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Yo, Blair!: Tony Blair's Disastrous Premiership
Book by GEOFFREY WHEATCROFT
128 pages, Hardcover
First published January 12, 2006
2 people are currently reading
23 people want to read
About the author
Geoffrey Wheatcroft
20 books7 followersGeoffrey Albert Wheatcroft (born 23 December 1945 in London) is a British journalist and writer.
He was educated at University College School, London, and at New College, Oxford, where he read Modern History.
Publishing and journalism
He started work in publishing in 1968, working for Hamish Hamilton (1968–70), Michael Joseph (1971–73), and Cassell & Co (1974–75).
In 1975 he became the assistant editor of The Spectator, moving to the post of literary editor, which he occupied from 1977 to 1981. During the period 1981–84, he worked as a reporter in South Africa before becoming editor of the Londoner's Diary gossip column in the London Evening Standard, 1985–86. He was a Sunday Telegraph columnist 1987–91, freelance 1993–96; feature writer on the Daily Express, 1996–97; and has since written for The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, The New York Review of Books, The New Republic, the Boston Globe, the Atlantic, The American Conservative, and other publications on both sides of the Atlantic.
He was educated at University College School, London, and at New College, Oxford, where he read Modern History.
Publishing and journalism
He started work in publishing in 1968, working for Hamish Hamilton (1968–70), Michael Joseph (1971–73), and Cassell & Co (1974–75).
In 1975 he became the assistant editor of The Spectator, moving to the post of literary editor, which he occupied from 1977 to 1981. During the period 1981–84, he worked as a reporter in South Africa before becoming editor of the Londoner's Diary gossip column in the London Evening Standard, 1985–86. He was a Sunday Telegraph columnist 1987–91, freelance 1993–96; feature writer on the Daily Express, 1996–97; and has since written for The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, The New York Review of Books, The New Republic, the Boston Globe, the Atlantic, The American Conservative, and other publications on both sides of the Atlantic.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
December 30, 2021
“Like a bride’s outfit, Blair’s rhetoric was something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue.”
This is a really well-written account which captures the hypocrisy and chicanery of the Blair era with pin point clarity. Aside from being one of Bush’s lapdogs alongside the likes of Australia’s hapless Johnny Howard as they stumbled into the disastrous illegal invasion of Iraq, we see that New Labour appeared to be all about conjuring up of new ways to deceive, lie, cheat and indulge in large scale corruption and incompetence.
“He was capable of saying absolutely anything, and ‘he always means it at the time’. He had meant it when he had said that he had been a stowaway as a young boy even though he had not been, he had meant it when he said he had voted to ban hunting even though he had not done so, and now he meant it when he said that Saddam had WMD.”
“It’s not that the British people think that they have an honest government led by a Prime Minister who tells the truth; they know that they have a deeply dishonest government led by a Prime Minister who habitually lies, and they don’t care. That is Blair’s victory.”
April 8, 2024
get his arse!!!!!!!!!!!!
June 2, 2008
This was a freebie after taking out a New Statesman subscription last year. It was okay but a bit tendentious.
May 25, 2016
Could have done some footnotes for the key quotes and strong assertions.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews