Tuesday 9 November 2010

SIMON HEFFER SAYS WHAT HE REALLY THINKS ABOUT DAVE


Cynical Highlander pointed out this article and indeed linked to it in another post on here, but I think it is worth a post in itself to ensure that it reaches a wider audience. I wrote last week about his appointment of two of his private staff to the Civil Service. I didn’t realise that, in fact that was the tip of the iceberg: It seems he has appointed no fewer than 26 people to the public payroll, on short-term contracts, without advertising their posts. Each one a vanity post.. and this is particularly galling given that he criticized the last government for all their special advisors and promised to do away with that kind of government..

In this comment piece Simon Heffer, in his own highly amusing style, has torn David Cameron to pieces for being as shallow as I have always thought him to be.

I feared when he was elected over David Davis that the Tories had made a huge mistake. Yes he was shiny; yes he was younger than Davies and despite his modernising tone he was more of what the Tories used to be before Heath, Thatcher and major (I nearly said and Blair!) lowered the tone, as it were. (David Davis is a working class Tory who had come up the hard way from an estate, raised, I seem to remember, by a single mum.)

But with Dave, it seemed to me that there was nothing underneath the gloss; the shiny exterior groomed by Eton and oxford for a place at someone’s top table.

But what, I wondered, did Dave stand for? Modernisation of course, but, what did that mean? In opposition it seemed to mean “hug and hoodie” and “call me Dave” (just like he was an ‘ordinary’ person. He even took his tie off sometimes.

But Dave hadn’t been passionate about politics all his life; he was no William Hague, deciding he wanted to be prime minister when he was 6 ... or thereby. At Oxford he eschewed political organisations and chose instead to play tennis for Brasenose and to join the Octagon and Bullingdon clubs, organizations for the well heeled. He appears not even to have been a member of the Oxford Union.

His only real job outside politics was as Director of Corporate Affairs (whatever that is, it’s at director level and seems to have involved PR and spin) for a tv compa
ny.

I’m not sure if anyone has much of a clue what motivates David Cameron, beyond his ambition.

One thing seems self evident. He lacks any kind of conviction; he has no founding principles underpinning his politics, and this lack of foundation is made up for by an overload of....yes that thing he so criticised in the appalling Labour governments of Blair and Brown: Spin.

The piece is relatively long, at some 1500 words, but it well worth a read. It seems to encapsulate what David Cameron is about... and I had wondered, as I’m sure you did..
. added to which it is extremely funny.

18 comments:

  1. He's over in China buying his xmas pressies (cheaper than Harrods) must be his only reason for going. I also hear he and his enterage are wearing poppies, oops big no no in China as they have long memories but then he likes to fly high.

    p.s. BBCode play around and explore how to change to html.

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  2. Disagree with Heffer [and yourself it seems] concerning the differences between Cameron and Davis.

    David Davis is your typical, eurosceptic, Thatcherite Tory. I have precious little in common with him, except the civil liberties agenda he promotes and the lonesome issue of grammar schools.

    David Cameron has displayed MacMillanite/Heathite tendancies with regards to his staunch defence of the NHS from the sharks who would cut it to hell.

    He has tried, though failed largely, to negotiate a neutral position regarding Europe.

    I will always defend David Cameron as leader until he provides me with clear reasons why not to. God knows, there is no one who I'd rather see replace him:

    David Davis? No.
    George Osborne? No.
    Dr Liam Fox? Never.

    Face it, there is no stalking horse that can undermine him. All he has to do is prove his One Nation credentials.

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  3. Ohhhh that's what he's doing there. I thought he was going to give Hu Jintau a good talking to about Human Rights.... You know, the ones that the Coalition is threatening to get rid of in the UK by unsigning to the European Convention, and replacing it with a British Human Rights code... as in...You've got none!

    Oh and thanks for the link. I'm not very good at playing around with computer things as Spook or Subrosa will tell you, but I'll do my best.

