain’t. Sad for the otherwise-could-be-employed it certainly is.
Well, even the plebs are not quite as gullible as 25 years ago. The negative effects on employment are blindingly-obvious to employers but as it is such an easy thing to understand (though not apparently for the entire French government or for Mr Brown) ordinary people are beginning to understand it, too. Brown’s statement that he will raise NI isn’t doing his election campaign any good at all.
However, as it is currently business leaders in particular who are bleating about this, perhaps it will be spun as: “Don’t worry chaps – it’s just those capitalist business-chief bastards whinging again”. That’s one thing you can rely on in an election; there will be endless spinning, quoting of statistics and rubbishing of the enemy ….
Well, this is election season in Britain, or as near as it gets ….. no doubt British PM Gordon Brown will wait to the last possible moment in the hope that either oil in vast quantities will be struck on Salisbury Plain or that David Cameron will be found wandering around near the men’s toilets on Wandsworth Common late one night.
But Gordon-Brown’s procrastination has almost reached its consume-by date and everyone expects an announcement soon for an election on May 6th.
This will be a momentous election. As it seems that British politics has evolved into mammoth-long parliamentary stints – a bit like Japan – the government of the next 15 years could be up for grabs. Will we stagger along under the camel-breaking weight of turgid bureaucracy, overspending and debt under Labour or emerge post-election into the great entrepreneurial leap forward à la Maggie Thatcher Mark II? (this is a slight over-simplification for newcomers to British politics).
We’ll see, but one of the most fascinating aspects of general elections is always to listen to what politicians say. On rare occasions we may be inspired and amazed by their vision and rhetoric, but unfortunately one’s reaction is more often one of total disbelief. I had one of the latter yesterday when I read the following in the Guardian:
“I will continue as Labour leader even if I lose election, “Gordon Brown says.
Now nobody pretends being British PM is easy, but one does at least hope that one’s leader – the one with the finger on the nuclear button after all – will not lose touch with reality. And the idea that Brown could soldier on after a defeat is surreal.
He was never actually elected by his party in the first place, nor of course as PM by the British Public. He has already nearly been thrown out a couple of times by his own party so what possible justification could there be for trying to stay on in defeat? Is the following a justification?
“I owe it to people to continue and complete the work we have started of taking this country out of the most difficult global financial recession.” (Reuters)
Does he really think that NOBODY ELSE can save Britain? Megalomaniac delusions, I fear. And IF he loses the election, the Labour Party could face another 15 years in opposition. The idea of Brown staggering on until he drops is rather sobering.
Mr Brown didn’t NEED to say what he did; the usual politician’s deviousness would have sufficed: “no point speculating about hypothetical situations …. ” and so on …. the fact that he cannot seem to imagine NOT being leader after so many years of playing sulky bridesmaid to the slick and charismatic Tony Blair is pathetic in the true sense of the word.
In sport, business, love and politics, there comes a time when you have to give up, and leading your party to defeat at an election is one of them ……..
PS Of course, he could WIN the election! Oh dear …… pass me the Glenfiddich …..
“Gordon Brown was ‘marginalised’ by Tony Blair in the build-up to the Iraq war”, former International Development Secretary Clare Short has said.
“The then chancellor neither opposed nor supported the invasion but was ‘preoccupied’ by other concerns,” she told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show.
Frankly, it is surreally ludicrous. Is she really saying that while the country was preparing to go to war in extraordinarily-controversial circumstances, with hundreds of thousands marching in protest and all the rest, that
Clare Short
Brown had “other concerns”? And during the whole process these “other concerns” prevented him from AT ANY TIME having an input or indeed an opinion?
Is this some sort of attempt to disassociate him from responsibility? Whatever one thinks about the rights or wrongs of the invasion it was in the end a COLLECTIVE DECISION. Blair could NOT have done it without the support of the British Cabinet, especially Brown and Straw. If they had felt strongly enough about it, they could have resigned, or more likely have told Blair they WOULD resign if he pressed on, and thereby thwarted him. Now, it isn’t easy to resign, or even threaten to – your bluff could always be called and your career go down the spout – but if you can’t do it when it is a matter of your country going to war when the hell CAN you do it?
Gordon Brown
As for “neither supported nor opposed” the invasion, what a PATHETIC verdict on someone who went on (without an election) to “lead” the country.
“Well, I’m neither supporting nor opposing it since that way I can take either position later depending on how it pans out.”
I can’t recall having seen a more pathetic, fumbling, cowardly shambles. You may love or – more likely – hate Tony Blair, but as with Margaret Thatcher, you certainly knew where he stood.
Learning from Dogs 