What happened to the "Blair Democrats"?

[T_i_B]

I ask this because not too long ago some people were calling on the Democrats to be more like Tony Blair and trying to bask in hislight as can be seen by this article here

http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=251557&kaid=127&subid=171

Now the principal thing behind this was to try to look pro-war in order toride on the backof Blair's high US Poll ratings.

However, the Iraq war has only served to damage Blair in the UK (which is after all the market he is supposed to serve) and Blair has been shown since the end of the war to have grossly exaggerated the threat from Saddam to take us into war, been put through the Hutton enquiry and now the electoral chickens are coming home to roost as the Liberal Democrats have won an elction in a previously safe Labour seat with a swing of nearly 30%! We Brits are very unhappy with Blair's actions over Iraq and disillusioned with his domestic policies.

Now the question is, does anyone still think that the Democrats should still be looking to Tony Blair when he is such damaged goodshere in the UK?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3121336.stm

The Liberal Democrats have snatched one of Labour's safest seats with a victory in a key north London by-election. Sarah Teather won the Brent East poll by more than 1,100 votes, overturning a 13,047 majority.

The 29% swing from Labour to the Liberal Democrats is the largest for almost a decade, and is being described by commentators as one of the most stunning turnarounds in British electoral history. However, with a turnout of 36.4%, senior Labour figures say many of the party's supporters simply did not vote.

Commentators are linking the Labour defeat with Tony Blair's decision to go to war with Iraq, and anger among the party's traditional voters over the involvement of the private sector in public services.

[wryter2000]

1. Thanks for the report

Keep us informed of what goes on in the UK, please. We don't even get good information about the USA over here. (See the front page article about combat casualities.)

[T_i_B]

2. Blair and Labour 'under threat'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3122496.stm

Labour could lose the next General Election following its disastrous poll at the Brent East by-election, former minister Frank Field has warned. He said the party was in "deep trouble" following the Liberal Democrats' Thursday night success in the former Labour stronghold.

Mr Field, a former minister for welfare reform, stressed: "We are in deep trouble and for the first time we see the prospect that we might actually lose the election on a record low turnout."

But fellow ex-minister Glenda Jackson said she believed Labour could win a third term - if Tony Blair was to quit as prime minister and party leader.

She said the Brent East result showed the electorate had a "complete lack of trust in the government" and therefore in Mr Blair.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3121512.stm

Disillusioned Labour voters in the Brent East by-election went to the polls to deliver their verdict on the war on Iraq, government trustworthiness and, most pointedly, Tony Blair's leadership. And the message could not have been clearer, or more sensational.

They turned their backs on Labour in their thousands, rejected the Tories and instead handed the Liberal Democrats another of their occasional historic victories with a huge swing.

After his own personal annus horribilis, the prime minister must have been braced for a drubbing. But even in his gloomiest moments he probably tried to reassure himself that this seat was so rock-solid Labour he could not lose it.

Time and again during the campaign, the issues of trust and the backlash at the war and the way the prime minister led Britain into it emerged as key issues.