Big Surprise, Blair Wins

Looks like its official, Britain’s Labour Party held on to its lead in Parliament just enough to ensure keeping Blair in office. I really don’t have anything to say one way or the other on the British PM — except that he’s a hell of a lot more eloquent than our “benevolent” dictator — but being in the UK for the last couple weeks of this election was pretty interesting.

Iraq was a bigger issue in the UK election that it seemed to be here in the states during our last election. The Conservative leaders went on and on about the legality of the invasion and how Blair misled the people into war (sound familiar…yeah, it didn’t work for him either). There was the usual prattle about health care, jobs, and the economy (no real issues, just imagery), but there were a lot less dirty personal attacks than our campaigns had. The UK process was by no means pretty, but it wasn’t as disgustingly showy and scum-ridden as our electoral process.

As much noise as everyone made about Iraq having the possibility of unseating Blair, no-one I talked to when I was in the UK (locals and ex-pats alike) felt there was really any risk of such. The polls always had him with a solid lead, even with the very progressive Liberal Democrat party sapping points from Labour I’m sure (Nader couldn’t spoil the election over there).