This description of Tony Blair’s ambitions by Alastair Campbell invites a question I’ve often wondered about. What is ‘modernising zeal’? It’s such a loaded term but clearly so significant to understand centrists dispositions yet it’s rarely, if ever, defined: But he feared that unless the party adapted to the modern post-Cold War, post-Thatcherite world, it […]
Tag: tony blair
The section at 18 mins about Iraq-related dreams is fascinating. They both seem rather haunted, in radically different ways:
This is a fascinating exchange between Owen Jones and Alastair Campbell, bringing to life many of the themes I’ve been preoccupied with in the last few months. I agree with Owen’s claim that Campbell’s world view is in crisis. The promise of the modernisers rested on a basic electoral proposition: triangulation was necessary to win power […]
A couple of months ago, The New Statesman carried an interview with Tony Blair for the first time in a long time. Leaving aside how haunted the man looked in the portrait accompanying it, what stood out to me about it was how readily he had incorporated techno-speak into the language of the third way. Here are some […]
He was kind enough to provide an answer in this recent talk: In some cases, this will mean a certain convergence of thinking with the centre-right. Relax. It happens the world over and where it doesn’t – see the polarisation of American politics today – a country is the poorer for it.
Oh Tony, if only you’d used your powers for good rather than for evil.
Wonderful work by Cassetteboy: Alas! It’s still online here –> http://www.theguardian.com/politics/video/2014/apr/25/tony-blair-cassetteboy-video-mashup-bloomberg-speech
England’s riots shouldn’t be blamed on ‘moral decline’, says Tony Blair | UK news | The Observer. Rather interesting. This is without doubt the most sensible thing I have ever heard this man say. My only point of contention is the apparent contradiction inherent in what he’s saying: he talks about ‘these people’ not being symptomatic […]
