Not so much a bang as a whimper

I've said this before... but I think it is worth repeating. In the late 1970's there were a group of, comfortably off, largely middle-class, often trotskyist and frequently law students or journalists, who advocated a Labour defeat in 1979. A Tory victory, they argued, would mobilise the working class, give rise to a militancy in the trade unions, and allow Labour to refresh its ranks and renew its strategies. Well, a bloody fine strategy that turned out to be. We had 18 years of reactionary Conservative rule, pit closures, closure of the steel industry and our manufacturing base, decimation of the national health service and savage attacks on education and public sector investment. I only repeat all this because of this twaddle in The Guardian today.

"A period in opposition, far from being a disaster, will be the final test of the durability of Blair's historic transformation."

Particularly for former editors of the New Statesmen with comfortable bank accounts to rest on, no doubt.