Agreed

Sally I groan whenever Billy Bragg is on tv/radio. Who could forget All Around My Hat: I think it was in the charts for months. Folk music generally used to put me off but I am warming to it and am thinking of getting some sea shanties. I like Mozart but prefer Bach. I used to be a great fan of Beethoven but no more. Is it because I am a euro-sceptic or simply find his music too over-powering? I like Satie, adore Elgar and don't see what it wrong with a bit of sentimentality if that characterises Vaughan Williams for some people.

Like Graham I also liked The Who and a bit of punk. My tastes moved with time and ranged from Status Quo, Bad Company, Cockney Rebel, Thin Lizzy and Yes, on to the Jam, the Stanglers and Debbie Harry. My tastes were and remain eclectic. However if entertaining mixed company I will veer towards British 50s and 60s stuff or English classical composers, with nothing too heavy.

Malcom I would favour a more libertarian approach (although not the extreme kind) to government or the lack of it. And I too remember the 70s and staying up as a school boy all night to watch the election results when she won and then going in to school. The events of the last year seem all too reminiscent of 70s bad memories. By way of acknowledging how we have stood still since then in some areas, I remember my state school economics teacher advocating school vouchers and the abolition of the absurd CAP. La plus ca change la plus c'est la meme chose.

I think the idea that Thatcher "was to a large extent a triumph of style over substance" strikes me as a little unfair once one recognises the forces she was up against and which have continued to reassert themselves. It was precisely because she took them on and checked their advance that she is so magnificent. We need someone of Thatcher's calibre to reverse the nightmare years of New Labour. Sadly I see no obvious candidates.

The impression I got from pre-credit crunch Cameroon Tories was that they wanted to 1. "share the proceeds of growth", 2. maintain Labour's public spending plans 3. avoid tax cuts.

I don't accept the change agenda was entirely necessary. The Tories got more votes in England than Labour; Labour's mismanagement of the economy was clearly going to stuff things sooner rather than later without the credit crunch; and their ongoing cultural revolution was bound to result in a backlash agian sooner rather than later. Of course the central issue was and remains the economy; by neglecting its centrality before the deluge (and not doing much since) Cameron has enabled New Labour to recover as frightened voters give the devil they know the benefit of the doubt: now when did that last happen: oh yes I remember, under John Major.

I guess one should not expect anything better from a man who pontificated on the best place for retailers to place chocolate oranges. The Cameroons assumed they understood the zeitgeist. They were wrong. By seeking to outdo New Labour in their fluffiness and positioning themselves in the middle they put themselves and the rest of us at risk from the juggernaut heading towards us. Labour may well steal victory from the jaws of defeat. The overall Tory response to the credit cruch has been IMO, pathetic.

And there was me thinking the minority related to smaller parties.

I don't think Andrew addressed my question to him about disposable income on one of his last posts, but no matter. I sympathise with Witney Tory view. New Layabout stuffed the economy with their policies. They inherited a golden legacy in terms of the economy and employment law reforms which they steadily undid. They made the private sector less competitive with endless red tape. They embarked on bonkers expansion of public spending and public sector employment without commensurate improvements in output. They weakended (sic) the Bank of England through changes to the its regulatory role. And they allowed a grotesque increase in money supply. That is why we are so weak in the face of the global economic downturn.

I think the CofE needs to think more in terms of re-establishing iself.

David What was it Mao said about the long march. There are probably a million small things that could be done to significantly improve the public finances without frightening the horses.

"la porte etroite"

Or "Strait"

"Straight is the gate and narrow is the way"

Sally What UKIP policies do you object to?

What an excllent piece by an excellent man. Shame he is not in the shadow Cabinet. Required reading for any MP who does not understand how we got in this mess and how to get out of it. "Proceeds of growth", what a laugh.

Check out wecameron and a snippet of Damien Green's office being searched. Absolutely staggering.

5 Live reporting a senior police officer to review handling of leak enquiry.

Dontmakemelaugh I can think of various areas where for good or bad reasons (depends on your view) the police have avoided enforcing the law. The idea that they should get precious over non Official Secrets Act leI don't think MPs necessarily wish to be above the law. Maybe you a particular fan of the police.

You must be joking Dontmakemelaugh. New Labour have been undermining our liberties from day one. I think we are now living in far more of an authoritarion / police state (call it what one will) than for centuries. As far as the police are concerned, the rot began to set in during the 60s.

I can see the point that our EU membership has so greatly damaged our parliamentary sovereignty that it is hard to imagine much worse that could be done. I cannot imagine a vibrant un-neutered pre 1972 parliament putting up with this sort of rubbish (and a lot else to be frank). The police and the civil service wouldn't have dared.

Whwn they were in opposition Labour went on and on about civil liberties. They wanted a FOI Act and the ECHR enacted into domestic law. But we are far less free and far more surveilled than we ever were under the Tories.

If we hadn't listened to the environmentalists, we wouldn't be facing the energy crisis we are facing today. Bring on nuclear power and incinerators. Down with ugly wind powered generators.

Build the third runway. It should have been done years ago.