Stealing The Prime Minister's Clothes

Blair and New Labour stole the Tories' clothes and repackaged policies to woo Middle England all wrapped up in Tony's 'nice guy' image.

The suit has faded and so has Middle England's hope in New Labour. Time for David Cameron to steal back the shiny conservative cloth and tailor a new suit that fits.



Of course, we all know that there is no "new suit". There is the chance to offer some vague hope that where Blair has failed, Cameron might succeed. Will we buy into it?

The vagueness is what annoys me most, I think. The bicycle-riding loving father. Just a hint of environmentalism to appeal to Friends of the Earth and The Independent. The right image to get the female vote to put an X in his box. Wears jeans in a tragic attempt to appeal to young people...

Simon Carr, sketch writer at The Indy has taken perhaps the unprecedented step of likening Cameron to Liz Hurley

As he told Blair at the despatch box at PMQs, "You were the future once." And in that context, Cameron is already the past. Why?

Because the moment of pseudo-idealism has passed. He is now the Tory leader. The shackles of power are slowly locking around his ankles.



He is the past because he represents no alternative vision for Britain or for the world. He stood out at Eton and Oxford just the right amount to get noticed, but not too much so as to be too idealistic.
He has no radical new answers because he has not voiced any challenging or probing questions regarding our destiny.

The monolith of global capitalism is firmly cemented in place, thanks to the likes of Thatcher, her predecessors and successors.

To try and uproot or replace it would be to try to "turn back the clock" and become a "force of conservatism".

And yet in the coming weeks and months, the media will attempt to gently persuade us that Cameron is a face of hope. On the contrary, if joining the Tory party and becoming a leadership candidate is his idea of an attempt to inspire hope in the country, then he is to be pitied as a tragedy.




'It's all about bucks kid, and the rest is just conversation.' - Gordon Gekko in Oliver Stone's film, Wall Street.