Goodbye, Gordon

How do I feel about Gordon Brown's resignation as Prime Minister and party leader? Ambiguous, I think. When he and Blair took over the Labour Party, I already distrusted Blair, but hoped that Gordon's background in proper Scottish socialism would keep the party honest.

On that, I was totally wrong. As Chancellor, Brown seemed to see it as his duty to make the Labour Party safe for bankers, speculators and associated charlatans. Pension contribution holidays continued, regulation was almost abolished, tax rates on banks, hedge funds and speculators were slashed (hedge fund traders pay tax of 18%: their cleaners pay 20%). The eocnomy was run on the fantasy maths of the city while manufacturing was allowed to die. Brown supported every rightwing dream of the authoritarian Fabian faction - illegal wars, ID cards, nuclear weapons, the lot. He saved the economy after the crash, without a doubt, but he saved capitalism rather than saving us, because he long ago lost his ideological and moral compass.

And yet, and yet. There's a personal tragedy here. I don't care about the gibe that he was never elected as PM: nor was John Major or Margaret Thatcher. Nobody is, technically: he's elected as an MP and the biggest party chooses. The tragedy is the way in which an intelligent, passionate and committed man sold his soul for power, then found himself unable to wield that power effectively. The struggle to succeed broke him, distorted him, hollowed him out. Sometimes, we're told, he's a loving, jolly man in private. Perhaps, and perhaps he'd have won and governed well.

Let's not forget, too, that he suffered the misery of a dead child, yet had to continue in office and political life as though it had no effect. A few years ago, a Swedish prime minister took time off for depression. How sad that our own political system is so staggeringly immature that a period of mourning and recovery would have been depicted as weakness. Sad, too, that his near-blindness and partial deafness were points of mockery.

I'm sorry for him on a personal level, and I'm sad that a man with such potential wasted it all. The cliché is that all political careers end in failure. For poor Gordon, his started in the same way. He's both brilliant at small politics (you don't get to be PM without eating a lot of rubber chicken and burying plenty of daggers in friends' backs) and useless at big politics: tone deaf when it comes to public opinion (e.g. the 10p tax, and ID cards) and incapable of communicating effectively ('bigot-gate').

Will Britain and the world be better off without him? I wish it were so, but I see no heavyweight intellectual in the Labour Party - the Cabinet is a collection of bitter losers and degenerate children of Blair, obsessed with presentation and power, yet lacking principle. John McDonnell for PM!

Steve Bell's election morning cartoon

Damn!

I've missed my chance to be insulted by the Prime Minister. All the leaders are in the West Midlands because the last leadership debate is from Birmingham University tonight:

9.51am: Gordon Brown has just got off a train in Wolverhampton with his wife, Sarah. A lot of handshaking going on at the station. A lot of smiles from what I assume are commuters and then he's driven off in a car surrounded by an escort convoy.

Watching Channel 4 News last night, I was amused by the shot of two rozzers outside Gillian Duffy's house as though it was a crime scene, with the newscaster saying 'she hasn't been seen since Gordon Brown left her house some time ago'. Jesus, Gordon, I know she annoyed you, but you didn't have to murder her!

Go Gordon

The scandal of the election has just hit.
Gordon Brown was heckled by a former Labour voter, Gillian Duffy who objected, in strong terms, to immigration, particularly from Eastern Europe and about pretty much everything else (we only have the tail-end on film here). They had a conversation which didn't go particularly well, then he got back into the car.
He still wore his microphone, and after berating his aides for setting the conversation up, described the woman as a bigot.

'that was a disaster. Should never have put me with that woman .. . Whose idea was that?' It's just ridiculous ... she was just a bigoted woman

Now he's apologising all round and fudging what he said.

Of course I apologise if I have said anything that has been offensive, and I would never put myself in a position where I would want to say anything like that about a woman I met. It was a question about immigration that really I think was annoying.

I'm blaming myself. I blame myself for what is done. You've got to remember that this was me being helpful to the broadcasters with my microphone on, rushing into the car because I had to get to another appointment.

They have chosen to play my private conversation with the person who was in the car with me. I know these things can happen. I apologise profusely to the woman concerned. I think it was just the view that she expressed that I was worried about that I could not respond to.

Labour spin-doctor:

Gordon has apologised to Mrs Duffy personally by phone. He does not think that she is bigoted. He was letting off steam in the car after a difficult conversation.

No, Gordon. She is a bigot. I know it doesn't look right for the PM to criticise a pensioner, but she made a bigoted comment. You should have told her that. Now you've definitely lost the election.


Ho hum. Decades of Tory rule stretch out before us. The Tory press is going to push this for weeks, as will the BBC.

Steve Bell: genius

(Nicked from the NSPCC's adverts)

Gordon hits out

Taiwan's Apple Daily excelled with its CGI extrapolation of what might have happened between Tiger Woods and his wife.

Now they've gone one better: Gordon Brown's violent outbursts in beautifully rendered graphics. It must be true - they couldn't have made this stuff up.

