Across the pond

p>The London Times scooped the rest of Fleet Street this morning with the first extract of the autobiography of Cherie Blair. For once, the ‘Exclusive’ tag to the story is justified. The Times has no doubt paid serious money for the extract rights to the memoirs of the former Prrime Minister’s wife. And they are making the most of it, by launching it on a Saturday, the day of the week when circulation of the national newspaper heavies dips.

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(Picture from The Times)

The impact of this chunk of contemporary history is brought up to date by an interview with Cherie Blair (also, of course, ‘exclusive’), which brings the story right up to date, by linking it directly to the present predicament of Gordon Brown, who is still-shocked by the worst Labour local election results for forty years, and the high profile loss of the London mayor’s porlour to one of the new Conservative leader’s closest friends, Boris Johnson.

Cherie reveals that even now Tony Blair is talking to Gordon Brown and advising him how to get himself, and the party, out of the hole he has dug. Amazingly, Blair thinks that Labour can still win the next election if he puts more emphasis of continuing the public sector reforms started during the early years of the Blair government.

This morning’s Times also carries some advice from a leading Blairite, Peter Hyman, who was Blair’s chief speech writer, during the campaign to win the 1997 election and susequently, in the cabinet office during the years of power. Now, Hyman is a school teacher and columnist for The Times in his spare time. This morning he suggests that the way ouf of the debacle is to switch David Millibrand, one of the brightest of the young Cabinet ministers, from Foreign Secretary, to be Chancellor of the Exchequer. The present incumbent, Alastair Darling is almost as clumsy as Gordon Brown, not because he has a clunking fist, more because he comes over as a bloke with a limp handshake.

It is an ingenious suggestion. As the economy moves into recession, the biggest challenge for the Government is steering the economy through the choppy seas ahead, and particularly helping those loyal Labour voters at the bottom end of the income band, who will suffer most. Though Hyman does not say so, if Millibrand does get the job, and if he makes a success of it, he will be the most credible leader to take Labour into the next election. As the leader of Even Newer Labour, who can lift the party beyond the squabbles between Blair and Brown.

There is much more meat in this morning’s Times, which I think is the best I have read since Rupert Murdoch bougt the paper from Lord Thomson. There is for instance an excellent story from Tim Reid from the campaign trail of the US election. I would like to blog about it.

But today is my day off. But at least I think I have learnt enough about the workings of the new version of WordPress, which carries this blog to readers, to be able put in a link, so that with one click of the mouse, you can read all of this yourself.