Tony Blair's participation trophy

It probably says, "Heckuva job" on it.

In the end, the British government “failed to achieve its stated objectives,” the inquiry concluded, and said that “Mr. Blair overestimated his ability to influence U.S. decisions on Iraq.”

Mr. Blair was said to have been advised by his diplomats and ministers of “the inadequacy of U.S. plans” and their concern “about the inability to exert significant influence on U.S. planning.” But he chose to override their objections.

The inquiry concluded, bluntly: “Mr. Blair eventually succeeded only in the narrow goal of securing President Bush’s agreement that there should be U.N. authorization of the post-conflict role.”

Influence, it said, “should not be set as an objective in itself.”

“The exercise of influence is a means to an end,” it said.

But, of course, influence is "an objective in itself." Piling up as much influence.. and of course money.. as possible is the whole name of this game. And the way to win at that is by never challenging power or convention regardless of the moral consequences which, ideally, never come up at all. 

Tony Blair is "a strong supporter of democracy but..."

Shorter Tony Blair: They elected some people we don't like so now we have to teach them how to do democracy better.

I am a strong supporter of democracy. But democratic government doesn't on its own mean effective government. Today, efficacy is the challenge. When governments don't deliver, people protest. They don't want to wait for an election.

In fact, as Turkey and Brazil show, they can protest even when, on any objective basis, countries have made huge progress. But as countries move from low to middle income status, the people's expectations rise. They want quality services, better housing, good infrastructure, especially transport. And they will fight against any sense that a clique at the top is barring their way.

This is a sort of free democratic spirit that operates outside the convention of democracy that elections decide the government. It is enormously fuelled by social media, itself a revolutionary phenomenon. And it moves very fast in precipitating crisis. It is not always consistent or rational. A protest is not a policy, or a placard a programme for government. But if governments don't have a clear argument with which to rebut the protest, they're in trouble.

As it turns out, though, we can really only determine who is "in trouble" according to whichever side the army happens to be on. In 2003 there were as many as 2 million people marching in the UK in opposition to the Iraq invasion. Tony Blair sent the troops anyway saying, unpopularity was "sometimes the price of leadership and the cost of conviction."  The consequences for Morsi were a bit greater than just unpopularity. The difference is sometimes the army goes where you send it and sometimes it comes to get you.

But okay now, according to Blair,  the West can't be shy to "engage" as much as possible until everybody finally elects the right people.

At its crudest, we can't afford for Egypt to collapse. So we should engage with the new de facto power and help the new government make the changes necessary, especially on the economy, so they can deliver for the people. In that way, we can also help shape a path back to the ballot box that is designed by and for Egyptians.

That last line must be one of those of Sphinx riddles you hear so much about. Anyway, that whole "engagement" thing shouldn't be too hard seeing as how we pay for the entity that makes all the decisions in the first place.