Labour has been steadily climbing in the polls, slashing the Conservatives’ 24-point lead to just 5 points in a matter of weeks. And with two weeks still to go until the election, some of Theresa May’s closest allies have started freaking out about her election chances.
The Spectator is a staunchly Conservative magazine. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson used to edit it. It runs headlines like The NHS is dying and only Theresa May can save it and Who’s to blame for Jeremy Corbyn? Step forward, Tony Blair. Now, Associate Editor Rod Liddle has written a column laying out his thoughts on this general election. And it will make very uncomfortable reading for Theresa May’s campaign team.
“Complacency and arrogance”
The analysis, headlined This is the worst Tory election campaign ever, is unforgiving from start to finish. For example:
I don’t think anything quite matches up to this combination of prize gaffes and the robotic incantation of platitudinous idiocies.
Liddle, the former Editor of the BBC‘s Today programme, slates the Conservative manifesto pledges – from fox hunting (“it makes no electoral sense”) to the ‘dementia tax’ (“complacency and arrogance”). He suggests that:
Theresa May called this election convinced that almost nothing she could do or say would prevent the inevitable landslide.
I think she was horribly wrong about that.
“Jeremy Corbyn is doing far better” than Theresa May, he says. And he worries Labour could win:
That scenario is still unlikely, but I will bet it is not half so unlikely as many of you, or Theresa May, believed when the election was called. Back then the headlines were talking of a Labour and Ukip wipeout and a landslide for the Tories.
‘The personal warmth of a fridge-freezer’
Why is Labour catching up with the Tories in the polls? Because people resent their lives being “disrupted for Theresa May’s political and personal gain”, he says. Corbyn, on the other hand, is running a strong election campaign. And:
Theresa May has the personal warmth, wit, oratorical ability and attractiveness of an Indesit fridge-freezer which has been faultily connected by a man called Trevor for five quid, cash in hand, and which is now full of decomposing Findus Crispy Pancakes. There is no vision, there is no chutzpah. Just the bland repetition of meaningless phrases. Corbyn is a far better campaigner.
And he ends:
I’ve always thought that calling the election was a mistake predicated on misplaced confidence. Today, I’m even more convinced of that view.
Since Corbyn was elected to lead the Labour Party, we’ve been repeatedly told – by the corporate media and Corbyn’s detractors within his own party – that he is unelectable. That message has been screamed at the British population through headlines, leaks and smears for almost two years. But Labour’s phenomenal surge is proving the pundits wrong. Nobody can say with any certainty what will happen on 8 June. But it is clear that some of the Conservative Prime Minister’s closest allies are getting very worried indeed.
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