Geezer

I think Labour have done the right thing, issued a statement saying what the poster really means. Any more would have allowed the row to blow up to be a major row about race, which is just what the Tories need to divert attention from the fact they are going to take a hiding in May again.

The Tories are desperate to try and dent the Labour lead.

Geezer

andrewdelvard

Eh? I'll agree with the inferiority complex bit, but luddite? I've always embraced change myself, looked forward to it. However looking at the way things are going I'm not going to see a change in Goverment for a few years yet. 'do-nothing blair' (another gem ) I'd suggest has done nothing because like the vast majority he see's nothing to answer to except spin. It's quite pitiful and as a jew I find my people being used this way distastful.

alcazar

iTrader: (2)

Haven't you just answered "yes" to your own question, if you read the first bit properly?

Positive discrimination/negative discrimination..........same thing, if it gives one lot rights the others haven't!

And I hate both Tories and Lying Labour (aka New Labour), with the same level of utter intensity

Alcazar

Holy Ghost

er, who's spinning here? blair's back room boys have messed up on this issue twice now - as two of his MPs have as well, namely mike o'brien and ian mccartney. and as usual, they collectively attempt to present things other than they are, rather than admit and deal with a damaging error of judgement that prevents people who give a to55 feeling the need to cry "foul!"

howard & letwin could have made much more of a big deal of this but haven't - and they're the ones who have been being distastefully lampooned: odd how you think that it's the tories spinning here. to be honest, i'm probably making a bigger deal of it than them. but there's a bunch of off-piste policy wonks and government public servants paid for off the taxpayers t1t undertaking questionable activities here that i, as a non-jew, find offensive and very very sly.

interestingly, rabbi julia neuberger was on vine's R2 lunchtime show and professed to find these posters inexplicable and although probably accidental, a worrying flashback to potent images and slurs of the past - particularly the watch chain. she also added that she found them extraordinary coming right on the back of last week's holocaust memorial day. she hasn't got a political axe to grind or a profile to spin and i think she's absolutely bang on the money.

doesn't make you wrong but i think you're missing the point here. go run a poster with paul boateng's face on a chimp's body saying labour are a bunch of monkeys and see how fast you end up being crucified by trevor phillips of the CRE and facing prosecution by the police.

Abdabz

Well put HG - I for one completely echo your sentiments and as I couldnt put them better myself will simply echo them rather than repeat them...spot on...
P

Oh and well put UB too

Holy Ghost

cheers - a group hug for common sense.

unclebuck

LOL - cheers guys. 'They' (the nay sayers that is) won't like it though.

UB

Holy Ghost

that's because scoobynet is not yet available in braille. and i say that with neither flippancy nor offence intended to those unlucky enough to need it.

Lum

First I heard of this was on the radio, and my reaction hasn't changed..

For gods sake, Michael Howard is the leader of the *opposition* not some random jew mugged in the street by a skinhead. There are plenty of reasons for Labour to mock him in their advertising campaign as he is the most ineffectual Tory leader since, well, Iain Duncan Smith.

Radio 4 had a rabbi on who was complaining about many jews seem to have fallen into a victim mentality since the events of the 1940s and dont seem to realise that there may be plenty of non-religious reasons why someone may attack them.

It reminds me of when my uncle was in the specials (ie. glorified traffic warden) there was some roadworks and about 40 cars all diverted up this one way street, so they parked a traffic car at the end, blocking them in and walked up the streat issuing tickets to each driver, about half way up "You're only doing this cos I'm black, I'm gonna have you for racism".

On the other hand, Labour should grow up, last time I saw well known person dpeicted as a pig, it was doodled in the inside of someone's school notebook.

Tiggs

anyone here Jewish and offended?

Brit_in_Japan

There seems to be two issues here, negative advertising and racism.

Negative advertising is not desirable, but it has been shown to be effective because the populous like easy to digest messages. Unpleasant but true.

The message trying to be conveyed was that it's not credible that you can both cut taxes and make the big extra investments in public services that the Tories say they will.

Who is responsible for financial policy within in the Tories? The party leader (Howard) and the shadow chancellor (Letwin). The fact that they both happen to be Jewish is incidental, it's the policy that is being attacked. (TBH I didn't even know Oliver Letwin was Jewish before unclebuck made it part of the argument.)

To unclebuck and Holy Ghost, I think it it you two who are making this some sort of racist issue when there is no racist intent. You are not seriously suggesting that somehow New Labour must play to different rules when attacking the Tories by steering clear of negative advertising of the top two Tories? It sounds like you would see any attack as de facto racist. That's just crazy IMHO. Could it be a cynical ploy to try and taint New Labour perhaps? I am sure Blair and Brown will be targetted by Tory negative campaigning so Howard and Letwin must be fair game in exactly the same way.

