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“... doubts, two days later, about the viability of the Conservative programme, declaring that ‘like Tony Blair in 1997, Mrs May is where the majority of voters are: to the left on the economy and to the right on social issues.’ The Observer was even more enthusiastic, seeing May’s election manifesto as ‘a watershed moment in British politics ...”

“... only trigger a dangerous new round of the arms race. And has George Bush thought this through? Or ...”

“... do is debate alternatives within its framework. It is essential to demythologise ‘Thatcherism’.Tony Blair, 29 October 1987 With Mrs Thatcher safely in the lead, that voice and the little scuttling walk threatening to lead us into the next century, Conservative commentators like P. Worsthorne feel it now safe to admit that perhaps there is just a ...”

“... corrupt Iraqi reconstruction contracts). It may be a consolation to some readers to think that Tony Blair, for instance, would admit to ‘stretching facts’ or reveal in private his contempt for the freedom he pays lip service to, but the scene is a fantasy, and, worse, it is also exactly the least surprising thing that could have happened at that ...”

“... is on schedule. So, too, is work on four large permanent US military bases. It isn’t clear how Tony Blair can think Iraq is a country on the verge of being a successful liberal democracy. But we do know what kind of mess will be left behind if the Coalition forces do eventually withdraw. 19 ...”

“... a closeness sealed by ten meetings between the two men during Bush’s first term as president. Tony Blair may see Bush just as often, but he doesn’t have the same influence over him. The military and political consequences of their collaboration, which was cemented after 9/11 and during the second intifada, have been devastating for the ...”

“... work only if they hit the tanks from the side. In his scathing contribution to British Generals in Blair’s Wars, a collection of 26 essays mainly by retired generals, Sir Paul Newton uses this story to mock the cliché that the British armed forces ‘punch above their weight’. ‘This was like telling a lightweight boxer he can only hit his oncoming ...”

“... an Iraqi woman living in Kuwait I met when I was here a few weeks ago. She thinks I look like Tony Blair, which I do not, but she thinks it anyway. I drive to her flat, navigating by map and mobile. She is wearing a white tracksuit. She has painted the walls of her flat an apricot colour. She leaves the door open. We can see the trees swaying in the ...”

“... it was not as much of a joke as you might think. Following whatever deal it was Murdoch made with Tony Blair in 1995, when Blair flew out to Australia to address a conference of News Corp executives, the Sun now backs Labour, the party most of its readers have supported all along. It would be fascinating to know the ...”

“... with Labour about to return to power, but still anxious to establish its mainstream credentials, Tony Blair chose to highlight his acceptance of the anti-union consensus in an article for the Times: ‘Let me state the position clearly, so that no one is in any doubt. [Under Labour] the essential elements of the trade union legislation of the 1980s will ...”

“... Commons he had been acting in when marching lockstep into Iraq with his role model in Washington. Tony Blair’s assurance was given as a response to the publication of the Butler Report (Stationery Office, £22.50), which he assumes has demonstrated that he is not in fact the Bliar of all those banners that were carried down Whitehall eighteen months ...”

“... of autistic people before autism was a concept, like the 18th-century ‘natural fool’ Hugh Blair of Borgue, a Scottish laird who filled his bedroom with twigs and feathers and liked to dine with cats, whose paws he licked clean. Silberman includes a chapter about Henry Cavendish, a pathologically shy scientific polymath whose many breakthroughs include ...”

“... of British origins, Paul Johnson (once on the Left, then Thatcherite, now an admirer of Tony Blair), whose own celebratory history of the United States appeared in 1997. In imagining an American narrative around which a renewed progressivism could unite, Evans adopts the Popular Front model that other liberal public intellectuals are now ...”

“... further south; Poland and Finland further east; the Adriatic is a stone’s throw away. Perhaps, Tony Blair calls it a ‘doorstep’ because Albanians are predominantly Muslim. The Government repeatedly refers to Serb atrocities which, George Robertson teaches us, Europe has not seen the like of ‘since the Middle Ages’. Isuppose if you overlook the ...”

“... despite its high Scottish representation, began to be alarmed about England’s reaction. Tony Blair announced that two referendums – one general, one on the taxing powers of the Scottish Parliament – would be held following a White Paper, but before a Bill was introduced into the Commons. This was a bold move, much criticised in Scotland. It ...”