How to save David Davis?
‘David Davis’ resignation isn’t the moment when the mainstream meeja took leave of their senses, but it will be seen in that way… When I heard of his resignation I was rattled… for about 30 seconds. It is a political masterstroke. Politicians have a range of tools at their disposal, but no British MP has ever gone leftfield like this. For innovation, DD scores 10 out of 10.’
– from ‘We Are Such Stuff As Dreams Are Made Of’ by Dominic Fisher, aka Prague Tory, (deleted shortly after publication)
I’m no fan of David Davis – I’ve always through him a bit of a tit – but his resignation has prompted something of a crisis. And it’s a crisis that threatens to misshape debate in this country in a way that will not only destroy David Davis’s career, but harm many of the civil liberties currently enjoyed by us all.
Some who applauded Davis for his principled stance, are now backpedalling fast. Prague Tory is something of a bellwether for Conservative Party bloggers and began with an excitable piece entitled ‘We Are Such Stuff As Dreams Are Made Of’; an excerpt from which is above, captured before the author, Dominic Fisher, had a chance to rethink and delete. He’s realised that Davis is toast… as many of us saw at the outset.
David Davis is right on the issue on which he wishes to campaign, but this stunt has gone horribly wrong. There’s nothing wrong with an effective stunt that delivers the right message to the right people, but this was never going to be that.
Some, like Iain Dale, his former chief of staff, cling to denial pretending that Kelvin Mackenzie’s candidacy in a good thing; no doubt Dale will be dumping the chump on return from his honeymoon.
Now may be a time for those who value civil liberties, and fear the easy corruption of the large databases that contain our identities, to hold our noses and work for David Davis. So long as no Labour candidate exists and Tory leader David Cameron continues to insist Davis’s decision was personal, this is not a party political issue.
Nobody would wish to start from this position, but this stunt may yet provide an opportunity for genuine debate… it would be fun to help realise that aim.
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