It’s quite amazing that at a moment when the Eurocrats have been thrown into crisis thanks to the actions of our friends the Irish, and when the NuLabour junta seek to remove even more of our hard won liberties through the imposition of the 42 Day Detention Bill, Conservative leader David Cameron takes the opportunity to insist that his “green agenda” is still his pressing concern. As you can imagine, the BBC delight in giving favourable coverage to Cameron’s eco-wackery at this moment and that is why he IS the sort of Conservative that the BBC will do business with. He runs away from tough issues and returns to the soft soap sell of the environmental gospel that plays so well through the BBC . It strikes me that British conservatism has been ratcheted so far to the left thanks to years of Labour triangulation, that if administration on power changed tomorrow we would not notice the real difference. And therein lies why the BBC will settle for Cameron’s mob in the medium term.
WHY CAMERON IS A CONSERVATIVE THE BBC CAN DO BUSINESS WITH.
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David Vance
He runs away from tough issues and returns to the soft soap sell of the environmental gospel…
Not so.
He gave very clear leadership on 42 days and was first out of the traps calling for the Lisbon Treaty ratification to be stopped. He has run away from nothing.
You may be certain that AGW is ‘eco-wackery’. I, myself, am unpersuaded one way or the other. Cameron has been persuaded. That doesn’t make him either a villain or a fool.
If you read his speech, his green proposals are sold on arguments that apply whether global warming is true or false.
Cameron is not necessarily persuaded. He will say what his audience wants to hear rather than risk getting on the wrong side of the BBC or the green lobby.
Of course there’s always a chance that he does believe in the green agenda which is something that those like me who are sceptical will have to consider come election time. But from Cameron’s point of view why risk the ire of the BBC or green lobby when his core vote has nowhere realistic to go and Labour is imploding?
PaulS: Cameron has backed away from things like reversing the 42 days and much of the other legislation passed by this bunch of crooks.
Will get give a us a vote on the Lisbon treaty?
Let’s face it. Cameron is conservative-lite.
Like Mcain in the US.
Just at a moment when the mega-government, multi-cultural, massive immigration, Super StatEU chickens are coming home to roost.
Cameron could forge an unbeatable coalition of disillusioned blue-collar workers and middle-classes, and promise real CHANGE based on timeless conservative principles.
But — like McCain he is held captive by the so many small groups who have an iron grip on some much of our culture.
The metrosexuals, the gay lobby, the chattering classes, and the soft-left media.
Martin | 16.06.08 – 3:01 pm
Cameron has backed away from things like reversing the 42 days
Not so.
the new Shadow Home Secretary Dominic Grieve confirmed that the Conservatives will repeal 42 days pre-charge detention if it is passed.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/torydiary/2008/06/dominic-grieve.html
Jack Bauer | Homepage | 16.06.08 – 3:19 pm
Hague tried it your way – and failed.
IDS tried it your way – and failed.
Michael Howard tried it your way – and failed.
Cameron chose another path – and is succeeding.
So cut the guy some slack.
Unfortunately even if Cameron doesn’t believe the ‘eco-whackery’, it’s still something he has to do.
Tory effort has concentrated on gathering in the non-committed voters in marginal/swing seats, i.e the ones who often vote LibDem; these undecided voices are the ones most influenced by the broadcast media. So for the moment, he has to hold the candle to the devil.
But also unfortunately, an unreformed al-Beeb will tear a truly conservative government to pieces, if and when it comes to power.
This is why al-Beeb needs to be effectively broken up – we can’t have these buggers keep deciding the parameters of political debate.
PaulS writes: “Hague tried it your way – and failed.”
This is a tired old argument.
Cameron’s predecessors ran at a time when ZaNuLabour was still popular. The old adage ‘oppositions don’t win elections, government’s loose them’ remains as true now as it ever was.
Moreover, Cameron is a creature of the BBC and David Vance is entirely right. He was foisted on the Conservatives primarily because he was telegenic and sufficiently soft on BBC/Guardianista issues no to generate the mauling Howard, IDS and Hague had suffered.
Couple lucky timing with an easy ride from the Leftist broadcast media and Cameron’s ‘success’ is easily accounted for.
PaulS: Wait to see if it’s in their Manifesto. As I’ve mentioned previously, politicians have a hsabit of NOT reversing such things.
When Greive was asked about this originally he hopped around before saying they would which makes me think they won’t.
