The genius of modern societies is the way they release individual creativity; the danger is growing shared risks.This is a condensed version of a longer article. Those who haven't had enough can read the full version, published in the respected leftwing journal, Tribune (2).
What is great about Britain is it has made me important; the bad thing is I might stop being important when my party gets voted out.
Gordon Brown has rightly said that the next general election will be the first of the global age.
I'm such a dick I don't realise that other countries have had elections in what might be the 'global age' whatever that is. I've never heard of Barack Obama. I'm an arse. I exist to make my brother look competent. Shoot me.
To win again, we need, as he has emphasised, to address both sides of the coin.
We should talk to money. Due to all the quantitive easing going on, there is a lot of it. And we've got to talk to both sides of it. So that's even more. In fact, I don't know a thing about metaphors and I'm an arse. Shoot me now.
As we look forward to the manifesto, we know the scale of our electoral challenge means we need to be more creative, innovative and forward-looking than ever before
We're fucked and if I'm going to keep my job we need to think of some good lies to address both sides of the coin with.
empowering
I read this word in a self help book and it made me feel warm inside.
and protecting people by using the government leadership, market dynamism and civic mobilisation that is necessary to solve any big problem.
I have a thesaurus. But I don't want to show off, so I used "big problem" instead of clever words like "gargantuan obstacle."
New Labour has been strongest when it has combined Labour's social-democratic and radical liberal traditions.
If I can say this with a straight face I'm going to win the world poker championship and them I won't need you plebs to vote me back into my job. Either that, or I'm totally deluded and actually believe this. Shoot me, just in case.
But we also need to learn the right organisational lessons of the past decade.
Everything will be okay if we organise it better.
To Hell with the "individual creativity" I mentioned earlier. That was bullshit, just like it was bullshit whan I said British intelligence didn't cover up allegations of torture.
Fuck your "individual creativity," I'm organising you.
If Labour is to lead this change, it needs to be a different kind of party. Not different in its passion and purpose, but different in its structures and role.
Okay, you've got me here.
It isn't possible for Labour to be different in its "purpose and passion" because it's only purpose and passion is retaining power so I can continue my self aggrandizing, simpering posturing. And if we change that purpose, obviously we have to surrender power.
So let's think about other stuff. Like "structures" and "roles." Because f**k me it wouldn't do to admit that we're a pointless bunch of tossers without the balls to admit we're incapable.
The traditional political structures of mainstream political parties are dying
No-one likes us any more but we can't admit this is our fault for being venal, useless and corrupt. So it is because all mainstream parties are experiencing the same thing. Just don't ask me to explain why the Tories aren't so affected by this malaise.
and our biggest concern is the gap between our membership and our potential voter base.
(Is he really saying he wants to put his member into his voter's base?)
We need to expand our reach by building social alliances and increasing opportunity for engagement and interaction with our party.
Ah, thank goodness for that self help book. Lots of warm, comforting words. Don't vote me out, I'll build alliances. Social ones. ANd give you opportunities to interact with my member.
You might say, I'm imitating Bill Clinton's modus operandi. He liked forming alliances and having interactions with his member.
There are important lessons from abroad. Rightly, people look to Barack Obama's election campaign.
But his election wasn't the first of the 'Golbal age.' He's just some tin pot little president of a banana republic. Christ, why did they make me Foreign Secretary when I'm so clearly clueless?
But the presidential system in the United States is not ours
Not much gets past me, eh?
and there is an example closer to home. Pasok, the Greek socialist party, was the only European socialist party to fare well in this year's European elections.
Oh, wait, there's a problem. T hey're socialists. New Labour aren't. THat might be why they are populatr and we're not. Rather put my foot in it there, didn't I? I said I was clueless.
Pasok has also gone furthest in party reform, opening up the party so that more than 900,000 Greeks, out of a population of 11 million, have equal rights as members or "friends". The party has quotas for male and female representation and open primaries to select party candidates for local elections. Such engaging and deliberative party structures enable Pasok to tap into the energy in communities, with resultant electoral success.
I read this on their website and I'm regugitating it. Don't ask me what it means.
Though I think there's a fundamental problem. Obviously, they are a popular leftwing party, not a bunch of corrupt, clueless, incompetent, hated, useless timewasting rightwing jobsworths who have been in power for over a decade and only managed to fuck things up.
In Britain, Labour's first port of call for expanding our reach should be a new relationship with three million-plus affiliated trade unionists. We can forge a new relationship with them by virtue of their signing up to the political fund of their union, making them a much closer part of a genuine Labour movement.
Give us some money, and then we'll shit on you again.
And we can go further in other areas, too. We say we want to listen to our voters; why not adopt a system of registered voters, as in the US, to create the basis for primaries?
Let's be useless and further annoy people by making a big fuss about how they get to select their own corrupt, clueless, incompetent, hated, useless timewasting jobsworth, even though they already do? Shoot me.
The renewal and modernisation of our party will be a key element of our fight for a fourth term. I hope that together we can respond – ideologically and organisationally – to the challenges of the next decade and ensure it belongs to Labour.
A few paragraphs ago I was saying we had to hold true to our roots, and we weren't to change our "pupose and our passion," but don't mind that, I'm pretty much making this up as I go along.
In fact this whole thing has been a test and if you're dumb enough to have read this far, you might just about be dumb enough to vote for New Labour again.
Years ago, Eric Blair, better known as George Orwell, used to write for Tribune. How utterly disgusted he would be to see how Miliband has debased the magazine, the Labour Party and the English language.
1 - "Labour's primary concern," by David Miliband, published in The Guardian, 7th of Agust, 2009. (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/aug/07/david-miliband-labour-primaries)
2 - "How the next decade can belong to Labour," by David Miliband, published in Tribune, 7th of August, 2009. (http://www.tribunemagazine.co.uk/2009/08/07/how-the-next-decade-can-belong-to-labour/)
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