Why the past matters
I don't regard the views someone held thirty years ago about what the rate of income tax should be, or even the views they held, provided those views were expressed through the democratic process, about matters of life or death such as capital punishment, should necessarily be the prime determinant of how you see them now, let alone as being a disqualification from office.
However, contacts with people convicted of membership of a terrorist organisation and active support for someone accused of murder are another matter entirely.
In an article in this week's Spectator, Stephen Daisley asks what people would think of the Conservative party if it elected and sustained in office as leader someone who had responded to the despicable murder of Labour MP Jo Cox in the same way that the present leader of the Labour party responded to the despicable murders which the IRA carried out at the Grand Hotel in Brighton.
As he writes here,
"I ask myself: What if, two weeks after Jo Cox was murdered, a backbench Tory invited members of National Action to Parliament?
What if, while her murderer Thomas Mair was in court declaring ‘death to traitors’, that same Tory MP was outside at a ‘solidarity’ vigil?
What if that Tory MP had been willing to get himself arrested for the pleasure? And what if he had written a cheery note to the organiser of the demo?
Now imagine that Tory MP ended up party leader one day. How would Labour MPs respond?
Would they cut his backbenchers the same slack they cut themselves? Would they shrug their shoulders and say, ‘Oh, they’re just being loyal party people’ or ‘He’s doing well in the polls’? Would they empathise with the Tory MPs and members who said they were staying to fight for their party’s ‘soul’?
Would they hell. They would be howling and marching and demanding every last Tory MP resign. And they’d be right."
However, contacts with people convicted of membership of a terrorist organisation and active support for someone accused of murder are another matter entirely.
In an article in this week's Spectator, Stephen Daisley asks what people would think of the Conservative party if it elected and sustained in office as leader someone who had responded to the despicable murder of Labour MP Jo Cox in the same way that the present leader of the Labour party responded to the despicable murders which the IRA carried out at the Grand Hotel in Brighton.
As he writes here,
"I ask myself: What if, two weeks after Jo Cox was murdered, a backbench Tory invited members of National Action to Parliament?
What if, while her murderer Thomas Mair was in court declaring ‘death to traitors’, that same Tory MP was outside at a ‘solidarity’ vigil?
What if that Tory MP had been willing to get himself arrested for the pleasure? And what if he had written a cheery note to the organiser of the demo?
Now imagine that Tory MP ended up party leader one day. How would Labour MPs respond?
Would they cut his backbenchers the same slack they cut themselves? Would they shrug their shoulders and say, ‘Oh, they’re just being loyal party people’ or ‘He’s doing well in the polls’? Would they empathise with the Tory MPs and members who said they were staying to fight for their party’s ‘soul’?
Would they hell. They would be howling and marching and demanding every last Tory MP resign. And they’d be right."
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