Friday 6 March 2009

The Leadership Race


Just watched BBC's "Margaret." Not at all bad. Very good actors and script, and for once Mrs T {Lindsey Duncan} was portrayed as odd rather than mad. There isn't much new, but its a good piece of drama. Political Betting even have a piece on Could This Happen To Gordon?
What I had forgotten was how many big Tory beasts there were, and how the unlikeliest of them got the job.

Howe, Lawson, Heseltine, Ridley, Fowler, King, Baker, Tebbit, Hurd, Patten, Parkinson, Lilley, Portillo, Clarke, Redwood..

John Major was the unlikeliest in the public's mind anyway.At the time I hadn't even noticed that he had been chancellor. So to the weekend fun.

A} Who will run for the labour leadership in 2010. {or sooner}
B} Who will be the eventual winner.
Harriet Harman
Ed Balls
Alistair Darling
David Miliband
Jack Straw
Jacqui Smith
John Hutton
Hilary Benn
Alan Johnson
Douglas Alexander
James Purnell
Geoff Hoon
Hazel Blears
Andy Burnham
John Denham
Yvette Cooper
Jon Cruddas

Or any other hopefuls you care to nominate. Even for fun.. like John Prescott or Tom Harris or Mr Draper.

12 comments:

  1. Good lord. That is as unprepossessing a list of incompetents as one could imagine.

    Leadership material? I don't think so.

    It will have to be Ken Livingstone, coming in from the blind side...

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  2. I liked the way they cast Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars as Dennis.

    Every time he sat down and comforted her I found myself thinking "Don't listen to him Maggie, he's a Sith Lord."

    Back on topic and they'll vote in a lefty like Cruddas on a 'change' agenda.

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  3. Incitatus, or if he is not available, Pete (Fly Me From Heathrow) Mandelson.

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  4. I am 100% with Elby, it has long been my belief that Ken Livingstone will find a way to run

    he is a very determined, ludicrously ambitious and strategically-minded operator who has thought of nothing else for 30 years

    he will run on a complicated "proven vote-winner / proven radical / no-one-else-wants-the-poison-chalice ticket"

    he is working out all the details as we speak (and has been for months)

    Mandelson will pull all the kingmaker strings (and he'll have a little quid pro quo in mind)

    watch for a London-area by-election ...

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  5. What Elby and ND said. Livingstone has an enormously loyal and extensive machine behind him (and us) both within and outside of the Party. He'll hit the same problems as John McDonnell though, unless there's Party fission.

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  6. Doesn't Ken have to be an MP to be leader. I'm sure Brent would elect him, but he has to stand and win, before the leadership election.
    Or are we proposing a sort of Lord Mandelsdon type fix..
    PM from the Lords, but appointed there by whom? Brown?

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  7. I have posted some pictures to help people make up their minds here.

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  8. Dont care, whoever wins it they will be as invisible as Micheal Barrymore, the Tories will dine out on Gordons madness for a decade or two.

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  9. Anonymous9:52 pm

    Change???? As the Victorian judge said, "Good God, are things not bad enough as it is?"

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  10. Anonymous5:17 am

    Isn't The Newt pissed as a Ken?

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  11. Anonymous10:42 am

    Harman will be the knife wielder, only it will be poison, slowly dripping into the media every week until Gordon succumbs.

    Harman as Heseltine, the left wing candidate
    David Miliband as Portillo, the Blairite candidate.
    Ed Balls as Redwood, the Brown faction.
    James Purnell as the unlikely candidate aka Hurd.
    Jon Cruddas as the grass roots choice
    Winner .. Ed Miliband sneaks in quietly like Major

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  12. you should revise the list as some of those wouldn't keep their seats

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