I blame the scapegoats Read Free

the gender of our children was greeted with
the usual hand-wringing. Some commentators said, 'It is time we had a full
public debate on this whole area,' which is another way of saying, 'I haven't
the faintest idea what I think about this one.' Meanwhile there were the predictable
howls of outrage from the very quarters that are always banging on about
freedom of choice. Because while we're confronted with too much choice when it
comes to Sky Movie channels and different sizes of cappuccino, for the really
big things in life the right's instinct is to deny people real choices. Why
shouldn't parents be able to opt for the gender they would prefer? Who could it
harm apart from the people selling yellow Babygros? Either way, when the child
is born the choices will still be narrow enough.
    Maybe
the critics don't like new generations having the opportunities that they
never had. Perhaps they feel that IVF makes it all too effortless. 'Honestly, sperm
today, they have it so easy,' they say. 'When I were a sperm, it were a
struggle. No fancy doctors helped me reached the egg - I did it through my own
hard work and perseverance. But young sperm these days, they don't know they're
born. Oh, they're not, are they?'
     
     
     
     
    The greatest Tories ever sold
     
    14
July 2001
     
     
    Who
says the dispossessed underclass of the inner cities are not interested in
politics? The first ballot in the Tory Party leadership contest produces a
stalemate and suddenly there are riots in the streets of Bradford. Gangs of
youths set fire to cars and looted shops, expressing their anger and
frustration that Michael Ancram and David Davies had tied for last place
thereby delaying the next stage of the contest. One masked teenager, hurling
bricks at the riot police, was heard to shout, 'Why can't the 1922 Committee
organize an exhaustive ballot using a single transferable vote!' 'Yes! The
constituency associations should have had the choice of all five candidates!'
cried another, but their desperate pleas were drowned out by the sounds of
sirens and smashing glass all around.
    There
are some cynics who suggest that the Tory leadership contest has failed to grip
the public's imagination; that it might have worked as a one-off show, but a
long-running series was stretching the idea too far. But everywhere else the
British people have been animatedly debating who'd be next to go. Will it be
the gay one, will it be the asset-stripper, will it be the ex-soldier? And then
it all got so confusing that one IOC delegate said he had voted for the 2008
Olympic Games to be held in Kenneth Clarke.
    The
Tory Party has an even greater problem looming on the horizon in that the final
decision will be made by its dwindling ancient membership, the majority of whom
are completely mad. These die-hards are still fuming about the fact that back
in the 1970s Britain adopted the duvet and abolished good old English sheets
and blankets. 'British bedding is being dictated by Brussels . . .' they say.
'Continental quilts were introduced without a referendum, and the value of togs
is outside Westminster's control.' They hate foreigners and they hate
homosexuals and these are the very voters to whom Michael Portillo has to
appeal. If they find out his dad was an asylum seeker he's really in trouble.
    In
the second ballot Portillo managed a net increase of just one, which is exactly
what the Tories managed at the last election, so it doesn't bode too well.
David Davies has jumped before he was pushed, but he only got this far because
some MPs were under the misapprehension that he was the bloke who used to
present World of Sport. Ken
Clarke was doomed from the outset because he would actually increase the appeal
of the Conservative Party and that is the last thing on their mind at the
moment.
    They say that the issue of Europe is causing
even deeper division within the Conservative Party than the Repeal of the Corn
Laws, but this isn't too surprising because you hardly ever