What to make of this political mess?

Or, is it a mess?

Conflicting opinions about New Labour have me trying to figure this out: if leftist Labourites consider New Labour an extension of Thatcher and the Tories, does that mean that Gordon Brown will not get any votes from the Labour left-wing?  Also, does that mean those Labour public who support Brown/Blair and all their social programmes should now throw their votes to the Tories in order to continue these programmes?

The government may be in a mess because of the reshuffling, but the public are in a mess as well.  The Lib Dems know where they stand.  The Conservatives do too – and they do not consider Brown an ally.  The Labour party has yet to identify themselves so that their public can understand them.  How can those single moms praise social programmes by New Labour and plan to continue voting Labour, and then have Labour left-wing denounce New Labour?

Why are the ministers rallying around Brown rather than stabbing him in the back?  Not because they have faith in him.  Maybe, because they’re holding out for the long run (and believe me, their support of him will not hurt them in the eyes of Labour faithfuls and leftists).  But, isn’t it possible that their actions show that they have as yet to define their party?  Milliband and Johnson don’t want to be leaders right now, not because the party is going down, but because they’re unsure how it will change.  It wouldn’t be good to fight for leadership of New Labour if everyone suddenly decides they want to be just Labour.  There’s too much infighting for anyone to successfully take over.

But, from former Labour MPs to the general public, there is an outcry for real news about the economy, politics, business, rather than about the MPs themselves.  Well, isn’t the reshuffle news?  People would like to know who will be in charge of what (though I admit that some positions are rather vague).  The reshuffling is not exactly taking attention away from the real issues.  The issues are there but cannot be adequately addressed, so it’s hardly surprising that the media cannot report on it except to say that there is not an answer yet.  The government is not working today because no one knows exactly what they’re doing.  I mean, if one day you’re Health Secretary and the next day you’re the Home Secretary, well, how can you effectively perform your job? 

The government is at a standstill until everyone learns their positions, just like the beginning of a new term in office.  Only, it’s the beginning of an end of a term.  Sorry, people, your MPs and the PM cannot address your concerns today because they’re still trying to fix some internal problems.  It’s like your computer crashed and you’re waiting for the technician to fix it.  Only, I’m not sure Gordon Brown is all that wonderful a technician, so your computer might not be fixed in a day.  You can’t really blame the media for putting the attention on the internal crisis.  The camera’s on the technician to make sure he does his job right.