Go Prescott

Again, a buffoon I never rated has come out fighting: here's an extract (and yes, I'm afraid today will be politics-heavy).

But whilst I knew we were short of money I didn't realise we also lacked the will to fight these elections. The people responsible for this non-campaign – and make no mistake there was no campaign - were Harriet Harman, Caroline Flint, Douglas Alexander and yes, our former Communities Secretary Hazel Blears.

I kept asking the party what was the strategy, what was our message, what was the campaign? I became so concerned I actually wrote to Harriet. Her reply was less than satisfactory. These apparently were the 'messages.'

For the many v for the few
Grow your way out v cut your way out
On your side v on your own
Substantial leadership v insubstantial salesmanship

And that was it.

It seems the people responsible for our campaign were resigned to defeat and were prepared to use the excuse that we had no money.

Treason doth never prosper

What's the reason? Why, if it prospers, none dare call it treason. (John Harington)

Well, I'm in the office for a few hours - need to write a module leader's report, if that excites you in any way. lair

Today is both glorious and tragic. Glorious in that I'm having a cup of tea with the Deer Friend, recently returned to these shores from a few weeks' grave-robbing in the pyramids. Weren't they a cheap rip-off of After Eights in the nineties?

Tragic in that bitter, twisted, selfish, self-important, deluded, reactionary no-mark Blairites are stabbing Gordon Brown in the back. As I said before, I've never rated him as much more than a capitalist stooge, but I like dour, eeyoreish monsters. Now I feel sorry for him - the unwanted dog in the pound, whipped, beaten and beneath contempt.

Who the fuck are these people? Does Blears think she'll be a rallying point for the Blairites? Does Purnell think his moment has come at last? Frankly, I wouldn't recognise him if he was alone in a room with his name on the door - and I'm a politics obsessive. They're not saving the party by knifing the prime minister. They're making it clear to the country that they'd rather get some headlines by treating Brown like a gimp than run the country or make Labour electable again. They're clearly neither socialists nor Labour supporters, because all they're doing is helping the Tories. How does guaranteeing a Tory government help the working people of this country? Blears, Purnell and Hutton are traitors, pure and simple. Watch as they pick up lucrative directorships and turn their backs on the people who (mistakenly) elected them.

The Guardian's live-blogging the shenanigans here.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha bye bye Blears

Maybe this makes me sound bitter, but Hazel Blears' resignation is one of the happiest days of my life - like all my graduations rolled into one - because I'm a socialist and a Labour Party member (I know, these things are mutually exclusive, but I exist in a state of cognitive dissonance). I hope that my constant acid attacks on her has helped foster in her the sense that the people don't really like her - but I doubt it.

True to form, she's resigned in a way designed to make herself look good and Brown look useless. He is, of course, but she's a deserting rat keen to inflict as much damage as possible. He should have sacked her a long time ago: it would have been good for the government of this country, good for the party and good for his reputation: he'd have looked decisive.

She said that she wants to

"help the Labour party to reconnect with the British people, to remind them that our values are their values, that their hopes and dreams are ours too".

But the Guardian is, thankfully, less impressed by her low cunning:

In a move that seemed deliberately hostile, Blears confirmed her departure publicly 90 minutes before prime minister's questions.

Obviously she's talking total bollocks. She represents nobody except careerist rightwing political obsessive class traitors, despite her incessant whinging that she's working class (because her brother drives a bus). Let's hope she's consigned to the dustbin of history for ever, and that New Labour goes with her.

As to the leadership, I maintain my record of opposing every Labour leader since Clement Atlee (and he drifted sharply to the right). I hated Blair when he was Home Office shadow minister and saw Gordon as his capitalist fixer - and a man who betrayed his Maxtonite roots. I see no reason to re-evaluate that position. I'd like John McDonnell to take the leadership, out of romantic socialism. If not, Alan Johnson would appeal to the electorate but not to me. Perhaps Rhodri Morgan (or in English) should be invited in: he's the leader of Wales's 'Classic Labour', which has made that country a socialist paradise, he's a heavyweight intellectual and a populist speaker and organiser. Michael Foot's still alive too.