PaulS | 16.06.08 – 3:27 pm |
Hague never had much of a chance anyway. He had to contend with the full flush of the BBC/Blair love affair, and never got anything like enough support from his own party. The only time the BBC smiled upon him was when he got the buzz cut. He was at least as good at PMQ as Cameron most of the time, and he actually had a real opponent to contend with, instead of a dithering Mr. Brown.
IDS was useless anyway.
Howard never had a chance either, because of his own personality and media let that “There’s something of the night about him” quote hang in the air far too long. He was a bit ethnically disadvantaged as well.
Jack Bauer has it right. It’s not that Cameron positively won’t succeed where the others hadn’t, but the idea that the only way to success is surrender to the values of the other side.
PaulS is a LIBTARD. Cameron is a fool.
To give in the Eco-wackery is foolish. It’s a f@##ing RELIGION of the left.
I for one am convinced that anything the left worships is a false God.
Abortion,
Islam,
Welfare,
Higher taxes,
Racial preference.
Homosexual special rights,
and anything with GREEN attached.
Pure non-sense.
For Cameron and/or McCain to give an inch to these nuts, is to give a mile/Kilometer.
David, with respect, I think you’ve called this partially wrong. Cameron has been banging on about 42 days, Lisbon, rising taxes, family breakdown and all the big issues of the moment. The fact that the BBC only choose to report him properly when he mentions stuff that they agree with isn’t his fault. I’m not wholly won over by some of the environmental debates, but the guy has spent 95% of the past month talking about the ‘real issues’. I honestly think you give him a bit of a harsh ride sometimes.
Cameron sounds a lot like McCain in his stances.
I think he’s a good man, but the GREEN crap is disturbing.
The media drum beat takes a toll on Conservatives it seems.
Hague tried it your way – and failed. IDS tried it your way – and failed. Michael Howard tried it your way – and failed.
They were all very flawed “leaders” caught in headlights, and trying to attract support at the bottom of the anti-Tory cycle. A thankless task.
They stood no chance.
My point is that we are now swinging back to a very anti-Labour cycle that reminds me of Callaghan’s dog days.
What I find disappointing is that the Conservative Party is now led by someone who doesn’t seem to be very conservative.
Unlike 1979 when they were.
Jack Bauer, that’s a big 10-4.
We are being told who our Conservative leaders are, by liberals.
Both here in the U.S.A and in the U.K..
The KGBBC likes Conservatives that aren’t conservative.
The MSM (ABC, SEE-B.S., NBC, the NEW YORK SLIMES, THE Washington Com-POST etc) all likes McCain the MAVERICK. As long as the MAVERICK was being a MAVERICK by taking the same side as LIBTARDS on certain issues.
Given a choice between OBAMA and a MAVERICK….the MAVERICK gets dumped.
Cameron has to be careful about revealing too much policy or Gordon will nick it- there’s no other way he can come up with his own.
But Cameron cannot simply push a traditional conservative path- the current state of British politics where a soft-left media lead by the Beeb attack anything remotely right of centre means he has to take a stealth approach. Whilst he might have more success now than his predecessors owing to Labour’s obvious implosion, the dominance of lefty media types make it very difficult to connect in any meaningful way with the electorate. Doubtless this is why he has recently attempted the “Cameron Direct” project (unsurprisingly something savaged by the Beeb as it involves the actors straying off the stage).
Cameron-Brown-Clegg could all be in the same ‘liberal’ woolly political party, with woolly Davis as ineffectual ‘leader’ and S. Chakrabarti as unelected, lobbying deputy. Yes, and the BBC’s ‘multiculturalist’ propaganda is at home in there too.
It should not be too late for conservatives (and others) to re-assert:
1.) the centrality of UK national sovereignty, in opposition to EU supremacism,
2.) the importance of national control and limits against mass immigration,
3.) Western values, against the nationally self-destructive ‘multiculturalism’ with its mantras of ‘diversity’ and ‘relativism’.
1.) the centrality of UK national sovereignty, in opposition to EU supremacism
Perhaps as a start by demanding a referendum on the EU constitutional treaty? And then maybe even considering putting in a manifesto commitment to re-negotiate the terms of the UK’s membership of the EU?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-505286/David-Cameron-Ill-tear-EU-treaty-signed.html
http://thehuntsman2007.blogspot.com/2008/05/tories-to-renegotiate-our-ties-to-eu.html
2.) the importance of national control and limits against mass immigration?
