Wednesday 28 April 2010

Gordon Brown: The Man In The Iron Grid

No-one will be the slightest bit surprised by Brown's off-camera mutterings, which are entirely in 'character' - the dismay at meeting someone who disagreed with him, however mildly; the immediate finger-pointing and disloyalty towards his aides; the inappropriate use of language.

His usual response to this kind of set-back is to play the Macavity and disappear.

But he can't. The iron grid of his final-week campaign appointments, starting right away with the third debate and his need to prep for that, cannot be modified to the extent of giving him a few days out of the spotlight.

He will get grumpier and grumpier. The medication will be stepped up. The infelicities will multiply. The NuLab plotters will redouble their machinations. etc etc etc. Can even Mandelson recover this one ?

Oh dear, oh dear. It couldn't happen to a nicer chap.

ND

13 comments:

Old BE said...

For me the turning point was Mandy losing his temper at Nick Robinson. Brown's idiocy today is just the icing on the cake.

Now, where's my postal vote?

Bill Quango MP said...

I feet a little sorry for Brown. The woman was saying it's the immigrants and he was saying no it wasn't.
What can he do? He must genuinely believe that immigration has been a wonderful thing for the UK. Scotland's declining population has risen for the first time in 31 years.
{Why it has been declining for 31 years is not often asked.}

So, Gordon doesn't agree with her and then tells an aide, she has bigoted views. Which, in Brown's eyes, she does. She's Old School. A little Englander without the vast breadth of vision to see EU cooperation and global regulation, world stage scale issues that must be solved.
So I felt a little pity that he was caught expressing his opinion of her views. They all do it off air. BQ MP has met a fair few tinfoil hatters in the last few weeks.

But then Gordon went on Vine and in a very tetchy from the first word interview said, "There is no extra £40 billion of debt,it won't happen, we've already accounted for it in out £1 billion of senior managers pay cuts it started in America, I was in charge and I'm responsible.... Responsible for sorting out the mess the global recession has made.
All this talk of a spending review isn't helping. If we had had a spending review then we could not have carried on spending to get ourselves out of the global recession that was caused by greedy bankers hiding information from the FSA....A spending review would have meant we could not spend today anything like we have been on public services...

He sounded angry, irritable and ever so slightly insane.
Like a man tring to remove water from a well by digging it deeper.

Andrew B said...

@elby

Possibly a little extreme.

What I would like to happen is for Gordon Brown to be remembered in the same way as Americans remember Gerald Ford

Anonymous said...

1. Never feel sorry for a politician.
2. We saw the man as he is.

Electro-Kevin said...

Let's hope those Labour votes don't go orange.

Budgie said...

Brown is obviously sorry his remarks were broadcast. But he just shows what Labour really thinks behind closed doors about ordinary people and their concerns. Patronising and arrogant, the Labour mindset is to close down debate and to vilify their opponents.

Y Ddraig Goch said...

RE: Andrew B

> @elby

> Possibly a little extreme.

I have to agree. I don't see what dog turds have done to deserve that treatment.

Andrew B said...

@Y Ddraig Goch

How do Americans remember Gerald Ford?

... From what I can see, they dont.

Quite big-brotherish.

CityUnslicker said...

Not worried about votes going yellow really, as long as 2% break to Tories they will get a majority.

Old BE said...

Spoke to a Leftie mate earlier and was expecting him to play the thing down but all he could say was "idiot". Labour know they can't win now. I think the LDs will be a good official opposition.

Anonymous said...

When you spend your political career trying to present a public face and change the recent past to your own interpretation of events, you need to let the truth out in private. It is a way of keeping a grasp on reality. We have had a glimpse of the false face of politics. The other, more serious, falsities in this election are
- Getting things out of proportion by saying minor changes proposed by others are the end of civilisation as we know it.
- Confusing investment with social returns (but financial liabilities) with investment with financial returns. We have got a structural deficit in the boom years through confusing the former with the later.

Sebastian Weetabix said...

I can't wait. What next? Punch a war widow if she asks about helicopters?

Nick Drew said...

justice indeed if Labour should lose as a result of Brown's own doing