David Cameron, Gordon Brown and That Interview

During the past few days in the news, there has been a number of commentaries on an interview on the ITV1 show Piers Morgans Life Stories (ITV 1 10:15pm 14/2/2010). The subject of the interview is none other than Gordon Brown. This interview is considered somewhat controversial as Morgan questions Brown about the death of his premature baby daughter, aged 11 days in 2002, and Brown understandably gets quite visibly upset talking about this. (though it would be an exaggeration to say that he breaks down and cries in the interview, as some have claimed.)








Now it appears that some have taken exception to him giving this interview as Brown has been reluctant to talk about his children in public. His son Fraser (who has cystic fibrosis) is never seen in photographs, as Brown wishes to protect him from the limelight. It has been argued that this line of questioning should not be directed at a prime minister during the run up to a general election, the main lines of argument being that it a) diverts from genuine political issues and b) is even an attempt to garner sympathy before polling day.



Now I personally don't think Brown should have NOT done this interview. Whether we like it our not we live in a more media orientated society, and sadly personality does influence voting more than it should. It is not too much of an exaggeration to say that some of Browns lack of success as a premier is down to his poor PR abilities, and his perception of being a dour, bad tempered loner. Modern politicians have to engage with their electorates on a more human level these days. Whether that gives us better politicians is unclear, but it is silly to think we don't have to do these things, because being "emotionally open" matters to people. It has also come to light that David Cameron has had an interview where he too has reacted; equally understandably, similarly when questioned about his own son, Ivans death last year.


Now let me make it clear, I have no objection to people debating where these kinds of topics in a politicians life have a place. I personally don't think either man did anything wrong at all. It is common knowledge what they have both sadly endured in their personal lives. I also can't get too worked up about public displays of emotion like what we see at Wootan Bassett, as some do. This is a more openly emotive nation (probably more in line with everywhere else to be honest) than in the past, and I don't see that changing any time soon. What I do object too however is some of the vindictiveness of the responses to these stories, and especially the stinks coming from that Pravda for Pricks the Daily Mail. (like that's nothing new.) Remember this is a response to a man describing how his 11 day old child died in his arms.

Here's odious gonk Richard Littlejohns take

I've often wondered why anyone bothers interviewing Gordon, since he refuses to
answer inconvenient or difficult questions, endlessly repeats the line he has
decided to take, and bulldozes on until they run out of time.


Which
makes the fact that he broke down and wept openly over the death of his baby
daughter Jennifer during the taping of an interview with TV's Piers Morgan all
the more despicable.

The heartless bastard, I mean crying over losing a child.

No one is underestimating or belittling the sincerity of his grief, but Gordon
has always been protective of his family's privacy and has consistently vowed
that he would not exploit his children for political gain

He's hardly violating his kids privacy, when it is common knowledge what happened to Jennifer. What is he implying?

But he must have known it was coming. It appears to have been stage-managed,
right down to a tearful Sarah Brown sitting in the audience.
And it smacks
of a cynical attempt to play the victim card, exploiting his family tragedy to
win votes.
The fact that he is now parading his grief on a chat show, in an
attempt to convince the electorate that he is human after all, is a measure of
his desperation and a graphic illustration of his complete absence of principle.

My god he thinks a women crying over her husband recalling the death of their baby is a plot to win votes. God Littlejohn is a prick. As for winning sympathy votes, it doesn't seem to be working, with comments like this.

I'm sorry. I care as much for these morons and their problems as they care
about mine. Zero. Human compassion knows limits and publicly emoting to show
what a nice person you are undoubtedly means the opposite. I only wish I had
taken my chance to emigrate 23 years ago. This country is stuffed and deserves
to be if we elect the sort of offensive parasites we have in recent years.
-
William Orr, Yorkshire,

Fuck off then William, you wanker. The country is better off without the likes of you.

Who cares? Please just get on a run the Country, we are all sinking in debt
and greed from the MP's.
- toto kubwa, Cyprus

Pass the sick bucket.
- Steven Farrow, Kings lynn Nofolk, 14/2/2010 7:44Read more:

Written by tossers for tossers.

Littlejohn's article is nasty, I mean what's new with that? But I think nothing surpasses this disgusting article by Liz Jones.

I want a leader who hurls things at his staff, not a blubbing 'poor
me'

This evening, you'll be able to watch
Gordon Brown squeezing 'poor me-dom' out of every oleaginous pore.
Of the
baby he lost aged only 11 days, he tells Piers Morgan: 'She was baptised and we
were with her and I held her as she... as she died.'
He talks of his son
Fraser, who has cystic fibrosis. 'We sometimes say, "Why, why, why us?"' His
eyes well up during the interview, and he denies accusations in a new biography
that he is a bad-tempered bully.

