Frank Field, Levy, Prescott, Cherie, & The Dance of DEATH
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12th May, 2008
THE DANCE OF THE ADDERS … DEATH
Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse for the present prime minister, the British adder gets up on its tail and dances.
Alongside BBC Radio 4’s Today report on Frank Field’s broadside against Brown, and Alan Johnson’s defence of the PM, I heard a piece about the declining adder population in Great Britain. We are asked to keep a lookout for this, our only venomous British snake. Seems they might be on the way out.
Right.
Male adders perform a “dance” in their competition for supremacy. Nothing new there then, I hear you say.
AND THE HOMO SAPIENS VERSION -
Lord Levy’s jitterbug - where he tells how he shook with shock over his arrest in the “honours” debacle.
Followed by the twist of John Prescott - where he sticks the knife in both brothers B, and callously turns it.
Then the liturgical (or perhaps belly dance) of Cherie - where she makes it clear that the man she loved really admired Brown, but couldn’t trust him to sustain Blair’s social changes. If he could have trusted him, Gordon would have been PM years ago. So it’s all his own fault.
And for the finale - perhaps - it’s the weapon dance of Frank Field. Listen to him on Brown’s “rage” and “unhappiness” here.
Telling the BBC’s World Service Mr Brown seemed “so unhappy inside his own body” and was prone to “indescribable” rages, he said the PM should talk to his loved ones and “see what they say and act on their advice”. If the PM still led Labour at the next election he would be “very surprised”.
IN BROWN’S DEFENCE
On “Today” Health Secretary Alan Johnson said that the “character assassination” of Gordon Brown should stop: “Frank Field doesn’t get on with Gordon Brown - well we’ve known that for 10 years.”
The thought crosses my mind that Field’s success with the backbench 10p revolt has over-enboldened him. Perhaps the rest of the rebels will now, adversely for Field, support Mr Brown in the upcoming tax vote, leaving Fields out on a limb.
And tonight, Ed Balls - who? - yes, Brown’s Balls has described Frank Fields, former Welfare Minister, as a ‘loner acting dishonourably‘.
Of course these two have history, when just a month ago Field accused Balls, the Schools Secretary, of carrying out a “near criminal” attack on high-performing faith schools. He also said that Gordon Brown’s closest colleague was “ranting” and using the row to position himself for Labour’s “next leadership contest”.
Hmm …mm. No love lost there, then.
BLAST FROM THE PAST - ANOTHER SNAKE-IN-THE-GRASS?
"The political scene in Britain had been frenetic - if not positively frenzied. One election campaign ended and another just begun, the ruling party tearing itself apart, the Prime Minister himself facing the real possibility of a leadership challenge. Every day bringing new tensions, new excitements."
No, not today - but an “On the Record” interview from May 1994 following the sudden death of John Smith, the Labour party leader and Blair’s predecessor. The prime minister under threat was the Conservatives’ John Major. The interviewer, John Humphrys; the interviewee - Brian Gould, MP.
Brian Gould - you remember him .. the New Zealander. Reading this I presume Gould was NEVER a New Labourite. Gould stood against John Smith for the party leadership in 1992 after Kinnock’s election defeat. Smith won. Read Gould’s interview with John Humphrys here shortly after John Smith’s death in 1994. It started off on his anti-Europe approach and differences with Smith (& Brown?) over the economy.
And today’s words of wisdom from Gould:
‘Tony’s supporters will conveniently forget that he was forced out because he had lost the confidence of his party and the country.
Gordon has had to reap what Tony had sown. I was one of those who hoped and believed that Gordon could save the Labour government; that an injection of more recognisable Labour values might restore some faith in a doomed enterprise. But Gordon has been simply overwhelmed by the torrent of disappointments and resentments of erstwhile Labour supporters. His personal qualities or lack of them have become the lightning rod for all those who wanted change but did not get it.
There is a certain rough justice in this. The New Labour project proved itself to be adept at winning elections - at least for a time. Where it has failed, as readers of the tree rings will one day confirm, is in using government’s power to bring about the change that was needed and that they promised. Instead, they wasted their opportunity and delivered more of the same. All of those who framed the New Labour project are implicated in that failure.’
Of course, Gould is wrong in much of what he says from this Left perspective; but they invariably are from that angle. And, by the way, Blair was forced out by Brown, Balls et al. That’s all! No-one as important as the voters.
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And this evening Lord Levy has stopped jitterbugging and thrown this onto the dance floor:
“I don’t think Gordon Brown is showing leadership qualities”.
HYPOCRITICAL PRESS ON THEIR HIGH HORSES OVER POLITICAL ONEUPMANSHIP
Back to the press; answering to no-one except the sometimes jaundiced views of their editors, paymasters and their sector of the politicised public, the press commentariat are on their high horses criticising the lot of them!
Their daily mantra - “let’s see how many unfounded, personal and vitriolic things we can say about the lot of them today” has been sidelined for once. Their irritation at the politicians’ oneupmanship knows no bounds.
So they throw the “pay cheque” charge at these “disloyal” politicians.
Two points here: 1. since a pay cheque is always offered to all high profile autobiographers, why should these three say “no thanks”; 2. who says they are being “disloyal”? It could be that they are being particularly “loyal” to the cause of their party, if they are helping to move an unpopular and ineffective leader who seems about to return them to the political wilderness.
And, another thing …
The most jaundiced paper of the lot is that used for the memoirs of Lord Levy - The Daily Mail.
