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Cherie Blair says things about Gordon Brown that Tony Blair can't
Telegraph ^ | May 11th, 2008 | Matthew d'Ancona

Posted on 05/11/2008 2:51:39 PM PDT by The_Republican

The fact that you already have several holes in your head doesn't mean you want another one. Imagine being Gordon Brown this weekend. You are still reeling from disastrous local election results and the loss of London to Boris Johnson. You trail a record 26 points behind David Cameron in the polls. Rebellion surges through your party's ranks: in Westminster, over the abolition of the 10p tax rate; in Scotland, over the proposed referendum on independence.

Senior Labour figures say that there will be trouble - meaning a leadership challenge - if the party does not make serious progress by its conference in September. And then - what do you know? - up pops the unmistakable grin of your Scouse nemesis. Yes, Gordon: Cherie Blair is publishing her memoirs.

The appearance of this book, much earlier than expected, is more than a publishing coup de théâtre. It is (whatever will be said to the contrary) a serious and significant political intervention at a ghastly time for the Prime Minister. For - by setting the record straight - Cherie is also offering a devastating gloss on the Brown Government, its origins and its structural crisis.

To judge from yesterday's extracts and interview in The Times, much of the memoir, predictably, is an apologia pro vita sua: an attempt to set her preoccupation with money in the context of a life begun in relative poverty, to justify her friendship with Carole Caplin, and to communicate the pressures of family life in what she has called, in a previous book, the "goldfish bowl" of Number 10.

Me? I have always been rather pro-Cherie.

Without doubt, she made errors of judgment, some of them worse than others. But if you scratched the surface of most of the allegedly principled objections to her conduct, you usually found an unpleasant aggression towards this attractive, brilliant lawyer for being just a bit too clever, a bit too gobby, for enjoying her prosperity a bit too much.

Personally, I rather liked all that: the combination of fierce family loyalty, personal ambition and an unashamed joie de vivre. Good luck to the girl.

All the same, she is having us on when she says that "the problem between Gordon and me is not anything personal". It could hardly have been more personal.

Gordon found the flashiness of the Blairs and their circle (especially Peter Mandelson) appalling. In the eyes of the Iron Chancellor, they were a bunch of freeloaders, with no sense of the seriousness of high office.

The flipside was that the Blairs thought Brown's frugality ridiculous and dysfunctional: he could not understand why a secretary earning £18,000 a year would still want to shop at Selfridges.

Tony was always slightly in awe of Gordon's intellect. Not so his wife, who had come top in almost every examination she had ever taken.

And there were specific incidents, too. She writes in her memoirs that she urged her husband to run for the leadership even if Gordon did not stand aside: "Just let him lose."

When Blair left for one of the "stormy discussions" with Brown in 1994, she said: "If you agree with Gordon that you're going to do this for one term, don't come back home."

Personal or not, the feud was politically toxic. "I thought my husband was the best person for the job and it is a damn difficult job," Cherie told The Times yesterday. "As far as Gordon's impatience about [Tony] moving on was a difficulty, I thought it was a difficulty Tony could do without. So I was just terribly partisan for Tony."

Her husband, she says, would have stepped aside before the 2005 election - "no question" - if only Gordon had done his bidding over foundation hospitals, city academies and other public service reforms: "Instead of which Tony felt he had no option but to stay on and fight for the things he believed in."

So here - straight from the Scouse's mouth, so to speak - is the official family version of what happened.

It is often said that only a spouse can tell the truth about or on behalf of a person. Certainly, Blair himself could not be so candid yet: perhaps he never will be. As I have written in this space before, the real problem between Tony and Gordon was not the hate but the residual love: what one Cabinet member described to me as "all that blood brother stuff".

The feuding between the two men is documented in more detail than any political relationship in modern history. Less obvious were the occasional rapprochements, the rekindling of the deep-in-the-marrow friendship.

And as Cherie was at pains to make clear yesterday, the scope for civility, warmth even, remains: "Tony has given Gordon advice. He and Gordon talk to each other even now."

But let us not kid ourselves. However sincere Mr Blair's assistance is, he is also covering his back.

