Newsfelch: 27/08/09 – Life. Oh, Life.

What is the significance of this picture to this post? A prize for the winner!

This morning I’m too busy to write anything substantial. This has been caused by – would you believe it – having an oversupply of work. How excellent.

But I just thought I’d pass some comment on a few of the things that caught my attention…

• Very sad news about Senator Kennedy. I hope America gets his dying wish of true healthcare reform soon. From a practical perspective, it’s going to be even more difficult though with one less vote in the House.
• Unsurprising news from Scotland: the polls haven’t really shifted all that much despite there being a slight majority against the Lockerbie bomber release. Nevertheless, I stand by my prediction that the SNP won’t be damaged by this. This is the kind of polling data that the opposition will need to weigh up before they decide to topple a government. If I were a Scottish Labour strategist, this wouldn’t convince me at all.
• Amazingly, I found someone more cynical about politics than me. I always read Daily Kos to see what the left are up to in the USA. But this post really summed up why many people find politics such a difficult profession to maintain interest in. It’s long, but well worth it.
• Should Cameron start opposing the Afghan War? Tough call. Wouldn’t be very Tory to do so. But that, in typical Blair fashion, could be exactly what he needs to show how different he is from Conservatives of the past. He’s got to be considering it.
• Meanwhile, Clegg is pandering to the Telegraph by trying to stir up their indignation over the expenses debacle again. A decent idea… as it is extremely important that people don’t forget exactly why it is we want to bring about the changes we do. But maybe the time to do this is after the Queen’s Speech and in the run up the  election.
• Finally, yet another reason why Dan Hannan is a huge liability for the Tories. Headlines like this aren’t good. Yes, this is the Guardian. But it hasn’t gone unnoticed in the Telegraph either. He may be an intelligent, erudite man, but I think his public relations sensors are a little off.

Time for work. Well, at least I have a job. Who knows what the long term implications of one-in-six households being completely jobless are going to be…