The Gord delusion
James Forsyth 11:38am
Matthew Parris, who has been consistently right about Gordon Brown, is on brilliant form in The Times this morning. Matthew points out how Brown seems quite incapable of admitting error.
Considering that Brown created the 10p tax band, abolished it and then reinstated it he must have got something wrong at some point. Here Parris analyses Brown’s answer to this question: "To my incredulity, he told his interviewers that the £2.7 billion tax cut, financed by borrowing, was a response to the world economic downturn: a measure to stimulate domestic growth by putting extra money in people’s pockets. Brown said he wanted to ease the financial squeeze being faced by hard-working families. Asked why the need for this had only been discovered since the Budget, he could give no answer. It was pitiable.
It was also scary. I’ll tell you what scares me, and scares (I believe) a wider public who may not always be consciously aware why. It’s not the thought that the Prime Minister may be lying. It’s a more disturbing thought: that he may not. That under the terrible internal pressure created in his own head by a refusal to accept either that his will may be thwarted or his judgment questioned, the PM is having to warp the external world to make it fit.”Now, I’m not sure whether things are this bad or if the Prime Minister is just too proud to publicly admit a mistake or fearful that admitting to one will open the floodgates. But Brown’s inability to ‘fess up is a problem for him.
Take the early election, if Brown had called in Andrew Marr that Saturday and said yes we did get rather carried away with how well everything was going, we did get distracted by the thought of an early election and the speculation did get rather out of the hand in the hot-house atmosphere of the party conference but I’ve told my colleagues to go back to their departments and concentrate on governing and can assure the British people that this won’t happen again then I think the whole fiasco would have caused him much less damage. Instead, he suggested that he was constitutionally obliged to think about having an early election as the Tories were calling for one and denied that the polls had had anything to do with his decision. Both assertions were risible and helped create the current credibility gap.
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Comments
Perry
May 17th, 2008 11:59amMz. Prudence of Noo-Lie-Bore : the phantasm of fiscal fantasy.
David Lindsay
May 17th, 2008 12:52pmHave Tories gleefully predicting the fall of Gordon Brown not realised that the Cameron-loving media pack would quickly transfer its affections from a mere Postmodern, hypercapitalist, meterosexual, warmongering, Oxonian Leader of the Opposition to an actual Postmodern, hypercapitalist, meterosexual, warmongering, Oxonian Prime Minister, should there suddenly be such a thing?
Ian C
May 17th, 2008 12:57pm'Warping the external world to make it fit' is a well known stress response. We have always known Brown does not handle stress - the finger nails, the tantrums, the secrecy, the hiding when Iraq, David Kelly, Cash for Honours, dodgy loans to the party etc. etc. pressures were on. Colleagues calling him Stalinist, balling at people, declaring he understands the politics of all that he does to juniors, is part of the 'grandiosity' that goes with a driven character under stress who cannot be challenged rationally. It eventually leads to manic depression and that is where he looks to me be headed - except that I don't think he will last in power long enough to get that bad. This confessedly amateur psychiatry but he is not a man in any sort of comfort in his role and he has been forced to realise it. I suspect that this sort of scenario is what M Paris is driving at.
Frank Pulley
May 17th, 2008 12:57pmSo Gordon is lying without realising it? Doesn't that define socialism? Except ... that gives both too much credit. It is the politics of ugliness and envy, masquerading as concern for the masses. Levelling down rather than encouragement of aspiration. Resource wasting rather than wealth creating (though once inside the COP they sure learn how to feather their own nests effectively as we have seen).
Nicholas
May 17th, 2008 1:42pmDavid, you do make I laugh! You are like a sea captain alone on the deck of a rapidly sinking ship surrounded by sharks worrying that there may be a storm coming.
New Labour is the crocodile closest to the canoe and you keep on kicking poor old Dave C and the Tories! Ten out of ten for persistence, zero for perspective, but with a mention in dispatches for bringing a smile to my face!
John Whittle
May 18th, 2008 12:50amCome on Gordon, get a grip! I would suggest on a bottle of 12 year old Scotch, Down it like a man, and then tell us all the truth. You don't know what you're doing, you don't know why you're there and you have no idea whatsoever on how to govern your own Cabinet, never mind the country. I suggest you invite Mr. Kennedy to join you and you can swap notes on governance!
Frank Pulley
May 18th, 2008 11:42amJohn Whittle
I'll drink to that! Cheers.
David Parker
May 18th, 2008 2:30pmI agree that it is frightening that someone in the position of a Prime Minister may actually be suffering from genuine delusions of his own infallibility. Yet, as Matthew Paris points out, there is some evidence that this may be true.
We are all used to hearing politicians lie, sadly we have even come to expect it; but the sheer arrogance and blatancy of some of Brown's lies is such that no sane person could utter these and exect to be believed.
But Brown quite clearly does expect this and can barely conceal his anger and contempt for those who have the temerity to challenge the truth of his claims.
This is dangerous for Labour, dangerous for this country and, ultimately, dangerous for what remains of Brown's own sanity.
Frank Pulley
May 18th, 2008 2:57pmBTW James - perfect caption pun. But to stretch it to its limit, I'm sad to see that the Gore (Vidal) delusions (they run in the Gore genes) are being encouraged through the auspices of the IQ2 debate. The egregious old sod is well past his sell-by date - and I speak as one who is no spring chicken himself.
David Lindsay
May 18th, 2008 7:20pmNicholas, why do you like Cameron so much? Why do you think that the Times, the Sunday Times, the Guardian, the Observer and the BBC like him so much? What do you think that he's going to do? Because he isn't going to do it, you know. He really isn't.
David Parker
May 18th, 2008 9:56pmDavid Lindsay, Yet more diversion tactics? This topic was about Brown's mental attitude and capacity, to which you clearly have no more answers than he does.