Tomorrow is Yesterday

My fellow Blogger has posted his thoughts on yesterday's Local Elections in the UK, and has unsurprisingly focused on the London Mayoral Elections, which seem to be the single bright spot in an otherwise fairly dismal picture for the Coalition. More on the wider ramifications, which are a direct result of the questionable Budget on which I posted what seems like an eon ago, later in the week, but it's perhaps worth considering the scale of the Johnson achievement, which comes in the shadow of A:/ A pretty dire performance by the Conservatives within London even in the 2010 Elections where they were the largest party and B:/ In the face of National polling data which has seen even the much-maligned Ed Miliband presiding over a 13 point (at maximum) poll Lead, which has led even Erstwhile and somewhat tiresome Former Statesman blogger Dan Hodges to damn him with faint praise. ( 9.30pm London time: Warning - Lest I speak too soon - It appears the result is considerably tighter than predicted - it looks like it will go right to the wire. However, the basic critique remains valid although were Livingstone to win the ramifications for those unfortunate enough to live in London would require a separate post)

As my colleague has pointed out, anyone wanting to see the scale of Ken's achievement in managing to snatch defeat from the jaws of what would have seemed certain victory need only follow Andrew Gilligan's blog in the Telegraph which gives an almost daily dose of bile for those able to stomach it. This has been derided on the Left as a 'smear campaign' which given the outrageous calumnies against Boris seen almost Daily on Twitter suggests either a distinct lack of Irony or failure to take account of the phrase beloved of the late Peter Cook, 'Mote and Beam , sir, Mote and Beam' (Based on the Biblical quotation from Matthew 7:3)

'Why beholdest thou the mote that is in your brother's eye, but consider not the beam that is in your own eye'

A quote the increasingly desperate bloggers such as Owen Jones  and Sunny Hundal  (who appear willing to forgive almost any outrage if it gets a Labour victory) would do well to bear in mind.  One can only imagine the reaction had Johnson made some of the verbal gaffes that Ken had. Who can forget this classic piece from the Ultra Left Compass think tank which would have touched the heart of the Late Joseph Goebbels with its use of selective quotations, dissimulation, out of context quotations and innuendoes back when Johnson first became a mayoral candidate in 2007? Given the state of the election, I'm surprised this wasn't used as a Bible for journalists to attack him!

As Hal points out, Livingstone's failure will have almost zero ramifications for Ed Miliband - he's considered as much a maverick by many across the political spectrum as was George Galloway, and if anything, I think Miliband will benefit from having, as far as possible kept a discreet distance from his candidate's antics.

So, what is the secret to Johnson's success?:

1/ He has kept a relatively Low profile throughout the campaign - A Savvy campaigner who since an unsuccessful bid for Parliament back in 1997 has an excellent track record, I think he quickly evaluated that Ken would do himself enough damage that his best bet was to keep quiet and leave discussion until the debate, where the visceral mutual loathing would do as much damage to Ken's campaign as to his. This lack of gaffes (and he has a track record here in terms of putting his foot in his mouth as anyone from the Liverpool area will testify) served only to magnify Ken's errors.

2/ The Labour Party managed to hang itself with a singularly unsuccessful and arguably the weakest candidate they could possibly have put in the field. Anyone who has lived under Ken and who worked in the Private Sector would have had no difficulty remembering Ken's record, which was to introduce huge tax rises with almost nothing in return except for a regular diet of Political propaganda, and procure contracts for his political cronies at, again , great expense to the taxpayer. His much-vaunted congestion charge merely had the effect of shifting commuter traffic outside the zone and made private motor transport the preserve of the rich. It is very hard to conceive of a single positive aspect to his period as mayor and suffice it to say, although I had fled London to the West of England by that point, the celebrations which followed Johnson's victory led to a less than productive Friday. Had Oona King been selected as candidate, given here popularity with Ethnic minorities and women, it would have been a tall order for Boris, even with a considerable cult 'Personal' following to overcome her.

3/ Although Boris has arguably been less effective than many hoped, he does possess a certain charm that sets him apart from the Coalition - various appearances on Have I Got News for You  combined with a carefully cultivated image as a shambling , quasi-cartoonish character has done much to negate the 'Tory contamination' that has affected almost the entire rest of the coalition and gives him a certain cachet amongst the apolitical voters especially. This, combined with his relatively calm persona in the face of quite vicious hatchet jobs from the Left has done a great deal to provide a personal bounce factor which has negated the otherwise dire Poll ratings for the Tories. By contrast, as I have pointed out to Hal, Ken's ruthless 'coalition-building' and effective use of Private Sector workers as cash cows for his political projects has led to an 'Anti-Ken' coalition (No prizes for guessing I was a member) of people who vote for anyone but Ken. Although many have left London for pastures new, I'd say only the BNP has a more polarising impact than that man.

