Bad torturer, good torturer

If you listen to centre-left commentators such as Martin Kettle in the Guardian or Sunny Hundal on Liberal Conspiracy and elsewhere, you’d be forgiven for thinking that although the Tories are wrong to insist that there is no alternative (TINA, as it gets called) to their top-speed state-shrinking, there is no other alternative (TINOA) to their third-way, centrist hope for reform. The Left cannot seriously hope for revolution of any kind. We must start from where we are, work with the parliamentary process, softly-softly. Continue reading →

Suzanne Saunders-Blundell, a midwife from the Midlands in BBC Two's 'Toughest Place to Be a…'

I don’t know which is worse, the awful BBC Two series ‘The Toughest Place to Be a…’ or David Milliband’s latest speech on the future of the Left. They’re actually pretty indistinguishable. Continue reading →