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Wednesday, December 30, 2009

The Contradictions Inherent in the System

Gordon Brown plays class warrior:

Ms Jowell, the Olympics Minister, urged the Prime Minister to stop attacking the Conservative leader for having a privileged background as such personal insults only alienated voters and risked bringing politics into disrepute.

The outspoken plea from the veteran former Blairite is the latest sign of serious concern at the highest level of the Government about Mr Brown's general election strategy.

Ms Jowell's intervention came days after reports of a rift between Mr Brown and Lord Mandelson who has warned the Prime Minister that he disagrees with his plan to fight the election on a message of "Labour investment versus Tory cuts".

The Business Secretary was also said to be concerned about the Prime Minister's use of class war rhetoric against Mr Cameron.

England without its Toffs is like Canada without maple syrup, and Australia without gruff backwoodsmen. It is the way of things. Britain today is not the Britain of the 1960s, the last time the class system had true power. The Thatcherite reforms did much to introduce a meritocracy into British life. Still, old grudges die hard and railing against the elite is a solid vote getting strategy among the troglodyte part of the Labour base. There is a price to all this late winter New Labour Marxism. Brown and Darling's war against the City is already threatening London's position as the world's number two financial center. If the City shrinks to the significance of, say, Frankfurt, there will be few ways in which a future Chancellor will be able to close the epic-sized deficit. 

Posted by Richard Anderson on December 30, 2009 | Permalink

Comments

This is very similar to the way the NDP talks - they plead poverty but, as all white Ontarians do, live in exceptional privilege and wealth. They even hired homeless people to protest for them so that their members can enjoy free weekends. They too are just a regional party of rich white people like the Liberals and Greens, concentrated in southern Ontario. I wish Mr. Harper would begin to return their ill-gotten wealth to the people they stole it from.

Posted by: Zebulon Pike | 2009-12-30 11:31:02 AM


What role does an "Olympics Minister" play exactly?

Posted by: Maxime | 2009-12-31 8:56:10 AM



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