Gordon is a Moron?

So the newspapers are full of reports (culled from Andrew Rawnsley's new book, The End of the Party, which I pre-ordered last year) that Gordon Brown has a ferocious temper and takes it out on anyone in the room, from advisers to secretaries.

I can't get too excited. It's not very socialist to treat the staff badly, but then he hasn't been a socialist for a long time. Nor is it a shock to discover that politicians have tempers or get stressed, particularly when we're in the worst recession in decades. It's only a surprise to some because politicians have spent too much time pretending to us that life at the centre of power is like one long wise-cracking episode of The West Wing rather than a combination of plotting, extemporising and panicking. A little more honesty would go a long way.

Tony Blair had his occasional rages ('the fucking Welsh' was one choice quote), but his general eery calm is far more frightening to me than Gordon's human anger and misery. Blair was messianic: he rose above mere democracy, and that's what led him into error. He didn't care enough to be stressed by events, or the voters. Gordon does - and that's endearing.

Poor Gordon is a bit odd - but then, to survive in politics, and in the Labour Party, and to want to govern, requires oddness. If you want some real horror, read Francis Wheen's Strange Days Indeed, about Britain in the 1970s. Extremely senior civil servants stripping off and rolling around on the carpet, royals, generals and newspaper editors seriously discussing a military coup, and a Prime Minister (Harold Wilson) talking about himself as the 'fat spider in the corner'.

Sly Gordon

Gordon Brown, knowing he's going to lose the election even if Jesus appears for the Second Coming and will only speak to the Prime Minister, gave a rousing speech which appeared to a) go for the Tories (excellent) and b) row back on some of his favourite reactionary policies.

Only, as usual with the Dear Leader, the small print is highly informative. He said that there won't be a vote in the next parliament on making ID cards compulsory. Well, that's very reassuring, were it not for a couple of minor points:

If you apply for a passport or driving licence, you'll go on the national identity register.

A parliamentary vote isn't required to make ID cards compulsory. Secondary legislation is enough.

As the chief executive of the passport agency says in this article: the 80% of the population who have a passport can leave the country without being on the ID register - they just won't get back in.

So thanks Gordon, very generous. Luckily for me, I have an Irish passport and no driving licence. The weird situation is that non-EU citizens already have to have ID cards, British citizens basically won't be able to avoid having one in the next few years, so EU citizens are actually better off than both other groups, better even than British people in Britain!

How blogging works, part 328.

You may have seen Andrew Marr ask the Prime Minister about his health (eyesight, depression) on the BBC this weekend. It was very strange: the story is the first one I know of which was entirely generated by bloggers.

Most of the time, bloggers claim that they generate news. They're wrong. They might hype stories up, but their sources are usually the standard media, especially with big sources. How do I know this? Because I co-wrote an academic paper on the subject. Read it here.

This story's different. It's untrue, as far as we can tell. As this Guardian story explains it, a blogger heard from a civil servant that Brown isn't allowed to eat cheese, salami, various other foods and red wine. He decided that this was stuff he was banned from consuming when he was on anti-depressants in the 1980s. Cue 'Brown depressed story'. Then a bigger site picked it up, as did all the conservative sites out to get Brown. Once enough sites were howling about it, it leaked into the mainstream media.

This is obviously a failure of journalistic standards, but also a beautiful demonstration of the shortcomings of blogging: a weird opinion is amplified by partisan interests during a period in which an individual is already fair game. Instead of ascertaining facts, opinion and speculation are accepted and even encouraged because it's arresting - it's the Fox News approach.

My two cents: if Brown is banned from eating these things, it's because he's in his late 50s and prone to getting a bit porky. I shouldn't be eating these things either.

Sweet Caroline

Hard-faced rightwing, selfish careerist and mediocre minister Caroline Flint has stabbed Brown in the back, leaving the cabinet in a huff because she didn't get a promotion. In her resignation letter she tells GB 'You treated me as window dressing'. It's true that Brown et al. are a lads' club, but let's remind ourselves of Ms. Flint's recent media appearances: a multipage fashion shoot in Observer Woman while declaring that she didn't want to be judged by her appearance.

Will the reshuffle save the party (and therefore the country)? No. Same useless, failed faces, plus Alan Bloody Sugar (after Brown declared the end of Blair's celebrity-run regime).

Meanwhile in St. Ives, the Labour Candidates finished significantly behind Lord Toby Jug of the Monster Raving Loony Party.

Treason doth never prosper

What's the reason? Why, if it prospers, none dare call it treason. (John Harington)

Well, I'm in the office for a few hours - need to write a module leader's report, if that excites you in any way. lair

Today is both glorious and tragic. Glorious in that I'm having a cup of tea with the Deer Friend, recently returned to these shores from a few weeks' grave-robbing in the pyramids. Weren't they a cheap rip-off of After Eights in the nineties?

