The Inscrutable Blair

I've read two reviews of Tony Blair's recent book ("A Journey"). One, by John Lancaster in The New Yorker, describes the man who emerges from the pages of the memoir as supremely gifted but emotionally and, perhaps, morally hollow. Coming from the other side is Christopher Hitchens, writing in The Atlantic, who contends that Blair "was a man of almost inordinate attachment to principle."

It's worth pointing out that Hitchens, a leftist who fervently supported the war in Iraq, serves himself by praising Blair - but Hitch is still Hitch and his thoughts always merit more than passing credit. Still, even in the world of politicians, where only protean shapeshifters seem to survive, it is striking to have two such divergent views of the same man. Who to credit?

Indeed, the more I learn, the more befuddled I become. For example: Lancaster makes the following point right near the start of his article:

Blair's reticence on some subjects reaches mystifying levels. On the six-hundred -and-eighty-two-page book that consists almost entirely of detailed accounts of politics, Blair writes, "I have always been more interested in religion than politics." It is just about the only mention of religion in the book. Blair nowhere says what his religious beliefs are, and nowhere discusses how they affect his politics or his decision-making or his daily life. It is a bizarre silence in a book of this type and title.

Cast in this manner, Blair seems disingenuous and insincere. And yet, from Hitchens, we have this:

When I went to interview Tony Blair, the newly elected leader of the opposition in the House of Commons, in 1994, I wanted to ask him about his membership in the Christian Socialist Movement, a very traditionalist affiliate of the British Labour Party. I had, I told him, by now read all his speeches since he had become leader, and could find no trace of any such commitment in his rhetoric. With the very disarming open-faced grin that so many people would later come to dislike, he replied that this was because he couldn’t stand the sort of politician who exploited religion for electoral purposes. His administration would become partly defined by a terse response from his highly unsentimental media chief, Alastair Campbell, to a faith-based question: “We don’t do God.” Toward the end of his time as prime minister, Blair had increasing resort to moral suasion and hints about faith as a means of defending some of his less popular positions. And he had barely retired from official politics when he was received into the Roman Catholic Church and set up a foundation in his own name with a vaguely ecumenical global agenda.

Hitchens' Blair does indeed come across as a sincere man of conviction. So who has the better measure? I'm at a loss to say. It seems odd, but I suspect that, if I were to read his memoirs, I would be further from an understanding of Tony Blair than I am now.

UPDATE: It just occurred to me: uncaviled praise to someone's religious sincerity, coming from Christopher Hitchens, has more than a taste of tendentiousness. Advantage Lancaster? Or am I a cynic?

What Is The Point of Nick Clegg?

The coalition agreement between the newly minted PM David Cameron and Deputy PM Nick Clegg does not give Clegg responsibility over particular matters (although it promises legislation on election reform, an issue near and dear to the Lib Dems). Alex Massie of The Spectator sees this as an advantage, in that it doesn't pigeonhole Clegg and, instead, makes the success of the coalition dependent on the working relationship between Cameron and Clegg.

I'm not so sanguine. If much of the policy agenda "will be agreed by the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister," as the coalition agreement puts it, it really gives Clegg little clout at all, beyond that which Cameron is willing to suffer. Frankly, I think this tends to undermine the stability of the coalition, rather than buttress it. Massie says:

Yes, he'll be like some Vice-Presidents but, since that job has grown in recent times, that's not, as the Americans say, chopped liver.

It is true that the job has grown in recent times (think Gore and Cheney). But increased vice presidential authority has always come at the pleasure of the president himself, and some presidents have preferred to keep their vice presidents on a shorter leash (think Quayle and, probably, Biden). In other words, the terms of the coalition agreement seem to give Clegg as much authority as Cameron wants him to have. Ironically, those Lib Dem members with concrete portfolios may end up with more clout than Clegg himself.