British politics back to normal   I have been observing British
politics since the early 1960s, and I have noticed a common
pattern: Until the 1990s, the party in power has most of the
time been behind in the polls.  It struck me that Brits had some
visceral sense that expressing disapproval in polls placed some
limits on the prime minister's theoretically dictatorial
powershe (or she) can get practically any legislation he (or
she) wants through the House of Commons but is likely to be
restrained from going too far by public opinion. Tony Blair and
his New Labor Party changed that pattern: From 1997 up through
the 2005 election, Blair has generally enjoyed positive job
ratings and has been favored over the leader of the Conservative
Party.  Now that has changed. The Conservatives' new leader
David Cameron is now preferred to Blair. In the same poll,
Conservatives lead Labor and the Liberal Democrats 39 to 33 to
18 percentalmost enough to win them a majority of seats. (New
Labor manipulated the redistrictin