Big J

[Viewpoint]

Evening all.

Seems to me there is a glaring omission regarding the Iraq war, notably that the Tories substantially voted in favour when led by a man from a military background who believed "the evidence" presented to him by Blair.

[Good old]

Blair, made mistakes of judgment ,

Jesus Christ, you have the english knack of understatement down to an art form don't you...

So what else has Blair, been guilty of other than making a wrong call?   Nothing new in that ,  many a top flight military decision has suffered from that problem. Not often the subject of public inquiry, and never the degree of media abuse dished out to Blair.  Churchill, and the Anzac, blood bath, criminal  waste of life and resource, what a wrong call that was,  Anthony Eden ,Suez, that was a self righteous piece of mischievous warmongering if ever there was. Never a war crime mentioned.

He lied 🤥. He knew there was no evidence of WMD's and he still went to war.

Nick, even Chilcot, didn't say Blair, lied. He said Blair was vague . Well that really picks him out from the heard, dont it >: Because the H of C.s is loaded with vague Tories concerning every issue you can think of. (  Blair, was not right in joining the  yanks , In Iraq,. that much is easy to see. Most certainly in retrospect. But what have you got? He is not a war criminal, Not even in Chilcots eyes. And Chilcot, doesn't even say he lied. So to say he is some kind of felon, is in reality well wide of the mark, in the same way that attitude  applied to the characters I mentioned in  a previous post.

Chilcot stated that Blair was not straight with the nation. All you're doing is arguing the difference between lying and not telling the truth.

No Nick , being straight with the nation ,means the nation were not made privy to every detail ,that's not lying .its what politicians of all persuasions do all the time. Lying is lying, being vague,  is not lying. If it was Chilcote , needed to say so. If being vague is lying ,which it's not, then hardly a single MP has not lied, even unto the house . And that really isn't allowed.
War criminal, lier,.  A convenient portrayal for his political enemies.  But not apparently for Chilcote. Or me as it happens.

[Nick]

Blair, made mistakes of judgment ,

Jesus Christ, you have the english knack of understatement down to an art form don't you...

So what else has Blair, been guilty of other than making a wrong call?   Nothing new in that ,  many a top flight military decision has suffered from that problem. Not often the subject of public inquiry, and never the degree of media abuse dished out to Blair.  Churchill, and the Anzac, blood bath, criminal  waste of life and resource, what a wrong call that was,  Anthony Eden ,Suez, that was a self righteous piece of mischievous warmongering if ever there was. Never a war crime mentioned.

He lied 🤥. He knew there was no evidence of WMD's and he still went to war.

Nick, even Chilcot, didn't say Blair, lied. He said Blair was vague . Well that really picks him out from the heard, dont it >: Because the H of C.s is loaded with vague Tories concerning every issue you can think of. (  Blair, was not right in joining the  yanks , In Iraq,. that much is easy to see. Most certainly in retrospect. But what have you got? He is not a war criminal, Not even in Chilcots eyes. And Chilcot, doesn't even say he lied. So to say he is some kind of felon, is in reality well wide of the mark, in the same way that attitude  applied to the characters I mentioned in  a previous post.

Chilcot stated that Blair was not straight with the nation. All you're doing is arguing the difference between lying and not telling the truth.

[patman post]

Also the biggy, why have Labour never had a female leader?

Margaret Beckett was Deputy Leader of the Labour Party and served as Leader of the Labour Party after John Smith's sudden death in 1994. She later became Britain's first female Foreign Secretary in 2006 Tony Blair' cabinet...

[Good old]

Blair, made mistakes of judgment ,

Jesus Christ, you have the english knack of understatement down to an art form don't you...

So what else has Blair, been guilty of other than making a wrong call?   Nothing new in that ,  many a top flight military decision has suffered from that problem. Not often the subject of public inquiry, and never the degree of media abuse dished out to Blair.  Churchill, and the Anzac, blood bath, criminal  waste of life and resource, what a wrong call that was,  Anthony Eden ,Suez, that was a self righteous piece of mischievous warmongering if ever there was. Never a war crime mentioned.

He lied 🤥. He knew there was no evidence of WMD's and he still went to war.

Nick, even Chilcot, didn't say Blair, lied. He said Blair was vague . Well that really picks him out from the heard, dont it >: Because the H of C.s is loaded with vague Tories concerning every issue you can think of. (  Blair, was not right in joining the  yanks , In Iraq,. that much is easy to see. Most certainly in retrospect. But what have you got? He is not a war criminal, Not even in Chilcots eyes. And Chilcot, doesn't even say he lied. So to say he is some kind of felon, is in reality well wide of the mark, in the same way that attitude  applied to the characters I mentioned in  a previous post.

[Nick]

Blair, made mistakes of judgment ,

Jesus Christ, you have the english knack of understatement down to an art form don't you...

So what else has Blair, been guilty of other than making a wrong call?   Nothing new in that ,  many a top flight military decision has suffered from that problem. Not often the subject of public inquiry, and never the degree of media abuse dished out to Blair.  Churchill, and the Anzac, blood bath, criminal  waste of life and resource, what a wrong call that was,  Anthony Eden ,Suez, that was a self righteous piece of mischievous warmongering if ever there was. Never a war crime mentioned.

He lied 🤥. He knew there was no evidence of WMD's and he still went to war.

[Good old]

Blair, made mistakes of judgment ,

Jesus Christ, you have the english knack of understatement down to an art form don't you...

So what else has Blair, been guilty of other than making a wrong call?   Nothing new in that ,  many a top flight military decision has suffered from that problem. Not often the subject of public inquiry, and never the degree of media abuse dished out to Blair.  Churchill, and the Anzac, blood bath, criminal  waste of life and resource, what a wrong call that was,  Anthony Eden ,Suez, that was a self righteous piece of mischievous warmongering if ever there was. Never a war crime mentioned.

