Sunday, September 24, 2006

Know Thine Enemy

The Guardian has got a quiz HERE to find out how much we know about the man who won't will be our next Prime Minister. I'm rather proud ashamed to say I scored a maximum 9 out of 9. Geek. The results screen says...

You scored 9 out of a possible 9. You are well acquainted with Gordon and may or may not be anticipating his rise to the premiership with relish. Either way, you could probably turn out an adequate The Brown era: what will it bring? piece for several national newspapers.

Never. Hat tip for graphic Theo Spark

27 comments:

James Higham said...

6 out of 9. Damn. Hardly impressive, it said.

Anonymous said...

5 out of 9 - and I don't think I've ever been so happy after screwing up a test.

Anonymous said...

6/9 I'm disgusted I know so much about the man. The less I know the better methinks!.

Anonymous said...

7 out of 9, I bow down before you Iain! At least now we know what you read in bed at night :-)

"You are well acquainted with Gordon and may or may not be anticipating his rise to the premiership with relish. Either way, you could probably turn out an adequate The Brown era: what will it bring? piece for several national newspapers."

Anonymous said...

I only scored six too, but hey ho, I think he's an utter arsehole anyways.

It was uproariously funny how the Guardian describes the loss of multi-billions of pounds with the criminal sell off of gold reserves to prop up the Euro as 'an unfortunate decision' when in reality it was criminal incompetence that the idiot was warned of.

I also didn't realise his PHD was in 'The Labour party and political change in Scotland 1918-29' which is even more fucking useless than Reids African Economic History...no wonder they now make students pay for their education when Brown and the rest rea;lise just how useless the courses are and they should have to pay to waste years studying them.

The mans a tosser anyways and will be PM, if ever, for a matter of perhaps only months. The electorate knows who was the back seat driver of at least 50% of New Tosser policy, so will treat him with the contempt they now feel for Bliar.

Good riddance.

Anonymous said...

Lots of interesting stuff in your blog today Iain, but where is the mention of the alleged adulterous affair of Cameron-favorite Zak Goldsmith and a 22-year old Rothschild heiress as described in lavish detail in the Sunday Mirror this morning? I would have thought this would have broken first on your super-investigatory blog given that it's about a leading and currently buzzed Tory - or could it be that you are not quite so well informed as you think?

Iain Dale said...

Anonymous, I might have some time for your views if you actually weren't anonymous, but that would never do, would it?

Anonymous said...

anon worries me as well.Why wont he stand up and be counted like the rest of us?

Or perhaps it is a sign of the 'sea change' now taking place in the Country. I hardly ever meet anyone now who admits to voting Labour !! They are too embarassed!

The Hitch said...

Anonymous=Arsehole

Simple law of physics Ladies and Gentlemen.

Anonymous said...

I got the first question wrong, otherwise 8/9! Know thine enemy.

Anonymous said...

7 out of 9. "Better" than I expected, but I did go through Kirkcaldy on a train a couple of weeks ago.

Anonymous said...

12 out of 9.

Anonymous said...

`fucking useless``The mans a tosser`

I am ,apparently ,on a `yellow card` for use of the C word. ( Is this serious ?), and ,ironically, I was only quoting `Guido` rubbish to demonstrate that quantity of postings is not everything. Is this fair ?What are the rules then ? Will I only understand my crime in the second before death when the word BORING is inscribed into my flesh by the blogs ghastly torture machine ?



I suspect Gordon `B` `s reinvention will be so complete as to alter history any way. How Labour would love this power , so useful to dictators of the primitive 20th century .

The Daily Pundit said...

Zac Goldsmith is no favourite of mine but he doesn't hold public office so his life is his own. Unlike Home Office minister Liam Byrne, 'who retained a major stake in E-Government Solutions, a company he founded in 2000, despite becoming a minister in a government department with the power to increase the company’s value.'

Sunday Times

Etzel Pangloss said...

6/9 more than I hoped.

Being reminded of the gold fiasco sent a long cold chill down my spine.

For some reason I thought of that long forgotten duo "Cannon and Baal".

Remember their catchphrases-

"Rock on Tony", "You little liar", "I piggin' hate you, Tony"

Anonymous said...

Thank you thank you for all the kind comments after having the temerity on a Tory blog to point out that one of your leading lights and the man who will take forward the environmental agenda of Conservativism into the new century is in fact a complete sleaze. Anyway, just to show I'm even-handed and not a mindless leftie as alleged, here is another handy link to the Liam Byrne story, agreed, he is a total shite.
Daily Mail article.

Etzel Pangloss said...

Is'nt "Peter Hitchens" a pot calling the kettle black?

Anonymous said...

Evening Iain,

Do 'astroturfers' get over-excited about this time of year?

Looks like a lot of 'anons' are bleating away now, desperate to be thinking they're in touch with their 'people'.

