Posted on 08/27/2006 3:22:48 PM PDT by bruinbirdman
British Prime Minister Tony Blair got back to work Saturday after a Caribbean vacation and faced a desk piled high with problems and a potentially rocky autumn ahead.
His own political future is at the top of a long list of thorny issues that Blair will have to deal with in the coming months. Many in Blair's governing Labour Party hope September's annual party conference will be his last, but he has given no sign he plans to leave office soon.
The party is anxious after a poll last week showed support for Labour at its lowest point in 19 years and the opposition Conservative Party reaching a level that could give it a majority in Parliament.
Fears about terrorism and worries about militancy in Britain's Muslim community also moved to the top of the agenda while Blair was gone when police broke up an alleged plot to bomb trans-Atlantic planes.
A cartoon in The Times newspaper shows Blair saying "I'm home!" to his deputy, John Prescott, who is buried beneath an avalanche of newspapers with headlines detailing a long list of woes. The list includes violence in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Tory surge and the chaos caused at airports by new, hastily implemented security measures. "Did I miss anything important?" Blair asks.
Tension in the Mideast is likely to keep the prime minister busy.
Blair delayed the start of his 2 1/2-week family holiday to press for a cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah militants, and he plans to continue diplomatic efforts with a trip to the region, possibly as soon as next month.
Blair's handling of the fighting _ which lasted for 34 days and killed hundreds of people, most of them civilians _ angered many Britons, who saw his refusal to demand a quicker cease-fire as stemming only from a desire to stick close to the U.S. stance.
Blair is facing trouble from an increasingly energized opposition.
Conservative leader David Cameron has given his party a big lift since taking over in December and starting to overhaul its image. The Tories scored a 40 percent approval rating in a poll published last week in the Guardian newspaper, well ahead of Labour's 31 percent showing.
Blair has said that after three straight wins, he will not run again in the election expected in 2009 and plans to step down in time to give his successor _ widely expected to be Treasury chief Gordon Brown _ a chance to settle into office before the vote.
It's a good time to be a Conservative in the UK, and getting better by the day! We have been out in the cold far too long, but not, I am sure, for too much longer.
At the top of Blair's "to do" list should be deporting as many Islamofasict's possible. It looks like some the conservatives are ready to do that.
He is unable to deport the ones born in the UK.
They seem to be causing most of the problem.
The Conservatives need to get a backbone, though -- thay're as bad as Labour on the PC crap. They need to stake out a stong alternative position on Muslims and Immigration.
Guess Britain can't deport undesirables to Australia anymore. But how about the Falklands?
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