Registered: Aug 2001
Location: Hilbert Space
Posts: 35776

The Blair reshuffle made the news in the US (perhaps not least because Jack Straw, with whom Condaleeza Rice had been cultivating a friendly working relationship, got shitcanned). It was the Blair response to Labour getting a drubbing in the local elections, but it did seem a bit odd. Charles Clarke was a likely victim because of the Home Office's failure to deport 1000 convicted foreign criminals on completion of their sentence, but it was just for PR, because Blair wanted Clarke (who's supposed to be a pretty talented guy) to take a different job in government, so he clearly didn't doubt his abilities. Clarke told him to stuff that where the sun doesn't shine.

Straw, it appears, may have gotten the boot because of his repeated assertions that attacking Iran (or, at least, British cooperation in such an attack) was 'inconceivable'; this is pretty much true, as Blair apparently has bugger all chance, as it stands, of getting such an attack through cabinet (not to mention the potential firestorm into which it would dump British troops in Basra Province in Iraq), but Blair would rather have his Foreign Secretary proclaiming what everyone knows to be untrue, so long as it holds the party line.

Anyhow, this was the first editorial that I read from the Sundays. I can't speak as to the exact details (even those, above, that I had heard from other sources) and it is from the Sunday Times (something of a shameful rag, nowadays, although not staffed by idiots or even those pretending to be idiots), but it's interesting. Blair does seem to be determined to leave Gordon Brown a steaming pile of shit of a job even if he can't stop Brown from taking it at all.

quote:

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Ever decreasing circles
Blair conducts an extensive Cabinet reshuffle — but to what end?

Cabinet reshuffles are at best usually pointless and at worst often destructive. They are usually pointless in that the public’s opinion of a government is unlikely to be altered by them. They are often destructive because ministers who have been in place for long enough to understand a brief are sent off to attempt to master another one. Tony Blair has been consistently and spectacularly inept at reshuffles. This one is, alas, no exception to that rule.

The only argument in favour of holding a reshuffle on the scale that the Prime Minister has done is to introduce lots of fresh blood into a sickly body politic. By that measure, Mr Blair has engaged in a huge amount of displacement activity, but little innovation. There are entrants to the Cabinet, including the able Douglas Alexander, Hazel Blears and, as the Chief Whip, Jacqui Smith, yet they are not in portfolios where they could seize the national imagination. It might be remarked about Mr Blair that, as Nye Bevan said of Harold Macmillan, he has “an absolute genius for putting flamboyant labels on empty luggage”.

Many of the appointments that the Prime Minister has made raise further questions. Charles Clarke acted honourably by insisting that if Mr Blair had lost confidence in him as Home Secretary (although he was expressing it a mere 48 hours ago), it would be wrong for him to assume another senior position. Yet John Prescott is to retain his salary and his title while his department is handed over to Ruth Kelly. It is an astonishing situation.

It is not, though, unique. Jack Straw has been an astute operator at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. His departure will cause heads to be scratched in Washington and Brussels as well as London. Margaret Beckett is no fool but, equally, she is not a Henry Kissinger. The farce that surrounded the role of Geoff Hoon as a supposed Secretary of State for Europe has compounded matters. John Reid is not without qualifications to serve as Home Secretary, even if his elevation breaks the convention that an MP from a Scottish seat would not hold this office. But the speed at which he has held seven Cabinet slots in the same tally of years is ludicrous. If Sir Thomas More was a man for all seasons, the robust Mr Reid is a man for all reshuffles. He must be permitted a decent stay this time.

And then there is the curious revolving door at the Department for Education and Skills. There was much logic in moving the savvy Alan Johnson to this berth six months ago. To ask him to switch now, with a crucial and controversial schools Bill in its committee stage and a potentially awkward third reading vote to come this month, is strange. To have transferred Ms Smith, Ms Kelly’s de facto deputy, as well borders on the surreal. In the midst of all of these changes, Patricia Hewitt has, bizarrely, been left at the helm of the Department for Health.

The worst aspect of the whole affair is the whiff of factionalism attached to it. Instead of recognising the reality of transition politics and conducting this reshuffle in close co-ordination with Gordon Brown, Mr Blair has left himself open to the suspicion that he is building up Mr Reid and Mr Johnson as rivals to the Chancellor and that he might be willing to soldier on indefinitely to block Mr Brown. Any such strategy is destined to fail, but can do immense damage regardless. This is a corker of a reshuffle even by the Prime Minister’s dubious record: it seems pointless and poisonous.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: In a Blue, Blue State
Posts: 13420

This is reshuffling deckchairs on the SS Minnow.

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Registered: Sep 2003
Location: Rancho CucAmonga, CA
Posts: 406

Was listening to BBC on NPR tonight and I heard that there's a chunk of people in the Labor party that are pushing for Blair to retire before the end of his term, 3? more years. Hopefully they'll just dump Blair, but the report seemed to imply that labor party rules made this extremely unlikely.

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Registered: Sep 2003
Location: Rancho CucAmonga, CA
Posts: 406

Looking at what I wrote, I now realize that I'm completely off topic, my apologies

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Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Den
Posts: 11721

Surely we prefer our poisonous corkers pointless.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
Posts: 13002

a reshuffle designed to take the stories about the kicking they took in the election off the front page and an attempt to secure his allies around him before he gets stabbed in the back.

