Exit Blair, enter Brown

As scheduled, Gordon Brown has taken over as leader of the United Kingdom. He immediately promised change in British politics — a promise we can only hope he can keep (not just in rhetoric). He has already spoken with a number of world leaders; US President Bush said he's looking forward to "working closely" with Brown government — hopefully not nearly as closely as he worked with Blair. Brown is quite the intellectual, but he will have to make up for some of his weak points, especially in comparison to his charismatic predecessor.

Meanwhile, outgoing PM Tony Blair is to become a Middle East envoy for the Diplomatic Quartet consisting of the US, EU, UN, and Russia. Considering all the troubles of the Mid-East — Israel/Palestine, the growth of terrorism, Lebanon, Iraq's civil war, Iran's nuclear program — Blair has quite a job ahead of him. Just hours after he resigned as UK prime minister... I guess he cannot resist working with Bush on, um, helping the Middle East. The White House is sad the "special relationship" between leaders Bush and Blair has effectively come to a close. Funny how America mourns the lost of the British leader as the UK is, for the most part, glad he's leaving.

technorati tags: UK, britain, united+kingdom, politics, news, bush, blair, brown, gordon+brown, tony+blair, prime+minister, middle-east

Blair's last day

Tomorrow, 27 June, will be the day Gordon Brown takes office as the 52nd Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He will be asked by the Queen to form a government tomorrow. Brown is currently Blair's chancellor of the exchequer and fellow Labour MP, and has been so since Blair has been Britain's leader.

Blair handed over the party leadership to Brown a few days ago (24 June) following his promise at the Labour Party conference last fall he would step down as party leader and prime minister before the next conference. He announced his departure in May. Since the announcement there's been much analysis in retrospect of the 10 years Tony Blair, the current prime minister, has been in power.

Considering the important position he currently fills and the even more important one he will have tomorrow, relatively little is known of Gordon Brown. We know he was actually supposed to become prime minister if Labour won the 1997 election, which it did, but the charismatic Tony Blair ended up getting the gold. Brown has been waiting years for the top job — and less than 24 hours it will be his.

I personally am a bit excited not only because a change in leadership means a change in politics (i.e. more news coverage and more blog posts), but mainly due to the 'war on terror' and fiasco in Iraq Blair has lost his edge. His best accomplishments were helping the economy, reducing poverty, increasing education, lowering crime, continuing the good policies of his Conservative predecessor John Major on making peace in Northern Ireland and achieving that peace, including with the IRA, and helping the NHS — though that was one of his failures too. Blair's worst characteristics were his civil liberties-restricting anti-terror policies and following the necon Bush administration into Iraq.

Expect Brown to distance himself from George Bush. The White House will likely feel the sting of a very different relationship with its English-speaking ally across the Atlantic. However on Iraq Brown is expected to roughly maintain the status quo. A cautious person from what I've read, he will not want to run the risk of pulling UK troops out immediately and being blamed for making the conflict there worse. He has spoken much on Africa and poverty, being at the forefront of aid and debt initiatives.

Brown shares the general viewpoint of many fellow politicians on the threat of global warming — remember he was the one who commissioned the Stern report on the economic impact of climate change. He is a calculated, practical man and has shown to be tough on terrorism — is that good or bad? — and very interested in international affairs, such as the Darfur genocide in Sudan and the Israel-Palestine conflict. We can guess he'll be more 'liberal' than Blair foreign policy wise, but to what extent is not really known.

Here are some links useful for learning more about the PM-in-waiting:
Wikipedia article
BBC News article on his known foreign policy views
Prospect article (year-old) on Brown's foreign policy
Profile by The Economist
10 Downing Street (PM's office) homepage
Guardian Unlimited profile
BBC News profile

And here's some good news to start Brown off on a positive note tomorrow:

Britain's new prime minister, Gordon Brown, will take office this week with his Labour Party ahead of its Conservative rivals for the first time in eight months [i.e. since October], a [Ipsos-Mori] poll showed today.

The poll, in the Observer newspaper, put support for Labour at 39 per cent and the Conservatives at 36 per cent.

Forty per cent of voters believed Brown would make a more capable prime minister, compared to just 22 per cent who prefer his Conservative rival David Cameron.

