Are Britain and the U.S. Drifting Apart Ideologically?
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN ANCHOR: Well, with Britain and the U.S. close allies, what effect is Thursday's Labour election victory expected to have on relations between the two nations? To answer that, we turn to Adrian Wooldridge. He is the Washington correspondent for "The Economist" magazine. Thank you very much for joining us.</s>ADRIAN WOOLDRIDGE, "THE ECONOMIST: Thank you.</s>SAVIDGE: Is it pretty much a done deal, Tony Blair going to make the election?</s>WOOLDRIDGE: Absolutely. I'm afraid it's a done deal. Well, I shouldn't say that I'm afraid it's a done deal, it's a done deal. I think it -- Blair has a very, very large lead in the opinion polls of between 12 and 30 points, and we could actually see Blair, the Labour government, actually increasing its majority. Its majority is now about 180, we could see a majority of 200. And this is actually a historical thing that's about to happen, because this will be the first time ever that a Labour government has won a second term.</s>SAVIDGE: And what has happened to the conservatives? Have they just self-destructed?</s>WOOLDRIDGE: They self-destructed. Blare has done, I think brilliantly, in occupying the center ground. He has adopted a lot of Mrs. Thatcher's policies of privatization and injecting the market forces into the public sector. And what the Tories have done is to retreat further to the right. They've moved to the right on social issues. They have made a huge issue of asylum seekers. They talked about putting asylum seekers into makeshift prisons,and I think that has alienated a lot of people, they have just ruled themselves out of the middle ground.</s>SAVIDGE: It's interesting as we look over the past relationship between the United States and Great Britain. Often the leadership and the parties they represent have been reflected in both countries. You had Tony Blair, you had Bill Clinton. But now there seems to be a parting of the ways. Why is that?</s>WOOLDRIDGE: I think that's absolutely right. I think if you look at the '60s, for example, you had Kennedy here, you had Wilson in Britain. If you look at the '80s, you had Reagan and Thatcher. Now, I think the electoral cycle, the political cycles are moving apart. You have certainly a conservative government in this country, and you have a center-left government in Britain. Why it has happened I think is because -- simply because the Tories have been in power for so long, they alienated so many people, there was a huge reaction against them, and Blair very cleverly continued to pursue centrist policies, thus forcing the Tories to pursue more unpopular policies. But I think the significance of this is actually quite considerable, because normally the trans-Atlantic alliance is strengthened by the fact that you have ideologically sympathetic people in power in London and Washington. Now you don't have that, and I think that increases the pressure on Blair to look very much to Europe rather than to the United States as a model and as an ally. And I think also, if Tony Blair does get a large majority, an increased majority, that also increases the likelihood that he will push for a referendum on membership of the euro, and if he goes into the euro again, that pushes him further toward Europe, and it also does -- I think once Britain joins the euro, creates a much stronger currency, which is a real rival to the dollar.</s>SAVIDGE: Does it also suggest that the British people and the American people are perhaps drifting apart?</s>WOOLDRIDGE: In some ways I think it does. I think we shouldn't underestimate the extent that Britain is actually much to the left of -- of the United States anyway. And many of the things that Mr. Hague is campaigning on would be regarded as pink socialism in the United States. He supports a public health service, he supports high levels of taxation, certainly by American standards. So he, on many issues, would be regarded as a Democrat, not as a Republican. But yes, they are continuing to drift apart, and Britain is drifting further toward Europe, further away from the United States.</s>SAVIDGE: All right. Adrian Wooldridge, we have to leave it there, with "The Economist." Thank you for joining us.</s>WOOLDRIDGE: Thank you.