I almost forgot: meanwhile, Labour HQ has dumped Dr Ian Gibson, for selling his flat to his daughter. Ridiculous: most of the cabinet have behaved corruptly, whereas he hasn't. Of course, it couldn't be because he's a sane, rational, thoughtful and occasionally rebellious independent thinker. He's particularly good on science. The country will certainly miss his contribution to public life.

Falling over like ninepins in Downing Street

So several ministers have said they'll quit their posts in a few days: Tom Watson, Beverly Hughes, Patricia Hewitt and Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary. Alastair Darling might go over a matter of £350, though I think he's done a good job in saving the actual economy, and Jeff Whoon is off too. Someone might notice. It's not great politics, making the government look incompetent a couple of days before the European elections. I won't miss many of these people, but when you compare Smith to Charles Clarke and David Blunkett, she was a calm, rational, reasonable and pleasant even when wrong, unlike those revolting predecessors.

BUT: what the hell is going on? All these people are going, yet Hazel Blears, the most blatantly corrupt, dishonest, disloyal and untrustworthy minister of all appears to be going nowhere. Astonishing.

I spent the afternoon in Walsall, speaking my mind to the PGCE's external examiner (every course asks someone at a different university to evaluate the standard of the course every year). I did it as a favour - then found that the last bus left at 3.15, almost an hour before I finished. So in the end it cost me money and two horrible sticky rides lasting an hour and a half to get back to Wolves. I'll have to do it again on Thursday. Not impressed!

All my Christmases come at once

Today's greedy porker is Bill Cash MP. I punned about him last week and you all ignored me ('Did Bill Cash in?').

I particularly hate and despise him because he's my parents' MP, and was mine when I lived on the lovely Shropshire/Staffordshire border. He should have been turfed out in 97, but the Tories hurriedly removed the only urban area in the constituency, leaving only subsidy-sucking farmers and feudal barons. When the locals hang shot magpies on trees rather than Christmas lights (yes, they do), you know that they're going to vote Tory even if Fred West stood.

Anyway, Cash is one of the absolute, raving loons who made poor John Major's life a misery. I saw Black Beauty the other day. It's a terrible film, and in it, a bigoted old general shouts 'God, I'd love another crack at the wog'. Bill Cash would consider him a lily-livered liberal. Cash (who made millions from inheriting 'Cash's Name Tapes') wears those horrible, loudly striped blazers and thinks that foreigners think in English really, and pretend not to just to annoy. Though as a Catholic of a particularly rancid variety, I suspect he thinks in Latin. His delightful son William is a dubious 'journalist' famous for anti-semitic articles about 'culturally nihilist' Jews running Hollywood: he's married to one of the revolting rich currently trying to overthrow Chavez's government in Venezuela.

Anyway, the Daily Telegraph has caught him subsidising his delightful daughter.

Despite owning a posh London flat and claiming to live in his 'gentlemen's club', he charged the taxpayer £15,000 per year to rent her London flat - which she subsequently sold for a massive profit - which seems rather odd. Laetitia (I know, we should have some sympathy) is clearly a lovely human being too. Despite being a Conservative councillor for Bridgnorth (about as challenging as standing as a racist in 1980s South Africa), she seems to need a London base, and she's simultaneously standing against Hazel Blears in Salford (the setting for Coronation Street, only it's less pleasant in real life). She has a Facebook page, seemingly packed with Hooray Henrys and the idle rich.

Now, there's a race you wish both of them could lose. I actually didn't think there was anyone less working-class than Blears, especially in Salford - but I do have a mental image of lovely Laetitia turning up dressed in her hunting pinks, shouting 'Hallooo' and treating everybody much as Melchett treats Baldrick. What's her slogan? 'Hello Paupers! How would you like some Cash?' (Though according to Labour Mancunians, she spends a lot of time in posh London nightclubs and rather little in the northern city) and even the Daily Wail thinks she's a waster.

I'm loving this. Lots of rightwing Labour MPs are proving that they're corrupt and greedy - but far more Tories are proving that they haven't changed since the 18th Century: servants, stately homes, assuming that they'll be elected forever whatever they do (as this analysis proves), even hereditary politics. This is why PR or AV is needed: they abolish safe seats, thus making the candidates and sitting MPs work hard and keep their noses clean.

Roast pork

Hooray! Moran and Kirkbride are standing down at the next election. Next up is Blears: we should have a pyre burning outside her house and constant, threatening chanting. Piggy must die! (That's a literary allusion, not incitement to violence).