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  4. You were spitting feathers at him last week Dean. I agree there's not much to replace him with. I don't particularly want Davis, but the point I was making was he seemed to have real substance, unlike Cameron who was losing horribly until he made that excellent speech. First rate communicator, although it would seem he is surrounded by people who make him look good (at our expense... all 26 of them).


    Liam Fox ARGH, what a plonker! They'd be better off with Thatcher back than him.

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  5. Hey there Conan... Are you still babysitting?

    How did it go on Nov 5 with the dogs? I was thinking about you. It was pretty quiet where i was.

    LOL

    BTW was that meant to be oh dear, or oh Dean?

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  6. Come on Tris, who do you allign yourself with on this one: Cameron or your new best friend, Simon 'Mr Right' Heffer?

    :D Devil, deep blue sea does come to mind ...

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  7. tris,

    Simon Heffer, apart from being ginger, is a right-wing tosser (no offence Dean) whose only contribution I can now recall was for the enforced wearing of ties and bringing back hanging - perhaps the two are related.

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  8. Nevertheless it shows Cameron up for the 2d carboard cut out that he is!

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  9. Dean: I certainly don't align myself with Simon Heffer. But he's right here. Just because someone is right wing, it doesn't mean he's wrong ALL the time.

    I undoubtedly wouldn't like what mr Heffer would want for us, but that doesn't mean I like what we have.

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  10. He he ... Ok John... Heffer is an eejit and ties are the work of the devil (I don't remember him demanding that they be worn...can you enlighten, please?), but you have to admit he's bang on the nail.

    He's one ugly bloke though, isn't he?

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  11. Munguin: I couldn't have put it better myself. Nothing has been thought through (eg, he's made a speech in China saying that the way to economic prosperity is through democracy... so what we have is the prime minister of a country whose economy is balancing between growth and recession, lecturing a country where growth slipped back to 7-8% during the worst of the recession and is now at 10-11%, about how to be successful!?*!?)

    And he's also been urging the Chinese to buy British stuff... ha ha ha. He can't get Brits to buy British stuff, why would he expect the Chinese to?

    Oh right mr Cameron, what is it you people make again... ? Oh yes, we make that too, but better and at 1/4 of the price.

    And this morning I heard that Mr Pickles has broken the law. Of course there is no punishment for him for doing this, just some high counrt judges telling him that he is now effectively a criminal.

    Laughing stock are the two words that come to mind.

    It is only fair at this point to note that the last idiot who was prime minister appeared before some committee in London yesterday and was feted and treated like royalty, despite him being the one who presided over the mess that Cameron and his crew are lamentably underqualified to sort out.

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  12. Tris

    Simon Heffer is prat most times.............but he is right on this one

    Deano

    http://scrapetv.com/News/News%20Pages/Politics/Images/man-being-thrown-under-bus.jpg

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  13. yep agreed Niko....

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  14. Tris

    is that about Heffer or Deano or both???


    btw how does he do those hyperlink

    Just been thrown of the Torydiary third time this week

    The Blitz spirit reigned at CCHQ during this afternoon's protests

    http://conservativehome.blogs.com/thetorydiary/2010/11/the-blitz-spirit-reigned-at-cchq-during-this-afternoons-protests.html

    Yeah i says you lot being the Luftwaffe to our Brave British students.......

    They dont like it up them do they?? ha ha ha

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  15. LOL Thanks Jonesie!

    The whole thing was a bit of a mess from what I acan make out.

    I'll have a look at Conservative Home. They'll be locking the door on you soon if you're not careful. I'm not sure I've ever been there before.

    I'm trying to work out how to do hyperlinks, but failing nastily. Try the link that Cynical Highlander put up (first post). See if you can make it happen.

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  16. Thats BBCode Tris learn that its simple then go resources and pasrte it will do html for you.

    [] bbcode <> html

    I'll try **title**

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  17. your site is too clever as it kept correcting my deliberate mistakes. damm

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