18 February 2007
IT'S no big deal that David Cameron smoked cannabis when he was at Eton. But he is wrong and self-serving to claim what he did before he became a politician should remain private.
To know the true face before he slapped on the public make-up is essential if we are to know the nature of the man. We are in a better position to judge the worth of Cameron's views on our "broken society", the breakdown of family life and the lawlessness of teenage gangs now we know he belonged to an Oxford gang that got blind drunk, trashed restaurants and smashed shop windows.
Cameron, we are told, continued to smoke pot at university. Not a hanging offence although it might be if he went on to heavier stuff.
More revealing is that he became a member of the ultra rich, ultra snob Bullingdon, an invitationonly drinking club where the aim was to get blind drunk, wreck restaurants and then pay for the damage with bundles of cash. Rich yob indulgence by privileged young men in £1,000 tail coats with big wallets and even bigger mouths.
Cameron's love affair with himself was illustrated again when he was a special adviser to Chancellor Norman Lamont at the time of Black Wednesday. After Lamont was fired he made a conference fringe speech hostile to British membership of the EU. Not something John Major wanted to hear. At a party that night Cameron cut Lamont dead. Such loyalty.
After the last election Cameron - who wrote the Tory manifesto and campaigned "passionately" for it - ditched virtually every major policy within weeks of becoming leader. This is not a man of principle, it's a selfish opportunist who believes only in what he can make you buy. The stuff dreamed up by marketing men, pollsters and image makers. If you trash belief and principle and bung enough cash at presentation you can get away with anything. Just like those drunken nights with the boys from the Bullingdon.
