Random British politics post

It's probably another milestone for being away from the UK when British politics starts to look less like a serious topic and more like some kind of weird, Maury Povich-ish form of entertainment. I'm now wondering exactly why the Tories think there's some kind of mileage in attacking Labour for being - shock! - connected to unions. I mean, this is still the *Labour* party, yes? The party that was formed out of trade unions in the first place, back at the start of the 20th century, expressly to represent the interests of the working man (yes, that was intentional, women couldn't vote at the time...) through the unions? Representing the labour unions is what the Labour party was formed to do, that's its purpose. Sure, Tony Blair did his best to torpedo the whole idea in the 90s and turn it into another party to represent the interests of the CBI (because, you know, just having the one isn't enough), but surely a decade is a little too short of an interval to let pass before you start screaming that being supported by labour unions is some sort of deep and dark shame for the Labour party? Sigh. Bizarro-world is back. I wonder how long it'll be before the UK is like the US (and a few people in Canada who've been infected by US politics), where the captains of industry have managed the impressive trick of convincing people who work for $7 an hour in Wal-Mart with no benefits that the *unions* are their enemy...