Daily catch-up: Blair and his heir on winning and losing

Plus the Europe referendum, inching closer; the real Steve Jobs; a diarist reflects; and a cartoon

Another fine cartoon by Jake Goretzki.

• David Cameron has been interviewed by James Forsyth and Fraser Nelson of The Spectator.

One of my longstanding friends and supporters said that because the Conservatives have taken the sensible centre ground, we have left Labour with so little to camp on that they have done that classic reaction of heading off into the hills.

I'm not sure I would describe Tony Blair as one of his "friends and supporters", but it is almost exactly what Blair said, with the words "Conservatives" and "Labour" transposed.

Blair himself has an article in the same Christmas edition of The Spectator, in which he says it all again, clearly and well. But he seems at a loss to explain why his own party doesn't share his view:

Many – especially in today’s Labour Party – felt we lost our way in Government. I feel we found it. But I accept in the process we failed to convince enough people that the true progressives are always the modernisers, not because they discard principle but because they have the courage to adhere to it when confronted with reality.

He has a curious aside about the path dependency of politics:

We should never forget David Miliband won a clear majority of the party membership in the leadership election of 2010.

Indeed, if just six MPs had voted for David rather his brother five years ago, the Conservatives would not have won the election this year and Labour's prospects might look very different. There were other flaps of other butterflies' wings (such as those who nominated Jeremy Corbyn to "widen the debate"), but Frank Field, Kate Hoey, Rachel Reeves, Emma Reynolds, Tom Greatrex and Luciana Berger, we are looking at you.

• The European referendum creeps ever closer. I think my analysis, that it is getting too late for the Outers, whom Cameron has played brilliantly, still stands. But Steve Van Riel makes some good points about the dissonances of the Inners. And yesterday's Daily Mail carried a second leading article that almost by mistake seemed to commit the newspaper to the Leaver cause.

• This, by MT Rainey on Apple and Steve Jobs, is eye-witness history of a high order. Jobs was a "hot" character, she says, unlike the "cold" one portrayed in the film.

• Alastair Campbell on writing a diary: a worthy repeat from October 2014.

• I reviewed yesterday's Prime Minister's Questions, featuring a sparkling Angela Eagle versus a wooden George Osborne.

• And finally, thanks to Gary Delaney ‏for this:

"I think the main way I can tell that I'm feeling a bit run down is when I look at myself and there's a car on top of me."