Update: Kirkbride is innocent. Well, no she isn't, but her heart's clearly in the right place: she's been

digging in plants to attract water voles

Friday's conundrum (again)

Today's Friday Conundrum is quite simple: who really needs a slap?

My list is obviously endless, with Hazel Blears at the top, but taking in people with hairstyles, Tories, entire categories such as advertising and PR workers, 4x4 drivers, litterbugs, UKIP, anyone who uses their mobile telephone as a music player, Steve Quitterill…

Caption competition

'I need a new host body. His will do'.

Any more?

Some dreadful political puns

I haven't moaned about politicians for a few days. Why is Hazel Blears still employed, even though non-Ministers have been suspended from the Party for doing the same thing? Perhaps because he'd have to sack several other ministers too, and perhaps because she's vindictive enough to devote the rest of her career to undermining the Labour Party.

Have you noticed that the more rightwing the MPs are, the more corrupt they are? Rob Marris (though by my standards he's quite rightwing): innocent. Paul Flynn: innocent. Dennis Skinner: innocent. Hazel Blears, Geoff Hoon, Tories who charged us for 'duck islands' and moat cleaning: GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY.

There's a simple ideological reason for this. Being rightwing means privileging individualism. The appeal of the Tories and of New Labour is this: do whatever you can to get ahead, and we'll reward you. Everybody else is a loser. So naturally, corner-cutting and fraud is admirable under this system.

Socialism said: there's plenty to go round, so if we work together and look after each other, all our lives will improve.

So socialists don't steal from the citizens and capitalists do.

Pun time. The full details of MPs expenses aren't out yet. Did Bill Cash in? What did Ken Purchase? Did David Borrow? Did Liam Fox his constituents? Is Joan Humble? Were Greg Hands in the till? Does Sir Michael Lord it over us? Is Paddy Tipping a racist sport? When it came to negotiating with the fees office, did Jon Trickett? If so, did Derek Twigg? Was there a Steve Webb of deceit? Finally, was Tony Wright? Feel free to add more…

Community payback

Steve Bell really is the new Gillray or Cruikshank. Today he imagines our leaders treating themselves as they treat poor people who nick another £10 from the social security…

Seumas Milne nails these bastards completely.

I buried this suggestion in an earlier post. Here's the version I just sent as a letter to the Guardian:

I have a solution for housing MPs which will reduce the opportunity for sleaze and produce social benefits.

Each MP will be loaned a council flat in London as their second home, preferably in the worst-built, highest-crime, least-maintained estate available. They will be offered the same facility in their constituency, though if they already own a home there, moving will not be required. Once the flat is furnished (and maintained) at reasonable expense, no further money will be provided. Living amongst the poorest citizens will keep the MP honest, remind them of their vocation, dissuade them from acquiring expensive white goods, encourage them to consider the most pressing social issues, and will surely lead rapidly to pressure on local authorities and agencies to improve living conditions for the people we consign to such places.

Pigs in pools

I'm loving this MPs sleaze story. Every news broadcast finds another red-faced cheat saying 'the system's totally rotten'. They all agree that it's totally rotten and has been for years. It's obviously a complete coincidence that they've realised it's open to corruption in the same week that a national newspaper paid some thief a lot of money for the details. Very brave.

I'm also enjoying it because the details reveal that the class structure is alive and well. All the New Labour class traitors are behaving like the 80s yuppies they so admire: John Prescott charged the taxpayer for some beams to make his house look more Fake Tudor. Others claimed for designer goods and posher houses. The dear old Tories, meanwhile, lived up to their image of Lords of the Manor by claiming for chandeliers and, my personal favourite, Douglas 'Viscount Hailsham' Hogg's MOAT maintenance. Isn't that wonderful? Presumably their are also claims for mantraps, armour-polishing, drawbridge oiling and jousting equipment. Michael 'Marquess of Lothian' Ancram, a millionaire many times over, charged the taxpayer for maintaining his swimming pool heater.

Other highlights:

Sir Michael Spicer - thousands for trimming his helipad.

James Arbuthnot - swimming pool cleaning paid for by us, despite the fact that he managed to pay for a £2 million house without even needing a mortgage.

David Davis: £5,700 on a 'portico' (essential to his work for the nation).

