May as well disband the party now then.

That'll be a disaster

Don't underestimate her, she's a bloody shrewd operative. Ed got his chance in the last leadership election, he won't get another. You also have to ask: who else is there? Please don't mention Alan Johnson, not after he threw his hand in once he found a rozzer had been nobbing his missus

good to see that Labour are unelectable, we don't need them anywhere near f'ing up the country again, ever.

Cooper has more chance becoming a cleaner at a Hilton hotel than PM.

This country is never more f'ckd then when the Tories get hold of it.

Yeah, the Tories are doing a terrific job.



As usual.

Don't you think so mate? You wouldn't get a Labour Government declaring war on behalf of American Foreign Policy, selling honours for cash, selling arms to dodgy regimes, keeping Tory anti-union laws, closing schools and hospitals. Oh, hang on! You're right! They're all a shower of s and in the thrall of a system designed to help the priviledged stay in their position of power at the expense of the working class.

Fixing Labours total and utter shambles is going to take some time, but you crack on bleating, it's funny to read.

As you well know, I was no fan of the previous administration and didn't vote for them. The current lot are doing no better and, in many instances, worse. Osbourne is the most economically illiterate chancellor I can remember in my lifetime, and his cabinet colleagues (both Tory and Lib Dem) aren't much better.

I wasn't 'bleating' as you so maturely put it. I was reacting with amused disdain to your completely one-eyed assertion that only Labour were capable of damaging the country when there is plenty of evidence to the contrary. Sadly I'm not at all surprised by your knee-jerkery when challenged.

Being a shrewd operative doesn't make any difference in today's world of politics. William Hague is a brilliant debator and politician, but people just don't like him. It's the same with Yvette Cooper.

On the other side of the fence you have Tony Blair, who was youthful and all the housewives fancied him. Average politically, but he could talk a magnificent talk.

In a leader, these days, you basically need a salesman, whilst all the real policitians do the work behind the scenes.

no, you'd have the Lib Dems sell our soul to Europe, and that would have been so much better, wouldn't it?

Unfortunately that is true, the electorate does seem to prefer snake-oil.
But it doesn't just require a salesman to keep it going, it also requires a vision (of some sort), substantial back-up within the party and Machiavellian managerial expertise to keep it running.

That's where Cameron is winning it at the moment, he has packaged-up his "rolling back the state and sod the lot of you" as "The Big Society".
Only a minority bought it ... but Cameron got lucky because Cleggy a) hated Brown and b) was weak-willed (or stupid) enough to join a "coalition" where the main point of agreement is that Cleggy doesn't do a runner.
Then Cameron stuffed his cabinet with his cabal of hoorays (don't want any of that oiky "conscience" nonsense) to keep it steady as she goes... and bingo, just keep lying to the electorate and Bob's your uncle.

Sell our soul?



We'd have been no worse off under a Lib Dem administration. Whether we'd have been much better off is open to question but we'd have avoided some of the more odious policies to come out of the 'coalition'. And we'd have avoided alienating our largest trading partner for no actual benefit to the country.

yes, because all exports to Europe have stopped, haven't they?

anyway, we'll never agree on politics, because I didn't chose to have children and then expect everyone else to help me pay their way.

You'd have pulled out then ... and that would have been so much better wouldn't it?
Blind Euroscepticism is so easy, all it needs is a touch of xenophobia and no actual thinking.

not at all, I'd be engaged at the very heart of Europe, but only on the things we can actually have comonality over, certain things are sovereign and certain things can be joint and several. Our relationship with Europe needs redefining, but it certainly doesn't need "cancelling"

we are on the right path, once we get the public sector down to the right level, cut the unnecessary legislation that Labour brought in and get us moving we'll be fine, it will just take time and some people will feel pain along the way.

You'd make a great novelist.

Hallelujah, some common sense.

It appears to me that, where trade is concerned, it is only interested in the member states trading amongst themselves, with 'Europe' trading with people outside of it. I really don't like that idea.

Personally I don't see why we can't trade with whoever we can forge trade links with. Why should we be compelled to go to Europe over the United States or of the Commonwealth?

Bleedin' hell – that's a poor excuse even by your standard of finding yourself backed into a corner after making a big, knee-jerk about the previous government and then finding it gets picked to pieces easily.

And plenty of people decide not to have children. They just don't all pretend that makes them into some form of superior being because they judge others for daring not to be able to plan for every possible eventually that may happen to them a decade or more down the line.

Yes, because we don't trade with either of those entities – and that's because the nasty EU stops us.

Can we assume you've never actually heard of anything like NAFTA?

OK.
You'll have heard of BRIC ? These are the economic powers of the future.
Let's say you are an important apparatchik in the Chinese or Indian leadership with a huge and still rising economy built on the backs of more than a billion people ... and there are trade delegations from all four corners of the world queuing up to talk to you ... which ones do you talk to first? Or at all ? The little one off the coast of Europe that has a population (and market) of a paltry 60 million whose business is very handy but by no means essential to you ... or the ones with huge markets like the EU and USA that you really don't want to fall out with? Which would you do trade deals with?

Look at Germany ... even during these recent crises, it has increased its exports to where? To BRIC and especially China, that's where!
Why do you think an important economy like Germany wants to keep Europe intact? To sell to us? Well, yes but increasingly more to have clout in the wider world.
The same applies to us, if we could just wipe our island-monkey eyes and see it.

the previous government SHAFTED the UK, it's there for us all to see.

As opposed to the ones before that, which set in place the core economic approach of the following 30 years?

Or do you need to be reminded of this FACT every single time you have a rant?

Let's face it – in your world, you just stick your fingers in your ears and whistle instead of acknowledging the damage done to the country by deindustrialisation – and let's ignore the use of North Sea gas revenues to pay for that. Or privatisation – all perfect. The bar on new social housing – brilliant and not remotely connected with what has happened in the last few years, oh no.

And anyone who doesn't like it is simply spouting the politics of envy – as opposed to your politics of look-at-me-I'm-so-perfect.

It is?

Go on, show me

Is that an argument?
Maybe it needs fleshing-out a bit ... you know, with facts and that.