Would a Tory Government be a good thing?
- Thread starter scawenb
- Start date
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Seven months out from the election, the Tory's have flashed a bit of policy leg and more will develop over the next week of Conference. If the results from this, and the next quarter, show growth - then there might be some trouble for Dave's media boys. If Labour can demonstrate that they've taken the country out of recession, and done it in the quickest possible time, then they can hammer Dave's free market ideas about the economy - play up experience and the need for continuity.
Add to that Cameron going up against Brown in specific policy area debates, the Tory won't be able to do his (very well practiced) deflection about ideology rather than solid ideas. There's only so much broken britain people can take before they start asking where the superglue is.
Conservatives will probably win, but it's not going to be an 1983 or a 1997. If Clegg decides to come and play as well, it could be a majority of maybe a hundred - maybe less. It's a little bit open at the minute, due to the time involved.
Plus there's always the threat that the Tories will implode, or play the Kinnock and start getting overconfident. Lots of potential in it.
Add to that Cameron going up against Brown in specific policy area debates, the Tory won't be able to do his (very well practiced) deflection about ideology rather than solid ideas. There's only so much broken britain people can take before they start asking where the superglue is.
Conservatives will probably win, but it's not going to be an 1983 or a 1997. If Clegg decides to come and play as well, it could be a majority of maybe a hundred - maybe less. It's a little bit open at the minute, due to the time involved.
Plus there's always the threat that the Tories will implode, or play the Kinnock and start getting overconfident. Lots of potential in it.
Kaka Tim
Half Arsed and Slapdash till I Die
Ouch. My defense is probably even this is preferable to the Tories (who this morning are boasting about how much they'd slash poor peoples benefits by).
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
I disagree with much of that analysis.
Cameron's biggest weakness is, IMHO, his obvious filching of the Blair mode of politics, which - as we are seeing in the stories about Blair running for President of Europe and the widespread hatred of politicians generally - is almost universally unpopular. Its not so long ago that he and his minions were yammering on about him being the "heir to Blair", and (as mentioned on the Conference thread) he is quite far along the process of rebranding the Tories into the same type of top-down, "donation"-dependent, twat-and-lobbyist stuffed (lots of their PPCs for safe seats are thoroughly unpleasant people) party that Labour has been since Blair took it over and made it all new.
By comparison, his economic policies - especially cuts - are blatantly not the political poison that the likes of NL and the Guardian would like them to be; most people would recognize that the state has got too big, that there is rampant waste and that savings need to be made. The difficulty for Cameron will come when he has to determine where to cut, and how deeply.
If he is genuine and wants to do the right thing then it will be the vast mob of consultants and consultancy firms, PFI, bad contracts, needless quangos and idiotic requirements for competition that will go - that is where the waste is, where the vast majority of savings could be made and where Labour could be even more discredited than it is now (such has been the level of waste, and almost certainly corrupt practices that has gone on). However those people - and their lobbyists - are much the same people that are donating large sums to the Tories (there is an interesting article in the latest Eye about how Balfour Beatty have already started to grease the wheel, as it were) and so its extremely likely that it will be low-level public servants and their terms and conditions that are targetted, as well as more selloffs of publicly owned assets (the Royal Mail almost certainly).... ie, continuing the same disasterous path of Brown.
(edit after reading Kaka Tim's post) - Furthermore, I dont even think that benefits being targetted is that bad a thing provided it is done right. For instance, Child Benefit should be means-tested, if for no other reason than you can then raise the level of benefit to the people who need it most.
but thats not the sort of benefit reductions the Tories do. They only hit the POOREST. They're the TORIES
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
That was much the point I was making, which you would have realised had you read it.
weltweit
Well-Known Member
You are like a stuck record, you only ever say the same thing, whenever I see a thread about the tories, the last poster is always you and you are always saying the above..
In fact you post so much on Tory threads that I expect you are a closet tory.
Beanburger
Deep Fried
No it's not, it's you. Oh hang on... maybe it's me.
Tarquin pass the orange , one fancies a wank
even if it's the same war criminals who ALSO voted for it?
Yes. At least they didn't do it.
but they WOULD'VE done.
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
Would they? I cant see Hague or Major going as far to make it happen as Blair did.
they almost unanimously voted for it. At least in New Labour there were a few backbenchers who, despite the intimidation from up high, voted AGAINST. The Tories LOVE that kinda shit. Not THEIR sons sent off to be shot at...
True enough; in the cases of Mark Lancaster and Desmond Swayne, it was Tory MPs themselves, not their sons, who served in Afghanistan and Iraq.
