The Jarndyce Blog: This soritical Blair government


Politics, PR and hack philosophy from A Guy Called Donald. But definitely no blogging. Probably.

21.3.06 This soritical Blair government Revealed: Blair's secret role in loans scandal: Evidence linking Tony Blair personally to the £14 million "loans for peerages" scandal engulfing Labour can be revealed today. A certificate putting forward a nominee for a peerage - and misleadingly stating they did not have a financial relationship with the party - was filled in inside No 10, Labour sources have told the Sunday Telegraph. The Rod Aldridge loan should bring Blair down: Today it was revealed that Rod Aldridge "loaned" Labour £1 million. Naturally enough, this was "in a private capacity". But come on... The chairman of a company whose entire success relies on big government contracts (funded by the taxpayer, lest we forget) bungs the government a million quid out of his own pocket (a million quid earned thanks to the big government contracts funded by the taxpayer and other, private sector contracts earned in part thanks to its high-profile government links) and there's nothing dodgy going on? The antidote has turned poison. This vacuous NuLabour project hoisted by its own hypocritical petard. Perhaps Blair, faced with the essentially vague accusation of sleaze, is relying on the sorites defence: no one grain of wheat makes the difference between there being and not being a heap of wheat. Given that one grain of wheat doesn't make a heap, it follows that two do not, thus three do not, and so on. In the end it seems that no amount of wheat can make a heap: a paradox that stumps the smartest logicians. So, one paltry Ecclestone doesn't make for corrupt government. Neither does a Hinduja. Neither do a couple of careless signatures over the pains au chocolat. Neither does a little help for your friends. Nor a good day to bury bad news. Nor a few convenient gaps in the memory. And so on. And on. And on. Not one adds up to corruption, so how can two, or three, or four? But there's a problem with the sorites paradox: at some point there's an unmistakeable heap of wheat, and this one's long gone rancid. Like everything else in Blairworld, the puny case for the defence is just semantics. Update 22/3: As if by magic, the sorites defence appears. posted by Jarndyce @ 12:03 Comments: Does this mean you're back with us again rather than just commenting everywhere? I reckon Tony's out with this one. Which conference will he announce at? # posted by MatGB @ 01:57 Dunno. Agreed, though medium- not short-term. And dunno. # posted by Jarndyce @ 10:49 Post a Comment Links to this post: <$BlogBacklinkTitle$> <$BlogBacklinkSnippet$> posted by <$BlogBacklinkAuthor$> @ <$BlogBacklinkDateTime$> Create a Link << Home	contact fairvote@gmail.com recent posts Liberal and (lapsed?) leftist seeks label Fraudulent irony Racism and cartoons (fin) Racism and cartoons (again) Anarchy in HK Those Danish cartoons and systematic oppression Whipper ye not It'll take a better man than me... Profiting from patients Small victory archives Current Posts May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 resources Public Accounts Committee The Public Whip They Work for You Write to Them Electionworld Parties and Elections Inter-Parliamentary Union International IDEA 1998 Jenkins Report Electoral Reform Society CIA World Factbook Psephos Archive Make Votes Count IFES UK Parliament Electoral Commission Center for Voting and Democracy ePolitix Electoral Calculus UK Elect politics.co.uk Prime Minister's Strategy Unit BC Citizens'Assembly PR Society of Australia Fair Vote Canada PR Library Scottish Politics Richard Kimbler archive Charter88 UNDP Governance Political Theory Daily Elect the Lords Democratic Audit CNN Electionwatch Freedom House Transparency International HighBeam Campaign for Democracy links Recommended reading The old home july 7 Conspirators Hysteria 21st Witch-hunt Torture Anger Amateurs Muslims Speculation Scum Cowards Survival Responsibility Apologists Wrong Failure Words stuff