Still, an early election might not be the best of ideas for Brown. Spring 2009 is the expected time of the next general election. The Conservatives have been doing well for a while now, and it's only recently that the political pendulum appears to have swung in the way of Labor. The Liberal Democrats seem to be proving more stubborn towards Brown than the Tories, demanding a snap election so that Brown can prove himself legitimate.

So who will Brown be governing with? Justice Minister Harriet Harman was elected deputy party leader on Sunday in a surprising win of 1% over Alan Johnston. From the BBC Question Time deputy leadership debate I watched, she seemed a reasonable candidate. She strongly disagrees with Blair's Iraq policies as well as his media spin — something both he and his American counterpart Bush have mastered. Even during the Blair-Brown transition has the government been accused of burying stories. Brown has expressed hopes for a cross-party cabinet, although a Lib Dem has already turned him down after being offered the position of N Ireland minister.

Blair sets date for departure

British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced he will leave office on 27 June.

He acknowledged his government had not always lived up to high expectations but said he had been very lucky to lead "the greatest nation on earth".

He will stay on in Downing Street until the Labour Party elects a new leader - widely expected to be Gordon Brown.

In an emotional speech, Mr Blair said he had been prime minister for 10 years which was "long enough" for the country and himself.

He thanked the British people for their support and apologised for when "I have fallen short".

(See also speech in full.)

Blair has done a lot of good, Northern Ireland and living standards come to mind, but also a lot of bad, namely by buddying up with the Bush administration in its 'war on terror' and passing questionable anti-terror laws as well as entering the Iraq war. One thing arguably good or bad was his reforming of the Labour Party.

Blair is a charismatic, intelligent leader, who seems to believe what he enacts. The UK's National Health Service has not been made much better, one of the major domestic hot topics that has faced the Blair occupation of No. 10 this past decade. The economy is doing better and education has seen some noticeable changes. He brought transparent, democratic government initiatives such as the Prime Minister's Questions, which I personally like immensely, but Blair also brought about some civil liberties crushing anti-terror reforms following the attacks on 9/11 and 7/7.

Labour has suffered defeat lately in local elections, especially in those of Scotland — a rebuke to the Blarite leadership? The fact of the matter is he's needed to leave for a while now, and his announcement today comes as no surprise.

As historians point out, Tony Blair has political savvy, he did work towards ridding Afghanistan of al-Qaeda, but he also brought the power of the PM to a "presidential" level.

What happens next?

Current Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown is likely to take over.

These days Mr Brown likes to talk about Britishness, which he sees as the fount of shared values that can bind society together. It often sounds a bit stilted. But of one thing Mr Brown is convinced: like him, the British care passionately about fairness. If he is right, and if he can find the words to express it (both big ifs), the voters may in time decide that there is something in this strange, clumsy, powerful champion of social justice that they find, if not likeable, at least admirable.

How long he will last is another question, but he is certainly qualified. Blair finally endorced Brown earlier this month for the job, and no serious contenders within Labour seem to have arisen.

Brown is an interesting man nonetheless. For one thing he is Scottish, which worries some English nationalists and xenophobes.

The not-so-conservative David Cameron, Conservative Party leader, is the greatest threat to Brown. On one hand he does not want to call a general election so soon (the last one was in 2005; they are generally five or so years apart), and by the way Labour is going Brown would probably loose. On the other hand he doesn't want people to look at him as a dictatorial-like successor to Blair, especially as the conservative media has labeled him "Stalinist" after his latest budget.

Rightfully, Blair has admitted the "blow-back" from Iraq. There has also been blowback at home from his Middle East excursions. Hopefully Brown will keep a more independent, yet international and liberal/centrist, foreign policy.

Farewell Tony. The end of the Blairite New Labour era — with all its ups and downs — is nearing. As Labour is down in the polls and the UK faces a number of important issues, a new, strong political leader is needed. Hopefully Brown will be able to step up to the plate. He has waited long enough.

technorati tags: tony+blair, downing+street, gordon+brown, david+cameron, labour+party, united+kingdom, blair+PM+resignation, prime+minister, news, iraq

Blair reduces UK Iraq force

BBC News:

Prime Minister Tony Blair has told MPs that 1,600 British troops will return from Iraq within the next few months.
He said the 7,100 serving troops would be cut to 5,500 soon, with hopes that 500 more will leave by late summer.