[johnofgwent]

Blair, made mistakes of judgment ,

Jesus Christ, you have the english knack of understatement down to an art form don't you...

[Good old]

You like to think Blair ,is a war criminal. That's not fact, more fake news

Really !!!

Chilcot report: Blair didn't tell truth about WMDs, the deal with Bush or the warnings of fallout – how Britain went to war in Iraq

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/chilcot-report-inquiry-tony-blair-iraq-war-weapons-of-mass-destruction-evidence-verdict-a7122361.html

Nowhere does the Chilcot, report, as it is known, refer to Blair, as a war criminal. Blair, has never faced that charge, let alone been convicted of it in a court of any sort other than the court of public opinion. On that basis calling Blair, a war criminal , is nothing more than political opportunism  . It's not factual, it therefore becomes fake news.
Blair, made mistakes of judgment , So did Winston Churchill,. I wouldn't call either a war criminal. Unless of course I was anti-war then they could have both barrels . Anything else is brazen political opportunism, nothing else.

[Nick]

You like to think Blair ,is a war criminal. That's not fact, more fake news

Really !!!

Chilcot report: Blair didn't tell truth about WMDs, the deal with Bush or the warnings of fallout – how Britain went to war in Iraq

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/chilcot-report-inquiry-tony-blair-iraq-war-weapons-of-mass-destruction-evidence-verdict-a7122361.html

[Good old]

Regardless of what quite a few of you think about Boris he is a very clever chap.
All the huff and bluster, that's just his hair, is just a cover for a man who is actually very much in touch what is going on in the country.
All you left wing Labourites who just spout the same dross should take a good look at the procession of leaders the LP have put forward in recent years, none of them are in the same league.

Blair the war criminal
Brown, "I will give you all our gold for a packet of wine gums"
Milliband.... Need I say anything
And of course Jeremy, the terrorist sympathiser.

Also the biggy, why have Labour never had a female leader?

You like to think Blair ,is a war criminal. That's not fact, more fake news.  By any standard you seem keen to use , close inspection of almost every war hero we have ever had would give reason to believe they went beyond the threshold you want to set for Blair.
As for whatabouts. Major, Cameron, May, and Boris, any remarkable signs of progress to be seen amongst that lot . I would say not. Even Maggie,s failures outweighed her success. To the degree her own party knifed her.  As for Europe ,taken in by a Tory ,taken out by one. Couldn't even get that right. And the juries out as to whether they are any closer to getting it right now.

[papasmurf]

That's good. Are you sure you are not confusing him with Chancellor Merkel ?

No I am not, Boris's ability to spout bullshine in received pronunciation does not mean he is fit for public office.   

[Borchester]

Why do you assume all who are critical of Johnson are of the Left? I'm a Maggie admirer for how she got Britain out of the grip of the reactionary trade unions that were running this country into the ground. She had a purpose and a vision. Boris had the aim to be PM. Hopefully, one term will be enough to satisfy his Churchillian fantasies. But it's difficult to see anyone of real substance emerging from the group of lacklustre arselickers Dominic has allowed him to surround himself with...

Much of the opposition to Boris comes from Tory remainers. They upper echelons of the party dare not say much for fear of the grassroots, but if the Times has come out with a positive article on the blonde moppet then I must have missed it. The Evening Standard never misses a chance to put the boot in while under the editorship of Geordie Grieg even the Daily Mail is no longer Bojo's house magazine.

The Labour party is not really bothered by Johnson. It will lob a few insults his way but what it really wants is to continue its hugely enjoyable civil war that has been running since February 1900 and shows no sign of abating.

[johnofgwent]

Now having got the why no women labour leaders out of the way, let's go back to the main point you made, regarding Johnson and his sham display of buffoonery.

Yes it's a sham. I've seen him off camera more than once.

What did concern me though was his clear lack of commitment in his answer to an obvious question.

I was fortunate to have a chance to nobble him as he got off that damn battle bus with that bloody lie on the side less than twenty feet from me as I went back to work after lunch one day.

Seizing the chance before the cameras got set up I put it to him straight that everyone knew the number on that bus was a lie (the numbers had been revealed about two or three weeks earlier) and he kept plugging it out, and in my eyes that made him REMAINS top secret weapon, and I told him I said say that as a bloke who WILL be voting leave. His answer was basically the number was out there now and they had to persist with it. He was hesitant and unconvincing. Of course, he did not have his carefully crafted script. I left him to his camera call. I did see him on telly some time later, being asked the same question as i put, and he gave pretty much the same answer, and gave it in equally unconvincing tones. It was as if he wanted to plead his case for being a hostage to fortune, or more precisely, am hostage to stupidity on the part of the jerk who did the calculation without checking it before he jumped on the campaign bandwagon.

[johnofgwent]

Also the biggy, why have Labour never had a female leader?

I'll take this one into a reply separate from the other point i wish to make.

Two probable causes. The first is Harriet 'Hate men' Harman.

But the second is the disaster that befell labour when they FORCED an all woman shortlist on the seat that sent Nye Bevan to form the NHS. I've spoken at length in the past on the constituency that returned Peter Law as an independent, shattering Labour's majority (of one) in the Assembly. But the backlash was more profound, They had to give the woman who won that nomination to fight the seat for labour a peerage to shut her up.

There is a third reason of course. These days they'd have to find a black woman who self identified as a man. I#m not sure they have many in their ranks

The other point i think i ought to make in the interests of balance is that several women have stood in the last three leadership elections and been rejected on policy grounds. Which I welcome. God help us when the left actually choose a woman to lead for being a woman,. down that road lies the American Democratic Party who I doubt will choose a white, heterosexual man as their presidential nominee ever again.