Now I'm sure being married toNirpal Dhaliwal would screw anyones head. But there is no excuse for an article like this. He's/They are not just blubbing poor me. They lost a child FOR FUCKS SAKE!! I mean you may not like them, or their policies, but my god this is something else entirely. You have to be a major league dick to be so full of hate to a politician, that you don't even feel for them suffering the worst fate imaginable for a parent. Which incidentally is the worst kind of personality based politics you can indulged, which contradicts the bloody thing they are supposed to be condemning! Well what did we expect? Consistency in the Mail?

I don't think there is really more I can add to this. The articles/comments speak for themselves. But I'd like to quote a "Malcolm Armsteen" a commentator from Mailwatch,sums up this kind of journalism very nicely.

This is a new low. This could be titled 'Man Cries at Death of Daughter -
Unusual? - you choose'.The article should never have been written, it is
intrusive, callous and cynical. The comments show that at least some members of
our society - who would no doubt congratulate themselves as being 'Decent
English' - in fact are heartless, cynical and prepared to be vicious in their
senseless tribalism.This is the sort of 'work' that is destroying our society,
not 'feral yoof', immigration or 'socialism'.Malcolm Armsteen, Bolton

I second that.

Peter Hitchens posts some pap about the Pope.

I'm convinced Peter Hitchens has to be some elaborate parody, mocking the very set of values he supposedly believes in, through the sheer silliness of his reasoning. Or an ultra devious fifth columnist designed to infiltrate right wing opinion from within and begin a campaign designed to undermine their beliefs through the sheer weight of the wackiness of his Mail on Sunday column. He doesn't just try and shoehorn logic and reason to try and support his beliefs, he actively dispenses with them completely if they have that damned inconvenient problem of negating everything he is trying to say. He does; and this is putting it mildly, have a liberal attitude to rational discourse (It's about the only liberal attitude towards something he holds!) And this is why we ended up getting this weeks freshly laid turd.

Actually, I am uneasy about the Pope telling us what to
do. This is part of being British, or was when I was growing up. I can still
recite great chunks of Tennyson’s wonderful Ballad Of The Fleet, all about Sir
Richard Grenville and the little ship Revenge, with her valiant Protestant crew,
fighting her unequal battle against the great sea-castles of King Philip, ‘the
Inquisition dogs and the devildoms of Spain’

I doubt British Catholics see it that way. About the Tennyson poem. Yeah it's good at getting the action across. But it's loaded with anti-Catholic sentiment. The line quoted is one of the nicer "compliments" paid to RC's. Does he think Anti-Rome sentiment was/is a good thing?

I had relatives who viewed the Vatican as
Babylon. I was taught at school about Bloody Mary, 400 years later still a
loathed figure.

Yeah it's hard to like someone who burnt people alive for having the "wrong" belief. But does he think his ancestors hating Rome is a good thing?

Even now, I like to roll over my tongue the
defiant 37th of the English
Church’s 39 articles: ‘The Bishop of Rome hath
no jurisdiction in this Realm of
England.’

I bet Englands Catholics were pissing their
sides when that doctrine was put in.

Those who are outraged – or claim to be – about the
Pontiff’s warning from Rome
are trying to use a force they don’t really
sympathise with. My anti-Catholic
forebears were Cromwellian Puritans, and
would have loathed the sexual
revolution even more than they disliked the RC
Church

No I think you'll find they're a bit annoyed that the Pope is trying to use his office to give his church carte blanche to discriminate against gay people. People is the key word here. The anti-gay stance of some parts of Christianity is an idea. Yes I'm sure some folk are going to be put out that they may not be able to implement anti -gay policies because it's going against their beliefs. But for my money the welfare of people goes ahead of respecting to the letter peoples "beliefs". Not every idea or belief automatically has some entitlement to be respected or upheld. We must weigh up the cost of upholding a belief (which is a tiny tiny part of the Christian doctrine in the New testament) against the cost of the welfare of gay people, or any other group of people who may be threatened by an ideology. It really is for my money a one - way contest.

No what I really find offensive (not so offensive I would say he shouldn't write it. I'm not that much of a hypocrite as to undermine the point I'm making!) about this article, is that Hitchens probably wanked himself senseless over the self appointed cleverness of his article. He uses all the big words, name drops obscure poems, and religious laws. I'm sure he sees himself as a self styled fogeyish contrarian, sticking two fingers up at modern liberal society. He's the enlightened bible buff looking down on all of us godless, unenlightened proles. He might want to remember that when Europe really took this kind of thing seriously, lots of people on the "wrong" side ended up as human torches. It is actually insulting to the victims of this kind of mentality, to claim that religious intolerance is somehow admirable.