“As good as it gets,” said Tony Blair of Gordon Brown. What he meant was: “As good as it got”, which is not quite the same thing. It is no secret that Mr Blair wanted someone to run against the Chancellor. But it did not happen, and here we all are.
And so today, with much backslapping and many tributes, the decree absolute was at last declared on the most turbulent political marriage of modern times. It is almost 13 years since Mr Blair became leader on 21 July 1994, and now Mr Brown has at last succeeded him. The couple are divorced at last. In his expression of absolute liberation, Gordon reminded me of Nicole Kidman when she leapt for joy after freeing herself from Tom Cruise.
The marital paperwork out of the way, the new leader got stuck into David Cameron.
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