Remaining troops will stay into 2008, to give back-up if necessary and secure borders, but the Iraqis would "write the next chapter" in Basra's history.

Source: BBC
There are approximately 132,000 US personnel currently in Iraq accounting for more than 90% of the occupying force

Iraq is divided into 5 main military zones. The US controls the north and west of the country, as well as Baghdad

The Centre-South is run Polish forces, but US troops lead any major operations against insurgents in this area

The UK's 7,100 soldiers are based in the South East zone. Three provinces - Muthanna, al-Najaf and Dhi Qar are now under provisional Iraqi control. Basra and Maysan provinces are expected to follow suit in the first half of 2007

Though some seemed surprised by this move, the cut in Basra and southern Iraq forces was inevitable as planned.

Does Blair truly believe in an Iraq exit or reduction as strategically positive, or is he just trying to salvage his legacy and New Labour movement tarnished by his later foreign policy debacles?

Blair is expected to step down from his post as prime minister by mid-summer this year. He has held the position for a decade, following a sweeping victory for Labour in 1997. There are plenty of people — including myself — ready for his departure.

Newsweek has an exclusive 'exit interview' of Blair, though the article is written in a decidedly pro-Blair bias. One thing that peeved me was how the article stated Blair was

Perhaps more than any British post-World War leader, save Margaret Thatcher, Blair personified his era, transforming the nation's politics and ushering in unrivaled prosperity.

Does the writer even know about a man named Clement Attlee? Attlee transformed Britain following their loss of their superpower status and the end of the British Empire. Thatcher's affect on the nation have yet to be seen as positive.

technorati tags: tony+blair, uk+troops, britain, iraq, politics, thatcher, blair, prime+minister,

Nothing new here...

With Iran looking — in some American neocon pundit's and policymakers' eyes — like the next Iraq, how does it play out in British politics.

Military action against Iran is not being discussed, but there is 'increasing alarm' about that state's actions among the international community, Prime Minister Tony Blair said.

'Nobody is talking about military intervention in respect of Iran,' Blair told MPs on a key parliamentary committee today.

However, he warned that 'you can't take any option off the table'.

I guess it is hard to take an option off the table when everyone around you is screaming for you to take it off the table, isn't it? Politicians both in the United States and the UK are being pressured and pressuring their peers to not even think about a preemptive attack on Iran. (However, how can Blair be talking about military intervention in Iran if 'nobody is talking about' it?)

Nothing too new here either.
American troops could start leaving Iraq by the end of this year if the plan to suppress sectarian violence with reinforcements in Baghdad is successful, Robert Gates, the secretary of defense, said today.

Testifying before the Senate Armed Forces Committee, Mr. Gates came under intense questioning by Senator Robert Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia.

“How much longer do you think we are going to be in Iraq before we start to bring our people home?” Senator Byrd asked over and over again.

Mr. Gates was reluctant at first to make a prediction, but under pressure said that if the Baghdad operation is successful and the Iraqis “establish leadership” the United States could “begin to draw down troops later this year.”

However, even if the bulk of American forces begin to head home, Mr. Gates said the United States would have to maintain a military presence in Iraq “for years.” He declined to specify how large a force would be required, but said it would be “a fraction of what we have there now.”
The 'we will stand down when the Iraqis stand up' is old rhetoric, but this latest testimony is a more promising spin on that existing policy.

technorati tags: iran, iraq, tony+blair, robert+gates, united+states, news, politics, byrd

Blair told to leave (again); Sarkozy in hot water (again)

Opposition leader David Cameron has told British Prime Minister Tony Blair it is really time for him to step down; I don't disagree.

David Cameron has told Tony Blair that it is in the "national interest" for him to quit now as prime minister.

Blair is expected so step down later this year.

French residential hopeful and Interior Secretary Nicolas Sarkozy has been attacked for going out of his way, to extraordinary lengths in fact, to recover an item of his son's: a scooter. Amazing.

