Having listened to BBC Radio 4's The Today progamme this morning, where John Humphrys, lambasted the Conservative party Chairman, Caroline Spelman, it really does seem as though something has gone awry. So what can it be?
Triangulation
The strategy is known as triangulation, where politicians try and straddle two extremes of the political divide. Bill Clinton and Tony Blair are to my knowledge the masters of the technique.
The traditional party members are claiming that he is abandoning the traditional party policies and values in favor of more centrist and liberal principles. Whist those on the left purport that he is a flip flopper and that he is not worth the vote.
Somehow both of these arguments are equally valid. The mandate with which he won the party nomination was one of modernizing the party and spearheading it into the 21st century of modern politics. By placing more emphasis on issues such as the environment and poverty the party would be in a good position to attract new voters who would add on to an aging conservative electorate.
It goes without say that from the moment he took over, David Cameron has been looking to ambush the Liberal Democrats (the 3rd political party in the UK) by appealing to those voters to join a more "compassionate" Conservative party. To a great extent it has worked and the Conservative party has begun to shed some of that dead weight from the historical past. He has appealed to the Black vote (which in UK includes any non-white groups), something that has never been known to happen on a large scale here in the UK. (_Majority, not all, of the Black Conservative vote are closet conservatives in that they never let be known in public that they are on the right. But it is changing.)
But by focusing too much on these non Tory issues, the party members have begrudged him for not speaking more about tax cuts and chastised him for his decision to abandon the support for grammar schools.
The Vacuum
If history is anything to go by, and it always is, once the incumbent leader who has applied the triangulation strategy vacates the office (as is the case in the USA where Bill Clinton was not up for re-election and in the UK where Tony Blair has just stepped aside for Gordon Brown), the middle ground is very disruptive and it makes more political sense to appeal and energize the traditional members as was the case with George W. Bush and the emergence of the religious right vote.
So I will not be surprised if in the coming months Mr Cameron reverts to the more widely accepted Tory party policies to try and appease certain ranks within the party.
When in doubt?
So with poor showing at the by elections and the internal wrangling how can Mr Cameron seek atonement? You guessed it. By going to Africa. Yes. Next week a whole delegation of Conservatives will be in Rwanda looking to do their bit for the continent and highlight the plight of the people on the continent. In my opinion this is another mistake. If it was a evangelical mission to spread the message of true economic empowerment through enterprise, small government and a bigger role for the private sector then I would have been in support of the idea. But seeing as it is more likely to be a photo ops and sound bites on ....... Please we've heard it all before!
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