"Don't blame the British people.We know the islands belong to you"

[Tangled up in Blue]

Kinnock was a prequel for what we got with Blair, a total hypocrite. John Smith and Michael Foot, I believe, would have made a decent attempt at being PM but I think Kinnock would have been awful, and his wife every bit as bad as Blair's.

Kinnock was(and remains)a genuine socialist.That's something Blair never was.
I agree with you about John Smith.I see him as Labour's great lost leader.Foot was a thoroughly decent man and a great Parliamentarian,who probably would have been a disaster as PM.

 

[canveyshrimper]

Au contraire,along with Smith and Michael Foot(plus Dennis Healey)he would have made a great PM.You can't run against the Murdoch press in the UK,though.

John Smith had he lived would almost certainly have won in 1997.
Even Labour didn't trust Healey as leader when he stood against sunny Jim Callaghan.

As for Foot in the words of political commentators about the Labour Manifesto of 1983, it was the longest suicide note in history. As for Kinnock his ill judged triumphalist appearance at the Sheffield rally in 1992 did for him not the Murdoch press, he made himself look utterly stupid. Besides which he was never able to keep his temper, he was consistenly out debated by Thatcher & Major at PMQ's.

 

[Neil_F]

I've never understood this notion that Smith would have made a good PM. He was a good Commons performer but his economic policies were lunacy: tax and spend, industrial policies and even more union power. It was also Smith that penned the shadow budget that cost Labour the 1992 election with the threat of substantial tax rises.

I think he would have been a disaster and the country would be in an even worse crippling debt problem than it is now.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

John Smith had he lived would almost certainly have won in 1997.
Even Labour didn't trust Healey as leader when he stood against sunny Jim Callaghan.

As for Foot in the words of political commentators about the Labour Manifesto of 1983, it was the longest suicide note in history. As for Kinnock his ill judged triumphalist appearance at the Sheffield rally in 1992 did for him not the Murdoch press, he made himself look utterly stupid. Besides which he was never able to keep his temper, he was consistenly out debated by Thatcher & Major at PMQ's.

That remark,was of course made by Gerrald Kaufman,who's still alive and well on Labour's backbenches.I saw him ask an extremely pertinent question, about one of his constituents, to Cameron in PMQT last Wednesday.
Btw,it was the Sun wot done for Kinnock.Sheffield was just a sideshow.:winking:

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

I've never understood this notion that Smith would have made a good PM. He was a good Commons performer but his economic policies were lunacy: tax and spend, industrial policies and even more union power. It was also Smith that penned the shadow budget that cost Labour the 1992 election with the threat of substantial tax rises.

I think he would have been a disaster and the country would be in an even worse crippling debt problem than it is now.

Smith was Old Labour.If he hadn't died when he did, maybe the nonsense that is/was New Labour, would never have happened.

 

[steveo]

I personally would have no qualms whatsoever about selling the 3,000 Falkland islanders down the river.FWIW,I'm no liberal(guilt-ridden or otherwise).

That's pretty poor Barna, but to be expected from someone who has deserted his home country in search of making a few Pesetas.

 

[canveyshrimper]

I've never understood this notion that Smith would have made a good PM. He was a good Commons performer but his economic policies were lunacy: tax and spend, industrial policies and even more union power. It was also Smith that penned the shadow budget that cost Labour the 1992 election with the threat of substantial tax rises.

I think he would have been a disaster and the country would be in an even worse crippling debt problem than it is now.

That may not have been overall a bad thing. I am certain that Smith would have won in 1997, but with a lower majority than Blair. Brown was also Smith's annointed one and we now know what an utter disaster Prudence was. Apart from saving the world that is. :unsure::unsure:

That remark,was of course made by Gerrald Kaufman,who's still alive and well on Labour's backbenches.I saw him ask an extremely pertinent question, about one of his constituents, to Cameron in PMQT last Wednesday.
Btw,it was the Sun wot done for Kinnock.Sheffield was just a sideshow.:winking:

I'm sorry but the press Murdoch or otherwise do not have as much influence as those on the left like to think, particularly when Kinnock was an obvious lightweight, short tempered buffoon. Labour supporters will vote Labour irrespective of wot The Sun says, they'll vote that way because Labour are the party of the working man doncha know :unsure: besides they couldn't vote for those nastyTories, but possibly could make a protest vote to the Lib Dems after all they've no chance of forming a Government.

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

So what is your threshold? 100k? 200k? If Norway invaded the Shetlands would you be of the same opinion?

The simple fact is that the Falklands are British because the inhabitants wish to remain so. I personally don't think we should sell them down the river to an economic basket case looking for a distraction so that some guilt ridden liberalssocialists can feel better about Britain's colonial past.

