Embarrassing memories

Martin Kettle - he's a very quick way to annoy yourself:

One of the ways New Labour deliberately signalled its break from the past was to burn its bridges with what it saw as luvviedom. Where Neil Kinnock had embraced the arts with exuberance, Blair icily kept his distance.

...what the hell is he on about? This is raging nonsense, it's rolling around on the floor and giggling hysterically, it's banging your fists against either side of your head and howling - "icily keeping his distance"?

And then:

Perhaps politics and the arts don't, can't and maybe even shouldn't mix. That was certainly what Lenin thought; which seems a good enough reason to assert that they can.

Blairites for Proletkult? It figures.