Summary
IAN Bell, in his critique of Mark Stuart's John Smith: A Life (June 18), is somewhat guilty of the same selective amnesia towards John Smith that he derides Princess Tony and his cronies for. In one way, one cannot blame Bell, or Stuart, considering New Labour's despicable treatment of their late leader. Voters were urged in 1997 to "Do it for John, the best prime minister Britain never had", and his already worn grave at Iona became a tacky site of "pilgrimage" that the faithful to the New Order were expected to visit and have their pictures taken there while looking suitably moved, one copy to Smith Square, and the other on their election leaflets.
Then after a suitable number of years had passed, this so atypically tasteless New Labourite appeal to sentimentality and pathos - the Smith totem - was just another PR device no longer useful and so was quietly junked. Instead, they began to weave the myth that only Tony Blair's New Labour could have delivered, when in reality Major's government had proved so shockingly bad that even a repeat of Kinnock making an idiot of himself at the Sheffield rally and John Smith fumbling over his economic plans on breakfast TV could not have stopped a Labour victory this time.See the full content of this document
Extract
Selective Amnesia Towards John Smith
But here lies the rub. Smith was certainly guilty of handing Major the lifeline in 1992 that inadvertently ensured Kinnock's...
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