Burhan Wazir (Mother Jones): Blair's Last Stand?

[Jack Rabbit]

From Mother Jones
Dated Wednesday April 13

Blair's Last Stand?
Tony Blair has lost the trust of the British public. He’ll probably win a third term, but don’t expect him to see it through.
By Burhan Wazir

Politicians often become victims of their own success--or, better yet, mythology. Take British Prime Minister Tony Blair. He once seemed invincible, his two election victories underpinned by large majorities in Britain's legislature; his New Labour project promising a governing vision that transcended the worn-out ideologies of the 20th century; his youth, vigor and optimism seeming to embody a confident nation on the rise after years of decline and self-doubt.

Eight years later, and less than a month away from a third general election, Blair, now visibly older, his reputation in tatters, distrusted by a majority of voters, is no longer unassailable. Far from it. He is widely seen--even by members of his own Labour party--as out of touch with popular sentiment. History will no doubt view Blair's decision, in 2003, throw in his lot with George W. Bush and support the US invasion of Iraq, as the moment when he lost the British public, and there's something to that. But, in truth, aloofness, moral self-certainty, and high-handedness have always been key to Blair's personality. Only now, the public seems to have had enough.

In the summer of 2001, I traveled with Blair as he campaigned for re-election in the once-industrial city of Birmingham, in the central belt of England. As his cavalcade of buses pulled into a local housing project, a small group of mothers stood demonstrating against recent local government cuts. Blair’s entourage, with all the bombast of a stadium rock show, swept past the group. "He won’t talk to us," said one. "Blair doesn’t like talking to people who disagree with him."

Four years later, after two wars, most controversially Iraq in 2003, less so Afghanistan, Blair's intransigence in the face of disapproval has become the key note of his second term. Immensely unpopular because of his support of the war in Iraq, pilloried as a poodle for his friendship with Bush, he is seen by the majority of the British electorate as having led the country to war on false pretenses. "The problem is I can apologize for the information being wrong," he told Labour party delegates at last September’s party conference in the seaside town of Brighton. "But I can never apologize, sincerely at least, for removing Saddam. The world is a better place with Saddam in prison." "Blair’s legacy has been demonstrably altered by his role in the war in Iraq," says historian Eric Hobsbawm. "After Iraq, he became synonymous with terms like deceit, spin and presentation. The trust that had once been placed in him vanished after he sided with President Bush against the Europe."

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