Perhaps by suggesting employing a points system to ensure immigration is limited to those who will make a positive contribution to society (so Labour can then nick it) and even suggesting an annual limit on the number of immigrants the UK is prepared to accept?
http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,91211-1290514,00.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7067149.stm
3.) Western values, against the nationally self-destructive ‘multiculturalism’ with its mantras of ‘diversity’ and ‘relativism’.
We could start, for instance, by insisting that Muslim faith schools admit at least a quarter of their pupils from other faiths. We should also be unequivocal that multi-culturalism as a policy has failed
http://croydonian.blogspot.com/2006/10/cameron-on-muslim-faith-schools.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6309427.stm
Given that he still actually has to get elected by many people who aren’t mail or telegraph readers, what more do you want the bloke to do?
Cameron was brought in to out Blair Blair.
Like Blair or not he was politically formidable, he always won elections.
Brown was always going to be a easy target, a loser, no wonder Cameron is stuffing him.
How the Conservatives must have laughed as Labour forced out Blair for Brown.
But now there is no need for the Blair like Cameron at all.
And anyone that thinks that Labour will not be just as ruthless as the Conservatives used to be and will bullet Brown in favour of a more likely candidate before the next election is fooling themselves.
I suspect that it will be Milliband v Cameron in the next election, with Labour jettisoned of the Iraq baggage, the economy picking up and more in line with early Blairism again.
A close elction choice between imitation blair v neo blair – what a prospect!
And Clegg is half a Blair, if he counts at all.
Cameron appears more appeasing, liberal and opportunistic, than a principled conservative.
On the EU, ‘eu referendum blogspot’ has little faith in him:
“Hope there is none”
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2008/06/hope-there-is-none.html
On the importance of national control and limit of mass immigration, Cameron merely tinkers around the edges. He does not have a principled stand on this, either because 1.) he welcomes mass immigration; or 2.) he fears that opposition to mass immigration may be deemed(wrongly) to be racist by ‘multiculturalists’ who he rather agrees with, or doesn’t want to offend. And so , in effect, his ‘policies’ will turn out to be very similar in practice, and in the end, to those of Labour and the Lib Dems because philosophically Cameron doesn’t differ much from them. So he’ll push the masochism of how the Britsh people should make greater economic sacrifices to show the UK’s lunatic Green unilateralism. That appears to be the ‘driving force’ of his political mission.
The danger with any politician from a highly priviledged background is that they are simply out of touch with what real people are thinking.
Look at some of those who Cameron surrounds himself with. Nothing against public schoolboys – but their idea of hardship is having to ring up their wine importer to chase up a few cases of pouligny montrachet that seem to have gone astray.
Just at the time when the country is starting to see through the NuLabour con trick, to understand that during the last decade we’ve been a big social experiment for the marxists, we get Cameron, who, bless him, is so busy trying to appease the hand wringing Guardian wets that he has completely overlooked the fact that the people need a champion, a firm leader who can get us out of this rat hole of a mess and reverse some of the nulab lunacy.
Will he do it? Don’t hold your breath.
Grimly Squeamish writes: “The danger with any politician from a highly priviledged background is that they are simply out of touch with what real people are thinking.”
That’s BBC thinking. You might, just as easily, tar Bliar with the same brush (public school, the Law etc).
We can be equally adrift with politicians from ‘the lower orders’ – think of Prescott or our beloved and much-cherished Speaker.
It’s not the background – it’s the quality of the man or woman in question.
Cameron on the EU referendum
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/2083080/David-Cameron-admits-EU-Treaty-referendum-may-be-hollow-promise.html
In the US they have yhe RINO (republican in name only ) Is cameron (like Heath before him a TINO (Tory in name only ?
http://www.ashleymote.co.uk/?p=600
Interesting link regarding the bbc and the eu.
Nice one batman. No doubt joel will be back on claiming the BBC isn’t up the arse of the EU.
The old Etonians I’ve had dealings with have all been pragmatic survivors with an knack for coming out on top – aquiring power is much more important to them than principles or dogma.
Dave will do what’s necessary to destroy New Labour – and then revert to his class instincts.
As a high rate taxpayer I’ll be happy – as an ex working class grammar school boy, I’m not so sure.
Either way I think he’ll have the measure of the beeb – and as a TV man he’ll know where the bodies are buried and where to strike for real effect.
If I was a beeboid at the moment – I’d not be sleeping too well.
