Labour snoozes

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): My feeling that there is something very odd about the deputy leadership campaign is reinforced by David Clark's article in today's Guardian. He calls for his fellow Labour members to support Jon Cruddas. Clark, who worked with Robin Cook, is very able and internationally minded. But apart from using the frightful Blairspeak of whether the candidates "get it" (which I've posted about before) Clark's prose seems stuck in the past, churning fudge about re-engagement. Even if you just want to look inwards and choose the deputy on the issue of how the party relates to its members, you still need to look outwards to how politics relates to the public. Brown has committed himself to addressing this, it is the only hard commitment he has made, namely to a new constitutional reform bill now, it seems, to be dynamised by immediate announcements when he becomes Prime Minister. But the issues raised by this and how the candidates respond figures not at all in Clark's sleepy vision. Wake up Dave!