Airstrip One

Tony Blair, you're no Maggie Thatcher

An awfully useful piece about the popularity of war leaders from antiwar.com. Basically if your looking for electoral popularity, the flak jacket is about as lasting as Tony Blair's attention.

I've always thought that it would have been useful to conduct a thorough survey of the opinion poll data emanating from the 1983 election. The "Falklands factor" has been used by the left for a generation to retrospectively steal the Conservative triumph. My feeling then, and my feeling now, is that this was an election won mostly on Economics. The sad fact is that most Conservatives have accepted the left's narrative.

This doesn't just lead Conservatives away from the useful conclusion that tax cuts and deregulation can win elections, it also leads all parties to think that winning wars will win elections. Of course America in 1992 and Britain in 1945 should disabuse us of this falacy, but the stake through the heart of this particular undead myth would be some proof as to why Maggie really won.

If politicians get the message that the electorate only care if you lose wars then remaking the world will seem less attractive.