And Another Thing…

So; this has nothing to do with an imminent election then?

I give much more kudos and credibility to political leaders who are frank about their errors. As a voter, I look at the balance of what I believe they got right, and what they got wrong.
Unfortunately, whilst I respect him, I think GB has made too many misjudgements, especially as PM.

“My guess is that this move by Gordon will be received more positively than negatively by voters.”

“who says whatever he thinks will make him popular.”

Just saying.

On the other hand, though, if Brown got it so wrong on banking regulation during his tenure as Chancellor, then doesn’t that rather weaken his “I’ve got more experience; vote for me” argument?

I’m with the commentator who said Gordon is playing a no trumps bridge hand….trying to establish losers before the debate begins.

Unfortunately for Gordon he is not a team player.

GB has spent years denying that he’s ever made a mistake as chancellor or as PM. Now when there’s an election … does he really think we’ll say oh that’s alright then. His mendacity is just too transparent

Well yes, of course Gordon Brown regrets not introducing more regulation before the financial crisis. With the benefit of hindsight he could hardly not do so today.

Gordon Brown handled the global financial crisis superbly and the Conservative opposition got it wrong on every call, during the crisis and they have continued to get it wrong after the crisis throughout the resulting recession.

The Conservatives were wrong to oppose Gordon Brown’s fiscal stimulus and they were wrong to prioritise cutting the deficit as early as they wanted to.

The Conservatives know very well they got this wrong because as you may notice they have stopped talking about this for a long time now, preferring to try to win this election with tax cuts and some baloney about people setting up their own schools.

It is good that Gordon Brown regrets not introducing more regulation before the crisis because this means that he will be more likely push for this globally after the election when he returns to his position as prime minister.

Personally I think that it is very important now for the world to embrace bank regulation, although it will be a difficult task.

Wouldn’t it be lovely to be able to rerun the tape and watch the Tories and their media friends spitting feathers at GB’s attempts to strengthen bank regulation whilst the rest of the world was going in the other direction?!

Even the sainted Vince Cable apparently kept saying he favoured less regulation back when such a stance was fashionable.

But if there really are an infinite number of parallel universes maybe somewhere it has happened. A pity we can’t open up a worm hole or some such to take a peek…

“After all, isn’t it reassuirng to know that our leaders are able to admit – and thereby learn from – their mistakes?”

Yes, absolutely correct.

Of course, it’s even better if the admission and taking of responsibility isn’t dragged from their lips. Those of us listening to Gordon on Monday (R4 interview) would have heard him studiously blaming everyone but himself.

Its hardly a hands in the air ‘I made a big b@lls up of it all’ type confession is it? More a begrudging ‘I might have made the odd wrong decision’ confession. Hardly a confession at all really.

And so strange it should come just weeks before an election. I’m sure there’s no link at all…………….surely one could not accuse Our Great Leader of insincerity?

I’m pleased that the man who saved the world has admitted he didn’t handle the banks properly when he was Chancellor.

What a bloody shame that it’s come several years too late.

You’re still toast, Gordon.

It really is a shame that election fever has swamped your normal reasonable sense and sensibility. History will not IN ANY SENSE see Gordon Brown as a leader “with the courage to admit mistakes.” That is a simple election lie. You know it. I know it. Everyone bloody knows it.

And Cameron is “untried, untested, unconvincing” is he? Same as Blair in 97 then eh? And actually he is not “unconvincing.” At least he has a coherent philosophy (which you might disagree with) about the moral case for smaller government and a bigger society. What do you have? Brown, Balls and Whelan pulling the strings from high above deciding what’s good for us.

Depressing thing is though: looks like you’ll pull it off and cling on to power for another five years. Aaaaarghh!!!

What a shame that this experienced leader has not been able to pluck up the courage to admit that he was wrong before the general election was called. Now his admission looks like another cynical ploy to garner votes by appearing to have human failings after all; in the smiling on you tube and weeping with Piers Morgan model. They didn’t work and I don’t think this will work either. Thanks for explaining it to us though Tom.

@Patrick James “Gordon Brown handled the global financial crisis superbly and the Conservative opposition got it wrong on every call, during the crisis and they have continued to get it wrong after the crisis throughout the resulting recession.”

Gordon Brown blamed America for years, but then admitted it was his changes to the regulations that caused the problem.

Gordon brown also said because of his economic policies we would have a smaller and shorter recession that anyone else. He was wrong on both accounts.

It’s difficult to see how he could have handled the recession any worse.

I agree. We want to hear a politician admit when he got it wrong. It reminds us that he or she realizes that they are human. After all, no one always gets it right. No one. Not even Tony Blair.

I remember listening to Ken Clarke when he was Chancellor, admitting to John Humphries that he was wrong and “when you’re in a hole the best thing to do is stop digging”.

A lifelong hater of the Tories and their evil treatment of Scotland, I had to stop and think, wow!

The difference is that Ken admitted it at the time, Gordon after telling is that everything his did was right, everything for 13 years, has admitted, just before an election he is likely to lose, that he was wrong on regulation.

I mean, please, a mentally deficient worm could see that he was wrong on it. It was a disaster. He was also wrong on selling gold, ruining the one “best in the world” company pension schemes which once meant that British pensioners could live a decent life after retirement. He did not even partially rectify this by augmenting the state scheme to even half the level of the French, Spanish or German schemes.

