John Major's Intervention If The Scottish Vote

[mikey4444]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-29140156

I listened to Major being interviewed yesterday by the Humph and I'm not sure if it was my imagination or not but I thought the former PM sounded more decisive and combative than he ever did when in office. We hear so little from him these days.

[ethelburga]

I agree there wholeheartedly.

[mikey4444]

For IF read IN !...I hare typos !...can we please have a review feature please Ed !

[ichkeria]

His article in the Times sounded like the rant of a bitter man to me.
Though his concluding paragraph summarising the basic reason for voting "no" is spot on of course.
He always used to bang on about devolution being he start of the break-up of the UK, and he plainly still hasn't got over it

[agchristie]

Oh I don't know Mikey, he openly said it would 'turn his stomach' doing a deal with the IRA!

[Jomlett]

30 minutes to edit, please...er editor!

[naomi24]

Mikey/Jomlett, typing your post into a Word document and then copying and pasting into AB is one way of spotting typos before you press submit. I do that with long responses. Just a tip.

[mikey4444]

Thanks Naomi...I sometimes do that myself.

[Hopkirk]

Mikey, what has got into you?

I keep seeing you praising past and present Tory politicians.

Are you turning right in your old age?

[mikey4444]

Hopkirk...I try to be fair as much as I can !

Major was probably quite a nice chap. He would have made a good next-door neighbour....he would have had all those Black and Decker attachments that you could borrow. If you had the bonnet up on your car, he would jump over the wall in seconds, to help you out. He could be relied on to mow your lawn and feed the budgie when you were on hols.

He would have been a really good Scout Leader. Indeed 53 years ago, I had a very similar Cub Leader when I was a boy, and we all worshiped him
( a Mr Neville Church, of the Wembley Scout Pack ) He would have been a smashing coach for the Boys Cricket Team. I'm sure that we would have been welcomed as the Chair of his local PTA, and a really reliable member of the Neighbourhood Watch.

But as a Manager of the country, which, after all is what a PM is, he was hopeless. He was promoted far above his abilities and was only voted in to replace Lady Voldemort because he wasn't Michael Heseltine. He had the disadvantage, of course, of being surrounded by a pack of backstabbers, or
Bar Stewards to use his own words, but if he had been a little stronger, he might have survived a little longer, although the Tory Party had clearly run out of steam by 1997. Hence the huge landslide of Blair and the Labour Party.

But on the radio yesterday, he had a fire in his belly that I have not heard before. Perhaps the NO camp should have brought him down from the attic sooner rather then later.

[ladybirder]

I agree Mikey, he does seem to have improved with age. Very much the elder statesman.

You'd have to mind him with your wife though but then again I would hazard a guess it was Edwina who made all the running there:-)

[jourdain2]

I heard him, too, and I agree entirely. I thought he was impressive in his clarity.

[Hopkirk]

Put him next to Gordon Brown or Ed Milliband and who would you vote in to power?

[mikey4444]

I am sure you know me well enough to realise that I would never vote for a Tory Hopkirk, quite nice chap that Major is !

[Hopkirk]

Oh surely you will vote for Boris when the time comes.

[mikey4444]

Boris won't need my vote...he will have plenty of others to get him to No. 10 without my assistance.

[ichkeria]

It's very easy to stoke a fire in your belly when the fire has long since ceased to matter. He was always firmer than he sometimes sounded tho he wasn't much of a Prime Minister - his only saving grace being he seemed "normal" to many of us after what went before. Probably the David Moyes of the Tory party :-)
I remember him attending a Rugby League international not long after he replaced Thatcher, and thinking how nice it was to have a semi-normal person in the job

[Bazile]

//..He had the disadvantage, of course, of being surrounded by a pack of backstabbers..//

mikey - that and is portrayal in spitting image

[mikey4444]

Life imitating art I guess Bazile !

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/1993/jul/25/politicalnews.uk