The two sides of Ken's coin

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): There is an interesting James Forsyth post in the Speccy on the half-hearted and unenthusiatic endorsements of Livingstone from the left(ish) media. You could say the same for me. The ambiguous nature of Ken was always part of his originality. Back in the days of the GLC I argued that what made him different from the Militant Trotskyists in Liverpool was that he was open to feminists and demands for racial and sexual equality in a way that his sectarian colleagues were not (regarding such issues as bourgeois distractions). Indeed, Ken was much less tribal than the official Labour Party. It was this aspect of his politics that Jeremy Gilbert praises in his disco dancer endorsement (opens as pdf). But Ken never understood this or made it part of his calling card. Today he is running on his 'record' but not on any wider vision. His election letter to Londoners is feeble rather than exciting. It is odd. Forsyth compares the media support Ken has got from the Guardian group to the low-key endorsements of John Major by the Tory press in 1997, support for a losing cause. But Major was a disaster; the man who brought us the privatisation of the railways whilst Ken did the congestion charge.