Holy Ghost

don't agree BiJ

here's a scenario:

tb knows that he has severely damaged labour's muslim vote because of the war in iraq. the muslim vote is important to labour in urban seats, including marginal ones. this is a practical political reality.

so how does he mitigate this damage? how does he check the loss of votes he knows he will suffer - either to tory or lib dem?

an obvious, albeit machiavellian, political solution is to remind british muslims that the leader of the opposition and the shadow chancellor are jews. that perhaps will cause some - or many - to think twice before voting for the main opposition party in protest or otherwise. the additional benefit is that it reminds everyone that the leader of the opposition and the shadow chancellor are jews - a fact that some people do find problematic and even off-putting. because, lets face it, bigotry and prejudice still exists here and jews are not exempt from it.

how to do this though? it must incorporate plausible deniability. it cannot be overt. it must be subtle. it cannot be associated with tb personally. in other words, a classic smear operation.

first we have two b-list MPs making separate public comments that 1) letwin's proposed financial policies make him a "fagin." 2) b-list MP comments in a UK muslim newspaper that howard cannot be trusted on israel palestine or middle eastern policy because he is jewish and will be biased.

so far so good: the flak they take (tomorrow's fish & chip paper) is worth the message they're sowing.

four months out from the election and the ante needs to be upped. design some sly adverts, put them on the website. some people take offence and the PR takes over: the posters become a hot story. the message is pushed home again. deny all allegations. the posters are eventually pulled from the web site. you can always blame over-zealous back room boys and others who "didn't know they were jews", as ian mccartney lamely trotted out when he labelled letwin a "21st century fagin" in 2004.

what helps is that the opposition won't want to make too big a fuss because they know that anti-jewish bigotry still exists and they don't want to stir things up whereby they ampify the covert message "if you don't like jews, then don't vote for howard."

two weeks later, wheel out an a-list labour MP - alan milburn, also election manager - who holds his hands up and says, as he did yesterday, that the posters "left the party open to legitimate criticism." pour oil on the water & soothe the story out of the media. it's not directly anti-semitic but it's using race & religion to achieve a political objective. sure it's coming on the back of holocaust memorial day but labour could never stoop to that level could it and anyway, who'll notice the timing?

**

now i'm not saying this is how it is. but it's suspicious. plus politics is the roughest of sports, rarely played by gentlemen and this government has a reputation for half-truths and manipulation greater than any that has gone before it. and if it is the case, then it's genius political management - but totally despicable.

but whatever you think, remember these four examples of questionable output all came directly from the labour party. approaching an election year. and if you've seen the posters - or heard mccartneys and o'brien's comments - you'll see exactly why a highly respected, high profile public figure, broadcaster and writer like rabbi julia neuberger finds them disquieting.

i've said my piece now in support of buck's post. if anyone's had pause for thought as a result then i've done my bit.

Brit_in_Japan

HG, I can see where you are coming from, but I don't agree that there's some mastermind plan behind these events.

Firstly playing the racism card, however cleverly or subtly done, is playing with fire. I cannot see such a tactic getting wholehearted support from within whatever inner circle at New Labour controls their election strategy. It would only take a quiet word to a journalist from someone who didn't agree with the tactic to bring the whole thing into the public domain. That would severly damage New Labour and Blair in particular.

Secondly why would New Labour need to do this? Where would this Muslim vote likely turn if they no longer voted New Labour? The Tories are not exactly the most electable party right now, so I can't see them turning there. Lib Dems maybe, but again what chance does that have of stopping a Labour majority? Virtually no chance.

The only way New Labour are going to lose the next election is if they shoot themselves in the foot in the most public and humiliating way, which is what you suggest they are flirting with. I'm sorry, I just don't buy it.

TelBoy

I agree with HG. Sorry, but the only lasting memory of this debacle to the majority of the electorate will be that the Tories didn't like the adverts because they were anti-Semitic, end of. More people now know that Howard and Letwin are Jews than knew before. Mission accomplished.

Brit_in_Japan

You're suggesting that less people will vote Conservative simply because Howard and Letwin are Jewish, not because of their policies? I wonder if there are that many biggots in the UK which could change an election result, I certainly hope not.

moses

uncle buck aint got a clue as usual

i aint a labour supporter as most of u know, but tony and his mates aint anti semite b-o-l-l-o-c-k-s

but it was very stupid to stick howard and letwins head on a pig, its so offensive to jews and muslims, it was pathetic actually, it was suppose to mean pigs may fly etc basically these guys tell porkies

howard is actually a nice dude but i aint a tory or labour supporter, im gonna vote for my scots party snp , i used to be a ssp supporter those *******s leckie and alan mccombe betrayed my hero tommy sheridan

but these posters were offensive the pig ones etc


brit in japan, dear bud anyone muslim voting for labour are f***ing traitors, in scotland they should vote for snp but in england they should vote for liberal democrats or tories if they have to , only if they dont wanna vote for liberals the second choice in england for them should be the tories, like i said i like howard he aint a zionist, he may do a good job and i dont think muslims need to be afraid he will make the laws to suit the zionists.