Are memories so short that the manner of Cameron’s election to the leadership of the ‘Conservative’ party is forgotten? The Guardian’s political correspondent remarked loudly that David Davis looked as though he were going to his own execution as he approached the podium to give a speech at the Tories’ leadership conference. Davis then went on to explain his policies; something which Cameron has yet to do. The membership were so open to external influence that they voted in haste, and the nation will repent at leisure because they robbed us of an opposition. Cameron is a placeman for The Guardian and by logical extension, the BBC.
Boy Cameron is a dick but he is the only game in town…any relief from the nulabour diehards will be a welcome break so greeny Dave it is I’m afraid.
I fear Allan@Oslo has it right.
I’d hurl bricks to get ZaNuLabour’s fascistic thugs out of office, but I will not vote for a vacuous child like Cameron.
Not only do I have socks older than him, but they have far greater philosophical and intellectual depth.
He may be better than McBean but that’s like saying sunburn is less painful than gout.
One can only echo Capt. Mainwaring: ‘Stupid boy!’
The Biased BBC Dictionary of Politics
Principles (n, pl.):
1. Something which the Left does not have
2. Something which the Right possesses (usually in abundance).
Consider our views on David Cameron, leader of British Conservatism:
Roland Deschain: Cameron … will say what his audience wants to hear rather than risk getting on the wrong side of the BBC or the green lobby.
Jack Bauer: (Cameron) is held captive by the so many small groups who have an iron grip on some much of our culture. The metrosexuals, the gay lobby, the chattering classes, and the soft-left media.
GCooper: Cameron is a creature of the BBC … He was foisted on the Conservatives primarily because he was telegenic and sufficiently soft on BBC/Guardianista issues…
David Preiser: (Cameron’s) only way to success is surrender to the values of the other side.
gus: Cameron is a fool.
Baggie Jonathan: imitation Blair
George R: more appeasing, liberal and opportunistic, than a principled conservative.
Squimly Greamish: so busy trying to appease the hand wringing Guardian wets that he has completely overlooked the fact that the people need a champion
Allan@OslobutsometimesinAberdeen: Cameron is a placeman for The Guardian and by logical extension, the BBC.
thud: Boy Cameron is a dick…
Allan@Oslo/Aberdeen: (Cameron) may be better than McBean but that’s like saying sunburn is less painful than gout.
Beats Labour’s Not Working as a set of slogans.
Any day.
Biased BBC: Politics Sunny Side Up
Apologies for GCooper, who lost the credit he deserves in the above for his Brown/gout hilarity.
Apologies, too, to Allan@Wherever for giving the impression he might talk like GCooper.
Look, everyone – “ColinChase” has been busy with his scrapbook! You get a gold star for paying attention, CC. There’s a good boy.
ive had to put the central heating on over the past few days
global warming? i wish
He’s said that any green tax revenue will go into a fund to give tax relief for families. That’s the fundamental difference between him and labour (green taxes get p*ssed into the wind with the rest) and is very important, not that the Beeb seems to particularly flag it.
A lot of what Cameron actually says is pretty conservative – he’s just achieved the feat of not looking/sounding conservative (in the sense of the grey ,miserable old man in the pub who thinks everything is sh*t these days) whilst he’s saying it.
redistribution of wealth eh sounds a bit like socialism to me, from a Conservative, corr blimey
hillhunt,
When did David Vance agree to lift your ban?
Was it just because you agreed to deceive people into thinking you were someone else as you post now under the name ColinChase?
Strange as last I knew David said he was going to continue to enforce it.
Given you are somehow still posting your mostly trolling ‘witicisms’ would not posting as “ColinChase formerly known as hillhunt” at least be more honest?
Or doesn’t honesty appear in your dictionary of principles?
hillhunt,
So a lot of us are neither Cameron fans or even Conservatives.
You have noticed it at last.
Yeeessss.
Bang goes your easy cheap line then.
Not that it was ever true.
Its a long way up for you to politics 101 but one day you may reach that exalted level, I doubt it, but maybe.
I am not an old-Etonian, but it does strike me that when toffs (whether Etonian or Harrovian) ran the Conservative Party and the country we were Top Dog, controlling an Empire upon which the sun never set. At home, all was law-abiding civility (with very few exceptions).
Ever since the Grammar School crowd took over, things have gone sharply South. Our international standing has plummeted and our domestic situation has gone to the dogs.