(Update 10pm London Time - the last few thousand ballots are having to be counted by hand due to a failure of the counting machines, Don't you just love modern technology?)

Once more unto the breach, dear Friends....

Have been kept, somewhat embarrassingly away from the mundanities of blogging by having to take care of administration on my new abode on the other side of the Atlantic,so have been on 'silent running' for a couple of weeks. however, despite a backlog of about seven posts (events never stop in the real world) a story from the UK necessitates comment. Several months back I referred to Labour's mayoral candidate, Ken Livingstone as the Jason Voorhees/Freddy Krueger of British Politics for his tasteless comparison of opponent Boris johnson's Chief of Staff, Eddie Lister, to Bosnian Serb commander and suspected war criminal, Rlatko Mladic. In this stunningly hamfisted interview in Total Politics, he goes one better than that by equating the coming mayoral struggle with the fight between Churchill and Hitler in World War Two.

The blog entry by the controversist, Toby Young, author of How to lose Friends and alienate people posits that Livingstone, through a combination of frustration and possibly premature senility has become unhinged, and several commentators on the post take him to task for not realising that what was said was Ken 'being drole' or making an attempt at humour. Whilst I would also agree this could be an interpretation, the problem for him is that, of arguably any politician in the last 30 years, Livingstone is a master of taking vicarious offence on behalf of the many 'minorities' (women, non-caucasians, homosexuals, LGBT, even famously the Irish in the height of the troubles) that comprise his 'rainbow' coalition. To illustrate the point, can one imagine the reaction of the Labour Left, the Guardian, Independent and the BBC (funded by a £155 stipend on every TV watching household in the country) had Johnson made the quite accurate remark that the election were 'reminscent of Korea and Vietnam'? - a statement which given Livingstone's quite self -evident links with both the Northern parts of those two countries' proxy allies during the conflicts in question is really quite unobjectionable to anyone without a vested interest in this man's election.

The issue is ,when you take an innocent remark out of context and, even though not part of the 'minority' in question, call for people to resign or apologise, it is rank hypocrisy to expect others to turn the cheek to the most odious and outrageous calumnies,even if they are said in jest. Having fallen foul of this with a tactless comment comparing a Jewish Evening Standard reporter to a concentration camp guard, I'd have thought Livingstone would have known better.

The sadly departed from the Telegraph, Simon Heffer, summed up the position quite admirably following the furore over Cameron's rather crass remarks to Labour shadow Minister, Angela Eagle. The Left's very 'thin skin' and the basic paucity of many of their arguments mean that the reflex weapon of howling 'racist' or 'sexist' or 'homophobe' is often the only weapon in their armoury. however, unless one wishes to fall foul of Livingstone's rather curious 'sense of humour', I would strongly urge anyone reading this who is able to vote for Johnson next year, lest you find yourself tagged as a member of the Waffen SS and subject to 'denazification' or 'war crimes trials' (just joking on the latter of course, Christ, don't you people have a sense of humour?)

The Jason Voorhees of British Politics

For those unfamiliar with the character of Jason Voorhees, he is the primary Antagonist of the Friday 13th series of films. Anyone famiilar with these will know the drill. Voorhees appears and wreaks havoc, usual involving multiple homicides only to seem as though he has finally perished. Then the film usually leaves a degree of ambiguity as to his fate. The franchise's original 1979 instalment spawned an enormous 10 sequels, some of which are some of the most wretched examples of horror cinema ever seen, but still Jason survives. The reason for mentioning him is that with the elections for the London assembly and mayoralty in prospect next year, perhaps its time to focus on the man most like him in terms of his longevity and arguably his likely impact on the London scene, for he has once more been up to his usual tricks.

Former mayor of the GLC, and two term London Mayor before his surprise defeat in 2008, Ken Livingstone has compared his mayoral rival's chief of staff, Eddie Lister to the Recently indicted Serbian General Ratko Mladic . It's not the first time the man has made a tastelessly crass remark. Who can forget his comparison of Evening Standard reporter Oliver Finegold (of Jewish descent) with a Nazi Concentration Camp guard?

