WHERE NEXT?
Blair's U-turn was awkward; harder still will be persuading the E.U.'s biggest crowd of Euro-skeptics to back the constitution
Courageous visionary or cornered opportunist? Confident democrat or hypocritical gambler? Tony Blair may qualify for all these titles thanks to his abrupt, massive and raggedly executed U-turn last week. After months of deriding a referendum on the proposed European Union constitution as a "gross and irresponsible betrayal of the true British national interest," he endorsed the idea after all. The normally dour Conservative leader, Michael Howard, was gleeful as he mocked Blair's pirouette during a House of Commons debate. "Six months ago, the Prime Minister stood before his party conference and said, with all the lip-quivering intensity for which he has...
