Here's what I don't get about the whole Blair hatred thing from the left

[Sir C]

He wasn't, actually. He got the Tory party back into some semblance of order after the Hague/Duncan Smith omnishambles years. He was never really meant to win an election, though, I'll grant you.

Plus he used to say 'people' the best way evs. 'Pipool', he would say. Pipool

[Burney]

So when May wins the Tory leadership as a Remainer that won't be hypocrisy by Tory members at all?

You seem to be assuming that all Tory members were pro-Leave, which simply isn't the case - not by a long chalk. Tory members will be given a choice of two candidates and will elect the one they think best able to win the next election. I see no hypocrisy in that

If May wins, it will in part be because she was never a committed Remainer and is therefore an acceptable compromise for the two halves of the party to get behind. Again, no hypocrisy.

[Dr Headgear - Wannabe viking]

Merely pointing out the left's apparently limitless capacity for self-serving humbug, hypocrisy and sanctimony as ever, doc.

No, you're just being a cock.

[Burney]

Plus he used to say 'people' the best way evs. 'Pipool', he would say. Pipool

I was reminded horribly yesterday just how much the way Blair says 'wunt' when he means 'want' grinds my ****ing gears. I'd put him on trial in the Hague just for that.

[Sir C]

I was reminded horribly yesterday just how much the way Blair says 'wunt' when he means 'want' grinds my ****ing gears. I'd put him on trial in the Hague just for that.

Lord yes, that did used to wind me up.

Fair play to him yesterday for standing up and giving his side. I might have been tempted to go and hide.

[Burney]

Lord yes, that did used to wind me up.

Fair play to him yesterday for standing up and giving his side. I might have been tempted to go and hide.

Yes, but you do have to bear in mind that he is actually a true believer in his own righteousness with a messianic streak a mile wide. He is a bit of a mad, if I'm any judge.

I ****ing hate the Swiss, btw. I had a very stressful journey from Friedrichshafen to Zurich airport that culminated in me handing a Turkish taxi driver a wedge of currency and shouting "Flughafen - Schnell! Schnell!" and only just catching my plane.

[Sir C]

Yes, but you do have to bear in mind that he is actually a true believer in his own righteousness with a messianic streak a mile wide. He is a bit of a mad, if I'm any judge.

I ****ing hate the Swiss, btw. I had a very stressful journey from Friedrichshafen to Zurich airport that culminated in me handing a Turkish taxi driver a wedge of currency and shouting "Flughafen - Schnell! Schnell!" and only just catching my plane.

At least you're still allowed to travel. Pretty soon we won't be able to leave the country. Or something like that.

[Burney]

At least you're still allowed to travel. Pretty soon we won't be able to leave the country. Or something like that.

It was my own fault for taking the PR girl's advice and taking a coach. It arrived half an hour late, the driver seemed obsessed with stopping at empty stops and then, just to put the tin ****ing lid on it, we got pulled over by Swiss Grenzkontrolle, who were extremely Swiss about everything and took ****ing ages.

[Ash]

Of course not. He was the figurehead and the leader, so he takes the thrashing. The rest can say they were following orders.

He wasn't leader of the 139 Tory MPs. Or the leader of the 557 MPs who voted to smash up Libya in another disastrous intervention years later.

I'm not disputing that some people did move away from Labour, I'm pointing out that many more didn't and wondering how they can reconcile that fact (of putting Blair back in office) with their moral conscience. Of course people vote on a package of policies, but it seems reasonable to me to expect that someone who feels as strongly about this issue as many of those now lining up to kick Blair profess to would then refuse to vote him back in. Now I have no issue with people voting for their interests, the economy or any number of other issues, but I do take the view that once you do so in favour of someone like Blair, you are essentially placing those things over and above your moral objections to the war he started and do ever so slightly lose the moral high ground when it comes to criticising him later.

Well, personally I resolved never to vote for him after he did a similar thing in '99. I would gladly have voted for the anti-NATO SNP given the chance, but that's just me. I do think your critique would be better applied to the political and media classes who have for the most part, gone along with the doctrine of humanitarian intervention for two decades now, and are now taking turns to stick the knife in, on, it seems, the basis of technical failures than principled ones.

[Burney]

He wasn't leader of the 139 Tory MPs. Or the leader of the 557 MPs who voted to smash up Libya in another disastrous intervention years later.



Well, personally I resolved never to vote for him after he did a similar thing in '99. I would gladly have voted for the anti-NATO SNP given the chance, but that's just me. I do think your critique would be better applied to the political and media classes who have for the most part, gone along with the doctrine of humanitarian intervention for two decades now, and are now taking turns to stick the knife in, on, it seems, the basis of technical failures than principled ones.

He was the leader of the country and those Tory MPs could quite legitimately claim they felt that they should have had a right to trust the PM's judgement on such a matter. Equally, he didn't actually need a Commons vote to commit troops. As Prime Minister, he absolutely had the right to do it regardless (as he did in 99), so trying to spread the blame doesn't really wash.

I'm not sure your criticism of the media is entirely fair. I seem to remember quite a lot of questioning from all sides of the political spectrum.

Of course, the big joke is that, had Iraq been successful in its aims (whatever they were), Chilcott would never have happened. It would have simply been a 'the ends justify the means' job and tiresome details such as legality and honesty would have been ignored. In other words, what Blair is really being condemned for isn't starting a war, but starting a war we didn't win.