France's Interior Minister and presidential contender Nicolas Sarkozy has been accused of abusing police powers to recover his son's scooter.

A scooter? All for a scooter Sarkozy has once again damaged his political credit. He used three DNA tests in his attempts to get the toy.

Just recently Sarkozy was accused of using the secret police to spy on his political rival's adviser. As readers already know, I dislike Sarkozy and dismiss him as a xenophobe at a time when that is something neither Europe nor North America needs. Xenophobia in a place with so much emigration can mean racism, often turning into hate and strife already seen in France a couple summers ago with minority rioting.

technorati tags: france, UK, britain, david+cameron, nicolas+sarkozy, tony+blair, politics, news

Inside the WEF's Davos 2007

Some of the worlds most powerful and recognizable figures have been meeting in Davos, Switzerland over this past week discussing everything from climate change to currencies. Davos 2007 is a meeting of the World Economic Forum. At first glance it may just sound like a meeting of economists, albeit at one of the nicest ski resort areas on earth. When one takes a closer look one sees a conference with influence that can measure on a massive scale. The likes of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, rock star/activist Bono, United States' Sen. John McCain, the globally influential Google's Chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt, Microsoft head Bill Gates, US Sen. John Kerry, and German leader Angela Merkel are all in attendance at the WEF meeting, and are joined by non-Western dignitaries such as the Chinese economic minister in addition to Brazil’s re-elected President ‘Lula’ de Silva. I find it amazing how many blogs are talking about Davos, and how many of them are newsblogs not run by individuals, but by news organizations like the BBC, CNN Money, The Economist, The Guardian, Comment is Free, Newsweek, Huffington Post, Financial Times, and the International Herald Tribune, and the New York Times. Le Monde (translated) and the Wall Street Journal have also joined the party. Davos ’07, like the World Economic Forum itself, is obviously elite — which is why there has been opposition to it, just like there is opposition to the G8, WTO, and other governmental and economic conferences.

The World Economic Forum's meeting may now be over, but its reverberations still feel the news atmosphere and international zeitgeist. I said earlier in this post, climate change seems to be a topic on everyone’s mind at Davos. Global warming will have not only a disastrous human and environmental impact, but obviously an economic impact too — as the Stern Review confirmed. If precautions are to be taken against things like greenhouse gasses, it would be better for those precautions to be taken now than later, when they would be even more costly. If I was a political leader in country X, it would be more economically and otherwise effective to work to prevent the effects of human-caused climate change sooner rather than later; the cost — in money and lives — would be all the more higher the longer I wait. That being said I’d look for dampers on global warming sooner rather than later. Let’s say country Y waited 40 years until they took any action their climate change battle. By then the environmental consequences have a massive malevolent potential and the cost of working to save what has been lost by global warming and work against the problem at its core would be more expensive than if that country had done it 40 years prior.

One major story relating to Davos on the climate change front. BBC News:

UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has told the World Economic Forum a major breakthrough on long-term climate change goals could be close.

Germany is taking center stage in the push for moderate globalization and has been a major player in European and world politics lately. Angela Merkel, the center-right German chancellor, has done well at balancing all the different forces of globalization — from human conflict and terrorism to climate change — in her recent agenda. Another international relations topic revealed more at Davos is that the United States is not nearly as ‘all powerful’ as it used to be, at least in regards to global economics. There’s a great IHT opinion piece on the matter.

This year's theme at the World Economic Forum annual meeting here — "the shifting power equation" — confirms the view of many participants that power is draining away from the United States to multiple centers as countries from Brazil to China move beyond "emerging" market status to establish themselves as major players on the world scene.
…
Far from some kind of conspiracy of the global elite plotting the future as they whisk down the Alpine slopes, Davos is in fact a back-end barometer of their evolving worldview. It does not break new ground but consolidates opinion. It does not generate new trends but codifies them into conventional wisdom. That is its power and its importance.

There is also hope for (BBC News) what is called the Doha round (The Guardian) of trade talks between the developed and developing nations. The Doha round ended without agreement earlier in 2006 and was seen as a failure of both sides of the developed/developing fringe. Skepticism should still be used for these trade talks, but if Doha does gain progress from the recent push at Davos, one may hope a positive outcome is reached. Some have gone far enough to say 2007 is going to be a ‘good’ year (BBC News) for economies in general. (As you can tell from the abundance of linking to the BBC News site, there is a lot of good Davos news there as well as at the afore-linked blogs and news websites.)


