It's not like it were in my day....

SingleSue

Granted but he gives very powerful and intelligent reasons why.....think he takes after his dear old mum who would never vote labour in a million years, although I don't do political discussion at home.

fedupfreda

nearlynew wrote: »

Politicians are like nappies - they should be changed regularly.


........ and for the same reason.

One of the rare posts I would like to thank twice!! :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Personally I think everyone is fed up to the back teeth with the whole lot of them. All the lying, double dealing, 2 faced-ness (IYKWIM) of the whole lot. Of course, they start out trying to think they can change things. Then, as they climb the greasy pole, they get contaminated with the ordure coming from the a*******s above...... and end up having to play the same game. Seems to be the nature of politics, I'm afraid.

Think its time we got rid of the whole lot - a parliament full of independents would probably be a lot better. They would certainly have better experience of life in the real world. And they couldn't possibly do any worse.....could they???

drc

Brown is pathetic.

kennyboy66_2

Thatcher - Doubt if anyone PM will come close to being as hated by a significant portion of the country - particularly during 1979 - 1982. A combination of the Falklands and a disasterous lurch to the left by Labour saved her in 1983.

Callaghan - I don't think he was personally hated. Labour didn't have a majority by the time he took over, so Thatcher was pushing at an open door.

John Major - don't think he was hated by most people. Many of his problems came from his own party. Unlucky to be PM when Spitting Image was on and watched by millions. Inevitably a figure of fun after Thatcher. Much under-rated if you want a country with low public spending and therefore low tax, albeit the infrastructure was falling apart.

Brown - complicated. Disliked, but I don't think he is hated. Probably a deeply flawed individual, but clearly believes in helping the poorest and giving people opportunity (however much you disagree with his methods). He's a bit of a throwback.
Compare with Blair or whom its difficult to know what he believes in.

Brown still has a slim chance as the oppostion is rightly seens as a bunch of vacous chancers. There current attack adverts on Brown are a bit of a waste of time. If you don't want rid of Brown by now then no amount of clever Saatchi adverts is going to change your mind.

lemonjelly

I agree with much of what has been said in respect of Blair.

In my mind, Blair is becoming more hated as time passes. I feel he has a wierd self perception as a form of messiah. Well, I believe history will show him to be one hell of a naughty boy. I think that Blair wouldn't know the truth if it walked up to him & smacked him in the face.

Brown is being foolishly compared to Blair. It is apples & oranges. Thing is, as alluded to by lir & other posters, even Brown is comparing himself to Blair. To my mind, that is his biggest mistake yet!

If he were his own man, & didn't feel so "in the shadow" of a pathological serial boolsheeting idiot, I doubt we'd have the questions about him that we do.

Following the very inception of the "crunch", Brown pretty much led the way in how to address the situation. Around the world, other leaders adopted his proposals. In the UK, infighting led to them being delayed. Net result, we exited recession later. & people blamed Brown for this!

Pobby

Bit of an aside if I may. I`ve mentioned this before. From the 60`s through to the 80`s people were a bit more organised. Firstly the annual CND marches. Then the anti war protests in the late 60`s. Rock against racism, support of the miners, anti cruise, some of the subjects that people got off their bottoms and hit the streets. With the exception of the 1967 anti Vietnam war protest, the majority of these demos were pretty peaceful, I know because I went to many of them.

Some commentators now point their fingers and say we were wrong to do it. I don`t. It brought attention to, imho , some of the ills of the day. I am proud that people, sometimes in their 10`s of thousands put in the effort to hit the streets.

Oh well, by gone days. Guess we have the internet now, I am also guilty, to make our " protests ".

On a lighter note I have a lovely image from the 1967 Grosvenor Square protest. I have to admit it did get violent with some protesters and the police.

Things quietened down and people started leaving. At the same time the police had rounded up some protesters and were dragging them into police vans.

A little old lady, must have been in her 70`s, was hitting the coppers with her umbrella and in a very posh accent she was yelling " Leave these young people alone ". Credit to the old Bill, they didn`t arrest her.

These days they prolly would have had her up in some anti- terrorist rap.

Cleaver

Pobby wrote: »

Bit of an aside if I may. I`ve mentioned this before. From the 60`s through to the 80`s people were a bit more organised. Firstly the annual CND marches. Then the anti war protests in the late 60`s. Rock against racism, support of the miners, anti cruise, some of the subjects that people got off their bottoms and hit the streets. With the exception of the 1967 anti Vietnam war protest, the majority of these demos were pretty peaceful, I know because I went to many of them.

Some commentators now point their fingers and say we were wrong to do it. I don`t. It brought attention to, imho , some of the ills of the day. I am proud that people, sometimes in their 10`s of thousands put in the effort to hit the streets.

Oh well, by gone days. Guess we have the internet now, I am also guilty, to make our " protests "

Just two comments really. Firstly, we've seen that the power of the internet and the 'virtual protest' can make a difference. A bit of a silly, non-political example, but just look at the Facebook campaign that put Rage Against The Machine at number one at Christmas. And in terms of not protesting anymore, wasn't there an estimate of over a million people marching as part of the ant-war movement in recent years? I think people will 'hit the streets' on occassion, but maybe you're right and there is more virtual protesting nowadays. Not really sure which is the most effective to be honest.

Cleaver

drc wrote: »

Brown is pathetic.

Fantastic insight there, thanks for sharing. Really answers Generali's original question in such a clever and thoughtful way.

Pobby

Thanks for pointing that out Cleaver. I hadn`t thought of that. In fact, in reflection, the internet could be a powerful tool for protest.

fedupfreda

Generali wrote: »

Now Brown. Is he really despised in the same way? I mean truly hated by the populace. I don't think he is, or that's what I see from a distance. Qualitatively I don't think there is the same depth of feeling against Brown as there was against the other three and as a result I think Brown has a good chance of victory given the advantage an incumbent has and the electoral (current) bias in favour of Labour.

Just as a thought, Gen - Brown might have a good advantage, but its a dead cert he won't last long as leader - his own party are bound to mount a leadership challenge after the election, regardless of if they get in or not.... Brown has always struck me as meaning well, but appearing pretty clueless. IMO the real culprit is, and always has been, Blair.

If you were to, say, stick them both in the stocks on the top of a hill and charge people £5 a pop for the privilege of throwing rotten tomatoes at them, who do you think would have the biggest queue in front of them????? The money raised would probably clear most of Britain's deficit in a matter of weeks....;)