His errors are legend. As prime minister in a laudable attempt to get cross party support he has created lords aplenty, appointed them minister and then had to “let them go” after a few months, lumbering us with an ever larger House of Peers. He has also failed completely to control their thieving and fiddling.

There’s not enough room on this page for a list of what he got wrong. One apology, presumably forced upon him by Sarah, without whom he appears to be totally useless, ain’t gonna change all that Tom.

I’ll accept his apology when he’s out of office and no longer in the position to do harm to me and mine.

£850 billion bail out for UK banks – that’s some mistake.

Would you vote for someone again when his mistake has cost every man, woman and child £15,000 each?

Saying “sorry” somehow doesn’t really do it.

What about the rest, selling the gold, destroying the private pensions. Taxing business and the people so much we are on our knees.Tom the list is endless when you start to think about it. So its a start and he needs to continue.

Learn from his error? so he is for returning bank governance to the BoE?

And next time he sees Peter Lilly, he needs to give him a personal apology.

“With the removal of banking control to the Financial Services Authority…it is difficult to see how and whether the Bank remains, as it surely must, responsible for ensuring the liquidity of the banking system and preventing systemic collapse….”

PL FSA debate 1997

Fair enough that he admits not regulating the banks enough in the late 90′s, we all make mistakes, but why didn’t he do something about it in the following 7 years?

Hi Tom

Case A.
On the 20th March you posted a blog called “Fur coat, nae knickers”. On the 21st March you realised that you’d failed to follow one of your guiding principles and made a mistake, for which you issued an apology blog.

All of this was commendable; it’s probably this willingness to admit a mistake and rectify it that makes you one of the better bloggers out there.

Now compare this to Gordon Brown:

Case B.
He made all the changes that helped the disaster along.
Prior to the disaster he was warned by various people that it may all come to tears (even Saint Vincent eventually caught on – i.e. he wasn’t the first).

But he insisted he was right, only he had the intelligence to make it all work.

Then the disaster happened, we immediately switched to a blame strategy, it was the fault of the USA, the boy on the corner made me do it, it’s the worlds fault cus they wouldn’t do as I told them.

Now, a couple of years later, we switch to the “bad people conned me and I shouldn’t have listened to them, but they promised me lots of shiny things” stratagy. An apology with caveats that it wasn’t his fault really, but there is an election in a couple of weeks so he needs to appear humble.

Now, would you care to guess which of the 2 examples (Case A or Case B) impresses me most?

Gordon in the wrong is still more right than Cameron……..or should that be ‘Chief scout’ I hear he wants to be called rather than Prime minister ‘IF’ we were unfortunate enough to see him elected(we wont)

And he intends to do away with the National anthem which will become

Ging Gang Goolie by Robert Baden Powell

http://www.youtube.com
/watch?v=lrYxfH08-wc

Cameron said
“Little platoons of civil society”,

to start new schools, take over the running of parks and libraries, operate local health services..

Sounds more like an increase in the Quango state than reducing them as Cameron promised

Oh and just to be clear

http://static.shopify.com/s/files/1/0001/1335/products/love_gordonbrown_large.jpg

i am sure all the people who are now stuck in this endless recession will be well chuffed with his apology!

i live in st. ives and even a delightful tourist destination like it is there are shops closing left, right and centre

sorry tom apologies dont pay the bills.

Calculating WHEN to be honest, i.e. just before a GE and therefore primarily to win votes, shows that he has even less integrity than if he’d kept his mouth shut.

If he’d come out with this admission 12 months ago, then perhaps his honesty would have earned some respect.

Surely you don’t believe people will be that gullible Tom?

Everyone apart from Brogan knows that Brown made big mistakes. What does it say about Brogans understanding of basic economics.Look at his background to find the answer.

Sorry to poop on your parade Tom, but Gordon Brown DID NOT SAY SORRY.

Admitting that you might have done things better (a massive understatement in this case) is a long way from apologising.

True, but I liked the headline, so…

“the choice we have: between an experienced leader with the courage to admit mistakes and an untried, untested, unconvincing Tory leader who says whatever he thinks will make him popular.”

Substitute “Labour” for “Tory” and much the same was probably being said about Blair in 1997. But I suppose that was OK then eh Tom?

(And some of us did think he was far from convincing – and we wern’t wrong were we? The master “snake-oil salesman” himself)

Brown has been a disaster, is a disaster, & would be a continuing disaster if for no other reason than he seems to have no grasp of rudimentary mathematics! Bit of a key issue for a chancellor cum PM doncha think?

A half dead cockroach would make a better PM.

Taxed to Death: “much the same was probably being said about Blair in 1997. But I suppose that was OK then eh Tom?”

Yup.

Taxed to Death: “much the same was probably being said about Blair in 1997. But I suppose that was OK then eh Tom?”

Tom: “Yup”

QED

Bit of a moot point then doncha think? None of the great PM’s had any experience of being PM before they became PM – last time I looked there isn’t a course/degree you can do in “How to be PM”.

Although given the number of “non” university degrees/courses that have been created in the last 10 years or so to hide the unemployed (unemployable?) somehow you’d think there should be!

Whether DC will be a great PM (or whether he will even get the chance to be PM) is not something anyone knows yet.

But in any case, the assumption that we know everything about him or how he will react/what he will do as a leader is somewhat daft.

So you can’t really argue that he isn’t up to the job yet now can you? OTOH we do have 1st hand experience of GB & most of it and the mess he’s made isn’t pretty really now is it? So what we do know, is that he’s definitly not up to the job!