Please. You're giving liberals a bad name.

Cricko made a good point about the FalklandsScotland costing us 80 [add in extra 0s here] million a year.IMO,that's only viable if we're going to get a speedy return on the oil and mineral reserves said to be available in the vicinity of the Falklands.
I personally would have no qualms whatsoever about selling the 35,000,000 Falkland islandersdrunken skirt wearers down the river.FWIW,I'm no liberal(guilt-ridden or otherwise).

I've never understood this notion that Smith would have made a good PM. He was a good Commons performer but his economic policies were lunacy: tax and spend, industrial policies and even more union power. It was also Smith that penned the shadow budget that cost Labour the 1992 election with the threat of substantial tax rises.

I think he would have been a disaster and the country would be in an even worse crippling debt problem than it is now.

It's the dead pop star routine.

No-one was interested in buying their records until they died.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

That's pretty poor Barna, but to be expected from someone who has deserted his home country in search of making a few Pesetas.

Stevo,
I think you'll find that Spain has been in the Euro for the last 10 years.:winking:
(As it happens,I was working in France at the time the Falklands war broke out,and opposed it then.So at least I'm consistent).

 

[GrumpyBlue]

Usually think Morrissey is a tosser - but I agree with him this time :stunned:

 

[Neil_F]

Stevo,
I think you'll find that Spain has been in the Euro for the last 10 years.:winking:
(As it happens,I was working in France at the time the Falklands war broke out,and opposed it then.So at least I'm consistent).

I really don't understand this position. Are you honestly saying that Britain shouldn't defend its sovereign territory when invaded? Surely the principle applies as an absolute?

 

[Swiss Tony]

I too think Morrissey is a tosser,and still do,how can anyone take that idiot serious.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

I too think Morrissey is a tosser,and still do,how can anyone take that idiot serious.

He wrote(and sang)some great choons with The Smiths.He's also quite brave(if possibly misguided).I remember seeing him here back in the '80's with The Smiths.On stage he said something about "We've seen your national sport and we don't like it," before launching into Meat is Murder.He was obviously referring to bullfighting.Presumably, nobody had told him that bullfighting has never been that big in Catalonia,(and was in fact abolished last year).Full marks to him for trying, though around me, not many people understood what he was on about.:winking:

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

I really don't understand this position. Are you honestly saying that Britain shouldn't defend its sovereign territory when invaded? Surely the principle applies as an absolute?

I think we're in a new ballgame now,which has rather more(or at least as much) to do with oil,than anything else.

 

[Neil_F]

I think we're in a new ballgame now,which has rather more(or at least as much) to do with oil,than anything else.

That doesn't answer my question. The Falklands were originally defended before the discovery (potential) mineral wealth yet you opposed that. My question still stands: are you saying that Britain shouldn't defend its sovereign territory if invaded?

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

That doesn't answer my question. The Falklands were originally defended before the discovery (potential) mineral wealth yet you opposed that. My question still stands: are you saying that Britain shouldn't defend its sovereign territory if invaded?

It is,I believe, a British Protectorate,hardly sovereign territory at all in fact.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

:



I'm sorry but the press Murdoch or otherwise do not have as much influence as those on the left like to think, particularly when Kinnock was an obvious lightweight, short tempered buffoon. Labour supporters will vote Labour irrespective of wot The Sun says, they'll vote that way because Labour are the party of the working man doncha know :unsure: besides they couldn't vote for those nastyTories, but possibly could make a protest vote to the Lib Dems after all they've no chance of forming a Government.

It wasn't only the left,who've snuggled up to the Murdoch press.Tory PM's and leaders since Thatcher,right up to and including Cameron, have done so too.Hopefully,in the light of recent events,Murdoch's power over the British political system will have been vastly diminished-we'll see in 2015.
I'm sure you're familiar with the concept of The Working Class Tory,wherebye it's been estimated, that up to one third of working class voters, regularly vote Tory.

 

[Neil_F]

It is,I believe, a British Protectorate,hardly sovereign territory at all in fact.

You still aren't answering the question. You said earlier that you wouldn't be prepared to defend the residents of the Falklands and I've asked repeatedly if that applies to other British citizens and you won't answer.

 

[canveyshrimper]

It is,I believe, a British Protectorate,hardly sovereign territory at all in fact.

A UK Overseas Territory, I believe.

 

[McNasty]

It is,I believe, a British Protectorate,hardly sovereign territory at all in fact.

If Argentina invaded Spain would you stay and fight or be on the first bus to the safety of the UK ?