Neck and Neck in the Race to the Bottom

Granted all the usual caveats and saline soupçons, the latest Guardian/ICM opinion poll on Twizzler Lansley's anti-NHS bill provides a handy index to the Brownite ineptitude and cowardice of the present Labour leadership. Daveybloke's Cuddly Conservatives have lost four points, the Deputy Conservatives two; but the disillusioned dupes have not for the most part transferred their affections to the Wannabe Conservatives. Instead, they are looking favourably at the smaller parties, despite being reminded that the NHS has already been partially privatised under the PFI scam originated by some snack of Edwina Currie's, whose name escapes me at the moment, and brought to glorious fruition under the Reverend Tony and his Glorious Successor. Amazingly, the Deputy Conservatives are now trusted on the NHS approximately as much as the proper Conservatives, despite all the concessions they have wrung from the latter. These concessions, it will be remembed, included permitting the Deputy Conservatives to tear up the coalition agreement in order to help the Twizzler get his bill through. It appears that, like the proper Conservatives, the Deputy Conservatives still have a bit of a job on hand in persuading an ungrateful public of the awesome nobility of their motives.