With hindsight it is clear that Hillary Clinton should have either hugged Barack Obama so close from the outset that he couldn’t wiggle free or set out to destroy him as soon as he announced his candidacy. Hillary, though, tried an odd mix of the two, giving Obama just the opening he needed.
Gordon Brown had the same two options after David Miliband’s infamous Guardian op-ed. Team Brown, though, like the Clinton campaign couldn’t decide which option to choose.
If Brown’s supporters had welcomed the op-ed and praised Miliband for going out there and taking it to the Tories, suggested it was all part of a grand plan and dropped hints about a big promotion for Miliband in an autumn reshuffle, they would have put him in a rather tricky position. Miliband’s spinners would have had to clarify whether or not this was a come and get me plea to the Labour party. It would certainly have wrong-footed Team Miliband and made his actions appear all the more disloyal if he had let it be known that it was indeed a message to the Labour party that he was ready and waiting for when it ditched Brown.
The other option was to go for Miliband with maximum force. Miliband’s cojones might have gone missing as they did last summer and all this could have ended with him timidly renewing his oaths of fealty to Gordon. Even if Miliband had not blinked, a ferocious counter-attack would have provided the media with a new narrative: Miliband taken down to size by Brown’s brusiers. Many in the press are slightly in awe of the brutality with which the Brownites have dealt with those Labour MPs who have got in Brown’s way and they could have been seduced into writing about how the boy Miliband got clunked.
Instead, Brown’s supporters ended up lurching from one approach to the other. First thing on Wednesday morning we were told Downing Street was relaxed about the piece, but by mid-morning Miliband was being slammed in the Evening Standard by Brown’s allies and so it went on before a truce was eventually agreed.
As soon as the Brownites had let on that they viewed Miliband’s piece as treasonous, they had to put down the rebellion. The fact that the leader of this rebellion has not been brought to book and is still in government is a vivid illustration of how weak Brown has become. To make matters worse, an expectation was created that that Sunday’s papers would see an all out assault on the Foreign Secretary. When that failed to materialise because of the Minorca peace accord, Miliband’s stock rose still further.
The PLP no longer loves Gordon Brown; he has disappointed them too much. But many in it still fear him. The longer the boy who lived survives, the more that fear will ebb away leaving Brown at the mercy of his Parliamentary colleagues.
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