Wednesday 8 November 2017

Blast from the Past: Polly Toynbee vs Gordon Brown

Toynbee vs Brown, round 12!  Both in the Red corner.   What a love-hate relationship, eh?

This time she's having a go at his new book.  "The sadness is that even 10 years later Brown’s old flaws and resentments remain perfectly intact.  Couldn’t he have restrained himself from expressing his loathing for Blair?"   She's a fine one to talk! - never tires of slagging off Blair, as a cursory search will establish.   

But back to the main theme: her bitter disappointment, firstly when Brown supported the war in Iraq, and again when she discovered paradise had not returned to earth in 2007.  "The real test surely came with his arrival in No 10.  I was among many hoping for a radical shift that never came. Those around him expecting a new blueprint found there was none."

Well, her grasp on facts was never great; but she got that one right.  And if we're dusting all this old stuff down again ... with apologies to Mad Carew:

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

There’s a one-eyed yellow Scotsman of a dour and sullen hue
There’s a stench of pious bullshit all around
There’s a broken-hearted woman dreams of socialism true
And the yellow Scot forever lets her down

He was known as Red McBroon, and he made the Party swoon
Though his cowardice had long begun to smell
But for all he was a wanker he was feted by the bankers
And Polly Toynbee smiled on him as well

He’d been stringing her along with his socialism strong
She’d swallowed all he put into her head
When she judged Blair’s time was short, she said Broon had her support
Provided he would prove himself True Red

He wrote to ask what promise she would like from Red McBroon
They met for lunch as many times before
And fervently she told him then that nothing else would do
But his vote against Blair’s mad Iraqi war

On the night of the debate, Red McBroon was in a state,
His followers could bring mad Tony down
But he’d never in his life had the balls to wield the knife
For he knew the wielder never wears the crown

When it came to the division, courage gave way to ambition
And his scruples failed as surely as his balls
When she heard them read the vote, fury welled up in her throat
And ‘betrayal!’ was her cry around the halls

Now Hell it hath no fury like a jilted Polly Toynbee
First Blair and now McBroon had sold his soul
As she stomped off in the night, for her op-ed piece to write
She vowed vengeance on the yellow Scots arsehole

There’s a one-eyed yellow Scotsman of a dour and sullen hue
There’s a stench of pious bullshit all around
There’s a broken-hearted woman dreams of socialism true
And the yellow Scot forever lets her down.

Nick Drew 2007

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why give her the oxygen of publicity? She already has VIP status at the BBC.

PeterS said...

I missed that poem the first time round. You should consider publishing an anthology - I'd pay good money (not too much, mind) for a copy.

dearieme said...

Blair is just an evil creature who should be hanged. Brown is a fit subject for a Shakespearean tragedy.

Remoaner-in-Chief said...

She appeared at a pro-Eu meeting in Westminster the other week and was distinctly a waste of space. Has nothing to offer and is no more than a media tart.

On behalf of my fellow Remoaners please feel free to have a go.

Anonymous said...

"I was among many hoping for a radical shift"

fuck me, she actually does get paid for penning such utter crap?

Let's av' a go.

Like an emotional adolescent, flickering her eyelids burnished 'coco' glossed red lips, eye liner bleared due to aging skin, crowsfeet running like tree roots about her unsmiling eyes. Snake skin Gucci boots, ha! no daughter of the proletariat was she! All of a flutter, pulling down tight her Che Guevarra Tshirt 'viva la Revolucion'! she shoved her way to the front of the snowflake mob.
shirt now clinging, breast heaving in wanton abandon she moued............"ooooh Jezza"

Questing, longing, panting, breathless she pleaded, "can I have your babies!"

and, "you know you want too, they were queueing up for me, though Gordon didn't!"

And therein lies the rub.

Electro-Kevin said...

A new book ? I'll keep an eye out for that one.

Nick Drew said...

A book? Anthology maybe (click on the 'doggerel' tag), but book may be stretching it

that's 'shift', anon - not shaft!

(and 'doggerel', not ...)

Dick the Prick said...

I bet Brown's done a James Joyce and spent hours contemplating each sentence. What a throbber.

Anonymous said...

I reckon that you should be the next Poet Laureate.. :-)

Baron Jackfield

Raedwald said...

I'll second the printed anthology idea Mr Drew - so long as it is illustrated with your rather clever sketches.