The last three Conservative Prime Ministers were the son of a builder; the daughter of a grocer and the son of a circus acrobat. That’s pretty ‘diverse’ – so you can’t say the Age of the Common Man hasn’t had a decent run for its ‘merit’.
The grocer’s daughter was pretty good. The other two were worse than useless.
Why not give the chinless wonders another crack at it?
gcooper et al are, with all due respect, misjudging Cameron.
He is very sound on a number of important issues and , more importantly looks human enough for people ouside the party to vote for.
If you can’t handle that, toddle off to ukip with the loony tunes and stop contaminating the Tory brand – the rest of us have labour to defeat.
Sorry, backwoodsman – on the whole I’d rather not vote for ‘anyone but Brown’ regardless of how inane he is. Neither do I want party leaders selected on the basis of their acceptability to the BBC.
“Cameron’s eco-wackery”
This kind of mindless drivel is why I have pretty much given up on this site. The level of ignorant anti-gay screeching and stupid anti-environment mouth-foaming has reached such proportions that I no longer have a burning desire to associate with the lunatics who come out with this moronic stuff.
Cameron’s disadvantage (one he shares with all the available alternatives) is that he has lived in the political bubble too long. At the age of 17 he chose a career in politics, and therefore chose to study for a vocational qualification; PPE in his case, law (which he never practised) for Blair and economics (gawd ‘elp us) for Brown. He then found a work experience placement at which he failed to excell (ditto B&B),and finally found his way into parliament where he managed the promotion game successfully.
This is not a CV to equip anyone for public office, as he has never met the public. The only people he has met throughout his career are politicians and political wannabes. When trying to appeal to the public he therefore needs to be briefed on what such strange beings might think. Having been told that most get their news and views from the BBC he feels he has no choice but to parrot the BBC/Guardian consensus. As a constituent I have tried to remind him that 40% of the electorate (almost enough to form a government) stayed home last time, and more will next time. This is not, as he (and Brown and the BBC) want to believe because they (OK, we) are apathetic. It is because there is no one speaking for us. The two (and a half) party system means a vote for UKIP or anyone outside the cartel is wasted; the established parties won’t even see it as a protest vote.
I’ve yet to decide between (a) holding my nose and voting for Cameron to get shot of Brown, (b) stick to my guns and vote UKIP and hope enough do the same to be noticed as a minority worth courting, or (c) stay home in the warm.
It’s not THAT cold in Witney in the summer, Mark – it’s even slightly south of where I am 😉
MarkE: “This is not a CV to equip anyone for public office, as he has never met the public.”
Welcome to the politics and media of 21st century Britain, where anyone with any influence at all has spent their years from 16 plus solely in the political/media bubble, with a PPE degree from Oxford and “token work experience” along the way (Ed “Sweaty” Balls is a classic example), which leads to a cushy job at the Beeb or as some kind of party apparatchik.
The only solution is some kind of cursus honorum, where one can only stand for public office having served a fixed term (say five years) in a private-sector job. Having said that, several ambitious Romans had no qualms about ignoring the cursus honorum, and doubtless British politics is more than capable of providing a Marius or Octavian…
Backwoodsman
paraphrasing Cameon’s anti-UKIP “fruitcakes and racists ” line is with all due respects worthy only of the kind of ad-homium attacks more typical of the urban socialists you profess to dislike.
I had voted condervative – even when I was one of the 3million unemployed during the 1980’s because I could see what Mrs thatcher was trying to achieve – sadly I no longer vote condervative because it has reverted back to the same failed heathite “tuscany tory” that took us into the European superstate
I now vote UKIP and encourage others who want to see government off our backs at locl and national as well as supra-national levelto visit thie website and see for themselves
I’d never vote for the UKIP in a month of Sundays, but the way they are (or aren’t) reported by the Beeb in comparison with comparative small parties like the greens is very poor.
Cockney | 18.06.08 – 8:48 am
Frankly I think UKIP gets too much publicity on the BBC. Nigel Farage is always popping up on the news with a soundbite, being interviewed on the Today programme and is a regular on Question Time.
As for the Greens, though I’d guess I take a more than average interest in political news, I have to admit that I have no idea who the leader of the Green Party is.
In fact, the only Green I’ve noticed at all in recent years was the one who stood against Boris and Ken Livingstone for mayor…and …mea culpa…the only reason she registered was because she scored quite high on the totty scale.
mmmm good point Paul, she did indeed.