"Tony does not want to be seen as Thatcher to Brown's Major," one of his closest allies told me. "If Gordon goes down, it is vital that Tony cannot possibly be blamed by anyone."

Cherie, on the other hand, feels she can be more open, and speak freely about the battles she and her husband fought with the angry man next door. The central fact, the dominant narrative of the Blair years, was Brown's demand for a departure date.

From the moment in May 1994 when it was agreed that Gordon would step aside and give Tony a clear run at the leadership, to June 2007 when Blair finally left Number 10, this running argument consumed the two men, poisoned their relationship and snarled up day-to-day administration.

Indeed, it sometimes seemed that the Labour Government was no more than a gigantic, fractious timetabling committee with a single issue on its agenda: how soon the PM would leave. All of which was most peculiar for the rest of us to behold, given that Blair racked up three election victories, two by landslide, exceeding even Margaret Thatcher's aggregate of parliamentary majorities.

Why on earth would he resign just to give Gordon a turn, as if Number 10 were a Nintendo DS to be shared by the children? Since when was the governance of Britain organised on a rota basis? What a ridiculous way to run a country. Still, that is the way New Labour has run it.

Ancient history? Far from it. If the question for 13 years was "When will Tony go?" the question now is "Was it really worth it, Gordon?" Disconsolate, embattled, exhausted, Brown increasingly resembles the Macbeth of Act V, king in no more than title, wondering whether the whole thing was all, after all, "a tale/ Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,/ Signifying nothing."

How shattering, after such a long wait in the ante-chamber of power, to find that the job is so hard, to be told every day that you are not up to it; perhaps, in your darkest moments, to wonder whether Tony was better qualified all along.

Not much fun for the rest of us, either. Cherie's memoirs coincide with an indisputable change in the political weather, and a growing assumption that Brown is finished. Lord Levy recently claimed that Mr Blair does not believe the PM can beat David Cameron.

What does Cherie think? "Lord Levy doesn't know anything," she says. "I know that Tony thinks Gordon could win the election." Notice that "could". A QC of Cherie's distinction chooses her language with exquisite care. Yes: I think that's pretty clear.


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: cherieblair; gordonbrown; labour; tonybglair; tonyblair

1 posted on 05/11/2008 2:51:39 PM PDT by The_Republican
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To: The_Republican
WOW. Sounds like it is another harsh blow for Gordon Brown to bear right now..... not that I have any sympathies for the guy, but WOW, for the spouse of your predecessor and party colleague to weigh in with this right now...... hmmmm, tough time to be Gordon Brown.

"The appearance of this book, much earlier than expected, is more than a publishing coup de théâtre. It is (whatever will be said to the contrary) a serious and significant political intervention at a ghastly time for the Prime Minister. For - by setting the record straight - Cherie is also offering a devastating gloss on the Brown Government, its origins and its structural crisis."
2 posted on 05/11/2008 3:02:30 PM PDT by Enchante (Obama: My 1930s Foreign Policy Goes Well With My 1960s Social Policy!)
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To: The_Republican

Ouch... If Blair wants to stab, Gordon Brown in the back, I’m all for it. TB was pro-America all the way and was much better than the other two anti-American morons over there now... Gordon Brown is fairly anti-American and Cameron has been striving to outdo him. (Cameron chose to throw America under the bus on 9/11 in order to score cheap electoral points).


3 posted on 05/11/2008 3:04:51 PM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: The_Republican
Nothing like the scorn of a woman.
A lioness defending her pride.
4 posted on 05/11/2008 3:13:58 PM PDT by golfisnr1 (Democrats are like roaches - hard to get rid of.)
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To: Accygirl

England’s Call to Repeal Our Declaration of Independence (Brown smackdown)
by Phyllis Schlafly

http://nationalwriterssyndicate.com/content/view/479/2/


5 posted on 05/11/2008 4:28:45 PM PDT by The Spirit Of Allegiance (Public Employees: Honor Your Oaths! Defend the Constitution from Enemies--Foreign and Domestic!)
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To: Accygirl

I wonder if there’s any thought of Tony stepping back in to the ring. Although, of course, he does have his health matters to consider.


