The vote against the military strike by 285 votes to 272 is the most momentous Commons vote of at least the last 40 years. It upended a Prime Minister who only recalled Parliament 4 days before Parliament was due anyway to reconvene because he was sure the House could be persuaded to support a motion which, reading the small print very carefully, could be construed as giving the green light to an early attack. Within 3 days he got it wrong on every count.
He thought he had the Labour Party in the bag (a reckless presumption), he under-estimated the unrest and sheer bloody-mindedness of the Tory Right (a surprising complacency considering their record of overturning him), and he failed to reckon with public opinion and the caution of the military top brass (his arrogant self-confidence in his right to rule blinding his judgement of the obstacles).
Thursday was undoubtedly a spectacular triumph for parliamentary accountability – holding the Executive to account on the greatest issue of all, war and peace – but above all for Ed Miliband who played his parliamentary hand with exquisite skill. But it would be wrong not to acknowledge the baneful influence from beyond the (political) grave of Tony Blair.
I see nothing great about this and I do not see any blinders being played, the people of this country are not sure in fact if they can trust politicians, to tell us the truth, so they have rejected a call to help a country basically because once a leader lied his teeth off to take us to two wars.
Miliband may not have been an MP he may not have been a minister, but he was in the Labour party and he was working within Labour and he did write speeches for Blair.
The sad part about this the public do not trust politician because of a Labour leader.
I see nothing at all to be proud of.