The changing terms of the debate now Labour have been defeated

Two key areas of the political debate look like they are on the move not that Labour have been removed from office - at last !

1) Debt.
Its no longer "the credit crisis" or the BBC approved Labour not at fault "downturn". The attempt by the left to say its "all the banks fault" is ongoing. But there is a realisation that Debt is the problem and that we in the west have been using it to steal from our children for at least the last decade.

Take a look at the articles in this weeks Economist that has a special report on debt ( private and public ).

A long time ago I called this as a debt crisis, but the left wing media has been desperate to stop that happening as they know where this will lead - to a change in the default ever increasing state controlled spending.

Now we have all much of the developed world taking the Conservatives approach ( you remember the one Gordon Brown used to ridicule us about at the dispatch box as being only followed by the Tories in the whole wide world ). Even the Lib Dems have finally understood the situation ( or at least those Lib Dems who have seen the books ).

2) Afghanistan.
Again this blog has been highly sceptical about the ongoing military activity in Afghanistan and more recently has come out against it. The move into Helmand was shown to be anything but the bloodless policing operation Labour sold to us.

Questions about the war have been asked for a long time. I can remember reading an Economist article about the impact of foreign military presence on the Pashtun population at least 4 years ago ( found it here - economist subscription required I'm afraid ). But its been too much trouble for the Labour to admit its potential errors, especially with the sunken cost of blood and treasure. Instead they have tried to hide behind the uniform with things like "Armed forces day" to make it hard to criticise the deployment.

The armed forces have issues warning about almost eternal deployments that its quite clear would never be politically viable - but our then Labour masters didn't want to deal with the short term consequences of admitting this. ( Easier to just let the cortèges drive through Wotten Basset every day. )

But again many Conservative leaning commentators are now questioning the war ( and calling it a war ), including the interesting character of the new MP Rory Stewart.

The current Conservative govt appears to be preparing the ground for a withdrawal, or at least a withdrawal of most of our military. The UK military and diplomatic commitment to Afghanistan has the momentum of a super tanker, but the signs are that the order to change course has been given and the rudder is now over, even if it will take time to see the results.


Both these issues are major departures from Labour's policy and key issues for our country. And these change in the balance of the debates are very much welcomed by this blogger.