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
Are you seriously suggesting that a party of opposition who voted for a government measure are more culpable than the Government who agitated for it, brought it in, voted for it, and carried out the invasion?
I think it was Derek Simpson I heard last week denouncing the Sun because the only Labour policy it supported was war with Iraq. He seemed to be implying that it was the Sun's fault we invaded another country. Which seemed a bit unreasonable as well.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Is anyone watching Jon Snow on C4 News killing Michael Gove in the face? 
"so you're holding a referendum or not based on an obscure court of a european country...." "Let me put it another way, are there any circumstances the Conservatives would have a referendum if it's been ratified..."
Lots of ducking and weaving Then the Tory accused Jon Snow of xenophobia against the Czech's and ageism over the 'technical college' announcement, as the bloke behind it was behind it the last time - under Thatcher.
Technical colleges according to Michael Gove will 'correct the lack of technical skilling our children deserve' - YES YOU FUCKING FUCKWIT, BECAUSE YOUR PARTY KILLED OFF THE FUCKING SKILLED TECHNICAL/MANUAL TRADES THE LAST TIME SOMEONE WAS FUCKING STUPID ENOUGH TO VOTE YOU CUNTS IN.
"so you're holding a referendum or not based on an obscure court of a european country...." "Let me put it another way, are there any circumstances the Conservatives would have a referendum if it's been ratified..."
Lots of ducking and weaving
Then the Tory accused Jon Snow of xenophobia against the Czech's and ageism over the 'technical college' announcement, as the bloke behind it was behind it the last time - under Thatcher.Technical colleges according to Michael Gove will 'correct the lack of technical skilling our children deserve' - YES YOU FUCKING FUCKWIT, BECAUSE YOUR PARTY KILLED OFF THE FUCKING SKILLED TECHNICAL/MANUAL TRADES THE LAST TIME SOMEONE WAS FUCKING STUPID ENOUGH TO VOTE YOU CUNTS IN.
Jeff Robinson
Marxist-Lentilist: Jackboots and Jackfruit
Of course they fucking would - remember the first gulf war? Major (who's now working for the war profiting murder organisation the Carlyle Group) didn't seem to bothered about participating in the slaughter of 100,000 Iraqis.
There was a parliamentary vote on the Iraq war: all the MPs who voted for it are equally up to their eyeballs in blood - and that includes the vast majority of the tory vermin party.
Nor can I. It was the "Nixon to China" syndrome, as we say in the USA.
the same as. They are SUPPOSED to be THE OPPOSITION. So to agree with something so bloodthirsty must make em the same?
They are horrible horrible bastards who sell papers out of people dying. "Our Boys" and all that shit - no they're NOT your boys - they're their parents, who were against them being sent off to die.
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
No, it doesnt. Blair told a load of fibs to Parliament about Iraq, after all. The upper echelons of the Tory Party may have been told the truth of the matter, though I seriously doubt it.
Jeff Robinson said:
That was the war where Saddam did actually invade and occupy a neighbouring country, right?
indeed but the real one would be far far worse
kyser_soze
Hawking's Angry Eyebrow
Cameron/Hague would have taken us into Afghanistan and Iraq even quicker than Blair did - anyone who thinks any differently is an absolute fucking idiot.
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
This is nonsense - Blair went a very, very long way towards making Iraq happen, going far beyond what any PM should have done in the circumstances (and probably far beyond what any potential PM would have done, with the possible exception of IDS).
To suggest - without any evidence whatsoever - that someone else would have been even worse than him is clearly an attempt to minimize Blair's personal responsibility for what happened to an unacceptable degree.
TRUE.
I really cant imagine any Tory Leader telling GWB sorry cant help you.
They are much more pro american and anti europe.
Not true. In fact a dangerous misconception, which is likely to keep people voting for the Labor Party.
First of all, no-one could have made more effort to get us into Iraq than Blair. He was lying his ass off in parliament and all over the media, he abandoned any scruple he ever might have had.
Second, the Tories retain a residual pride in British independence and still harbor illusions about being a player on the world stage. They wouldn't have followed a policy so obviously against British interests.
Third: the Nixon-to-China syndrome. Blair got away with it because of people who consider themselves liberals, or even Leftists, who backed him because they thought the war was about getting rid of a nasty dictator, or the liberation of women (remember that one) or somesuch crap.
So the Tories would certainly not have been as bad as Labor on this issue. And this is the sort of issue that would make me a single-issue voter, if I could be bothered to vote.
Similar threads
- Poll
