Come on Back, Tony Blair

By Ian Williams, AlterNet. Posted May 4, 2005.

Tony Blair is having a rough week. The days before the national elections in Britain have been marked by new and damning revelations of his outright mendacity or, at the very least, monumental self-deception over Iraq. Over the weekend, voters learned that not only had their prime minister planned for a war before he went to the UN to seek its blessing, but that Blair misrepresented his own attorney general's advice on the legality of the invasion to his cabinet.

Yet a majority of the British electorate will undoubtedly vote the Labour Party back into office -- and they will be right to do so. As a British expatriate living in New York, I would do exactly the same if I were back home today. For if my fellow countrymen and women are poised to reelect a man whom they clearly do not trust, it's a measure not of their gullibility but their immense political sophistication.

It's Gordon Brown, Stupid

The various American (mis)perceptions of the British electoral landscape were on full display last week at a Manhattan forum hosted by Harry Evans for The Week magazine. Here's what the two contending speakers had to say.

Sidney Blumenthal, who supports Tony Blair, portrayed him as a transatlantic Bill Clinton -- hardly a surprising characterization given the close relationship between the two men as evidenced by Clinton's recent public declaration of support for his old "Third Way" partner. Anything to help his buddy distance himself from George Bush, who is thoroughly disdained by most British voters.

Difficult as it was to get anyone to support Conservative leader Michael Howard, the organizers managed to conscript the National Review's Andrew Stuttaford, who fulfilled his obligation by damning the Tory candidate with exceedingly faint praise. Like Blumenthal, Stuttaford, took for granted an impending Blair victory, and reiterated his Clintonista tendencies -- though in less ecstatic terms than his debate opponent. But he warned that a Labour victory would mark the ascendancy not of Tony "New Labour" Blair but Gordon Brown -- a dyed-in-wool socialist, no less. (If only that were so!)

The irony, of course, is that Stuttaford made a much better case than Blumenthal for voting Labour -- at least in the minds of the average British voter -- since much of Blair's unpopularity in Britain derives from his Clintonian tendency to adopt his opponents' policies. And the increasing likelihood that Brown will supplant Blair in the future is good news for an electorate that has lost all trust in the slippery bosom buddy of both Bill and W. There's a good reason why the Labour Party's election campaign is astutely Blair-light, and most of its candidates are so eager to be seen on the same platform as Brown. If Tony Blair is re-elected this week it's because voters expect him to be ousted by his more openly liberal party colleague.

Blair is not the only New Labour luminary relying on old-fashioned Labour support to stay in office. Perhaps the ultimate in ironies is the campaign of Foreign Secretary Jack Straw whose opponent in his Blackburn constituency is none other than the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who resigned over British complicity in the U.S. policy of shipping its "suspected terrorists" into that country to be tortured. To prevail over Craig, Straw is relying on none other than former foreign secretary, old Labour Robin Cook -- the man who quit the Blair cabinet over the Iraq War.

The Old/New Labour Party

Straw's predicament also offers an important reminder to American observers who tend to forget that this is not a U.S.-style presidential election, i.e., a face-off between Blair and Howard. This is a parliamentary election that will be fought in 659 separate local seats, where, in most but not all cases, voters will choose candidates on the basis of their party affiliation. And whatever his credibility problems with the British electorate, Blair has not yet succeeded. in efforts to transform the Labour Party into something like the Democratic Leadership Council. If most Americans are not aware of the genuine accomplishments of the party, it's because Blair and his immediate entourage have been reluctant to advertise them in fear of alienating the Rupert Murdochs of the world. As one senior cabinet member of oldish Labour inclinations has complained in the safety of New York, "We've really done a lot of good, but we're not allowed to talk about it."

Ian Williams' new book Rum: A Social & Sociable History of the Real Spirit of 1776 will be out this Fall from Nation Books.

Liked this story? Get top stories in your inbox each week from AlterNet! Sign up now »