Showing posts with label Gordon Brown. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gordon Brown. Show all posts

Thursday, June 07, 2012

Decline & Fall: Diaries 2005-2010 by Chris Mullin (Profile Books 2010)



Tuesday, 24 January 2006

To my first meeting of the Standards and Privileges Committee, ably chaired by that most civilised of Tories, George Young. Then for a cup of tea with Hilary Benn, to report on Liberia. On the way out of the Tea Room I ran into Tristan Garel-Jones, who said, with only the slightest twinkle in his eye, ‘We’re grateful to you lot for all you’ve done during the last ten years. You’ve given us a good conservative prime minister, but now the ruling classes are back so you can fuck off.’ (page 72)


Monday, 13 March 2006

Morale very low. Colin Burgon, once a teacher, believes the Education Bill will widen rather than narrow the attainment gap. He also complained about the lifestyle of some of the New Labour elite – Mandelson, Blunkett, Jowell and her husband, and the increasingly shameless correlation between big donations and peerages. ‘We’re all contaminated,’ he said to Ed Miliband, Helen Goodman and myself as we sat in the Members’ Lobby awaiting the outcome of the division.
No one spoke. ‘I can tell by your silence that you all think I’m loopy,’ said Colin gloomily, walking away. But we didn’t actually. ‘The reason for my silence was that I agree,’ said Ed Miliband after Colin had gone. He added, ‘The trouble is that we are all held hostage by what he decides.’ (pages 79-80)

Tuesday, 2 May 2006

Coffee with an old friend who has spent a year working for Lord Levy, fundraiser extraordinaire. ‘I became aware of a Labour Party I didn’t know existed,’ he says. ‘A cluster of mega-rich, unideological, Blair-worshippers who are lunched and dined in grand hotels, granted favoured access and whose opinions are listened to with rapt attention. They have much more influence than the other Labour Party.’

And what about our little ‘loans for peerages’ difficulty? He had overheard one or two conversations and Levy always went out of his way to make clear that there was no promise of an honour, adding slyly, ‘but I will just make two points: (1) a donation does not rule out an honour and (2) contributions to good causes can lead to honours. If you wish, I can send you details of one or two good causes that might qualify.’ (pages 89-90)

Wednesday, 8 October 2008

Later, in the Tea Room, a brief exchange with Alistair, in good shape despite only three hours’ sleep last night. ‘Congratulations on delivering the 1983 manifesto,’ I said.
‘Yes,’ he said cheerfully, ‘and with Tory support.’ (page 232)

Monday, 26 January 2009

Jack Jones and Michael Foot, both aged 95, came to this evening’s meeting of the parliamentary party. It was moving to see the two old boys, both big figures in their day. Jack positively glowing, but not entirely with it. Michael a poor old ruin, wild, skeletal, no longer in control of his movements. It seemed almost cruel to expose him. Superlatives flowed. There were several standing ovations. People clicked away with their mobile phone cameras, knowing this is probably the last glimpse we shall see of either of them. To the New Labour generation, of course, they are ancient history, ghostly reminders of a past long ago repudiated, but everyone entered into the spirit of the occasion. Neil Kinnock, as ever too loud and too long, did the introductions. Gordon Brown made a simple, effective little speech. Then, with Gordon clutching his right arm, Michael spoke. Strong and clear. Only a few sentences, but enough to show that his mind is still alive inside that ruined body. Dear old Jack just smiled benignly. (pages 257-258)

Saturday, 13 March 2010

Glasgow

Breakfast with Tariq Ali. Charming, thoughtful, softly spoken, his Trotskyite past long behind him. He fears Obama may turn out to be a one-term president; that, re Afghanistan, defeat is inevitable and that the only way out is to talk to Russia, Iran and Pakistan and then withdraw with as much dignity as we can muster, taking Karzai with us. We discussed whether John Smith would have got us embroiled in Iraq – one of the great ‘what ifs’ of recent history. Tariq thought not. ‘He was a genuine social democrat, with an irreducible core of decency.’

Tariq recalled a heated exchange with Michael Foot, at Oxford in 1965, when everyone was up in arms about Wilson’s refusal to condemn the Americans for what they were up to in Vietnam. ‘Someone shouted, “Bring him down.” I have never forgotten Michael’s reply. “What you don’t realise is that Harold Wilson is the most left-wing prime minister we will ever have.” He was right.’ (pages 366-367)





Tuesday, May 01, 2012

The End of Days by Douglas Lindsay (Blasted Heath 2011)



0759hrs London, England

The PM petulantly pushed the newspapers off the desk. Here he was, suddenly at the peak of his career, and the media were barely taking any notice of him.

