Thursday 20 November 2008

Clinton's Coup

Her impending nomination as Secretary of State, even though she was exactly what the party rejected and her views were almost exactly what the country rejected (in foreign policy terms, entirely so), alongside the return of old hands such as Rahm Emanuel (who can't stand her personally, but that is by the by), is proof, as if proof were needed, that certain people are exceptionally good at one thing: staging a coup.

Over here, when John Smith died (and no, I am not suggesting that they had any hand in his death), these utterly unrepentant old Communists, Trotskyists and fellow-travellers, who had changed their means from economics to the culture wars but who had not changed their ends in the least, wasted no time whatever. Through media also stuffed with exactly such members of the 1968 generation, and knowing that a Labour victory was by then an absolute certainty (how that has been forgotten in the years since), they installed some malleable nonentity of whom only political anoraks had ever heard. And away they went.

Similarly, when Iain Duncan Smith had made the Tories the largest party in local government, united them on Europe, and taken them to parity and beyond in the opinion polls, all on a platform not to the coup-mongers' liking, they simply took to the airwaves and announced his deposition, watched and listened to impotently by mere MPs and the like. In his place, they put in, without any sort of contest, Michael Howard, a politician whose reputation has absolutely no relationship to his record.

Completely transformed, the Tories dutifully went down to what, by any historical standard, was a crushing defeat, before the whole coup-by-media thing was repeated in order to give the Leadership to another malleable nonentity of whom only political anoraks had ever heard, instead of the much stronger candidate favoured by such grass roots as there still were or are. That nonentity is openly planning to keep on James Purnell as Work and Pensions Secretary (although Purnell will retain the Labour Whip, because no one gives tuppence about that sort of thing any more, and there are now hardly any votes in the Commons, anyway), to make Andrew Adonis Education Secretary (likewise, although the Lords is a bit trickier, since a certain amount of real scrutiny does still go on there), and to give a peerage and Ministerial office to Geoff Mulgan, the old Trotskyist ex-Director of Demos, Blair's favourite think tank, and in point of fact a specific continuation of the dissolved Communist Party of Great Britain.

But it is in America that the standard for these things is set: the Trots who became Scoop Jackson hands, who became Reagan hands, who became Clinton hands, who in 2000 entered the White House behind the Great Simpleton, finally staging the full-blown putsch that they had been plotting and planning, right down to every tiny detail, for thirty years. Within a single generation, they had risen to the position from which they could stage a wholly voluntary and aggressive war against any country in the world, entirely of their own arbitrary choosing. As they have duly done.

And now, while they might not be getting Robert Kagan as Secretary of State and Randy Scheunemann as National Security Advisor, it hardly matters after all.

You have to hand it to them. They are good.

25 comments:

  1. What's all this about James Purnell? Do you have a link? (Obviously you do, or you wouldn't have said "openly" - what I meant is, could you please share it? I haven't heard this before.)

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  2. "Do you have a link?"

    You're still in school, aren't you...?

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  3. Everyone who is anyone knows this, dear boy. David has blogged about it several times. Osborne (I think, certainly one of them) made the offers openly in a newspaper interview and has never been publicly rebuffed. And everyone who is anyone knows this, dear boy. If you don't, then I think we all know what that makes you.

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  4. I'm happy to admit that I'm not "anyone" - I don't move in those circles, and never have. I don't have these political contacts. But I must say that I find that kind of snobbishness, and the reduction of politics to a cosy, cliquey game in which people drop knowing little hints about how well-connected they are, pretty pathetic.

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  5. Well-connected? Moi? I leave that to Anonymous 16:16. Who rightly points out that Osborne made this "offer" (in effect, this announcement) in a newspaper interview. Nothing "cosy" or "cliquey" about that.

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  6. Oh, sorry David, I thought Anonymous 16:16 was you.

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  7. I only call my tutees "dear boy", and then only in certain very specific contexts...

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  8. You'd have to be there.

    Now, back on topic, please.

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  9. I tried on-topic, and I just got snide comments implying that I was woefully uninformed. Still haven't had an answer.

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  10. Yes you did.

    Cameron's (not Osborne's) offer can be read about in full here:

    http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2008/04/tory-leader-beg.html

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  11. Could you please link to the interview in question so we can all witness the chutzpah?

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  12. Your Google is as good as mine there, I'm afraid.

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  13. I don't know why you bother David. People who do not know these things are not intereted in politics, so why do they come on this blog?

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  14. Maybe we're trying to learn something. For some reason, David is keen to make it as opaque as possible. It's all very odd.

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  15. It is not remotely "opaque". Perhaps Anonymous 17:11 has a point. If you find this sort of thing "opaque", then maybe you would be happier over on popbitch, or something?

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  16. Bring back grammar schools.

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  17. Quite.

    Then these people wouldn't be able to buy themselves into universities.

    And, to bring us back on topic, I very emphatically include James Purnell in that.

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  18. Yes, I too have often found that I only become interested in a subject after I know all about it. Some people have tried to tell me that it's the other way round! They actually believe that people try to learn about as subject because they're interested in it. These self-same idiots also won't agree that waking up makes my alarm clock go off.

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  19. 1) You claim that David Cameron is "openly planning to keep James Purnell on as Work and Pensions Secretary".

    2) I ask where this claim comes from, as I've never heard it before.

    3) You accuse me of being "still at school".

    4) An anonymous commenter patronisingly claims that "Everyone who is anyone knows this", and says that the offer was made in a newspaper interview.

    5) You post a link which says nothing about James Purnell at all.

    6) I claim that this is opaque.

    7) You effectively tell me I'm stupid.

    What am I supposed to do?

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  20. If you're interested, I have a completely consistent alternative explanation why Cameron would publically praise Adonis and Purnell (although I don't think Purnell is mentioned in Hitchen's blog). It certainly doesn't involve making a job offer. Would you like to know what it is?
    (You'll kick yourself, honestly.)

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  21. Waking up certainly always makes my alarm clock go off.

    I'll post a Purnell link in a moment.

    And if you think that Cameron was out to embarrass Purnell or Adonis, then, farnkly, you are living in the increasingly distant past.

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  22. I don't blame you. Facetious student humour is not what it was.

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