[…] words are substitutes for deeds and orders are taken for their effects. Nor is this a new phenomenon. The political genius of the group that surrounded Tony Blair and Gordon Brown in the 1990s was to see this system for what it was and then to develop rules for the acquisition of power that […]
Down Under David Lange may have come and gone and the New Zealand Labour Party may have blazed a rightwards trail for Tony Blair et al to follow, but the New Zealand anti-military, anti-spook campaigns continue. The latest journal to document the activities of the spooks and military in that part of the Pacific […]
[…] the British economy to make it fit for EEC entry. In Heath’s day the major co-conspirator in the project was the Cabinet Secretary Sir William Armstrong. With Blair it was his chief media wallah, Alistair Campbell. Thus the world has changed. Casualties So, after two reports by noble Lords and thousands of critical column […]
Ed. Jon Melissen London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005, h/b, £50.00 Just after World War 1, a group of the liberal-left in Britain began campaigning against orthodox – i.e. secret – diplomacy. It had caused the mind-bogglingly stupid carnage of World War 1, they argued, and had to go. This was the Union for Democratic Control […]
Waking up the incredible economic, political and social illusions of the Blair legacy Larry Elliot and Dan Atkinson London: Constable, 2007, p/b, £7.99 This appeared just as the last issue of Lobster was going to print and has been widely reviewed since then. Extracts were published in The Guardian and The Mail on […]
[…] the old money of the landed aristocracy is still very much part of this picture as is the more recently accumulated wealth of those whose company Tony Blair seems to enjoy. Indeed part of Lansley’s indignation at the growing inequality in Britain is directed at New Labour’s support and encouragement for it – and […]
[…] I guess, steal – every last barrel of oil on earth to keep its cars and its air-conditioning units running. Even though everyone – everyone bar Tony Blair, it seems – knows it’s about oil, throughout the summer and autumn the media was saturated with stories about about Saddam Hussein, Iraq, its weapons and […]
[…] lobbyist. This isn’t just a matter of old cronies who know each others’ phone numbers. The three principals of LLM each worked as senior advisors to PM Blair during the campaign and individually for Messrs. Straw, Brown and Blair in opposition. They, as other ‘connected’ lobbyists such as Mr Draper, gave me details of […]
[…] off-message On 25 January 2004 The Glasgow Herald reported what were claimed to be the views of senior British intelligence figures in a ‘pre-emptive strike against Tony Blair ahead of the publication of the Hutton report’ (2) The Herald said this of MI6: ‘The key points it wants on the record are: Many had […]
[…] against trade unions and having his substantial profits in offshore accounts, Branson has continued to find favour at the highest level, culminating in his knighthood from the Blair government, something that he was not seriously considered for even under the Tories. Bower also has a good account of the bungled attempt by the magnificently […]
