Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Cameron Pouts, Whines, Backflips

The Tories have a new talking point: Gordon Brown is a beast for accusing Cameron of trying to politicise the 'Baby P' case just because he brought it up at Prime Minister's Questions.

A-huh!

But, as ever with the Ayatollah Khameron, let's not let the obvious absurdity obscure the deeper humbuggery. Under Cameron the Tories not only threw conservative critics of social workers under the bus, as they did so they signed onto every self-serving myth these lunatics have ever hidden behind.

Say, would it be too political to ask if Cameron knows what social workers 'really do'?

See, this is the central problem with Cameronism. This is why Gordon Brown's popularity rises as a result of his handling of his own recession. Say what you like about Brown's policies, but at least he gives the impression of having an overall vision. Cameron? Not so much.

Cameron has anti-gravitas, and so he relies on his ability to shrink issues down to his own level. It was somehow inevitable that a point about child protection would devolve into weird passive-aggressive posturing. There's no actual strategy there. Consider the sheer brass neck of his position. Seemingly in the blink of an eye, the Tories have gone from calling critics of social workers ignorant to demanding that the government trash the existing review structure they themselves signed on to, in favour of a witch hunt.

I'd have more confidence in Cameron's sudden conversion to the conservative cause if he could explain exactly where he was on the road to Damascus when he suddenly realised the right was right, after all. Absent that, I think we're perfectly entitled to decide that, for once, Brown called it exactly right.

No comments: