Although the gesture could have been important, I feel the lack of time, care and effort reflects the level of respect and responsibility that the bloke feels towards the troops.

Or it could have been late at night, private secretary gave him the address details and he knocked this letter out and stuffed it into an envelope whilst slightly drunk?

Why short for a start FFS.

I thought it was 2 sides of A4 paper …….. how long do you think it should have been ?

BTW do something about the incorrect spelling and punctuation (questions end with a question mark) in your post Hora ……… as I felt it made you came across as insincere 😐

Deer Ernie_Finch, I thank you for yuor time and effort in correcting my mistakes at this dificult times. The time you sadly lost in corecting my mistake will be remembered by someone probably us all.

Writing a letter of condolence – good
Hand writing it – better
Spelling the name wrongly – bad, we all make mistakes (someone should have checked it though), but that doesn't take away from the fact he still spends time writing the letters.

The Sun using it to score political points – scum
The rest of the media trying to claim this is news – plain lazy journalism

I wonder how much the mother was paid to leak the story to the papers? And I wonder if they paid her extra to have a go at him about troop's equipment when he phoned to apologise for his spelling mistake.

The very worst thing that should have happened here is that someone should have circled it in red pen and written "Could do better" in a teacher stylee.

Must say that while I have no time for the man and feel that he has been a complete liability and disaster as both Chancellor and PM the whole story is one big over reaction. As has been said by many. I can understand the mother being a bit upset by it but the way it has gone on seems so typical of our current culture and climate. Give it another day or so and I wouldn't be surprised if we start hearing her or the Sun campaigning for some monetary compensation for her grief and distress over the letter.

I was pretty disgusted by the coverage yesterday – but today gets even worse…

"the Sun has published a transcript" of GB's conversation with the mother – so they were all sat there waiting for his call with their recording eqpt FFS 👿

The mother is understandably distraught, but the Sun have behaved despicably over this

give the guy a break… ?

fo.

Ah but remember Murdoch's backing Cameron now, so the Sun's going all out for Brown (which let's face it isn't difficult).
And in return for this the conservatives have no doubt agreed to dismantle significant bits of the BBC so that you can have Fox news instead. Just look at the speed that the shadow culture secretary came out in support of James Murdoch's anti BBC speech after Daddy said he'd help out the Tories.
Not that Labour wouldn't do exactly the same given half a chance.

Quit bleating. Maybe negative coverage might focus his mind on future deaths and more care in foreign policy. He has blood on his hands as does Blair. One day he will be sat in his big house, with his gilded-pension writing his memoirs whilst the people who voted for him live on a pisspoor state pension and cant afford to heat their own home.

Again, quit bleating. We have pensioners who will really suffer in years ahead thanks to what Brown has done (or not done to be more acute).

FWIW – what do the detractors suggest GB should do about Afghanistan???

Pulling out hardly seems to be an option – and certainly doesn't figure in the senior military leaders views

More / better equipment?? – It takes decades to procure and commission new military equipment (as the Chinook Mk3 debacle has shown). In the decade running up to 9/11 everyone (ie all political parties) was looking to cut defence budgets for a nice post cold war "peace dividend". Many Forces folks I know voted Labour in 97 because of previous Tory defence cuts…

So it probably comes down to cutting our cloth to match our needs. The UK is a small island nation. We already have a defence infrastructure vastly larger than our (normal) needs.

Increasing military spending to provide the equipment that the troops want seems hugely desirable – but we are in the middle of a recesion and neither Labour nor Conservatives want to hike taxes, even though they both know they need to – as well as cutting spending, not increasing…

Pressure on NATO allies to increase their share of the burden combined with a medium term (3-5 yrs??) withdrawal strategy??

Hora – WTF are you on about with pensioners? The poorest pensioners are much better off now than they were – one of the successes of this government. its the richer people who were getting massive tax subsidies for their pensions that are losers.

Remember for every £1 that the government subsidised public sector pensions it subsidised private pensions by £2.50 by tax relief.

One day he will be sat in his big house, with his gilded-pension writing his memoirs whilst the people who voted for him live on a pisspoor state pension and cant afford to heat their own home.

Really – that sounds so naiive. How is any other politician, of any political persuasion, any different??

Quit bleating. Maybe negative coverage might focus his mind on future deaths and more care in foreign policy. He has blood on his hands as does Blair

Again – what would you have done / do??? Unlike Iraq (which was truly unjustified, except in Bush's mind), intervention in Afghanistan had fairly wide international, UK political and UK popular support after 9/11.

I don't remember a loud clamour that the UK should not have committed forces to Afghanistan. We might now be in a total cluster f_ck, but this issue needs consensus to resolve, not cheap political point scoring

The consensus was to go into Afghanistan. Things have drastically changed since both economically in the world AND on the ground though.

Its grinding with no end in sight. I read the other day that 100m's outside many of the bases in Afghanistan can be classes as 'Taliban country'. WTF. Years in and we have the wagons overturned in a circle.

Just goes to show the sickening amount of power the Murdochs have got. 🙁

Its grinding with no end in sight. I read the other day that 100m's outside many of the bases in Afghanistan can be classes as 'Taliban country'. WTF. Years in and we have the wagons overturned in a circle.

Agreed – but how to extricate??? Having read a lot (in the 80s and 90s) about the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the CIA sponsorship of the mujahideen, I was one who thought any operations could only end in a bloodbath

You may wish to take a seat……….This may come as a surprise.

I agree with most of what CFH have said.
Now I feel very dirty. Plus I do find very ironic that Brown's grammar and spelling mistakes are to be discussed on STW.

At the end of the day what he and Blair has done is going to be felt for a decade by the poorest hardworking Britains.

We send aid abroad but every year we will see more Pensioners dying from lack of heating. Why bang on about that? The one-eye defence/'leave him alone' defense is crock compared to what we face because of incompetence. Good bye- hope he gets kicked out on his ass asap.

What I find interesting is the fact that the mother has now taped the PM apologising and sent it to the Sun. Lets just think about the premeditation required to do that and wonder about ulterior motives. How many people have the ability and knowledge to tape their own phonecalls? Few. How many newspapers will gladly give that sort of equipment for a sensationalist story from something blown out of all proportion….

The consensus was to go into Afghanistan. Things have drastically changed since both economically in the world AND on the ground though.

Who asked you or me Hora? Not much of a consensus IMO.

Things have changed drastically on the ground? Oh yes everything has changed since the Russians left (and all the others before that, did I mention the British?) They've flattened all those horrible mountains, planted nice crops and erected McDonalds………..

Thank goodness for the 'Independent'

hora – Member

At the end of the day what he and Blair has done is going to be felt for a decade by the poorest hardworking Britains

Hora – this is just rubbish. Slate them for stuff they have done by all means but try to have a grain of truth behind what you say.

Labour policies have reduced poverty

Sorry, its worrying why he scribbles these notes. It would be endeering in other circumstances but does he know how to manage strategy?

I genuinely don't even know what that means Hora. Strategy? Writing notes? Is he meant to have a note writing strategy? And one of such complexity that it needs managing? What?

According to a Sun representative the recording happened when Mrs (Ms?) Janes put the call on speaker phone and a 'friend' had the 'foresight' to record the conversation on his Blackberry.

According to a Sun representative the recording happened when Mrs (Ms?) Janes put the call on speaker phone and a 'friend' had the 'foresight' to record the conversation on his Blackberry.

Slight improvement, but still makes you wonder why you'd do that. In a time of emotional distress and thoughts of a lost family member, you/a friend thinks "I know, I'll tape him"

The worrying aspect of politics in the UK at the moment is less the fact our PM has naff handwriting skills and more the fact that hora's vote counts the same as the rest of us.

🙂

Mark you are leading/heading a country in a recession. You delegate and manage. You don't sit there writing badly spelt/written notes. You might see the MD of a business walking around the shopfloor and occasionally rolling his sleeves up- just enough to be seen as 'one of us' but just a smidgen. An MD too often on the shopfloor means theres no one upstairs steering the business or thinking strategically.

What will he do next? Phone the XFactor winner at the weekend to congratulate them? 🙄

Now this is really a bad day.
I have agreed with CFH and now with Mark. What next, agreeing with coffeking.

Edited. Have decided not to bite and am going to leave this one well alone.

Said all I have to say on the matter.

CFH i was not trying to catch you for once.

Juan, ce n'était pas toi, mon vieux!

That Mrs James woman disgusts me for doing this – using her son's death in this way is appalling.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2003/mar/17/labour.uk

Something left Labour along time ago.

Just wrote the Sun a letter:

Your recent story publishing the phone conversation between Gordon Brown and the mother of a soldier killed in action is a sickening abuse of her anguish in order to score political points. You should be thoroughly ashamed, and so should she for allowing her son's memory to be used in such a shoddy way. A new low for the Sun.

Something also left STW along time ago.

Does Hora get a prize for this one Mark?! 😆

What next, agreeing with coffeking.

We've agreed on loads, you miserable sod 😉 In fact we shared statistician jokes!

In fact we shared statistician jokes

Now that's a thread I'm sorry I missed.

just for you coyote 😉
Two statistician go duck hunting.
After several hours of walking in a swamp they spot a Duck.

First one raise his shot gun, aim and shoot. He misses the duck from a good metre on the left.
Second one raise his shot gun, aim and shoot. He misses the duck from a good metre on the right.

They smile at each other high five and say: Yeah we got it…

I know mine is the one in red.

Something also left STW along time ago

But not you it seems… Not you… Sigh 🙂

in a world where x-factor or strictly come dancing are often in the top 10 read stories on most news websites

are we really surprised that such sensationalist political point scoring over some bad handwriting and the death of a young soldier stirs up such bitter feelings

the kind of person who is outraged by browns spelling mistake is either extremely gullible or a complete arsehole, perhaps both