Riddle me this. There is a man who ducks every serious fight, is running scared of backbench rebellions and right royally screwed up a pivotal moment of his political career at the very moment the world was watching. There is another man who launched himself into the front rank of politics by disregarding the ambition of his elder brother, and has since stood up to the media mogul British politicians have, for generations, genuflected to, and is setting about re-establishing the relationship his party has with its traditional funders.
By any measure, regardless of the politics involved, who sounds tougher? Well, according to the media, it is our PM, Dave, a man who relishes making “tough choices” where the living standards of the poor and vulnerable are concerned. That, we’re told is leadership. That’s strength.
We all have myths we tell ourselves, and that is of true as politics as anything else. For example, when I used to peddle a certain left wing newspaper, I can remember saying to more than one comrade that of the thousands of papers we had sold over the years out there, somewhere, in Stoke-on-Trent are people who have read it, agree with it, and inevitably will act upon it. This hidden mass of sympathetic readers never materialised but it was something that helped keep you going and at least was plausible on the law of averages alone. Hope springs eternal, as they say.
If you step away from the toxicity of the Tory party and its paid little helpers that pepper the commentariat, the Conservatives are in a very weak position. Their economic recovery, which has been achieved by doing absolutely nothing for three years, is one that benefits the well-off at the expense of ordinary workers and our most poor and vulnerable people. Their party is menaced from the right by a populist pretender to the Tory crown. The party organisation itself is in such a state of collapse that it will find it a struggle to carry out the more labour intensive demands of campaigning. And to top it all off, despite not having any policies to speak of, and the avalanche of vicious attacks on Ed Miliband’s character, Labour remains stubbornly ahead in the polls. The Tories need a crutch, something they can lean on to pretend that everything will be alright. The zombie facts regurgitated week in, week out at Prime Minister’s Questions are one set of supports. And the other? Ed Miliband’s weakness.
Of course, the Tories and Tory commentators know this isn’t true. But where the defence of power is concerned, what trifle is truth? Their only hope is to be as negative as possible, to be as relentlessly base and divisive as they can get away with, to be complacent and pretend everything is healing on their watch. They do this because while they want to, the desperation of their situation simply means they have to.
Ed’s imagined weakness is here to stay, sadly. But the best way to tackle it is by refusing to play their game. This government’s record is appalling, and every one of their actions demands a positive alternative. At next week’s conference that alternative must take form. Voters have to have an idea of what they’ll be voting for in a little over a year-and-a-half’s time. Because if Labour doesn’t develop its own positions and sticks to them, the more the Tory story will play in the media and given the leader’s propensity to take Westminster Bubble concerns too seriously, the more likely it is he’ll succumb to battling them on their terms.
Ed’s imagined weakness is here to stay, sadly. But the best way to tackle it is by refusing to play their game. This government’s record is appalling, and every one of their actions demands a positive alternative. At next week’s conference that alternative must take form. Voters have to have an idea of what they’ll be voting for in a little over a year-and-a-half’s time. Because if Labour doesn’t develop its own positions and sticks to them, the more the Tory story will play in the media and given the leader’s propensity to take Westminster Bubble concerns too seriously, the more likely it is he’ll succumb to battling them on their terms.
I can back most of that, but so far I’ve not heard to much of anything which is alternative.
Labour came out with free schools, not everything the Tories do is wrong, now of course the Labour party has a different view, but not always.
Austerity is it good or bad labour has no real answer we saw that in Ed speech at conference he’s worried he will upset the swing voters.
Welfare reforms and the so called vulnerable call me vulnerable would be a risky business, I’m disabled and struggling but vulnerable not to sure.
But lets look at Miliband view I knocked on a door a disabled man answered I knew he could do something, I can do something sadly I do that now four hours a week I worked for a charity for free, would that earn me a living nope.
Doing something is not enough is it.
Then you had Miliband saying a few months ago Labour would hammer down on welfare and stick to the Tories spending and wage cap.
and now he has a really brave moment he has stated he would cap benefits to 1% for four years.
Now then what does labour think of ATOS it seems they are ok he would not change things.
Thank god the Tories have, last month they decided that the DWP would review all the failures of the ATOS group.
The reason is ATOS has a contract to check people out, then they can fail people, then get paid to take people through the appeals.
ATOS gets paid more to fail people then actually pass them, come on people that cannot be right.
But that just like New Labour is it not.
The fact is voting Labour may well be ok if your middle England you may get something out of the Labour party, if your working class then sadly your not going to get much.
they cannot even answer the simplest question what would you do with the bed room so called tax.
“Ed’s imagined weakness is here to stay, sadly”
I agree but all is not lost, the very best way to tackle this is to get Ed in Downing St as PM, then the public will get to see his numerous strengths. I think he will make an excellent PM and the public will see that. Of course the Tories and their mates in the right wing press all fully realise this which is why they do not want the public to know Ed Miliband and why they continue with their character assassination. It is also why David Cameron is furiously trying to get out of holding the live leadership debates on TV.
The Lord Ashcroft poll of the 40 marginals is extremely good news for Ed and Labour, where they are 14% ahead if the Tories and on course to win the next election.
Also you do not have to be popular to win elections, look at Thatcher, she trailed all the time and the new Australian Conservative PM was way behind in popularity stakes, but still made it!
“Reasons to be hopeful” (but *never* complacent)
Well we will see as they say, I’m sure Ed will make a great leader for which ever team he finally decides to bat for.