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In 1997, I heard a lot about what happened the previous time Labour had been in power. I heard, endlessly, aboud the Miners' strike and the Winter of Discontent (I still don't see Thatcher as Richard III, but that's another issue). All of that, I was promised by the scare-mongers, could be mine if only I voted Labour. This time round, I'm getting a lot of 'remember what happened last time'. Well, yes, I do remember - and I'm still terrified of John Major, sad to say. However, Cameron isn't Major and he sure as hell isn't Thatcher. I was annoyed then, and I'm just as annoyed and sceptical now.
Don't vote based on what may or may not have happened last time - vote according to the manifesto, and be prepared to be disappointed anyway (remember the 1997 Labour pledge to repeal the Criminal Justice Act (1994)? It's still law). There's plenty in the Conservative manifesto to keep me from voting for them, as it happens. Please, please vote according to what the parties actually offer.
Again, if all a party or candidate has to offer is that they're not something else, do they deserve your vote? No! I want to vote for a fairer asylum system, scrapping Trident, more windfarms, and a candidate who has served my interests well in the past. Your values may differ, your vote may vary - I don't want you to vote what's right for me, I want you to vote what's right for you. I'd like best of all for them to be the same thing, of course.
Don't vote based on what may or may not have happened last time - vote according to the manifesto, and be prepared to be disappointed anyway (remember the 1997 Labour pledge to repeal the Criminal Justice Act (1994)? It's still law). There's plenty in the Conservative manifesto to keep me from voting for them, as it happens. Please, please vote according to what the parties actually offer.
Again, if all a party or candidate has to offer is that they're not something else, do they deserve your vote? No! I want to vote for a fairer asylum system, scrapping Trident, more windfarms, and a candidate who has served my interests well in the past. Your values may differ, your vote may vary - I don't want you to vote what's right for me, I want you to vote what's right for you. I'd like best of all for them to be the same thing, of course.
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Date: 2010-04-29 07:49 am (UTC)I have had an interesting time discussing the Conservative party lately. On the one hand certain people I talk to are agreeing with Clegg's 8 yo article that we shouldn't judge a country & its people on the politics of n years ago - and in the same breath they're saying that we can never trust a Tory, remember Thatcher, etc. Er, hang on - that was ~30 years ago and as you say, Cameron isn't Thatcher. He isn't even particularly similar. We aren't exactly coming out of the same environment, being lured by the same promises, nor dealing with the external factors that made Thatcherism attractive to those who supported it through the 1980s (the interaction with Reaganomics, for instance). So why assume today's party is not one whit changed from that of 1979? [Counter-argument: look at the politics. Counter-counter-argument: Yes. And see how many familiar ideas have appeared in Labour policies in the last 18 years. Better argument needed.]
[I don't vote Tory and am not likely to in the future - we can get an LD MP around here and I want that; I am just flummoxed by people's inability to see the contradiction/hypocrisy in this stance.]
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Date: 2010-04-29 07:54 am (UTC)(completely agree with the rest, which I'm sure doesn't surprise you)
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Date: 2010-04-29 08:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-04-29 08:24 am (UTC)Re Major & NI: yes, I agree; that is the first thing I think of if asked to discuss his period in office.
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Date: 2010-04-29 08:43 am (UTC)I just think of Major as grey and drippy; it's Thatcher I'm terrified of. But Major pre-dates Thatcherism. Cameron doesn't; Cameron joined up under Thatcher.
Like you say, they don't do the things their manifestos say, and so it does matter what their instincts are too. Anyone who enthusiastically signed up to and promoted Thatcher in the late 1980s and hasn't had a Road to Damascus moment since isn't someone I want running the country, whatever the focus groups are telling him to say at the moment.
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Date: 2010-04-29 09:35 am (UTC)For example, one of the parties makes the very reasonable point that avoiding population growth is an important pillar in any strategy to control our resource usage and help prevent climate change. I'd vote for that policy… except that the party in question is the BNP so we all know how they want to avoid population growth.
That's an extreme example, but the same kind of concern plays out on a smaller scale with the more mainstream parties.
I think we have to choose based on the totality of what the parties say, both intentionally and in unguarded moments, on what they have actually done, especially in recent history, on the general character of their politicians, on how they are funded and who influences them, on how, historically, their kind of ideology has played out in circumstances such as those we expect during the lifetime of the next government.
Negative voting isn't necessarily a bad thing. Being of a small-'c' conservative bent, I can dream of a time when everything's ticking over nicely and I just want things to continue the way they are without anybody screwing it up. In such circumstances, it makes sense to vote against various things without voting for anything in particular.
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