6 posted on 05/11/2008 4:53:16 PM PDT by fightinJAG (RUSH: McCain was in the Hanoi Hilton longer than we've been in Iraq, and never gave up.)
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To: The_Republican

Are all liberal men in power always controlled by their women or is it just my imagination?


7 posted on 05/11/2008 5:50:02 PM PDT by TheThinker (Capitalism is the natural result of a democratic government.)
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To: The Spirit Of Allegiance

The pity is that the Tories (although the new mayor of London seems refreshing) strike me as no better.


8 posted on 05/11/2008 7:00:15 PM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: fightinJAG

Does he still have the heart issues??


9 posted on 05/11/2008 7:05:07 PM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: Accygirl

I thought it was cancer. ???

He’s not looking too well in recent photos, but you never know about those.

I’d like to see him back in the saddle!


10 posted on 05/11/2008 10:33:42 PM PDT by fightinJAG (RUSH: McCain was in the Hanoi Hilton longer than we've been in Iraq, and never gave up.)
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To: fightinJAG

I thought that he had a heart issue in 2004, but I wasn’t aware of anything after that.


11 posted on 05/12/2008 10:26:02 AM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: Accygirl

Gordon Brown is a staunch atlantacist. He is only anti-american if you make an unfavourable comparison to the craveness of Tony Blair’s attitude towards America. After him, any Prime Minister who doesn’t snap to attention and follow the POTUS’ orders like a subordinate in a chain of command is going to look like an anti-american pinko communist by comparison to people like you....


12 posted on 05/20/2008 2:55:34 PM PDT by thundrey
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To: thundrey

I was kinda young when Margaret Thatcher and John Major were PM, but they were kinda pro-American too. As was Winston Churchill. So there have been a few that have valued the Atlantic relationship much more than Gordon Brown.

I’m all for politicians catering to their own base, but I don’t think that one who does can be taken as being for the alliance. I also very much object to the fact that Blair was just doing what Bush said. That’s kinda disgusting to smear a such a principled leader that way. Blair followed his principles and paid a high price for it. Many Americans consider him a true profile in courage.


13 posted on 05/20/2008 4:47:00 PM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: Accygirl

Don’t mistake Brown’s obvious disdain for Bush personally as disdain for America generally. He has always been known to look towards America rather than Europe when he was Chancellor.
As for Tony Blair being a principled honourable leader, I know for a fact that you wouldn’t be using those words to describe him if you had lived under his premiership. His so called ‘principled’ stand with the US over Iraq was based on what has now been proven to be falsified evidence, committing British troops to a war on dubious grounds with completely inadequate funding for equipment and logisitical support. He is an absolute arse and I was delighted to see the back of the grinning master of spin and sophistery....


14 posted on 05/20/2008 5:10:37 PM PDT by thundrey
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To: thundrey

A. It’s kinda hard to have a “special relationship” with your closest ally if you act like a latte liberal from NY who thinks that that country’s elected leader is a retarded third grader.

B. It seems to me that Gordon Brown is mining for votes by being extra anti-American. It’s a pity for him that the new Tories are trying to outdo Labor in their anti-Americanism. If I remember correctly, David Cameron threw America under the bus in an anti-American speech on 9/11 a few years ago. If you haven’t heard, there was this big terrorist attack in the U.S. on that date less than ten years ago.

C. Blair signed on to war based on the best available info @ the time, which stated that Iraq was a pretty imminent threat. In doing so, he went against his party. He later lost his job because he did what was right... This would be considered a profile in courage in the U.S.

D. I don’t know the details of the British troops, but I do know that many of the problems in Basra came after Brown withdrew the British troops from the city and let the Mahdi army run wild. The Iraqi gov’t and the U.S. recently had to clean up that mess for the Brits, and it distracted from America finishing off AQI in Mosul.


15 posted on 05/20/2008 9:54:00 PM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: Accygirl

A) Not liking the current incumbent at the whitehouse is not the same as being anti-american. Unless of course you would have described yourself as ‘anti-american’ whilst Clinton was in Office.

