A Footnote to History

[hairyears]

RIP Michael Foot: archetypal Wadhamite - academic and rhetorical brilliance, dedication and an appetite for work, and a social conscience that led him to the Left; politically-ineffective and blinded by a purity of principles that led him to dangerous folly

Comments

[hairyears]

You are not alone in that!

Before the news today, I doubt that one in ten of all adults alive in Britain could've named the Leader of the Opposition in the first, and most destructive, Parliamentary term of Thatcherism.

Many would've blurted 'Scargill' and all too few would ask themselves why it seems so difficult to recall a single voice that spoke aloud. There Is No Alternative, indeed.

[huggyrei]

I don't recognise any of these names! Mind you, I only started paying any kind of attention to the news round about sixth form age, by which point Tony had already been in power for 3 years. I have very vague memories of turning over the TV when John Major appeared.

[naath]

I wasn't even born... and besides, couldn't tell you the name of the previous leader of the Conservative party (of course Cameron's all over the news at the moment). Not sure that "he was pretty crap" is the main reason people don't remember him.

[katsmeat]

He kept quiet in recent years.

I wonder what his private opinion was of the NuLab shower who are doubtless heaping fulsome praise on him, as I type this.

a fine academic, who should've stayed well out of politics.

I think he is of an era when politics attracted some extremely talented people. Whether they should have gone into politics is, as you say, another matter. Enoch Powell is another such, who really, really should have stuck to being a Cambridge classicist.

Michael Foot was, at least, a contrast with the modern political generation who seem to have have a tendancy to be worthless spivs, who should've stayed well out of politics.

[reddragdiva]

The scary thing about New Labour is how smart they all are. They're what happens when academics get to put their sillier ideas into practice.

("Smart" and "blitheringly stupid" are not opposites. The first makes the second that much worse. Add "sincere" and you have Gordon Brown.)

[hairyears]

Who is attracted to politics

[pwilkinson]

Seeing that Michael Foot's been out of front-line politics for well over twenty years, I was very pleasantly surprised to see a knowledgeable (and intelligent) post about him from someone quite a bit younger than me. But I disagree with a couple of your major points - I'll do so briefly here but put my arguments into a post on my own LJ rather than do a grotesquely long comment here.

Firstly, Michael Foot's opposition to rearmament in the mid-1930s was typical for someone of his age and political attitudes, and there were some apparently good though (at least in hindsight) misguided reasons for it.

Secondly, his period as Labour Party leader (during which I started twenty years of active involvement in my local Labour Party) was definitely not a success, but even so it was arguably less of a failure than any of the possible alternatives - you underestimate what he was up against.

But I'll argue this further on my own LJ.

[livredor]

Don't remember much about Foot, I was vaguely aware of him as a sort of Old Left buffoon. What you've said about him pretty much encapsulates my feelings about Hague: good at debating and and intellectual stuff in a sort of tweedy donnish way, but I can't forgive him for making such a dog's breakfast of being the leader of the Opposition at a time when we desperately needed an Opposition.

[pfy]

Let us not forget that his appointment as chairperson of a nuclear disarmament committee gave us the legendary headline "Foot Heads Arms Body".