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Machiavellian PM loses his cunning
Joe Murphy1 May 2009
Gordon Brown may feel today like Kenneth Williams in Carry on Cleo: “Infamy, infamy, they've all got it in for me.”
However, nobody is seriously calling for a leadership challenge, a fact that should alarm rather than encourage the PM. Unlike a year ago, when Mr Brown was last plunging into a comparable crisis, Labour MPs have actually given up hope of being able to win the next election with this leader or any other.
The most common complaint is that Gordon Brown is losing it — his judgment, that is.
Failing to say sorry for the email smears, blundering on to YouTube with a back-of-a-fag-packet reform of expenses, underestimating the campaign for the Gurkhas, breaking Labour's manifesto pledge on the top rate of tax.
“Who is advising him at No 10?” asks one petrified MP.
What most panics Labour MPs is seeing how coolly David Cameron is beating the Prime Minister, tactically and strategically.
Brown is a Machiavellian, constantly seeking to outmanoeuvre his enemy through his beloved dividing lines with all the cunning of a Florentine prince.
Cameron is an heir to Sun Tzu, the ancient Chinese general, who advised an army to flow like water and never to fight head-on except where victory is certain. “Seizing the enemy without fighting is the most skilful,” is a maxim that Cameron used well in recent weeks, avoiding two huge elephant traps in the 50p rate and the expenses crackdown, so Brown ended up impaling himself.
Mr Brown has recovered from disaster before. But with local and European elections a month away, things will get very much worse for him before they can get better.
Reader views (8)
Gordon is like the famous uzelum bird. Goes around in ever-decreasing circles until he disappears up his own . . . . ? Leave you to fill in the dots.
- Albert Hall, hove england, 26/05/2009 07:11
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There should be an election now. The electorate has lost faith in the current representatives. Even those MPs not touched by the sleaze should look for a vote of confidence from their constituents. Why wait for another year when there is so very little public confidence in the present Parliament. If Gordon Brown won't do the honurable thing, then the Queen should step in and call an election; that's her job -- to oversee Parliament on behalf of the British people, and to step in when it has become dysfunctional.
- Phil Jones, London UK, 19/05/2009 11:37
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At last cameron is waking up to the maxim of Napoleon, "never interupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.
- Nebrodi, valletta, malta., 19/05/2009 10:37
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Brown (like Blair) has accomplished what he came in to do! make a mess of this country, pave the way to Draconian laws, and create such a public backlash, that the votes will swing to the Right in the next general elections. If anything he has been selfless to his cause even at the cost of his public career. The land-slide victory which brought Labour to power was also due to a similar backlash against a catalogue of failures and unpopular policies by the Conservatives.
Our Democracy is no more than predicatable, incremental swings of the pendulum from right to left.
- W Joseph, London, England, 19/05/2009 10:37
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For all the years Blair was leading his party, one felt that Brown was behind the scenes sulking and resentful and using a number of his cronies to bad-mouth Blair. For some unfathomable reason, during this time, he was credited with having a great financial brain which I never bought and which we can now liken to the emperor's new clothes. He never did have a financial brain. Finally, when his day arrives and we see him for what he is - inadequate.
I feel no sympathy for him but I do have sneeking admiration for Blair. The timing of his move could not have been better. He has set himself up with a number of jobs which appear to be earning him sack loads of money and which do not appear to be causing him any great strain. In getting out when he did, he was not around then we were hit with the global recession, not around when MP's expenses hit the fan and no-where in sight when the Ghurkas issue arose. All of it fell into the lap of Brown and all of it has been too much for him.
I wonder how many of those Labour MP's who were so keen to be rid of Blair would love to have him back.
- Geoffrey Speller, Altrincham, UK, 19/05/2009 10:37
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What Brown or his misguided counsellors in the Bunker ( and the Westminster commentariat) under-estimate is the sheer level of public rage with this shambles of a Government. Trawl any political blog - even or especially left-wing ones - and the tide of bile has reached Tsunami levels. Brown is spinning helplessly towards Niagara Falls carrying his party to its doom alongwith him. And he ain't got a paddle. He's toast.
- Joe Blogs, Lewes, Sussex, UK, 19/05/2009 10:37
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Unfortunatly, it's not just Trash Gordon that's being destroyed, he's taking the country with him, end it's not just his own country of Scotland, it's the whole of the British Isles. Time for total devolution maybe? He doesn't even speak recognisable English.
- Lezli Taubler, London / UK, 19/05/2009 10:37
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You flatter him by crediting him with machiavellian cunning.
Gordon Brown is a classic bully who used the members of his 'gang' such as Damian MacBride, Derek Draper, Ed Balls, Tom Watson and Liam Byrne to scare and intimidate potential opponents. They did this so well that there was not even a token challenge to Gordon Brown for the leadership of the Labour Party. They could not allow even a semblance of democracy for this would have exposed his 'Achilles Heel', his record as Chancellor.
After a decade in the second most powerful post in the government, Gordon would have had to run on his record. That was the very last thing he wanted to draw attention to, for what has he achieved during this position of such power?
What is fascinating is that for his whole career Gordon Brown has focused his efforts on opponents WITHIN the Labour Party, and the effect of his pernicious and malign influence is finally made visible.
Having not opposed his selection as Leader of the Labour Party, the MP's cannot now say they they do not want him even as his power dribbles away and his efforts to regain it become ever more desperate. Having removed all opponents, he no longer has anyone to blame, leaving himself alone, centre stage under the spotlight!
He talked of his 'values' and we now know what they are, we are living with the consequences of his economic policies, he has no political programme to pursue, the Labour Party is bankrupt and riven with factions.
What a legacy!
- Manny Goldstein, London, UK, 19/05/2009 10:37
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