"Blame Me! Blame Me!"

The Centre for Policy Studies claims to have invented various of this Government's policies. So, did Tony Blair and David Miliband really get them from the CPS, founded by Margaret Thatcher and Keith Joseph? Or did the CPS get them from Tony Blair and David Miliband, the present age's Margaret Thatcher and Keith Joseph? But which is which, and why?

Funnily enough, the policies in question do not include withdrawal from Afghanistan, restoration of the link between pensions and earnings, taking the working poor out of income tax, abandonment of identity cards, the prospect of electoral reform, an inquiry into the last lot's complicity in torture (that means you, David Miliband), dismantlement of the surveillance state, a renewed emphasis on a manufacturing-based economy diffused throughout the country, one coalition partner that really did oppose the Iraq War, another that at least has the decency to pretend that it did so, or the pursuit of bilateral ties with Russia, with China, with Latin American countries, with the Arab world in general and the United Arab Emirates in particular, with India, with Indonesia, with Japan, with the major Commonwealth countries of Africa, and through the Commonwealth generally, among others.