Essentially, the Tories appear to feel that their expenses are a kind of National Trust fund: they get a second, third or fourth stately home, and we get to pay for it.

(Paul Flynn, the honest, decent Welsh Labour MP, is similarly outraged).

You all know that I think Hazel Blears is the epitome of everything that went wrong with the left. It appears that Steve Bell agrees (click here for the original):

Salford United v. Manchester City

Somehow, this blog seems to have been taken over by a nest of Reds. So I thought I should introduce you to my old friend Neil.

Like you Manchester United fans, he doesn't live anywhere near Manchester.

As one of Murdoch's News International team, he too has a 'privileged' relationship with the regulatory authorities, and lives to wipe out the opposition.

Unlike you, he's a Manchester City fan. Let's hope Everyday Isn't Like Sunday for you, Neil!

(Sorry. Bit of Mancunian music-based humour there. But you did ask for more jokes, and everybody ignored my comment about Hazel Blears and the large TV).

Friday's conundrum

Mr Meat Loaf proclaimed that he would do anything for love, but he wouldn't do 'that', which in his case presumably meant 'diet'.

What wouldn't you do for love? As you're my readers, you're probably lonely, desperate and vulnerable - like me - so I'm guessing that very little self-abasement is excluded, but let's hear it.

What wouldn't I do?

Hazel Blears

vote Tory

praise Ocean Colour Scene

eat fish

recognise Nagorno-Karabakh

read Coelho or any other self-help book

endure Tarantino films

I'm sure there are more.

Hazel's squirrelling nuts away

Imagine my joy! I've had occasion to take Ms. Blears to task before, so it's sweet to be vindicated. Not only is she a moral and political void, the epitome of mechanoid politics, she's on the take. She's spent nearly £2000 on two TVs - why not a couple of £250 units, Hazel? Perhaps the thinking was that if she bought a 52-inch screen, she could watch her own appearances in life-size!

Worst of all, she's been playing the property market like a Tory, using our money to do places up, then sell them on - claiming on three houses in one year. Clearly Hazel has been using her mega-screen TVs to watch 'Trading Up' or some such evil, Thatcherite programme. I imagine my cousins the weasels are denying any relation to her right now.

Blears - the lynch mob forms

Monbiot weighs in this time - a head-to-head (actually, her head to around his knees) interview. Compelling, unless you have little stomach for mechanoids.

Everyday is like Sunday…

I've popped home to see the aged parents for a day or so - I've got a taste for greenery now, and I couldn't abide being in Wolves while it's packed with triumphalist Wanderer's fans. Though it was really sweet to hear my boss and a student discussing their signing potential and premiership plans as though it was a proper grown-up football team. Still, it means that the mighty Stoke is still assured of an easy 6 points from West Mids teams despite West Brom's sad demotion. 

Today the spot list includes a gloriously unconcerned fox and two ostriches. Yes, there are ostriches living in Wolverhampton - in the yard of a pet shop near the railway viaduct. I wouldn't have seen them if I'd taken the train, but because it's a holiday weekend, we were packed into a coach which gave me the perfect vantage point to see these poor animals. 

I see the Observer's front page story is 'Key Minister savages PM over 'lamentable' failures'. As it's journalism, you have to overlook the two inaccuracies in 7 words - Hazel Blears isn't a key minister (the headline is an attempt to con people into buying the paper) and she doesn't 'savage' Brown, rather notes that some strategies haven't worked. 

Most astonishing of all, however, is the sub headline: 'We must appear more human - Blears'. Now, I've met Hazel Blears twice. The first time, she exuded all the warmth of a komodo dragon. The second time, the only connection between organic life and her was the komodo-like poison dripping from her lips (I say this as a Party member). You could easily find more empathy in your average traffic light than from Hazel. It's hard to describe how inhuman her little black button eyes are. Perhaps the closest I can get to summarising her is to say that she's the only person I've ever met who seems more real on television than in the flesh. If she zipped her head open like that Dr. Who episode, I wouldn't be at all surprised. She's classic New Labour, so obsessed with purging the few remaining socialists in the party by promoting more and more rightwing ideas that she has no vision left at all - she's HAL, running forever with no discernible purpose other than to betray her comrades. The only human character she reminds me of is Dolores Umbridge from one of the Harry Potter books - a threatening sweet smile which only accentuates the horror. 

