James O’Brien has dismissed Tony Blair’s explosive criticism of the Labour Party as ‘insane’, revealing that he has lost respect for the former prime minister.
On Wednesday, Blair published a 5,700 essay on his thinktank’s website in which he took aim at pretty much everyone and everything in the Labour Party.
The three-time general election winner with Labour criticised a number of Starmer’s policies and called for the party to move away from the soft-left and occupy the “radical centre.”
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Blair also said any leadership change at the top of the party was “irrelevant if it doesn’t start with a policy debate” and accused Starmer’s government of having no “coherent plan” for the United Kingdom.
The essay has sparked plenty of chat and debate, with people split over how valid Blair’s criticisms are and how much he should be listened to.
One person who isn’t having Blair’s intervention though is James O’Brien.
Speaking on his LBC show on Wednesday, the presenter acknowledged that it is almost impossible NOT to care about what Labour’s most successful leader has to say – but that he “can’t tell you why you should care.”
O’Brien said much of Blair’s essay was “just a broad insistence that what he says matters because of who he is.”
He continued: “Because what he is saying, and I say this cautiously, is insane. What he’s saying is absolutely bonkers!”
After saying Blair’s essay “could have been written verbatim by one of Donald Trump’s billionaire backers,” O’Brien pointed out how one of Trump’s biggest backers, Larry Ellison, also funds the Tony Blair Institute “to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.”
The journalist then took aim at Blair for cosying up to Trump in recent months, and in particular hit out at the former Labour leader for joining the US president’s Board of Peace.
“That was the moment where I experienced the dissimilar liberation of my relationship with Tony Blair,” he said.
“That was the moment where I felt, oh okay, you’ve gone over the edge, over the brink. You’ve joined Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, you’re disgusting.”