Holy Ghost

not exactly "change" an election result but perhaps make sufficient difference in some key marginals. create a bit of uncertainty maybe. in the eyes of those who might use it, it probably won't hurt things ...

otherwise yes. anti-semitism is perhaps the oldest of all prejudices and consequently more ingrained. it still exists - more covertly than overtly, more private than public. and it also appears to be the only prejudice that you can get away with.

Holy Ghost

exactly. and i've saved the best till last. just for you tel.

the two ads were created by trevor beattie: an ad-land luminary of some standing and labour party donor. his speciality? controversial creative ad executions that use editorial coverage in the media to drive publicity for the product or brand in question.

hang on, hang on it gets better: alan milburn yesterday remarked in the press about how the posters "left the party open to legitimate criticism." and who originally approved beattie's posters for public view online? well, yup, you guessed it. alan milburn.

QED.

ugh. leaves a slimy taste in yer mouth.

Leslie

If as you say Telboy, because everyone now knows that Michael Howard and Oliver Letwin are Jewish, and you say that is "Mission Accomplished", then that can only be down to anti semitism in itself!

Les

Mungo

For a party known so well for making sure its message is given exactly how and when it will make the desired impact, I'd doubt that this was a ****-up, but it's easy to think of it that way.

Brendan Hughes

I love this. For a fairly right-wing BBS that keeps complaining about political correctness - which is usually interpreted as being over-sensitive to minorities, like baa baa white sheep and teaching Hindu songs to schoolkids, if you don't like it then **** off back to where you came from - we now have people raving about disgraceful anti-Semitic poster campaigns about which even the Jewish aren't offended.

It's PC gone mad, I tell you!

Adam M

I have to say, I am jewish and I don't find the posters, even the pig ones offensive.

Michael Howard is about as jewish as my cat. Ask him if he eats bacon before wondering about the offense caused by placing his head on a pig.

I hate to say it, but I would rather he and letwin were not jewish. I would like to see labour get beaten after the travesty of their last term, but it would be naive to assume that there isn't enough prejudice left for his faith to affect whether or not people vote for him. Because of this, he is never going to be voted in as people will not want a jewish leader of england. I remember a pole showing that 20% of britains would not vote for a jewish candidate, without even considering his policies.

It is a sad state of affairs but I believe it to be the truth, and with that in mind, the greater good here is that labour are not re-elected. Sorry to say that Howard and Letwin are the wrong choice if the conservatives are going to be the ones to keep them out of number 10.

Iain Young

Out of interest, why is this any worse than the conservatives portraying Blair as a devil in the last election? At least this was an accident (which has offended nobody but the pc brigade), whereas the devil posters were deliberate.

Personally, I find it all rather childish and wish they could actually spend more time on creating decent policies than just finding new ways of mud slinging all the time (and I am referring to all the parties when I say that)...

unclebuck

Add that 20% to the Muslim voters then, and this little smear will have a powerful effect on the overall vote. Way beyond the apparently 'accidental and innocent blunder' it has been portrayed as. Cunning to the point of being extremely distasteful and questionable. IMO.

SJ_Skyline

Simple - One of these posters was a slur, the other was portaying the truth

Drunken Bungle Whore

Don't you think it's a sad comment on the state of pollitics in this country that we can only choose to vote for the lesser of 3 or 4 evils? Tony Blair will most likely get in again next time, not because we want him too, but because we want the others even less.

Bring on Brewsters Millions and vote for 'None of the Above'

Mungo

I know it was "a while" ago, but wasn't Disraeli jewish?

TelBoy

Yep. There can be no accurate statistics about the extent to which people would avoid voting for a Jew, but i'll bet a LOT of money that the numbers aren't insignificant. It's the world we live in.

tiggers

Regardless of whether this is racially motivated or not I can't help but feel this typifies what is wrong with British politics - why can't the parties get it into their heads - we wnat to know what they are going to do not how badly their opposition have done.

All parties, but particularly Labour and the Tories, are guilty of smear campaigning and it is one of the many things that turns me off the whole political process in this country.

tiggers.

scoobynutta555

Utterly pointless thread

Can't wait 'til the next election after which there will be another Conservative 'leader' after another defeat.