Cicero's Songs

Alas! I will be in Vilnius speaking at an economics conference, so will not be able to watch the first leaders debate- at least not live. It is quite a moment - the first time anything like this has happened in British electoral history. The historic excuse for not doing so was ostensibly because the British system is Parliamentary, not Presidential. However, as power has been centralised on 10 Downing St, so the resistance to the idea of a debate has fallen. It will be - of course- a highly managed affair, though David Cameron tried to pretend today that the rigid restrictions were nothing to do with him, in fact the Tory minders, such as Andy Coulson, pretty much dictated the rules: so if Mr. Cameron thinks the debate might be "slow" he has only himself to blame. In fact Cameron is on very thin ice- he has a record of breaking down at interviews, the latest with Gay Times , was particularly excruciating, but he has also done it on Sky too. It is no wonder that he is trying ...

I notice that the Government of the French Republic has described the commemoration of the 65 th anniversary of the Normandy landings as " primarily a Franco-American affair" . Once again it shows President Sarkozy in a pretty bad light. Of the 156,000 troops landed on Omaha, Utah, (American) Juno, Gold and Sword (British and Dominion, primarily Canadian) beaches 73,000 were American and 83,115 were under British command, including a contingent of 900 Free French under the command of General Leclerc . D-day itself was not, noticeably , a primarily Franco-American affair. The largest military contingent was from Britain and the Commonwealth. The Queen is not merely Head of State of the United Kingdom, but also of Queen of Canada, Australia and New Zealand amongst others- and Head of the Commonwealth. All of which nations participated in the Normandy landings and the liberation of France. My Great-uncle Claude was a short man. It was just as well, because when he jumped out ...

Peter Mandelson is an... unusual... political figure. He began his career as an exponent of the blackest of the black political arts. The quintessential back room boy, he was one of the most ruthless of the political spin doctors who jointly founded the New Labour project. Fiercely loyal to Tony Blair, he repressed anti-Labour stories and promoted the New Labour project with a will that one of my friends, who as a Newsnight producer was a regular recipient of Mr. Mandelson's brand of charmless bullying, did not hesitate to describe as "evil". Yet, as a Minister, he was surprisingly clumsy. He was forced from office, not just once, but twice under circumstances that would have destroyed any other political career. His forgetfulness over loans advanced to him to purchase his large house in Notting Hill could have left him open to fraud charges. His handling of the Hinduja passport applications was said to be "naive", yet the very word naive seemed the antit...

An intensely driven, rather solitary and gloomy man from a strictly religious background achieves the heights of politics. This comes after a long struggle against more popular figures in his own party at a point when many have previously written off his chances completely. The Leader continues to prosecute an Asian war inherited from his predecessor, though ultimately the leader hopes to withdraw his forces. Intensely driven, the leader feels a sense of inferiority towards the more socially polished figures around him and resentful of their thinly disguised patronising of his education and background. There are rumours of questionable practices amidst a self selected elite close to the leader. His intensity repels as much as it compels. A firm believer in big government solutions to people's problems, nevertheless the leader does not enjoy the full ideological support of his party, where he is often considered as betraying its fundamental principles in an attempt to appeal to the ...

Oh Purr-lease! Gordon Brown was "too busy" to co-ordinate times with all the other 26 heads of government in the European Union, so could not sign the Reform treaty with them, but had to do it in the shed , while all the other leaders went to have a boozy lunch. What a totally pathetic way to behave! Poor old Gordon "No Mates", has not got the balls to either so "no, I won't sign" or "Yes I will sign with everyone else... and then get pissed". I don't know why he did not just create a "review' to decide whether he should sign or not- then he could put the decision off forever- just like he does with everything else.

As the scale of the latest terrorist attack , or rather attempt, emerges, I do not think that I am alone in feeling vastly relieved that the new crew do not stoop to Tony Blair's emotive histrionics . Jack Staw's comments were almost along the lines of "well these things happen", and actually as a line to take, it is not a bad one. We know that there are out there a whole load of dangerous nutters out to kill as many innocent people as they can. However, as the attacks on London nearly two years ago showed, it takes more than a bunch of suicidal nutcases turning themselves into puree to make the people of Britain terrorised. If they do manage to actually succeed in an attack, then we will be shocked, saddened and repelled by the violence. We will not, however, be changed one little bit. The quite gravitas of Gordon Brown was the right response to a difficult start to his premiership, but frankly it comes as a relief to most of us not to have the "I feel your pa...

What happens if Gordon Brown makes a radical move on electoral reform? It now looks quite possible that Gordon Brown as Prime Minister will start office in the same way that he began his term as Chancellor- with an unexpected and far reaching radical reform. As Chancellor his first act was to give independence to the Bank of England. Arguably this was the single most important reform that he has made. Now, there are many hints that he will pass a package of constitutional reforms, including reform of the government of England and electoral reform. Certainly the hint that came from Jack Straw was that additional member voting was being seriously considered. OK, it is not a strictly proportional system, but it is likely to help the Liberal Democrats in any event since at present they have less than 10% of the seats in the House of Commons despite gaining 23% of the votes. However a switch to additional member voting also carries significant risks for the Liberal Democrats. Firstly, after...