Gordon Brown's Legacy Revisted

RobertD

Brown should give the speech drafted by Fraser Nelson in the NoW today.... with the additional ending of "I resign goodbye."

fulcanelli

It's a bit late to start apologising for the decade of errors and hubris we've had to suffer at the hands of this man.

He should go now, and save us another 15 months of this nightmare. I have to say though, I thought Fraser Nelson's piece on the upcoming speech was spot on. Wouldn't it be lovely to see this man sincerely apologise for the mess he has caused, and then resign of course. It'll never happen, but one can always dream.

Martin Bright

Let's be realistic. The months to come are going to be extremely difficult and wishing Gordon Brown away will not help matters. People need to start coming up with some serious proposals here (or alternatively recognise that we just have to ride this out and let the market self-adjust).

oldrightie

This "performance" will be excruciating for the hubris, arrogance and egotistical self lauding hypocrite the man is. My prayer is that his medication fails and he is seen for the dreadful NWO apologist he is.

Vauxhall

Glittering?

Well, perhaps in the sense that he is about as popular in the country at large as Gary Glitter.

RW

"Officials have been unable to identify the person who was asking for this [Obama]footage"

Oh, didn't you hear, apparently it was Harriet Harman, getting together some ideas and material for her maiden "OK guys, Brown screwed up, but never fear, I'm here to sort out the mess" speech to the House, as the next Prime Minister.

Rhoda Klapp

Martin, there have been many serious proposals in various comments here. Not in your blog, but then you never asked. But proposals or not, what the government is actually doing, so-called headless chicken mode, is not helping. It's not even as useful as your own let the market sort it out suggestion.

What does concern us is that Gordon Brown is the architect of all this (which he denies), has no clue of what to do (which he denies) and is still more concerned with party political issues than tackling the problem. Which he would probably deny. He has to go. We can't make him go, only his own party can do that. But they won't. Calls for him to quit, wishing him away, are inevitable. If you want solutions, ask. (There have been a couple of such threads on Coffee House, perhaps you haven't seen them.)

What does make me wonder is why No 10 should be so concerned with what you write here. It's not as if GB is all that popular with anyone in the country, but especially among speccy readers. Maybe it's because they see you as an apostate. Beware the fatwah.

Steve.W

Martin Bright quotes Andrew Rawnsley -

"When they first knew they had landed this big gig for Mr Brown in Washington, Number 10 got terribly excited. Now, as the deadline to the speech approaches, they are feeling increasingly anxious”.

What's the problem? America is the land of Hollywood, they love actors. Just ham it up and like at a film festival award ceremony, when the gongs are given out, do a bit of blubbing at the end.

seb

oldrightie

True. Many of us here, having been subjected for years to the sight of Brown simultaneously gurning and bee-essing, cannot bear to hear him or to see his face. I wonder how long it will take an American audience to start feeling queasy once Gormless has launched into his gruesome Charlton Heston impersonation.

Hawkeye

Brown's legacy is very simple - the ruination of a strong economy and a recession made a lot worse than it had to be.
.
If, as Martin implies, No.10 reads this then I suggest they tell the PM what people really think.

Fergus Pickering

Oh come on , Steve. Brown can't do actor. Blair could have. Brown is always... just Brown.

RW

re Steve W above: Brown could always wrap up his little diatribe to Congress with a nice tuneful rendition of "I Did It My Way". Of course he'd have to leave out some inconvenient lines, such as "Regrets, I've had a few"...

JimBob

Its easy for Obama to talk about what went wrong seeing as he can blame good old Dubya - less so for Brown. He'll probably blame the Chinese and his speech will be the usual combination of asinine drivel delivered in the most excruciatingly awkward way imaginable

Steve

I think Brown's speaking style is very ill-suited to American tastes. They applaud every other line but at the same time want you to make your points quickly and clearly. A British speaker would be inclined to continually stop and pause to wait for the applause to subside, thus prolonging the affair by at least half an hour. It might be a trainwreck waiting to happen.

TrevorsDen

"That succeeded because he gave a candid account of what went wrong during the bubble years and that allowed him to be persuasive about how it can be put right."

It succeeded because it was a load of platitudinous drivel.

Browns speech will consist of Brown giving his view of the world (one which Alice of Wonderland fame would be familiar with) and than putting his own ("and therefore it is right to ...") 'solution' to it.

Expect loads of 'common this common that special the other ' guff as well.

Hysteria

was it just me - or did anyone else find the constant standing ovations from La Pelosi a little creepy - especially when she got the timing wrong - lppked a bit like a Chinese Congress meeting

That said - my guess is Brown won't get so many! More a "say - what?" reaction

Trumpeter Lanfried

Brown's speech will be a LIST of THINGS. Watch out for the phrase, 'Not only ... but also'. It's the only type of speech he ever makes.

Ryan Decosta....

Brown imppicable style of speaking english is really american it is like getting pause and than speaking he has speaking capability truely american...