I'm preparing for the General Election to be within the next 18 months as I thibnk Brown will go to the polls early after taking over, at which point we will kick them again and be back in power.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location:
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Made CBS news:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006...in1596108.shtml

quote:

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Two London papers have speculated this weekend that complaints by President George W. Bush forced a British minister from his post because of his opposition to the use of nuclear force against Iran.

The Independent suggests that a phone call from the U.S. president to British Prime Minister Tony Blair led to the removal of Foreign Secretary Jack Straw Friday.

The newspaper reports that friends of Straw believe Mr. Bush was extremely upset when Straw pronounced any use of nuclear weapons against Iran "nuts."

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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complete bollocks

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Registered: Aug 2001
Location: Hilbert Space
Posts: 35776

That Iran was the issue is likely, isn't it?

Even if Bush complained to Blair, though (which I can believe), I don't see what Blair would have to gain from acting according to Bush's wishes. Involvement with Bush hasn't done Blair any good, and the principal quid pro quo over Iraq, which was support for a two-state solution in Israel-Palestine, didn't come to anything for a variety of reasons (but in any case, Bush spoke some tough words at the start then didn't act on them, so he didn't even do a great deal to hold up his end). Just repeatedly expressing opinions counter to those of Blair was probably enough, but I think that he's probably made a mistake in firing Straw.

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Registered: Jun 2001
Location: finding the new flesh after killing the old one
Posts: 2007

I presumed that it was because of the Iran comments, but I think Phil - and most of the other tories I've seen commenting - are more accurate when they attribute it to loyalty, as Beckett hasn't made any anti Blair comments and she's desperate for a gig imo which will also keep her loyal.

However. I did actually have a little restoration of faith when I saw the Rice/Straw interview with Dimbleby [i think], on Sunday morning a few weeks back. A few commenters pointed out that it was Straw saying it was inconceivable and not actually Blair, but I thought there'd be no way that Blair could ever back down after that comment regardless.

Cameron has now started using this to promote the tories too, which is pretty smart .. highlighting that he'd make sure that military action of any considerable level would only be authorised by a voting system which included the whole cabinet [or some such].

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Registered: Jul 2001
Location: China
Posts: 11795

Ahmadinejad just sent the first Iranian official letter to the US since the Revolution. No word yet on what it says.

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Registered: Jan 2002
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quote:

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Originally posted by Smug Git
That Iran was the issue is likely, isn't it?

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Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Den
Posts: 11721

quote:

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The letter from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - thought to be the first from an Iranian president to a US leader since Iran's 1979 revolution - was dispatched via the Swiss embassy in Tehran on Monday. In it, he proposed "new solutions for getting out of international problems and the current fragile situation of the world", Iranian officials said on Monday.

But US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said it did not help resolve the nuclear stand-off.

"This letter is not the place that one would find an opening to engage on the nuclear issue or anything of the sort.

"It isn't addressing the issues we are dealing with in a concrete way," she told the Associated Press news agency.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
Posts: 13002

it is bollocks, Straw was demoted because of the internal politics in the Labour Party civil war.

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Registered: Aug 2001
Location: Hilbert Space
Posts: 35776

Blair wasn't irritated by Straw repeatedly and publically describing as 'inconceivable' or 'nuts', etc, a course of action that Blair himself thought might needs br considered? It seems to me that if you're after solidifying your position in the Labour Party or in government in general, firing the Foreign Secretary, who has been publically ridiculing something that you might be planning to do (despite requests to stop), is a relatively logical step.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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Im not saying he wasnt irritated, i'm saying that the Brown bornwnosing by Blair is more relevant to his reshuffle than Iran. I think you're perceiving Straw's demotion through American eyes rather than the British realities under which it occured.

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Registered: Aug 2001
Location: Hilbert Space
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All my information has come from British sources, actually. The US version has generally been: 'bad election results, Blair fires people'.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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which sources would those be then? Thus far you;ve posted an article from the Times which doesn;t assert that argument that I can see. There is a link in here to a BBC page where an inference is made that because Becketts chose not to repeat Straw's word that must be the reason he was demoted which is of course utterly fallicious.

The Labour Party is currently in a total state of civil war, Straw is a casualty of that war, it's very simple. It;s got bugger all to do with whether "military action" is on the table or not over Iran.

Basically you're wrong.

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Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Den
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quote:

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Originally posted by philjit
There is a link in here to a BBC page where an inference is made that because Becketts chose not to repeat Straw's word that must be the reason he was demoted which is of course utterly fallicious.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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they asked a question that was designed to deliberately give them the ability to make the inference. If you read the news about Straw its rather clearly he was moved because of Brownisms.

Are you saying that the connnections being made due to the lack of particular words being used are not hopelessly flawed arguments?

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Registered: Apr 2004
Location: Den
Posts: 11721

Well, it just sounds stupid. Beckett will allegedly stick to Straw's line, but she goes out of her way not to call a strike on Iran inconceivable. Instead, she says, they weren't discussing it...?
I have a feeling Britain ought to discuss it, unless its inconceivable.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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quote:

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Originally posted by Coincidence
Yeah, those BBC journalists generally have no clue what's going on, compared to you.

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