Suddenly Labour party wannabe deputy leaders are discovering that there was something wrong, after all, with Blair's policies these past 10 years.

And of course they are all extremely careful to keep Brown's name out of the conversation!

Peter Hain tells us that policy under Blair has put the NHS into a state of "permanent revolution" and that it should be given time to settle down.

All the candidates tell us that the invasion of Iraq was not such a good idea. That is, except Tony Benn's son, Hilary, who is still defending the line that it "got rid of Saddam". Not one of them would, however, admit the catastrophic scale of the situation they helped precipitate in Iraq. And according to them the invasion was an understandable error, and only "with hindsight". Peter Hain tells us, that "everyone" believed in the WMD myth at the time. Sure, everyone without common sense and with vested interests.

You would think that people with the blood of hundreds of thousands men, women and children on their hands and who have helped turn the whole of the Middle East upside down for generations to come might show more remorse. But even PM-in-waiting Brown will only admit to "some mistakes" having been made by the government over its "handling of the situation" in Iraq.

In fact the candidates' performance on the Newsnight deputy leadership debate just exposed today's "democratic" politics for the total farce it really is. It came across just like a school contest for head boy or girl - and it was just as childish. Yet these are the people who are entrusted to run the country and make policies which launch wars!

By appearing as competing candidates with "different" things to offer, of course, they hope that the audience - and the electorate beyond - will be duped once more into going along with the sham.

Alan Johnson - the postman-poacher turned gamekeeper-politician, even went so far as to claim that there is full employment in Britain today!

As if most workers don't know that such "contests" are always an open and shut case. Whoever wins will be representing the interests of the class which is in power. If we want representation for the poor, the elderly, and the working class as a whole, we have no choice but to build it for ourselves.