Click on image to download UK
To celebrate the new cover image for the paperback and Kindle editions of this Nazi era drama, it is available free to download until midnight US Pacific Time Sunday. The image shows Karl Kaufmann, Gauleiter of Hamburg and husband of the woman on whose life the character of Lise is based in the book, riding in the left back seat of Hitler’s car.
This morning we wake up to learn that the Tories have suddenly found £8 billion to fund the shortfall in the NHS. Where they found it they are not so far saying. Other parties will dismiss it as ‘uncosted’ before coming up with some news-flash style policy announcement of their own. It is unclear whether anybody outside the political bubble and the media is listening to this stuff. There is very slight movement in the polls in Labour’s favour (not in Scotland) and the Lib Dems seem to be recovering a little.
Does it have to be like this? Why is this election campaign among the big parties so piecemeal and long winded? There are still four weeks to go so anything can happen, though so far it hasn’t. We can only hope it does.
Click on image to download UK
To celebrate the new cover image for the paperback and Kindle editions of this Nazi era drama, it is available free to download until midnight US Pacific Time Sunday. The image shows Karl Kaufmann, Gauleiter of Hamburg and husband of the woman on whose life the character of Lise is based in the book, riding in the left back seat of Hitler’s car.
It was very ill advised for medical staff at Southampton General to organise a PR defence in the media today of their absolutely disgraceful performance over the Ashya King case, when they showed a serious lack of judgement and understanding, and turned the child’s parents into international criminals on the run, when all they wanted was to seek alternative treatment for their child.
Southampton General, whatever its positive qualities, is possessed of an unacceptable level of professional arrogance in its paediatric department and a lack of interpersonal skills when dealing with parents who question their judgement. I know. I was forced to agree to a new treatment regime for my daughter against her and her parents wishes and threatened with a police protection order if we did not concede to their demands. We did. The hospital proceeded with its plan. It proved fatal.
This hospital’s decision to re-open this whole sorry episode following the successful treatment of Ashya overseas, will cause this family further trauma and betrays the same lack of judgement as was demonstrated during the incident itself.
Click on image to download UK
To celebrate the new cover image for the paperback and Kindle editions of this Nazi era drama, it is available free to download until midnight US Pacific Time Sunday. The image shows Karl Kaufmann, Gauleiter of Hamburg and husband of the woman on whose life the character of Lise is based in the book, riding in the left back seat of Hitler’s car.
Lise Bauer is born in Africa in 1906, brought to England by her parents from where she is expelled with them in 1914, because her father is an East Prussian. They settle in America and become Americans, but return to Europe in the 1920’s. Here Lise is involved in the rise of the Nazi party, marries one of Hitler’s closest associates and later has a relationship with Hitler himself, before divorcing her husband and marrying an English friend of Hitler’s deputy, Rudolf Hess. She settles again in England with the consent of the security services and she and her husband establish a cell to act as a secret communication channel between Hitler and Churchill at the critical period of WWII.
The novel offers a new view of Hitler’s sexual relationships, a plot to overthrow Churchill and the flight to Scotland by Rudolf Hess. Using historical characters often portrayed in a new light, this dramatic account challenges the accepted view of recorded history. It leaves readers wondering why they were never told about double lives and events shrouded in secrecy.
An idea to stimulate economic growth without further government 
borrowing. Written in plain English and very easy to follow, this is the only really fresh approach out there to the intractable problems of the UK economy, and it is just beginning to be noticed in important places. Buy!
There is no doubt that the Tories began with the better campaign theme and a clear message. They had a narrative that Labour lacked, but it is becoming pretty clear as the days go by that they are losing their advantage among the floating votes they must gain to win. The simplistic and negative derision of everything Labour says or does with the word ‘chaos’ flying everywhere, is just not good enough for a modern sophisticated electorate distrustful of politicians with access to its own information. This is playing into Milliband’s hands as both his personal rating and polling shows improvement.
Take today’s cry that Labour will bargain Trident away to get the Scot Nats to support them in Downing Street. First this is a Tory invention and second guessing other party’s policies is the game of political fools. Second Sturgeon has said that her party would vote against a Trident renewal. Most of the Labour party would vote for it as would most of the Tories, the DUP and any UKIP, so it would pass anyway in a hung parliament. Third a good chunk of the electorate, and especially the floaters, think it a waste of money. An even bigger chunk would agree if money goes to Trident instead of their public services. The Tory core vote applauds this stuff but that core vote is nowhere near big enough any longer to win an election. It all depends on the floaters. So today is without doubt a wasted Tory day.
The campaign headquarters of the Tory party needs to pull itself together and organize a campaign built around the dynamics of 2015, not the nineteen fifties. This is not Australia. I know quite a bit about Australian politics, which are clunky and old fashioned and driven often by fear of the future and prejudice about new ideas. I heard one politician declare in 2012 ‘who wants broadband?’
Cameron and Osborne need to take a serious audit of affairs then sit down with Lynton Crosby and tell him to measure up or go home. That is if they want to win. They still can. I think.
There are hints that clear water is opening up between the major parties. There is now a strategic choice between Labour and the Tories over Europe and Labour are now shifting towards their core vote of working families and those at the base of the economy. This represents a decisive move from New Labour, which was actually a Thatcherite party with a less strident ideology.
Having lacked a Labour narrative, there is now at least a theme developing. A cut in tuition fees, more humane cuts of government spending (but we do not yet know what) a boost to growth by borrowing for infrastructure development, ending the non-dom tax tax status and tax rises for the rich all could be outriders for a goody bag of populist measures which seek to bring the benefits of economic recovery to the majority rather than just the top few.
There is a danger in this for the Tories. So far they have made the weather by concentrating on the economic recovery and various demand side incentives to ensure a house price boom, which is the economic model they know and like best. Their problem is in their cuts programme which is beginning to worry a lot of people who know that the last five years have left little more to cut without a major diminution in the quality and scope of public services. Serious strains are now evident in the NHS which cannot be glossed over with smooth talk.
Then there is Europe. The well meaning offer of a referendum on Europe after two years of horse trading and rows between Britain and the EU was fine if the effect on the economy meanwhile was neutral. But now the pro-Europeans, emboldened by Blair, are starting to say that the whole process will in itself be damaging and cost jobs, because of the uncertainty it will cause and if the vote went to quit, we would face the biggest economic disaster since the end of WWII. Having lived through that period I can tell you that it is something to be really scared of. And voters do not vote for scary things.
This is just about the most stilted and sterile election campaign in my life. I think I have been through seventeen and this is the eighteenth. While the minor parties have some distinctive ideas whether you approve or not, the two major parties are slogging at each other over details which turn everybody off concerning exactly when, by how much and whose fault. Ask any of them a simple question and it is impossible to get an answer. No wonder the polls are stuck neck and neck. Basically the choice is between the unctuous Cameron or geeky Milliband, austerity heavy or austerity light. It is all about management not about government.
It is therefore welcome that the somewhat discredited Tony Blair is going to enter the fray today with a powerful defence of our membership of the European Union. This is a timely upgrade to a campaign bogged down, which will significantly raise the stakes. For too long the only voices raised to challenge the quitters have been either muted or from the past. Just recently and to his credit Milliband has become more strident and this may explain his improvement in approval ratings. Blair looks set to give him a boost. The Tories will have to raise their game to keep in the frame. Meanwhile the only election communication I have received is from UKIP. That might be significant.