Updated with more links to sites covering Davos '07.

technorati tags: trade, economics, blair, merkel, germany, uinited+states, davos, doha, world, economic, forum, economics, world, news, in+the+news, current, politics, world+trade, globalization, climate+change, global+warming, wef, davos+2007

Blair on defense and isolationism

The fine line between defense and humanitarianism and interventionism — and excessive hawkishness... [AP/CNN:]

Prime Minister Tony Blair said Friday that Britain's influence on the world stage and ability to right global wrongs depends on active engagement and the country cannot defend itself from terrorism by retreating into isolationism.

He said the public must see operations in places like Iraq and Afghanistan as a "necessary engagement" to protect security and advance British interests globally.

Tony Blair has already admitted Iraq is a disaster, and his people are more adamantly against the mission in Iraq than those in the United States, why must Blair continue the rhetoric?

Defending from modern terrorism has nothing to do with Iraq, or it did have nothing until Iraq was invaded over three years ago by a United States-led coalition. Now new terrorism — global and Middle East-centered — has been created and there is a rallying cry for Islamic extremists because of the horrible Iraq situation ('Fight against the Western menace', whether in Iraq or Times Square).

One does not have to defend one's self by being preemptive and overaggressive, especially if one is a nation-state and if the thing they are defending themselves from is modern terrorism. Islamic extremism is not something you can just shoot and wait for it to die; ideals like Islamic extremism are a cultural threat and can spread like a virus if they are provoked and have a rallying cry, like the Nazis against the Jews and Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez against the 'American imperial menace'.

Also, since when were the Brits, or anyone, for that matter, made world police? "Right global wrongs"? Going with the lapdog metaphor, I guess Blair is the deputy to Bush's sheriff and they both are in a Clint Eastwood-style Wild West fighting Indians or something like that. (Learning from history is key — especially when starting a war. The fact that Bush and Blair are in a Clint Eastwood western shows that they have no grip on history, like the supposedly-good cowboys of the Wild West, but instead pertaining to the more fragile and virulent Middle East.) However, Tony Blair is still not as bad a politician and — in my opinion — person as George W. Bush, who has a more extreme case of "us versus them" syndrome.

I'll cut some slack for the mission in Afghanistan, but none for Iraq and the reasoning behind that war. Blair, don't equate — like your friend across the Atlantic — Iraq with the 9/11 and 7/7 terror attacks, it certainly will not help your already-botched legacy as the first Labour PM since before Thatcher. Man, I cannot wait for this guy to step down!


Song stuck in my head right now: "Fake Plastic Trees" by Radiohead.

technorati tags: blair, tony+blair, politics, news, isolationism, interventionism, defense, foreign+policy, international+relations, bush, iraq, afghanistan, united+kingdom, UK, terrorism, war+on+terror, current

When will we be rid of Tony Blair?

There was a good analysis (BBC) of British politics the other day relating to Tony Blair.

Whatever else happens in 2007 one thing seems certain, at some point Britain will have a new prime minister - even two, if David Cameron gets his way.

The single biggest political event of the year will almost certainly be the retirement of Tony Blair and the selection of his replacement.

And today we read more (Guardian) about the Blair hopefully soon-to-be-over leadership, and his most likely successor, UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown.

Tony Blair's silence over the manner of Saddam Hussein's execution until he faces questions in parliament on Wednesday was developing into a test of his personal authority last night.

Downing Street was bounced into issuing a statement criticising the execution as "wrong and unacceptable" yesterday to defend the prime minister's decision not to comment. The trigger came when the chancellor, Gordon Brown, used an interview on the BBC's Sunday AM programme to join a chorus of ministers in describing the events surrounding the execution as "deplorable".

The Liberal Democrat leader, Sir Menzies Campbell, later accused Mr Blair of running a "dysfunctional government".

Mr Brown set out his future vision, which included giving greater power to parliament - such as having the right to vote on going to war - and encouraging people to become active in local politics.

