This entry was posted on
Friday, January 6th, 2006 at
10:33 am and is filed
under Tony ‘King Blair.
I guess you can’t blame Blair for feeling a little cocky now that both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats are doing the Reset Shuffle….
The Sun – Duty to Labour voters to stay: Defiant Tony Blair last night vowed to carry on as Prime Minister for the bulk of this Parliament – saying he owed it to the people. The PM insisted it was his duty to voters to stay in power because that is what they demanded at last May’s election. Declaring he would not flinch in the face of Labour rebels, he said: “I’m not going anywhere. I’m here and I’m going to see the whole programme through.”
More on Blair in a moment. First, we have to get on to Charles Kennedy and…. well, I have to begin by saying that I really feel for the guy.
How galling it must be for him to be lectured on honesty and the evils of drink by a bunch of drunken liars.
The Scum do unwittingly raise an interesting point in their editorial, though: Charles Kennedy is no George Bush, who also renounced the demon drink, but remained dry before standing for office.
But, years after ‘quitting’, George Bush still held the view that; “I don’t think I was clinically an alcoholic; I didn’t have the genuine addiction. I don’t know why I drank. I liked to drink, I guess.”
Denial. Even after the fact. Now that’s impressive.
For most alcoholics, the end of denial is the beginning of the end of the problem.
One might argue that this delusional state, common to most alcoholics, is the key to the ‘liar’ debate.
After all, in the past year, Charles Kennedy did not deny that he drank; he denied having a problem with alcohol. In his mind, this may have been the truth… and one can hardly blame him given his environment. (In this country, addiction to alcohol is treated differently to other forms of substance abuse – it’s all a bit of a laugh until a kidney drops off. You also have to consider that the man worked in Parliament. Anybody who has spent any time inside Parliament will know that it’s not necessary for me to finish this sentenc….)
Sadly, this argument is drenched in steaming piss when you consider that Kennedy openly admitted to lying to the public yesterday when he said that; “Over the past 18 months, I have been coming to terms with, and seeking to cope with, a drink problem.”
So… not a common and understandable level of self-delusion, but a lie. That’s it for Kennedy, then… and it’s not about drinking (insert joke about cheap shots here), it’s about trust.
On the high note of trust, we get back to Blair… via the subject of delusion.
Men do not choose their delusions. They may stagger toward them and/or willingly fall under the table with them, but they do not choose them.
So perhaps – just perhaps – it is unfair to call Tony Blair a liar.
He does, after all, claim to be acting in ‘good faith‘, in our best interests and so on… maybe this is a sign that he actually believes what he says.
When he took a rather selective view of evidence, intelligence and advice before going into Iraq, perhaps it was not the (now known) agenda that forced him, but the delusion that guided him.
When he claimed to be blissfully unaware of evidence or intelligence obtained by torture, perhaps – again – it was the delusion speaking.
Mind you, this line of thinking involves giving the guy a double portion of well-distilled benefit-of-the-doubt, and even if you did manage to reason in this way that he wasn’t lying, you would still have to take his delusional state into account when you asked that all-important question… do you trust him?
Further, you would have to ask; can you place your faith in a man who is so addicted to power (with a side-order or relish) that he refuses to give it up or even acknowledge that he may have a problem?
UPDATE – CuriousHamster – The Fluffers: Blair says “If you’ve won three elections then you’re obviously what the people want.” No mention of the fact that only 22% of the electorate voted Labour at the last election? No mention of the fact that 78% of the electorate didn’t want Blair enough to vote for his party? No mention of the fact that Blair had to draft in Brown to take a high profile role in the election campaign after initially attempting to freeze him out? No mention of the fact that this was because Blair was basically a liability at the election and that the implied message was quite clearly “vote Blair, get Brown”? No mention of the fact that the Conservatives had to drop that very slogan after they realised that Blair was selling the exact same message? Not a word.
