Support for Ming Campbell in a letter to the Independent

9.59.01am UTC (GMT +0000) Thu 6th Sep 2007

Sir: Having read Dominic Lawson's wise words on Ming Campbell (4 September), I wonder whether we have entered a parallel universe. If Iraq has become the defining moral and political issue of our age, then Ming stands out as a man whose voice has, from the beginning, been in accord not only with that of the majority of the British people but also with what looks increasingly like being the verdict of history. And yet he is struggling in the polls, and largely derided and dismissed by the media.

Messrs Brown and Cameron, on the other hand, are put up for our admiration as political giants, engaged in an epic struggle for our vote. Can anyone explain to me when either of these two titans raised so much as a squeak of misgiving, let alone protest, when the Bush/Blair adventure was launched?

Increasingly, the leitmotif for our politics seems to be that it is much less important to be right than it is to be young, and preferably pretty, with a plausible line of banter. They say that we get the government that we deserve. I only hope that next time they turn out to be wrong.

Henry Lawson

Reading, Berkshire

Read Dominic Lawson: It is time to stop sneering at Sir Menzies

Published: 04 September 2007

http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/dominic_lawson/article2924413.ece