Thursday 4 February 2010

Nelson: 20/20 Vision

"the Tories have adopted so many Labour policies out of tactical considerations that they are in danger of getting to office only to find they have signed up to continuing Gordon Brown’s agenda."

Fraser Nelson did the Keith Joseph Lecture this week. A dry old stick, Brother Keith (who was it who christened him The Mad Monk?) but not mad at all. A Grade A, Ocean-Going, Weapons Grade Conservative. He did the heavy lifting for the route out of the 1979 Labour Economic Disaster. Who will provide the road map this time?

Nelson's full text: http://www.cps.org.uk/cps_catalog/2010%20Keith%20Joseph%20Lecture%20-%20Winning%20is%20not%20enough%20by%20Fraser%20Nelson.pdf

7 comments:

Thud said...

I wish I knew,I just hope there is somebody out there with the courage and gravity to take up the slack.

Alceste said...

It was Chris Patten who coined the Mad Monk. (Source: Ferdinand Mount in his brilliant autobiog Cold Cream.)

Looking forward to an AMEX-fuelled lunch on Monday, Idle.

Anonymous said...

I met Sir Keith during my YC days and thought he was a very intense but quite brilliant man.

My father also had dealings with him in the Department of Trade & Industry and had a similar opinion of him.

I can't think of anyone in the current crop of MPs who you could compare him to.

Nick Drew said...

the Boy Osborne is always hailed as a great strategist but he looks to me like a typical smartarse politico-tactician of the student-union sort

we may yet all suffer from Cameron's undue 'loyalty' to him

for Actually Getting Things Done, it's Heseltine every time

Vision ? there is no vision but Nietzsche's - of a time of great strife ahead ... Brown has scorched the earth - scorched and salted it, yea, and rendered it barren

woe, woe unto the third generation

and a good weekend to y'all

Electro-Kevin said...

Agree with Nelson totally, Idle.

The landslide manifesto is a very simple one.

We won't ever get it.

circus monkey said...

That's what happens when you confuse showbiz with politics - confusion and a general air of gutlessness!

lilith said...

Idle! Come back! Someone is posting Japanese porn (no I haven't checked...it could be a Sudoku promotion...)

A "socialist" I briefly dated at university threw eggs at Sir Keith who was visiting Warwick in his capacity as Education Minister. After graduating this socialist went off to teach in a Public School..."the kids are great" was his explanation.