It is great to see these spinners cocking it all up yet again. All those very serious important faces answering countless phone calls from squeaking comrades makes life so much more enjoyable.

Anonymous said...

9/9? Does that make Iain a stalker? Well acquainted indeed!

Anonymous said...

anon...you don't half talk some shite...((((Thank you thank you for all the kind comments after having the temerity on a Tory blog))))

At least here you have your comments seen and heard by all...if this was a Labour blog you would have been deleted long ago and your IP address locked out.

((((to point out that one of your leading lights and the man who will take forward the environmental agenda of Conservativism into the new century is in fact a complete sleaze.))))

Is he now? Is that sleaze in the context of Prescotts son getting hundreds of council houses at rock bottom prices while fat shite was in charge of local Government? Or any one of the hundreds of other corruption cases of New labour...now I understand...Tories commit sleaze as they hump, and New Labour aren't sleazy at all; they are corrupt...now we have the semantics fully understood.

Newmani...my swearing is in context, and I don;t have to swear except for effect...and Gorgon needs effects.

Anonymous said...

SHOT GUN - Swear all you like. I would like to use the `C ` word to fully express my feelings of warm regard for Ken Livingstone. Iain Dale is stony hearted though and dislikes me for criticising politicians who patronise popular culture (in both senses) .I alone , it seems, cannot swear .

Good stuff on `Emperor Prescott the corrupt` I also laughed in a broken bitter way on discovering his sons activities. Its not even subtle. Brian Clough was similar mix of professed Socialism and wholesale bung taking. Only alcohol related health problems saved him from choky . I am vastly more inclined to forgive England’s greatest Manager and (I `m told ) a deadly finisher than that fat fraud Prescott.

The Leadership Blogger said...

Delighted to say that even trying quire hard, I scored 4 / 10.

On their website the BBC asked people, "Has it got to be Gordon?"

Oh dear.

Yes 21.47%

No 65.12%

I don't care 13.40%

1425 Votes Cast

That's RATHER fewer people than care about Hamster of Top Gear.

Martyn said...

I think when it comes down to it voters will look at those photos of Lord Snooty Cameron alongside that economic giant and sturdy guardian of the nations finances, Norman Lamont and ask if he's really anymore to be trusted with the national interest than Gordon Brown.
Despite the best efforts of the Tory press and the open-mouthed Tory front bench, his economic predictions have come generally come good.

Why trust the nations finances to the gilded sons of privilege ? Men who have never had to worry about balancing the books in their lives.

I'd rather have a dour intellectual running the country than yet another vacuous PR man.

Tapestry said...

5 out of 9. Slipping. Memory's not what is was. That aside, I do know one thing - that Gordon Brown is exactly as described by Charles Clarke.

He's a deluded kleptomaniac - with nil team-working skills, and no leadership capacity. He only knows how to gring everything down to a level that his tiny ego can cope with, while stealthily grasping the power and money he craves.

Blair suppressed opposition by using his boyish charm to create (false) hope.

Brown suppresses by instilling boredom and fear - creating a sick feeling in the bottom of your stomach. Brown makes even trying to think positively completely pointless. It's easier just to turn your brain off, than face the depressing prospect of having to listen any more to that tedious, unimaginative psychological cripple any longer.

Can't Britain find a way to leap straight from the Blair era to the Cameron era? Please.

Serf said...

I'd rather have a dour intellectual running the country than yet another vacuous PR man.

I hold no special regard for PR men, but Gordon is an intellectual in the sense that he thinks he is clever. Nobody looking at his record on gold trading, tax credits or efficient government, could come to any conclusion other than he is completely deluded.

Norman Lamont screwed up big time. Why? ERM. At the time, Gordon was a supporter of membership as well, so he would have been in the same position.

PS 9 from 9, as befits a Tory for Gordon.

Anonymous said...

Quite right Serf,

An intellectual does not study 'The Labour party and political change in Scotland 1918-29'

Brown's problem, as outlined by the likes of Clarke, and let't not forget what Blunkett wrote about him too, is that he is a dour, arrogant and egotistical maniac.

Intellectuals study.....intellectual subjects...not vacuous transient subjects like political parties; that is for deluded pretenscious anal retentives.

Bliar went from party to party, initially the Tories until they refused to give him a safe seat, and his ambition centred round being top man, and if he had been in Browns position, would he have accepted the knives and refusal to move aside? Brown should have TAKEN the top job long ago if he had any balls, but he doesn't and doesn't deserve it...he has neither tjhe bottle or brains he thinks he has.

Anonymous said...

7/9. What is more interesting (well to me at least)is that I got the gold question wrong. Infact I never even considered that he could have been so incompetent. Competence is something he's built up a reputation for, and it will take some knocking down, especially as Everyman's interest in economics doesn't stretch much beyond his own balance at the ATM. Which is generally not a weak point, for the Son of the Manse.