66 more days of handbags
Monday, February 26, 2007

The gloves are off, because as all good politicians know you can't sling mud if your hands are tied up.

So much for parties putting forward a positive future vision for Wales at this election. Labour spent their conference slagging off the Tories and inadvertently drawing attention to David Cameron's current popularity. Plaid kicked out at Labour, and the Tories, in turn, volleyed a few missiles back towards Rhodri Morgan.

Nobody really bothered to attack the Lib Dems, so Peter Black stepped up to attack Plaid for attacking Labour.

Meanwhile, the Lib Dems claim they are whiter than white (or goldener than gold), but Alun Cairns reminds us that they fought the 2003 campaign on a misfiring 'Kick the Tories out' platform.

Soon, the twisting of facts and figures will go into overdrive, leaving voters disillusioned and confused. I've already received promotional literature from the Lib Dems asserting that Plaid 'betrayed students' and 'caved in' to help Labour 'sell out our students' over the assembly budget. Of course, Plaid would put it somewhat differently.

So, what's the answer? I'm afraid there isn't one. Negative politics is a cornerstone of modern electioneering. But parties should face up to it and stop claiming to be virtuous on the one hand while swinging the handbag with the other.

UPDATE: Apologies if you've seen a strange piece appear here about Nick Bourne. It's now deleted. The perils of using Google Reader...

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posted by Blamerbell @ 10:55 am,

5 Comments:

At 12:23 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I know it's difficult but perhaps we could try talking about real issues -health, housing, schools, planning etc. All of these could potentially be the subject of significant policy change after May if we don't have another Rhodri WAG.
I have two first time voters in my family, both at Uni and I want to persuade them to take the trouble to vote! I think they have grasped that it's nothing to do with either Blair or Cameron but it's hard work - and then I have to explain the interesting voting system - and the new rules on postal voting!

 
At 4:00 pm, Blogger Sir Edward Heath said...

The funny thing is come May 4th they will all be wondering why the vast majority of people didn't vote for any of them.

 
At 10:30 pm, Blogger cymrumark said...

The problem here is that Blammerbell and other commentators just focus on a few high profile stunts. certainly the campaigns we are running on the ground in north wales offer something to vote for eg retention and investment in hospital services.

The negative stuff we used during Labour conference is just part of the process not the full picture. There is more positive stuff to come.

 
At 10:50 pm, Blogger Blamerbell said...

"The problem here is that Blammerbell and other commentators just focus on a few high profile stunts."

High profile stunts. You've hit the nail on the head. We are obviously *supposed* to be paying attention to these stunts. Therefore they are clearly significant.

There's a balance, and the people at the top in Plaid clearly thought this was worth pushing over and above anything virtuous you've been doing in North Wales.

 
At 11:36 pm, Blogger Bonheddwr said...

"There's a balance, and the people at the top in Plaid clearly thought this was worth pushing over and above anything virtuous you've been doing in North Wales."

And of course knew that political commentators would not give any coverage to the local campaigns being run by Plaid in North Wales, no matter how hard they pushed them!

 

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