Blair – a deluded, desperate, neoliberal banker

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Blair’s spoken about his new book to the Guardian. There’s much to despise. For example,as the Guardian notes:

Blair's outspoken remarks about the financial crisis and the aftermath of the British general election of 2010 in his book's postscript are likely to have a wide party political impact, especially his caution about any embrace of the view that "the state is back".

As Blair put it:

"The problem, I would say error, was in buying a package which combined deficit spending, heavy regulation, identifying banks as the malfeasants and jettisoning the reinvention of government in favour of the rehabilitation of government. The public understands the difference between the state being forced to intervene to stabilise the market and government back in fashion as a major actor in the economy."

And that in a nutshell summarises the sell out of New Labour.

It was neoliberal, through and through. It betrayed as a result the very core of what Labour did stand for and should stand for.

It was desperate — power at any cost. But that was wrong. Power comes with a responsibility to those who grant it — and New Labour failed in that duty.

Blair’s desperate — to hide his mistakes and the blood on his hands.

And  now he’s a banker. Never forget it. As sell outs go Blair’s is complete. This is not a Labour elder statement speaking. This is a full blown member of the banking community speaking. And of course he blames government for the crisis as a result — even though he ran the government — rather than the banks.

The corruption in the thinking that this represents is astonishing.

People know there was a failure of government under Blair. It was a failure to govern finance. A willingness to connive with it. A desire to be corrupted — to the core of the soul - by it in Blair's case.

And yes people do want government back. They do want a non-neoliberal party, not a third neo-liberal party. And of course Blair does not want that. It would threaten all he aspired to — the crassness of the wealth that seduced him — if the hegemony of neoliberal politics in the UK was challenged.

And that’s exactly the job Labour has to now take on.

Will it?


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