Tragic in that bitter, twisted, selfish, self-important, deluded, reactionary no-mark Blairites are stabbing Gordon Brown in the back. As I said before, I've never rated him as much more than a capitalist stooge, but I like dour, eeyoreish monsters. Now I feel sorry for him - the unwanted dog in the pound, whipped, beaten and beneath contempt.

Who the fuck are these people? Does Blears think she'll be a rallying point for the Blairites? Does Purnell think his moment has come at last? Frankly, I wouldn't recognise him if he was alone in a room with his name on the door - and I'm a politics obsessive. They're not saving the party by knifing the prime minister. They're making it clear to the country that they'd rather get some headlines by treating Brown like a gimp than run the country or make Labour electable again. They're clearly neither socialists nor Labour supporters, because all they're doing is helping the Tories. How does guaranteeing a Tory government help the working people of this country? Blears, Purnell and Hutton are traitors, pure and simple. Watch as they pick up lucrative directorships and turn their backs on the people who (mistakenly) elected them.

The Guardian's live-blogging the shenanigans here.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha bye bye Blears

Maybe this makes me sound bitter, but Hazel Blears' resignation is one of the happiest days of my life - like all my graduations rolled into one - because I'm a socialist and a Labour Party member (I know, these things are mutually exclusive, but I exist in a state of cognitive dissonance). I hope that my constant acid attacks on her has helped foster in her the sense that the people don't really like her - but I doubt it.

True to form, she's resigned in a way designed to make herself look good and Brown look useless. He is, of course, but she's a deserting rat keen to inflict as much damage as possible. He should have sacked her a long time ago: it would have been good for the government of this country, good for the party and good for his reputation: he'd have looked decisive.

She said that she wants to

"help the Labour party to reconnect with the British people, to remind them that our values are their values, that their hopes and dreams are ours too".

But the Guardian is, thankfully, less impressed by her low cunning:

In a move that seemed deliberately hostile, Blears confirmed her departure publicly 90 minutes before prime minister's questions.

Obviously she's talking total bollocks. She represents nobody except careerist rightwing political obsessive class traitors, despite her incessant whinging that she's working class (because her brother drives a bus). Let's hope she's consigned to the dustbin of history for ever, and that New Labour goes with her.

As to the leadership, I maintain my record of opposing every Labour leader since Clement Atlee (and he drifted sharply to the right). I hated Blair when he was Home Office shadow minister and saw Gordon as his capitalist fixer - and a man who betrayed his Maxtonite roots. I see no reason to re-evaluate that position. I'd like John McDonnell to take the leadership, out of romantic socialism. If not, Alan Johnson would appeal to the electorate but not to me. Perhaps Rhodri Morgan (or in English) should be invited in: he's the leader of Wales's 'Classic Labour', which has made that country a socialist paradise, he's a heavyweight intellectual and a populist speaker and organiser. Michael Foot's still alive too.

I almost forgot: meanwhile, Labour HQ has dumped Dr Ian Gibson, for selling his flat to his daughter. Ridiculous: most of the cabinet have behaved corruptly, whereas he hasn't. Of course, it couldn't be because he's a sane, rational, thoughtful and occasionally rebellious independent thinker. He's particularly good on science. The country will certainly miss his contribution to public life.

Sralan

My wonderful brother sent me a link to Cassette Boy's (that's his main site) take on The Apprentice (which I hate with a passion). I didn't know that the great man put stuff on YouTube as well as release albums (I love The Meat Section). I should be marking but I'll have to watch CassetteBoy versus Jeremy Clarkson. The Gordon Brown one is genius too. Do not play the Harry Potter ones in polite society.

Caption competition

'I need a new host body. His will do'.

Any more?

Insult to injury

Apparently, while universities offer us a 0.3% pay rise, Vice-Chancellors have averaged a 9% increase this year, to £194,000 (the same as the prime minister). Meanwhile, our (generous) pay rise of 5% last year is listed as a 'problem' by our own V-C in her presentation. I've written to ask what salary and pay rise she got. Think I'll get a reply?

Update: in 2007-08, she was paid £180,000: an increase of 24.8% on the 2006-7 salary of the previous incumbent (figures available here). How many students' fees is that?

Jade Goody… her legacy

I'm slightly saddened by the death of Jade Goody - as saddened as I was by Diana's death: someone I didn't know, don't respect and don't otherwise care about dying young. I'm angry because I switched on the news yesterday to hear the words 'The Prime Minister and the Archbishop of Canterbury led the tributes to Jade Goody…'.

This is a political, moral and journalistic failure. We're all going to die - it's not a special achievement. Such figures should be too busy to express and opinion about a citizen they don't know, and WHAT TRIBUTE COULD POSSIBLY BE PAID? Goody was emblematic of a failed social and educational system, and as such should spur us on to make this country a kinder, gentler place - but she achieved nothing other than to highlight these failings.

It's a journalistic failure because the press shouldn't be wasting the prime minister's time with this rubbish - it's an attempt to catch him looking out of touch. Meanwhile his advisers will have prepared a response to make him look in touch. Neither side cares about this unfortunate woman.