Right. Did you mean to link a different article?
The Guardian
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It’s the irony of this particular author talking about post shame just beginning now.
I've read it. Nothing wrong with it.
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Look at the writer of the article.
As a continental barbarian, I have no idea who that man is
Kill me.Guardian said:
Good article. Thanks for sharing.
He was Tony Blair's spin doctor and a very shrewd political operator. The Labour hard left despise him. I think here they are specifically referring to the Iraq war (as usual) and the deception over it.
Campbell's attempts to reform himself as this calm, jovial sage who is keen to address mental health problems etc is...bizarre to say the least. Considering the type of person he was while working with Blair's government.
The irony being that if Corbyn is ever to have even the vaguest hope of becoming Prime Minister he is desperately in need of someone with a similar skillset to Alistair Campbell to help him with his campaign.
Ah, I'm beginning to see the irony here.
I think I've already told this story before but I remember him giving a speech in Dundee to about 4-500 college students. As you can imagine the majority of us at that age thought he was a prick and were firmly against him when he came out to give his speech. The first couple of sentences he spoke were met with a hall filled with crossed armed, dead stared faces. The next sentence was a self deprecating joke, and there were a few laughs. The next was another self deprecating joke, and by then he had everyone in the room on his side. Looking back it was incredible how easy he had manipulated an entire audience.
The biggest test of this was at the Q&A when one student stood up and asked what everyone wanted to - about his horrible spin during the Iraq war and his (at the time) very strong allegations that he had been involved with the doctoring of evidence. Nearly everyone groaned and a lot of people started shouting at the guy to sit down. Campbell just raised his hands and said something along the lines of "now, now, I understand everyone's hesitance but the gentlemen has a right to an answer. I would love to meet him after the event to discuss this further but I have been asked to only answer questions relating to business development for the Q&A. But I promise that we will talk after the event".
He never met the kid after the event.
Aye, it's a weird one, because as much as I'd probably agree with elements of his political philosophy, in isolation a fair few of the articles he's written for publications are, on the surface, generally quite decent - he makes plenty of fair points about Brexit, and while things have obviously gone awry now he was often fairly tempered (for what you'd expect) in his criticism of Corbyn.
But I remember reading one of his articles on mental health and stress and it just left me with a weird feeling - on the one hand, the arguments he was making were fair, and were clearly drawn from his own experience. But it was difficult to read through the piece without recalling the fact that while involved with government he was cited as someone who was a flat-out bully, a bit of a nasty person, and as a result someone who I'm fairly sure was probably incredibly detrimental to the mental health of plenty of people who were unfortunate to work alongside him. All because he was in a position of power and used that to assert himself to an extent that was probably much greater than necessary.
He's like the poster boy for someone who's clearly a cnut but who you'll probably agree with a lot. The anecdote above probably just about sums him up perfectly.
Ever since their editor started clamping down on user comments being enabled on their articles the site has just become a hotbed for soapbox shouting. It used to have it's fair share of it before but at least they were willing to stand by what they said and accept that some people would want to debate/moan about it. Now it's pretty much just the text equivalent of "I'll say whatever I want and feck you for thinking I'm wrong".
Which they'll then use in their next column to complain about the backlash they received. Its a soul destroyed circle jerk for everyone involved.
Although I think the biggest issue with the opinion pieces is that they rarely say anything of interest. Even the writers I like are pretty much saying the same stuff since 2016.
Just your daily reminder that when it comes to political analysis this newspaper is waste of time
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The Guardian currently has an article about a strong smell of sick at a tube station ON THE FRONT PAGE of it's website. They may as well rename it The London Guardian.
Never really use Kenningon, but Waterloo nearly always reeks of sick when you change lines there.
Old white dudes strike again.Guardian said:
Gold.
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Campbell was just doing his job, he wasn’t as nasty as is made out. I’ve met him before and he’s quite humble and seems to have conscience. Peter Mandelson on the other hand..
Well...yeah, that was kind of the point I'm making. Part of his success comes from the fact that despite his nasty reputation he's good at selling himself and at coming across as rational and reasonable when he wants to.
But by all accounts his spell in New Labour involved him being a bit of a cnut and bully to most people he was around. To suddenly rally against that kind of culture when you were exactly the type of person who perpetuated it in the first place is obviously going to come across as a cynical move from someone looking to reform himself as a wisened sage and calm voice of reason.
I met him with a Dutch colleague of
mine in a hotel lobby in Dumfries of all places about 8 years ago. He had his gloves down and we chatted away for an hour or 3 whilst watching some footy. He was tea total and we had a few beers. When you have a party as broad and diverse as the Labour Party I can imagine it’s tough to get everyone to toe the party line. Like a teacher giving an unruly class a hard time in order to keep authority. But he seemed a decent & moderate sort, certainly nothing like this psychopath Cummings.
Guardian said:
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Awful
Don't mean to be "that" dickhead but his government was responsible for forcing thousands of disabled British citizens off of their benefits through cnuts like Atos and Maximus or whatever the feck kind of aggressive name they had. It also looks like that Tweeter didn't read the whole sentence.
...of Brexit
Just saw that on their website and came on here to post it.Her face looks weird with that haircut.
Oh, sorry. Is that sexist? I guess judging someone based on their physical appearance is not ok, is it Guardian?
If people are swayed by a haircut more than what someone actually does then we're fecked as a society.
Vote Basil Brush in 2020 dammit.
Typical - why are there no female Basil Brushes in government, eh?
Was Basil even male? Not being funny but I never remember them being referred to as him. I mean, sure, I haven't done any research into it whatsoever but that's not going to stop me from shouting out my opinion on the subject.