'What do I have to do?' he said, looking at Prime Ministerial aide Bleacher, Barney Thomson, diary secretary Lucy, and cabinet secretary Blaine. 'I'm busting my balls here. I've ordered more troops to Afghanistan, I'm crushing the other guy in my iron fist, I opened up a can of whoop-ass at PMQs, I told the Prime Minister of Pakistan how to run his country, and I've got the best hair of my life. What else can I do? Yet what do we get today? More Tiger flippin' Woods. Banks, banks, banks. The Mail says they cost forty thousand a family, the Telegraph, five and a half. Hah! Seems I'm not the only one can't do maths. And now these bloody murders and everyone's going to be peeing in their pants about that.'

They were all staring at him, waiting for the invitation to speak.

'Well?' said the PM. 'What about me?' Another pause. 'People say, where's our Obama? Well, don't they see? I'm their Obama. It's me. I could be PM for twenty years. I can cement our place as a world leader.'
There was another extended pause around the room. None of them gawped at the PM in quite the manner that his words demanded. They were all quite used to his self-obsession; even Barney Thomson, who had only been there three days.

'Prime Minister,' said Blaine dryly, 'we lead the world in pregnant teenagers, binge drinking teenagers, divorce, cocaine addiction and litter. If you'd like to be the Prime Minister who cements that, I salute you, but I just came in to remind you that there's an emergency cabinet meeting to discuss the crisis at 0900hrs.'

He turned to leave.

'What crisis?' barked the PM, scowling.

'The murders,' said Blaine. 'At Westminster,' he added, in case the PM might have thought he meant Midsomer.

Friday, July 04, 2008

Insert punning headline here

Once upon a time Wired magazine hit upon the winning idea of asking various writers to come up with a six word short story. I mentioned it in passing on the blog in more than six words . . . naturally.

Now, Dave O has had a similar idea to Wired magazine on his blog, but this time it's not a short story he's asking readers to try their hand at but political fiction. In his own words, ' . . . can you encapsulate what Gordon Brown is supposedly all about, in seven words or less?'

I could only think of two:

  • Standard editorial: The return of bleak times
  • James Maxton's biographer; The Labour Party's undertaker
  • Granted they're nothing more than blatant spamming of the Socialist Standard on the one hand and me pretending that I used to read books once upon a time on the other hand, but maybe you can do better.

    Monday, January 07, 2008

    January Socialist Standard 2008: Democracy Gets A Re-tread

    January 2008 Socialist Standard

    Editorial

  • Why the Green Party is wrong
  • Regular Columns

  • Pathfinders Why the minus 16.3 percent happy face?
  • Cooking the Books #1 Dreaming of a super cycle
  • Cooking the Books #2 Bottom line building
  • Material World Iran in the crosshairs
  • Greasy Pole Money, Money, Money...
  • 50 Years Ago Upset in Accra: Dr. Nkrumah upsets his friends
  • Main Articles

  • Jack London’s The Iron Heel London’s widely read book of this title was published a hundred years ago. But how realistic was it and how much of a socialist was Jack London?
  • And they call this Democracy? “It’s a truism, but one that needs to be constantly stressed, that capitalism and democracy are ultimately quite incompatible.” (Noam Chomsky).
  • The nature of human nature The cultural anthropologist Ashley Montagu once said that what cultural anthropologists were really interested in was “the nature of human nature”. So what do they think it is?
  • “Socialism is Illogical and Irrational” Free-market capitalism, left to its own chaotic and predatory devices would self-destruct in very short order.
  • The thoughts of Premier Brown (thirty years ago) In 1975 Gordon Brown edited The Red Paper on Scotland, a collection of articles by leftwing Labour activists.
  • The trouble with gods Those fortunate enough to live in relatively secularized societies should not underestimate global power of religion
  • What they did to Thomas Hardy The writer Thomas Hardy died, eighty years ago, in January 1928. Here’s what we said at the time.
  • Simon the Sociobiologist Cartoon strip
  • Letters, Reviews, Obituary & Meetings

  • Letters to the Editor: 'Silly Ceremony'
  • Book Reviews: 'Chew On This' by Eric Schlosser and Charles Wilson; 'All Knees and Elbows of Susceptibility and Refusal' Edited by Anthony Iles and Tom Roberts; 'The Class War Radical History Tour of Notting Hill' by Tom Vague
  • Obituary: Edmund Grant
  • Socialist Party Meetings: Birmingham, Central London, Manchester, Norwich, Salisbury & West London
  • Voice From The Back

  • Land of the Free; Death in a Harsh Society; Heiress on the Run; Old Age Fears; Promises, Promises; The Price of Gold