There, that feels better. 

Jack Straw: more evil than Hazel Blears?

I've thought recently that Charlie Brooker's column in the Guardian has become a little self-parodic in recent times.

I was wrong. This week's column is brilliant because he's angry with Jack Straw and nails that little turd for his contempt for democracy. Read it for yourself. However, the bit that makes me boil with anger is Straw's statement of his political beliefs:

"If people were angels there would be no need for government . . . But sadly people are not all angels."

Never mind that this is purest bollocks: people will still need disaster relief, and health care, and old age care, and environmental protection and everything else that isn't law'n'order.

Brooker points out that Straw therefore elevates politicians above the people, which is bad enough. What gets me though is that this is Straw coming out as a philosophical Tory. At the heart of the socialist (and liberal) project is a fundamental belief in the essential goodness of humanity. Toryism believes that people are inherently bad and need restraining. This is the fundamental philosophical divide - and Straw clearly believes that government exists for the purpose of repressing the atavistic qualities of the people. I think I prefer the American 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness' to his profoundly depressing vision. No wonder the cover of my copy of The Demon Headmaster takes Straw as its inspiration. (I can't find a scan of it, but here's one that looks almost as chilling):

Hazel Blears - has been assimilated

I've met Hazel Blears twice, and was struck both times by the horrifying robotic black voids that are her eyes - not once did she betray a flicker of interest in a) people and b) ideas. George Monbiot discusses her extraordinary life here.

Hazel Blears: shut up and feck off

Oh goody, Hazel Blears is in The Guardian telling us that it's the fault of the 'commentariat' that public political discourse has been weakened. Now as it happens, I've met Hazel twice this year, once at a party policy forum, and once randomly at Birmingham New Street Station. At the forum, she and her henchmen refused to acknowledge any dissent and made it clear that mere party members were there to support the government and nothing more, and when I talked to her at New Street she was astonishingly disloyal to Gordon and suggested we should get Alastair Campbell back (how prophetic). 

What really annoys me about this is that New Labour took several outdated lessons from the Democrats: that party members are less important than donors, that opinion polls serve only to help repackage predetermined policies, and that debate should revolve solely around marketing rather than ideology. Think on this: Howard Dean's 50 state strategy has won today. He said that Democrats should get activists out on the street in every state, not the 5 or 6 which were seen as battlegrounds. For that, you need enthusiastic volunteers and party members who aren't treated as embarrassing relics to be tapped for cash when your favourite hedge fund managers are short of a bob or two.

She also says that 'commentary has taken over from investigation or news reporting' - hardly surprising given politicians' reluctance to face anybody less cuddly than Richard and Judy. I'm so bored with Radio 4 having to say 'no minister was available for comment'. Let's be honest, Hazel. You'd rather have your awful ministerial blog and David Cameron would far rather concentrate on the toe-curlingly embarrassing Webcameron than be filletted by a decent interviewer or reporter - any defence of the political high ground from you is sheer cant.

I know I'm starting to rant now, but this got to me even more. Remember, she's having a go at journalists: 'And if you can wield influence and even power, without ever standing for office or being held to account by an electorate, it further undermines our democracy'.

Er… Peter Mandelson - Baron of Foy and Hartlepool. Now has a senior ministerial position without ever facing the electorate. He has a vote in a legislative chamber for the rest of his life, and never has to face MPs. Lord Adonis - the most malign influence on education since Margaret Thatcher snatched free milk from little children when she was an education minister. He's there for ever too. Rupert Murdoch and Paul Dacre appear to have their own keys to Downing Street: not much accountability there. The list goes on and on and on - so it's a bit rich of this appalling representative of the worst clique the party has ever seen to tell us that it's the journalists who are distorting the public sphere. 

Most astoundingly, Hazel doesn't know what she's talking about. She declares that the vast majority of political blogs are rightwing Tory sites (when actually they're just the ones that rightwing newspapers cite a lot). She's clearly not familiar with the blogosphere at all. 'Mostly', she writes, 'political blogs are written by people with a disdain for the political system and for politicians…'. She got that right: her useless and no doubt adviser-written blog lacks any passion or any sign of ideological commitment. I despise the Tory bloggers she names (Iain Dale, Guido Fawkes etc), but her rant is just the eternal cry of the know-nothing. She could start here