Monday 24 March 2014

The Judgement of History on Tony Blair

Mr Quango opined last week that the judgement of history will be kinder on Cameron's coalition than the judgement of today.  (Actually, it's the 2015 verdict matters ...)  

But some pretty durable quick-drying cement seems to be forming around Tony Blair's feet of clay, in a lump big enough to drag him under for good.   Did you see Turks and Caicos, the second of David Hare's trilogy?  Beasley, the Blair character, is explicitly colluding and collaborating with the USA on extraordinary rendition + torture, and feathering his nest on an oligarchic scale, using oligarchic means.  

These are hardly new charges, see CiF comments passim: and Hare's not the only proper writer to have had a crack.  The Trial of Tony Blair was off the blocks as early as 2007 and probably counts as the first serious, high-profile pop at the man.  And Robert Harris' The Ghost, also 2007, was obviously an outlet for similar pent-up anger.  (Harris levels as much against Cherie as against Tone, which may be a fair distribution of opprobrium: don't we think her fevered love of the filthy lucre lies behind his ever more shameless venality?)

But Hare is the man to plant these things rather deeper into the collective subliminal.  (Beasley, Beastly ... if the tricks of the trade are good enough for Dickens - and he had some powerful points to make.)  It isn't just historians (or journalists) who have their hands on the Big Pen of History; and the very fact that 100 years from now people will be making their historical inferences based in part on the contemporary cultural landscape makes it fairly certain that heavyweight Hare's case for the prosecution will inform the Judgement.  Heavens, how Blair is hated.

ND    

19 comments:

Jan said...

He is a very slippery customer and in my opinion has literally got away with murder whilst at the same time professing to have found God in a big way and in his messianic fervour believes he is doing/has done God's work. The reality is that he has royally feathered his own nest on the backs of many innocents.

MorristheMiner said...

He always says history swill be his judge. That's not good enough.
A judge should be his judge.

Although I strongly suspect he would get off any charges.

DtP said...

Cameron's not helped by kicking the Chilcott Inquiry into the long grass - can't have the plebs knowing that it was all 'planned' on the back of a fag packet.

I guess that comes back to many of our conversations here that the Tories just aren't very good at politics - they could totally shaft Labour but as with GCHQ, this Health Care data transfer etc - they're so very similar in their authoritarianism that it makes not one jot of difference.

dearieme said...

"Heavens, how Blair is hated."

A referendum on the return of hanging would be won easily as long as its proponents promised to start with Blair.

Jer said...

Cash for honours!

Everyone except the legal system, and apparently the political system can see it...

DJK said...

No surprise that Cameron has postponed Chilcott; the politicos in Westminster have far, far more in common with each other than with the country at large. Of course they stick up for each other.

Come the next election I'll probably vote Labour. At least they're honest about their plans to wreck Britain. Or maybe I'll vote Ukip, as they are the most attractive of the parties. But I can certainly see no reason whatsover to vote for the present lot of Tories.

Re. Blair. He deserves to be in a cell in the Hague, but he'll probably retire surrounded by wealth and honours and in his 90s he'll be revered as a National Treasure.

Blue Eyes said...

Blair has no idea how much feeling there is against him. How do I know? When in the run-up to the 2005 election someone challenged him over the GP appointment target meaning nobody could book an appointment ib advance he simply had no idea that it was a result of his policy. Genuinly no idea.

That is how he sleeps at night.

Sackerson said...

Thing is, he doesn't care. He's mixed so long with the world's cynical winners that he has acquired their contempt for losers.

I fancy he thinks of God as an indulgent housemaster who will protect him from the caning his actions have earned.

But judge not etc.

B. Elzebub. said...

Dh is time will come. Not for a long while.
We did a little deal. I have him wealth and power and status and prestige.

In return he gave me 100,001 souls. I collected the 100,000 up front.

The last one is the final payment. Not due until... Well I can't reveal the Ts&cs. But it's one ill be pleased to collect on when the time comes.

But the contract

Sebastian Weetabix said...

For a long time I have been convinced Blair is deluded to the point of being mentally ill. At the very least he has narcissistic personality disorder and/or megalomania. Perhaps even messiah complex. His wife however is merely a standard issue venal socialist hypocrite.

Leaving all that aside I don't buy the idea he is a war criminal or should be on trial. What about all those dozy bastards in parliament who voted for his war? Only 149 out of our 650 MPs voted against. Anyone with a brain could see the dodgy dossier/45 minute claim was specious bollocks. If Blair is a war criminal so are the 412 other MPs who voted for it.

Ossian said...

"Heavens, how Blair is hated."

The cheerleader was Brown who at least was honest. History will show that he strove to do his best for the country, while being maligned for his efforts by the Blairites - who still infect the Labour party. Nothing less than a complete witch-hunt of these crooks is needed less at the next election Blair/Damien 2 will emerge to lead the country to another reign of kleptocracy.

dearieme said...

"Brown who at least was honest": not quite. His instinct was honest which was why he was so visibly uncomfortable being dishonest. Son of the manse, you see.

Matt said...

Imagine that, in 50 years time, a state funeral, how nauseating.

Nick Drew said...

comparisons with Brown are interesting: being an economic / financial blog we are inclined to be pretty scathing about him, but at least he wasn't a war-crim candidate, and he may indeed be in the 'history will be kinder' category

(he does however have some truly ghastly personal failings ...)

Bill Quango MP said...

Can't see history being kinder to Brown.

Except at the point where the great ditherer was convinced by the treasury that if he did not act, it was all over. After that there was no stopping his involvement and bailing of the economy. With mixed results.

When he claims to have saved the banks, he is not wrong.
But in the way that one of those fireman who develop such a compulsion to put out fires they set alight buildings for a call out.

Anonymous said...

They were neo-cons.
Same policies as Bushes USA.
Mass immigration - check
debt fueled boom - check
banker elite running riot - check
warmongering aboard - check
reduction in democracy at home with huge increases in surveillance state - check.

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