The Voorhees analogy, no doubt distasteful to Livingstone's acolytes as his comparison of Lister (who has courted controversy for potentially charging children for access to public playgrounds) to a man accused of the genocide of 8000 people is however apt. Whatever else I think of him, following his defeat at the hands of Kenneth Baker in 1986, he bounced back in 2000 to defeat two candidates (including a rival from his former party) to win the mayoralty and held the position for 8 years. I hoped his defeat by current incumbent, Boris Johnson in 2008 had finally driven a metaphorical stake through his political heart, but terrifyingly the man has returned to once again cast his dark shadow over the London scene. As Giroscoper points out, chillingly, the London elections are not, as I erroneously thought conducted on an electoral college basis (ie borough by borough), thus the multiple defeats he suffered in 2008 in the outer London boroughs could be overcome by him piling up enough of a majority amongst the so-called 'Rainbow coalition' (composed of around 11 boroughs with heavy concentrations of ethnic minorities, students and public sector employees) which delivered him two election triumphs. Admittedly many more verbal gaffes such as this one, and the poll lead he has might start to look slimmer, but it is perhaps a reflection on the chaos wrought in the nation's capital between 1997 and 2010, that such a being can have the slightest chance of achieving high office after decisive rejection in 2008.

Don't believe the ES BS - Ken can (and probably will) still win in London

I don't read the gutter tabloid press much, but the Evening Standard's assault on Ken Livingstone is real back-to-the-80s Tory vitriol of a kind that no-one since Neil Kinnock has had to face with such ferocity.

Almost every single Standard headline for the last two months at least has been rabid anti-Ken propaganda. Ken is being bankrolled by some nasty bunch or other - tube drivers, Islamofascists, Mothers for Peace, etc. Ken is pissed on the job. Ken's advisers are communists. Ken eats live newts for tea. Ken is ten to fifteen points behind Boris Johnson on whatever bogus poll YouGov have made up next. And the BS goes on. And on. And on.

Now, I'm no slavish Ken supporter. Yep, I gave £50 to the 'purple' Mayor campaign of 2000 when he ran as an independent and kicked Frank Dobson's cuddly ass back to Camden. But I thought his decision to revert to Labour was a shame as it immediately meant he didn't have full latitude to denounce the many bullshit policies which the Treasury have saddled London with - Tube PPPs, anyone? - and that he would be vulnerable to being tarred with the same brush as an unpopular Blair (or now, Brown) Labour Government.

I was doubly worried by certain features of the Dispatches documentary screened on Channel 4 back in February. It was appallingly biased rubbish for sure, but there were certain legitimate criticisms. It's by no means a good idea for Livingstone to be drinking on the job, for example. (I know loads of MPs do the same, but no-one outside the Guido Fawkes blog and the Oliver Reed appreciation society would seriously endorse this kind of behaviour.) And Livingstone's decision to grant a platform to homophobic Islamic preacher Yusuf al-Qaradawi was, as Peter Tatchell has pointed out, a disgrace.

But, on balance, who would you really rather have? Ken, who has made several mistakes but who may be the last serious left-wing politician left in any kind of major office in this country? Or Boris Johnson, who is either a flaky buffoon, a right-wing extremist, or (likely) both? It's a no-brainer.

If I were based in London my vote would be (1) Sian Berry (2) Ken and I think that, despite the increased discontent over the national government, he will prevail on Thursday. Forget the YouGov polls showing a 10 point lead (or more) for Boris - they're codswallop. I'm a YouGov panelist and I just enter complete garbage to get my 50p a survey. Literally, I enter complete random nonsense in the surveys. Also it's a self-selected sample - you actively apply to join YouGov, you're not approached by pollsters. Additionally, by definition, no-one without internet access is on the YouGov panel. So how the hell can it be representative?

YouGov are being used by the Evening Standard as part of an out-and-out war against Ken Livingstone. This kind of one-sided coverage presents the greatest danger to our free society (such as it is) since the Thatcherite media fascism of the 1980s. Really, during the elections the papers should have to follow a special rule: whenever a negative story is run on one of the mayoral candidates, the paper should have to allow an equal amount of space for reply by the mayoral candidate who is attacked in the story. Conversely, whenever a positive story is run on one of the mayoral candidates, the other mayoral candidates should get a right of reply equal in size to the original story. This rule could also be extended for General Elections. One way or another, rampant political propaganda and bias in our national newspapers has to be stamped out - whether it's pro-Tory, New Labour, or anything else. As Billy Bragg put it,

When you wake up to the fact that your paper is Tory
Just remember there are two sides to every story.