Leaders’ debate

Posted on Thursday 29 April, 2010
Filed Under Politics

 


Thoughts?


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18 Responses to “Leaders’ debate”

  2. Dave
    on April 29th, 2010 at 21:31

    Incisive analysis from Northern Ireland’s premier Marxist blogger … to match same on my part, I suppose.

  3. Splintered Sunrise
    on April 29th, 2010 at 21:33

    Hey, I’m waiting for the North Antrim debate. Jim Allister versus Ian Paisley Jr should be better than WWF.

  4. Dave
    on April 29th, 2010 at 21:35

    Daddy’s Little Princesses were kind of interested for the first 45 minutes. Then they volunteered to go to bed early, which is most unlike them. Must say something.

  5. Darren
    on April 29th, 2010 at 21:44

    “Then they volunteered to go to bed early, which is most unlike them. Must say something.”

    I need a copy of that debate. It may be my best chance of me getting a decent night kip in the foreseeable future.

  6. Robbinghood
    on April 29th, 2010 at 22:24

    Awful. Just plain awful. The politics of double glazing salespeople. Or the politics of The X Factor.

    Meanwhile in my area, and indeed all around, there is no sign of Labour, noone on the ground, no posters, no sense that a General Election is a week away.

    We need some real politics – by party workers on the ground. I begin to think that this anodyne garbage is all we will have – and have to endure – for the forseeable future.

    Oh, btw, Brown just looks like he is ready to retire, worn out. A pity he is worn out by years of lying, interpersonal intrigue and propping up his real friends among the powerful, rather than by years of trying to do all he can for the sort of people who have voted for him and Blair over the last 13 years.

  7. BenSix
    on April 30th, 2010 at 08:12

    Thoughts?

    I didn’t spot any.

  8. Richard Harris
    on April 30th, 2010 at 09:16

    “Labour has NEVER spelled out precisely what it would do if the global banking tax, the living will rules and even the Basel III negotiations themselves all come to nothing. “What do you do if there is no global agreement on re-regulation?” should be high on the list of the questions for the leaders in the economy debate.” ~ Paul Mason BBC2 Economics Blog 14/4/2010

    Well last night Brown said AGAIN exactly what the banks had repeatedly briefed him to say! – “global or nothing”. Which “happily for the banks” means nothing. The city’s hegenomy must be preserved at all costs because Labour (after 13 years and counting) has absolutely no other policy or vision, Brown having based his entire “British Model” specifically on this base. So, Rebalancing the UK? The New Economy? A radical break? BULLSHIT, it’s Brown business as usual just as soon as the “beast can be got back into heat”. (Brecht)

    Shame (or not) he won’t be around to see it…

  9. Paul
    on April 30th, 2010 at 09:46

    Cameron started off looking tense and mean, then he got more confident and looked more peppy. Clegg was peppy from the start as ever, but the lack of subsrtance started to show through in his repetitive sloganising. Poor, hapless Gordon just looked haggard.

    The real tragedy is that this is what counted…appearewnces, style, body language. Who gives a shit about real issues, or convictions based on facts rather than slogans? Cameron was perceived as the winner because of his poise and verve, in spite of the fact that he blatently and repeatedly evoided giving concrete answers to difficult questions.

    So now we have to cheer on Clegg to save us from Cameron. It is a constant vice of the politicians and political nerds to despise the electorate, but I find myself tempted to do just that. People who watch an hour and a half of debate – however contrived and vacuous – in order only to judge inn the end on appearences,may indeed derserve five years of Dave.

  10. Dave
    on April 30th, 2010 at 09:58

    One thing that did strike me; Brown has clearly dusted off his copy of ‘Keynesianism for Beginners’ and was talking in terms of social democratic generalities rather than neoliberalism. Obviously that is hardly a great step forward for the class struggle, but it is an interesting nuance.

  11. Bill Corr
    on April 30th, 2010 at 10:04

    To have included UKIP, BNP and the various Celtic Nationalist parties would have made the show too long, sad to say.

    Still, 890,000,000,000 quid of debt divided by 60 million people is a mere fifteen thousand quid a head. You ought to be able to pay it off in next to no time.

    Make do and mend, just like your grannies told you to!

  12. Sue R
    on April 30th, 2010 at 10:05

    Where do I send my £15,000?

  13. boilermaker
    on April 30th, 2010 at 10:13

    I read somewhere that a question about immigration has now been asked in each of the three debates.

    So much for “the subject nobody’s allowed to talk about”.

  14. Bill Corr
    on April 30th, 2010 at 10:39

    Er, yes, Boilermaker. Up to a point.

    All three dodged the issue as best they could. None live in areas enlivened by Somali gangs or similar vibrant enrichers.

    Disappointingly, Clegg did not say the following clearly, “Lib-Dem policy is that those who have successfully got away with breaking British law for a decade will be rewarded with British nationality. It’s called an amnesty. They’ve had them in Spain and Italy and they work so well that they’re quite regular occurences.”

    There isn’t a cigarette paper’s thickness between the parties on the issue, excpt that a Tory Home Secretart might not be so willing to listen to sob-stories avout HIV-enriched picanninies enriching Britain with their presence.

    I realise that not all here read the awful ‘Mail’ so you might have missed this:

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1269918/ELECTION-2010-Gordon-Brown-hates-everybody–Labour-voters-included.html

    Rather funny.

  15. Sue R
    on April 30th, 2010 at 10:48

    In the Great Battle between Capital and Labuor, I’d say that Capital is winning. i am considering changing sides. no-one likes to be on the losing side, after all.

  16. Andrew Coates
    on April 30th, 2010 at 12:49

    I was reading one of George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman tales, (doing research into primary sources about the history of British Imperialism) to keep me awake while watching.

    The only thing that dragged my attention away was when Clegg made the point – quite correctly – that Hard Man on Foreigners Cameron would soon meet the reality that he couldn’t legally stop migrant workers from Eastern Europe coming here.

  17. JOHNNO
    on April 30th, 2010 at 12:59

    Coatsey,

    Brown made the even better point that Cameron knew this reality and was just playing up to anti immigrant feeling. Though pot and kettle do spring to mind.

  18. Bill Corr
    on April 30th, 2010 at 13:45

    Tory guff about cracking down on immigration?

    Have we heard it before?

    Hah! Every election since 1959 in one guise or another!

    In 1964 some Labour canvassers were bold enough to dare to whisper “The Blacks came in under the Tories”

    The following anecdote predates the race replacement we’ve seen in Moss Side, Leicester, Glodwick and Tower Hamlets:

    When Duncan Sandys was briefly corned by a rank-and-file Tory complaining bitterly about immigration – a mere trickle by today’s standards – he looked at the man with utter contempt and replied. “Well, there’s a labour shortage, isn’t there?”

    Precisely! For the Tory Class the important issue is the short-term interest of the boss class, not the long-term interests of the British people.

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