B) How is Gordon Brown being anti-american?

C) He fabricated that evidence that said Iraq was an imminent threat. That is indisuputable. Of course, whether you believe the ends justified the means is another matter, but this duplicity understandably caused a great deal of outrage from accross the political spectrum. Blair ‘lost his job’ several years after the Iraq invasion and what he basically did was bail out whilst the Labour party is on a death-cycle so that he doesn’t take the blame when the party loses the next election and he goes down in the history books as the man who won an unprecedented 3 consecutive terms for the Labour Party. Instead, Brown takes the blame for the Labour Party’s decline. In my books, that doesn’t make him courageous, it makes him a conniving little s**t.

D)Brown had no choice in the matter. Blair had overstretched Britain’s armed forces by committing them to two major wars whilst at the same time starving them of funding because he was more interested in pumping more and more money into that bottomless well of an unreformed NHS.


16 posted on 05/21/2008 8:09:14 AM PDT by thundrey
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To: thundrey

A. Generally, world leaders are able to feign politeness and courtesy when meeting with their counterparts; Brown couldn’t even do this. Frankly, I think that Brown’s a hard leftist who ascribes to the same view that the NYC set does... that Bush is Chimpy Moron McHitler.

B. He’s balked on the UK’s commitments in Afghanistan and Iraq, appointed anti-American leftists to his government, and couldn’t even feign civility when meeting the U.S. President. I’m not sure what the guy’s ideals are, but it seems that he at least feels that it’s smart politics to dis America.

C. I’ve always felt that people shouldn’t believe the Internets.. perhaps this should be extended to the BBC. Frankly, the BBC is anti-American and pro everything that is against the Americans including Al Qaeda and Islamic extremists. At the time, everyone believed the evidence. He erred on the side of protecting the British from a catastrophic attack. He is a hero to many Americans because he went against his party and lost his job because of it.

D. What commitments??? Maintaining British rule in India... Oh that’s right; that ended in the 1940s. Frankly, the only British commitments are the same that the U.S. has (but with less troops). Perhaps the Brits should spend more on defense.

As a sidenote, I highly doubt that anyone on this forum cares much about the decline of the Labor Party in Britain. Many people on this forum admire Blair, but would probably rate Churchill or Thatcher as their favorite British Prime Minister. Also, if you are concerned with the left-side of British politics (which seems highly likely judging by your posts), I’m not sure why you aren’t at least partially happy about the Tory victory... They seem to be trying to out liberal Labor nowadays.


17 posted on 05/21/2008 8:00:04 PM PDT by Accygirl (My Savior already came to the Earth.. His name was Jesus, not Obama)
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To: Accygirl

I’m not a left-winger, I’m an old-fashioned Tory. Blair has devasted Britain’s constitution and our civil liberties, both of which he viewed as an annoyance. But you wouldn’t know about that, you only know Blair through his relationship to America. Brown is New Labour, but he is still an improvement on Blair, and despite the fact I have a different political opinion than he does, I believe he is fundamentally a decent man who has been utterly crapped on by Tony Blair (as you don’t live in Britain, you are probably not aware of the rivalry between these two and the pact they made when TB became leader in 1994 which he seemed to be doing his best to renege on, or only adhere to in letter and not in spirit).
Brown doesn’t have completely free choice when it comes to choosing his cabinet. Under our system, a Prime-Minister has to govern with the cooperation of other politically influential people and he cannot sideline those who would support his premiership.
The British Army, which has never been very large except in the two world wars, has been scaled down considerably since the days of Empire, and is simply not able to fight two major wars, especially if one is very unpopular like the Iraqi war which affects recruitment and retention without feeling the strain of overstretch. Most Britons view the Afghan war as a just one, and would rather we focused on that as the Canadians have done. To his credit, Brown is doing his best to extracate Britain from Iraq (where we get nothing but criticism for our efforts anyway) and refocus on Afghanistan...


18 posted on 05/22/2008 2:34:55 AM PDT by thundrey
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