Right But Wrong

Some of my favourite bloggers are those I disagree with. Third Avenue is always a pleasure to read, as, surprisingly for an SWP person, is Meaders at Dead Men Left.

Dafydd is a well-read, civilised sort of chap, who thinks you can take away the cultural underpinnings (chiefly liberty and Christianity) from Western society without it crumbling.

Meaders is one of those infuriating types. Like the journalist Nick Davies ('Dark Heart' etc), he can see clearly what's wrong - then jump straight to the wrong conclusion. Social mobility dropping ? Life expectancy decreasing ? Nothing to do with the abolition of grammar schools, cultural factors, a welfare-funded underclass. It's down to the Blairite neo-liberal agenda, apparently.

He's picked up an interesting quote by Lib-Dem Vincent Cable.

It's because of the politics of identity that I can't see the Conservative Party reverting back to the role it had in the Fifties, Sixties and even under Margaret Thatcher as a broad church appealing to people on the middle ground. I cannot see that happening any more. There will have to be realignment.

"I can see a world where there is an authentic party of the nationalist right, an authentic socialist party and several in the centre."

I think he's right about the nationalist party - the question is just which party that will be.

But I see no reason why 'the politics of identity' shouldn't also include a party of the religious Right. Like Respect.