The interview, which would normally be expected to be given by Mr Blair as a curtain raiser to a new session of parliament, focused on how the chancellor wanted the country to develop, including a warning to George Bush that he would be "frank" in defending Britain's interests.

Assuming Gordon Brown succeeds Tony Blair as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland (that's the UK's full name, you know), he's letting Britain and the world know that he plans to no longer be President Bush's lapdog — as Blair has often been pointed out to be on Iraq and other "war on terror" issues. The ruling Labour Party, which Blair heads for know as PM, is likely to see Brown as its leader by fall 2007 (that's this fall for all you who have not gotten your calendar bearings yet).

Blair came into power with a sweeping Labour party victory in 1997 and was reaffirmed as the former superpower's head in 2005, however, I am honestly sick of him and his neo-liberal economic, hawkish military New Labour ideology. I feel much more comfortable about Brown, but is he too boring? Brits seem to respond better to John Reid as though but charismatic. However the chance of Reid, a fellow Blair cabinet member with Brown, becoming the next prime minister are minuscule; Reid has stated that he will not attempt to take the reins — at least not for now.

Blair's tenure as head of the United Kingdom has included the important topics of economics (EU- and workforce-related) and the NIH (Britain's government-fun public health service) reform as domestic issues and Iraq and the Middle East (including Afghanistan) in general as well as national security (after the 9/11 and 7/7 attacks) as other topics. Blair has helped the economy some, but the NIH is in as much trouble as ever with its computer debacle, national security is being supposedly brought or is just a guise for taking away civil liberties, and Blair has been far too close to Bush in his worsening of the Middle East.

Here are some of the points (Guardian) Brown made about what he plans to do assuming he becomes the next UK PM:

· Parliament to gain powers under 'servant state'
· Plans for frankness with the US and cull of advisers

How Gordon Brown intends to transform government

Whitehall
· New independent commission to run the NHS to improve delivery of healthcare
· Examination of a similar education commission to supervise delivery of education
· Review of role of Department of Trade and Industry

Parliament
· Parliament to get power to vote on whether Britain goes to war
· Government agencies, including police and security services, to be made directly accountable to parliamentary select committees
· Much tougher pre-scrutiny of legislation to ensure that fewer mistakes are made in law-making
· Reform of the Lords might be delayed

Local government
· Local police chiefs to be made accountable to local citizens' boards

Political advisers
· Cull of the old "Labour party apparatchik" political advisers, particularly in No 10 where they will be replaced by mainstream civil servants
· End of "sofa-style" government and strengthening of role of cabinet committees
· Abolition of special advisers' power to order civil servants to take action

To see the full Brown interview, broken down by topic, see this BBC News article.

Keep in mind, the centre-right Conservative Party (Wikipedia), the largest rival to Labour, has gotten the friendly, likable, and not all too conservative David Cameron as their head. Hell, he even convinced the party of Thatcher to change their symbol to a tree!

There is also the relatively minor opposition of the centre-left Liberal Democrats (Wikipedia), which holds 63 House of Commons seats compared to Labour's (Wikipedia) 354 and the Conservative's 198. (See how the Political Compass charts each party's ideology.)

technorati tags: tony+bliar, blair, brown, reid, david+cameron, analysis, commentary, ideology, party+politics, prime+minister, gordon+browne, united+kingdon, britain, british+politics, UK+politics, politics, news, in+the+news, current+affairs, conservative+party, liberal+democrats, labour+party, new+labour

Ya think?

Sarcasm about the obviousness of today's headlines.
* Purported Iraq al Qaeda tape to US: Jihad not over — duh.

* Israeli gay pride rally meets opposition from Orthodox religions — never would have guessed that!

* Blair: home grown terror threats may last 'a generation' — and you had nothing to do with it, did you (at home or abroad)?...

* Rumsfeld: Iraq war not going to well — hmm, that sure wasn't obvious.

technorati tags: blair, rumsfeld, donald+rumsfeld, tony+blair, jew, israel, gay, homosexual, terrorism, al-qaeda, iraq, news, politics, current+affairs, humor, in+the+news, sarcasm, analysis, in+perspective, clearthought