Simon Carr: Gordon looks happy. Time to panic
The Sketch: Shares in the PM are the only ones in Britain that are going up
Tuesday, 7 October 2008
These are serious times, with the entire structure of the world financial system looking like Chateau Collapso, real skills are called for by our political leaders.
It's an education to see them in action. They recognise the issues, I think and have developed strategies to cope. The oppositions need to be seen to be part of a government of national unity. The Government has to welcome them into "the progressive consensus". To that extent everyone has to appear close and cosy. But the Government has to keep the credit for any success and the oppositions have to avoid being tainted by any failure. That means they have to keep their cool and distance. It's not easy.
So, Gordon Brown looked immensely cheerful in the Commons yesterday. And why not? Shares in the PM are the only ones in Britain that are going up. He sat in on the Chancellor's statement yesterday with a face full of lively cunning. As the shadow Chancellor spoke Gordon radiated a transcendental superiority. "Oh, if only he knew," he managed to project. With a scratch of his temple he was able to say, "Of course, I have spoken to President Bush about something very similar." And in total, "Obviously I can't say anything but you, poor fool, have really let yourself down there."
George Osborne's offers to join the decision-making process reminded me of my own efforts to get into a certain reception at the conference. Alistair Darling kept saying he couldn't find Osbo's name on the list. Vince Cable got a cheer and went on to recommend "partial nationalisation". Then he asked for the Bank of England's remit to be changed a bit. I think we need something more alarming from Vince.
Only one of the Chancellor's remarks stuck in my mind, and only because it sounded so cynical. The German announcement about guaranteeing all private deposits was "not legally binding" because it was only "a political declaration". That made me wonder about government guarantees that were actually supposed to be binding. Ultimately, paper money is a "political declaration". And all these calm, consensual words and promises to do "whatever it takes" to create stability in these difficult, dangerous times – they're political declarations too. I'm scaring myself now.
Having listened to the Chancellor, the Sketch has some advice for all readers. Get out of money. Buy gold. And not gold futures or options. Buy Krugerrands and put them in a safe deposit box. Then buy 500 kilos of rice and an automatic rifle. This is not a drill!
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Perhaps he felt the hand of history on his shoulder & the fist of peter up his.....
Nuff said.
Posted by RSBridgman | 07.10.08, 16:13 GMT
Brown is happy because he believes he's done the trick - ie uber-spin merchants Mandelson and Campbell will surely keep him at No.10 and win the next election for him. This is Brown's only vision - his right to occupy No.10 until he graciously chooses to go and the whole world will applaud his genius. He has no idea how to achieve that except get supersalesmen to sell his "image".
If this country elects this incompetent and specious Labour party again, they will get what they deserve - even more of a mess than we are in now and England the paymasters for the rest of the UK as we are squeezed until we break. Will Mandelson be PM - or Tony Blair? It surely won't be Brown. Mandelson, Campbell and Blair are far cleverer than him. If he stays at No. 10, it's because they think that's a good idea....
Posted by R.W. | 07.10.08, 14:37 GMT
I only watched a little of Darling’s dirge and only saw the normal miserable, brooding and commissar like face of our dear leader sitting alongside. It was interesting how the stock market dropped all the time Darling was saying nothing really, but lurched back as he sat down.
What ever these likely lads, Brown and Darling, aided by the old Queen of Sleaze Mandy, do to pump more money into banks, it will all have to be borrowed, because Brown’s ‘gigantic intellect’ told him that the boom days would last forever. Remember, “no more boom and bust.” I also remember “this government will be whiter than white,” and now they give a peerage to the sleaziest of them all. You really couldn’t make it up, could you?
Posted by P Stroud | 07.10.08, 10:43 GMT
Brown only is happy because he thinks the crisis might make people forget about his woeful performance in the last year, and hopes that people will forget that the opinion polls were going against him before the crisis even hit. People don't forget that easily that they have been repeatedly lied to about the EU referendum, that nobody would be affected by the loss of the 10p rate (except for the odd 5 million of course) that the polls didn't affect the election decision etc. Combined with the lies is incompetence in just about every area, whether its releasing instead of extraditing foreign convicts, calculating foreign worker numbers, losing millions of computer records etc. I have news for Brown, people don't forget as he will find out first at Glenrothes and then at the general election. His defeat will be deservedly massive and appointing a sleazy has-been, will not help him save his skin.
Posted by dave | 07.10.08, 01:34 GMT