David Cameron, an Early George W. Bush

From the desk of The Brussels Journal on Thu, 2006-10-12 15:03

A quote from AEI resident fellow and former White House speechwriter David Frum in National Post (Canada), 7 October 2006

Ironically, the figure David Cameron most closely resembles is one few British voters feel much affection for: the Governor George W. Bush of 1999-2000, who excited Clinton-battered Republicans with promises of a new “compassionate conservatism.”

Like the early Bush’s, Cameron’s big ideas come concealed in a thick haze of evasive verbiage. [...] [Cameron] has learned a lesson from [Tony Blair]’s experience. You cannot let people down, if you offer them nothing.

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Off the Wall

Submitted by Voyager on Thu, 2006-10-12 15:19.

It is true that Bush was a poor candidate compared to McCain and that he was not into nation-building and wanted to be isolationist so that the doctrine New American Century was drafted to get him involved in world affairs, but Cameron is something else.

Cameron is a PR creation, a hologram designed to present fuzzy policy with no identifiable contours, a sort of Max Headroom to give people the impression he is all things to all men. Bush said he was heir to Ronald Reagan - Cameron disowned Thatcher, the US, and the party manifesto he drew up only last year.

Frum has too little exposure to UK politics to understand so fits everything into a US template. A big American failing. They understand so little of political systems outside the USA that they look for analogues abroad and get into a very big mess.

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