The political realignment

Via Craig Murray has an essay noting the political realignment that is happening

The most important rift in British politics today is not between left and right, it is between authoritarians and libertarians, between those who support human and civil rights, and those who prefer "Strong government".

The old alignment based around economics is not longer useful, quite simply free markets won. With nobody really arguing about whether markets should be free or not anymore the only other major argument is whether the people should be free as well. The new split will be fought on centralisation versus localism, targets and accountability versus professional autonomy and responsibility, the individual versus the collective.

There is no doubt about where Labour stands with its record of legislative diarrhea creating "more than 3,000 new criminal offences" and extending the state into areas of life that it has never ventured before. What is also clear is that it is in this area that David Cameron has found the clear blue water to separate himself from Labour. He explicitly stated it in his views on education

This is not something that requires central imposition: in fact it is centralisation that today stands in the way of the right approach.

And in his speech to the police federation:

You accept that responsibility when you choose to become police officers, and I believe it's time for reform to set you free to do the job you want to do and to give you the full professional responsibility you deserve.

Also in his latest speech

Parents know best what works for their kids. Doctors and nurses know best how to improve the NHS and give patients great healthcare. Residents know best how to make their neighbourhoods better places to live. We’re living in an age where people want to control their government, not have their government control them.

Cameron definitely seems to want to lead the Conservatives to the side of the Libertarians. Margaret Thatcher freed the economy, now David Cameron looks like he wants to do the same for the rest of society. Unlike all their other policies as the co-creator of the New Labour project this is something that Gordon Brown is not going to copy. Even if he believed it to be the right thing would the big clunking fist's Stalinist tendencies let him give up control? Unlikely.