No other agenda there then? No helping the Conservative cause? Associated Newspapers operates the Daily Mail. They are unambiguously conservative.
And, anOTHER another thing …
Cherie’s memoirs appear in The Times and The Sun (Two “exclusives” for the price of one). Prescott too uses The Times. Rupert Murdoch’s News International/Corporation owns The Times/The Sunday Times and The Sun.
And News Corporation, which supported Blair since 1997, might just be considering jumping ship to the next winner (once they can decipher the colour of Cameron’s policies).
Or, like some of the rest of us, they might just be wondering if it is at all possible to bring back “Lord Blair of Sedgefield”. As a Lords member, he could actually take over the leadership of the party and thus the premiership.
NEVER FORGET - THE NEWSPAPERS HAVE THEIR OWN AGENDAS.
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LISTEN TO POLITICAL HYPOCRISY DISCUSSION (ANDREW MARR)
Andrew Marr on Radio 4’s ‘Start the Week’ (12th May, 200 
speaks to writer David Runciman about his book on political hypocrisy. A fascinating book. Worth a listen to this precis for anyone who thinks politicians MUST operate on different … er … higher standards than the rest of us.
What kind of hypocrite should voters choose as their next leader? The question seems utterly cynical. But DAVID RUNCIMAN argues that it is actually more cynical to pretend that politics can ever be completely sincere. In his latest book, he explains that the most dangerous form of political hypocrisy is to claim to have a politics without it and that we must learn to distinguish between its harmless and harmful types. Political Hypocrisy: The Mask of Power from Hobbes to Orwell and Beyond is published by Princeton University Press.
COULD ‘LORD’ BLAIR RETURN AS ‘PRIMUS INTER PARES’ - FIRST AMONG EQUALS?
WARNING 1: If he did it would not be for three or four years, when Labour finally comes to its senses. He would have to be put forward for a peerage by the Prime Minister. Perhaps Cameron might not be so keen, then, knowing the powers of his great hero. And Brown is hardly likely to do so now. Keep your eye on the summer’s Honours’ List, in case.
WARNING 2: He said in this Mirror interview in December 2005 that he would NOT want to become a peer - “it is not my scene”. Then again, if he didn’t have to be a working peer, as “first among equals” he might just re-consider. If we needed him that much.
Primus inter pares or First among equals is a phrase which indicates that a person is the most senior of a group of people sharing the same rank or office.
When not used in reference to a specific title, it may indicate that the person so described is technically equal, but looked upon as an authority of special importance by his peers. In some cases it may also be used to indicate that while the person described appears to be an equal, he actually is the group’s unofficial or hidden leader.
Lord Robert Cecil, in office from 25 June 1895 – 11 July 1902 was the last PM to head his administration from the House of Lords.
Sir Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, KG, GCVO, PC (3 February 1830 – 22 August 1903), known as Lord Robert Cecil before 1865 and as Viscount Cranborne from 1865 until 1868, was a British statesman and thrice Prime Minister, serving for a total of over 13 years. He was the first British Prime Minister of the 20th century and the last Prime Minister to head their full administration from the House of Lords.
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I steer clear, instinctively, of the likes of George Galloway, but even he mentions the unmentionable - Blair returning as PM via the House of Lords.
All sorts of options are being canvassed: from someone standing down to let Ken Livingstone into the House to contest a leadership election, to Tony Blair returning as Prime Minister from the House of Lords.
It’s almost laughable, isn’t it? Hard choice. Ken Livingstone or Tony Blair!
And such disparate options tell you how unstuck has become the glue binding Labour together. Here, Galloway, sounding more bitter than a pint of Glasgow heavy agrees with my thoughts on the ‘political pygmies’ surrounding Brown. The rest of his analysis is, of course, wrong, imho.
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I’M (almost) BEGINNING TO FEEL SORRY FOR BROWN
Lord Levy tells Jackie Ashley how he felt hung out to dry by Blair over cash-for-honours, and I have no doubt he did, since it seems there was not even a phone call from the then PM to his old friend/fundraiser when he was under arrest.
But, on the other hand - and I am here to hold out the other hand, am I not? - the last thing that Blair could have done at that time would have been to get in touch with Levy while he was being investigated by the police. Blair had learned that nothing he said or did was able to be conducted covertly. Somehow or other, leaks were spouting galore, from who knows where, and Blair knew this. If he had rung up Lord Levy and someone had found this out, he would have been accused of fabricating a story and/or agreeing a line. And despite Blair’s instant support of Ruth Turner when she was arrested at dawn, Lord Levy is perhaps being rather unrealistic here to think that he should have had the same support as a then working staff member.
But unless Charles Clarke, Alan Milburn, Peter Mandelson or A.N.Other is about to launch another attack on Brown’s flawed character, I foresee his party rallying round him, for reasons of expediency, if not actually trust or loyalty.
After all there’s only so much political regicide one gang of lost London-based workers can commit in any one year, without being handed an ASBO.
Surely?
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NORTHERN ROCK SHAREHOLDERS OFFER TO BUY BANKRUPT LABOUR PARTY - FOR £100
Guido Fawkes has been having some fun here. The present PM should snap it up, before the offer lapses!
Tags: book, cherie blair, ed balls, Frank Field, Gordon Brown, Jackie Ashley, John Prescott, labour party, leadership, lord levy, memoirs, prime minister, The Daily Mail, The Sun, The Times, Tony Blair
