The vultures seem to be circling round Ed Miliband. The latest person to add their pennyworth of criticism is Brian Wilson, who served as energy minister under Tony Blair. He said that the Labour leader had a duty to "look in the mirror and honestly answer the question: 'Will the electorate ever assent to me being Prime
Minister?" Meanwhile, Diane Abbott, the shadow health minister, claimed that Mr Miliband privately supported immigration and had his "heart in the right place", but was too swayed by opinion polls whcih confirmed that the open door approach of the last Labour government was now deeply unpopular - damning him with faint praise, in other words. If that wasn't bad enough, Ken Livingstone has ridden to his defence, calling him "the most impressive Labour leader" since John Smith. With friends like Red Ken, who needs enemies??
As I have never been impressed by Ed Miliband, and believe he would be a complete disaster as Prime Minister, I am encouraged by Labour's history of being kinder to dud leaders than the Tories, who did a pretty ruthless hatchet job on Iain Duncan-Smith and Michael Howard. It is still possible that Red Ed will survive the current barrage of criticism and lead Labour into the next election, and personally, I hope he does. This puts me in a pretty small minority, according to an ICM poll published in the Daily Mirror earlier this week, which found that only 26% of all voters want him still to be Labour leader in 2015. However, my reasoning may not be the same as the other 25.999% - I want him to be leader because Labour are likely to do pretty badly in the 2015 election under his disastrous leadership and therefore lose.
The panic in Labour ranks may be focussed on their leader, but it actually goes deeper than the failings of Millipede junior. Who, or what does the party stand for? Its principal paymasters, the trade unions, want to see a return to a centrally planned economy and the take the UK back to the dark ages of the 1970s when frequent damaging strikes turned us into the sick man of Europe, The Blairites, to their credit, do at least recognise that the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991, but their multi-culti agenda isn't very popular with their traditional supporters, some of whom have found themselves shut out of the labour market by the tidal wave of Eastern Europeans. The harsh reality is that both classic socialism and its Frankfurt-school variant have failed. In short, Labour has become a party fit only for scroungers, whingers and control freaks.
What is so tragic is that if the Conservatives were led by Lady Thatcher, or someone of her stamp, our country could look forward to becoming one of the first Western democracies to rid themselves of socialism in all its variants, to the inestimable blessing of the entire country (apart from the scroungers, whingers and control freaks, of course!) Unfortunately, we have Cast Iron Dave instead, and even though Tory disquiet about his calamitous leadership has become very low-key as Labour's double-digit lead in the opinion polls has dropped significantly, he has just done too many silly things to justify the current upbeat mood in Conservative Central Office. The reality is that he has offered no substantive reason for disillusioned Tories to consider returning to the fold. The current positive mood music may change when the party discovers too late how great is the hostility to his "Modernising" agenda. Disillusioned Tories can turn to UKIP, whereas neither old nor new socialists are likely to desert Labour, and it is Miliband's party who are most likely to profit from the Lib Dem disarray.
I doubt if Dave or any of his close colleagues will read this blog, but if they want to be re-elected, here are some tips that ought to improve the Tory party poll ratings:-
1) Come out in support of leaving the EU.
2) Reverse the gay marriage bill.
3) Make actual cuts to the budget deficit
4) Scrap the 2010 Equality act and all other Equality and Diversity legislation passed since the 1970s
5) Set a target of zero net immigration
6) Abolish sex education in schools
7) Allow new grammar schools to be founded
8) Re-balance our justice system to ensure that criminals are punished rather than treated as victims
9) Show some pride in our Christian heritage instead of being embarrassed by it
10) Promote withdrawalists to ministerial positions.
I'm not holding my breath for any of these changes to be adopted in the next two years, but if we end up, as I still fear we might, with Red Ed moving into No. 10 in May 2015, I hope that something will emerge from the ashes of the dreadful Cameron years along these lines, for such an agenda, I believe, could bury socialism in Britain for ever. Hasten the day!
Minister?" Meanwhile, Diane Abbott, the shadow health minister, claimed that Mr Miliband privately supported immigration and had his "heart in the right place", but was too swayed by opinion polls whcih confirmed that the open door approach of the last Labour government was now deeply unpopular - damning him with faint praise, in other words. If that wasn't bad enough, Ken Livingstone has ridden to his defence, calling him "the most impressive Labour leader" since John Smith. With friends like Red Ken, who needs enemies??
As I have never been impressed by Ed Miliband, and believe he would be a complete disaster as Prime Minister, I am encouraged by Labour's history of being kinder to dud leaders than the Tories, who did a pretty ruthless hatchet job on Iain Duncan-Smith and Michael Howard. It is still possible that Red Ed will survive the current barrage of criticism and lead Labour into the next election, and personally, I hope he does. This puts me in a pretty small minority, according to an ICM poll published in the Daily Mirror earlier this week, which found that only 26% of all voters want him still to be Labour leader in 2015. However, my reasoning may not be the same as the other 25.999% - I want him to be leader because Labour are likely to do pretty badly in the 2015 election under his disastrous leadership and therefore lose.
The panic in Labour ranks may be focussed on their leader, but it actually goes deeper than the failings of Millipede junior. Who, or what does the party stand for? Its principal paymasters, the trade unions, want to see a return to a centrally planned economy and the take the UK back to the dark ages of the 1970s when frequent damaging strikes turned us into the sick man of Europe, The Blairites, to their credit, do at least recognise that the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991, but their multi-culti agenda isn't very popular with their traditional supporters, some of whom have found themselves shut out of the labour market by the tidal wave of Eastern Europeans. The harsh reality is that both classic socialism and its Frankfurt-school variant have failed. In short, Labour has become a party fit only for scroungers, whingers and control freaks.
What is so tragic is that if the Conservatives were led by Lady Thatcher, or someone of her stamp, our country could look forward to becoming one of the first Western democracies to rid themselves of socialism in all its variants, to the inestimable blessing of the entire country (apart from the scroungers, whingers and control freaks, of course!) Unfortunately, we have Cast Iron Dave instead, and even though Tory disquiet about his calamitous leadership has become very low-key as Labour's double-digit lead in the opinion polls has dropped significantly, he has just done too many silly things to justify the current upbeat mood in Conservative Central Office. The reality is that he has offered no substantive reason for disillusioned Tories to consider returning to the fold. The current positive mood music may change when the party discovers too late how great is the hostility to his "Modernising" agenda. Disillusioned Tories can turn to UKIP, whereas neither old nor new socialists are likely to desert Labour, and it is Miliband's party who are most likely to profit from the Lib Dem disarray.
I doubt if Dave or any of his close colleagues will read this blog, but if they want to be re-elected, here are some tips that ought to improve the Tory party poll ratings:-
1) Come out in support of leaving the EU.
2) Reverse the gay marriage bill.
3) Make actual cuts to the budget deficit
4) Scrap the 2010 Equality act and all other Equality and Diversity legislation passed since the 1970s
5) Set a target of zero net immigration
6) Abolish sex education in schools
7) Allow new grammar schools to be founded
8) Re-balance our justice system to ensure that criminals are punished rather than treated as victims
9) Show some pride in our Christian heritage instead of being embarrassed by it
10) Promote withdrawalists to ministerial positions.
I'm not holding my breath for any of these changes to be adopted in the next two years, but if we end up, as I still fear we might, with Red Ed moving into No. 10 in May 2015, I hope that something will emerge from the ashes of the dreadful Cameron years along these lines, for such an agenda, I believe, could bury socialism in Britain for ever. Hasten the day!