Why Brown bottled it: Six point Tory lead in the marginals

Oscar Miller

What was the Today programmes election prediction slot called - the doomsday clock? Now we know whose doomsday.

Tiberius

How could one expect Brown to go for it after England beat Australia in the world cup? It sends all his Britishness stuff up in smoke! Well to my mind, we've gone full circle. We're back to where we were just before he received what now looks like an unsustainable bounce after his coronation, and its effect on galvanizing the Tories. And it is now not possible for Brown to go in 2008 either. What must be understood now, though, is that the Tories have completed the decontamination exercise. The party conference followed by these poll results confirm that. Cameron cannot ease up for one minute as leader of HM Opposition and cannot draw back from the areas of policy that for so long have been out of bounds to his party. The Tories can now win the next election, and David Cameron can now be our next Prime Minister.

TGF UKIP

Not only was I completely wrong,I'm absolutely flabbergasted. I really thought it impossible for a pol like Brown to risk such utter humiliation. No comparison with Stoker Jim, he postponed out of calculation, Gordon's just chickening out. Not so much "Big Clunking Fist as "Wet Limp Nailbitten Hand."

James

Brown is obviously the New Yellow!

John

Just shows how wrong it is to put narrow Party interests above the interests of the UK. It would have been an entirely unnecessary election called solely for Brown's ego. By the way - anyone going to the Stop The War march on Monday? Tony Benn looks sure to be arrested marching down Whitehall. More egg on Brown's face. Lol.

Perry

On the principle that people should clear up their own mess, would be nice to think that the Noo Layba chickens came home to roost on their watch, - providing that the rest of us aren't hurt too much?

Praguetory

If the marginals were 44 - 38 now, I think it would have widened if he called an election. Labour would have been blown away.

TGF UKIP

Tiberius, this time we may even be in agreement. Dave has had, I think, a huge escape and, after two years of making some really daft mistakes, now has a huge chance ahead of him. First thing to drop is "no Punch and Judy." One of his mates (Matthew d'Ancona?) has got to tell him that he really is Mr Punch and that he must now well and truly get stuck in. I would also entirely agree that more than ever he can and should get back to proper conservative as well as Tory territory. In retrospect he has been done a huge favour by three people. First is obviously Gordon but a joint close second must come Gummer and Goldsmith. Much of the Tory success in the past couple of weeks has come not just from "The Speech" but as a result of the reaction on this website and others on the right to the G&G idiocies. The scramble back to safer Tory ground was immediate and now Dave should stay there, wipe his brow and say "lesson learned." If he wants to do this without losing face, he could do worse than sponsor an open-minded debate on the whole subject of the "World's Future & Climate Change" and invite Bjorn Lomborg to debate with, say, George Monbiot (not Zak - he wouldn't want to see his mate humiliated.) Anyone who heard Lomborg on "Talking Politics" this morning would know who would win and with one bound Dave could be free.

Craig Strachan

Looks like Douglas Alexander made as big a hash of the might-have-been Autumn election in the U.K. as he did of the actual election in Scotland in the Spring. Wonder if Gordon will keep him on the job?

Carol42

Looks like the 'Great Clucking Fist' has jumped the shark. There is a God.

John Whitworth

Certainly there is a God. And the most cursory reading of the Good Book shows that that he is a Tory as Doctor Johnson (and even Tom Paine) knew perfectly well.

David Lindsay

Nowhere near enough for the Tories to win. A conservative party could win. A "free" market "libertarian" party could lose fair and square. But all that the Tories can now do is lose for ever because elections are effectively rigged against them. They should give it up, and let those other two parties emerge in their place. Still, it's good to see that the grown ups are in charge after all: the media cannot simply demand an Election in order to keep themselves amused, and then bang on and on until they get one. Brown should now state once and for all that the next General Election will be on the first Thursday in May 2009 and there's an end to it. It was always going to be then, anyway.

bb

David Cameron, a politician, proves he can speak for an hour without an autocue and thereby proves his credentials to be Prime Minister of Great Britain? The late Mssrs Hague, Duncan Smith and Howard must be kicking themselves.

DC

Brown is clearly afraid of any kind of election. On what basis is he to impose his 'vision' on the people of England? Not one of them has ever had the opportunity to vote for him or his policies which appear largely made up on the hoof. Mr Brown should have called an election as he has no personal mandate whatsoever; the fact that he did not do so because he was frit of the voters will hopefully only delay the rightful return of democracy to the English nation.