Quote of the Day

-Paul Goodman

Enough

said.

"Funeral Hearses are Circling Parliament Sq"

Make no mistake how damaging the Peter Watt expose is. Finally someone from the heart of Downing Street is saying the truth. It's telling how quick

LabourList

are to come out of the blocks with the official line:

That's not what TB is hearing from one of his more reliable Labour sources though:

"Watt an earth is going? I've heard a rumour that a fleet of funeral hearses are circling parliament square. It's so bad. I wouldn't rule out another plot at this rate: regicide or cannibalism? Need gallows humour to get through.

The ferrets are well and truly fretting. The Mail

editorial

is killer:

"This is not so much a government in crisis as a crisis pretending to be a government"

Tories Put Boot In re Watt

Commenting on the revelations by former Labour General Secretary Peter Watt, Conservative Party Chairman, Eric Pickles said:

"After a week in which six senior Cabinet Ministers failed to back the Prime Minister, this is yet more evidence of the dysfuntion at the heart of Gordon Brown's Government. It is now clearer than ever that we can't go on like this with such a weak Prime Minister and such a divided government."

TB makes that the 178,492nd thing we can't go on like this week.

Watt a Legend

"Peter, we've spent 10 years working with Gordon and we don't like him. The more the public get to know, the less they will like him too"

Dale has quite the scoop in bagging Peter Watt's book.

The Mail has the serialisation

. Despite being able to see the pound signs glowing in Watt's eyes on Sky a moment ago, he raises some

serious points

:

Mr Brown’s Cabinet ally Douglas Alexander said the PM’s inner circle wanted an early Election partly because even they didn’t like him – and they feared the British public would soon form the same view.

The day Mr Brown called off the 2007 Election, denying he had ever intended to hold one, Labour chiefs had a fleet of limousines circling Parliament Square ready to take Ministers on the campaign trail, and had 1.5million leaflets ready to be posted.

No10 is ‘completely dysfunctional’ under Mr Brown, who runs the country ‘by making it up as he goes along’.

Sulking Mr Brown walked out of a Downing Street dinner party with US politicians because they sat down without his permission.

Ouch.

The most damning part has to be the evidence of just how was the "election that never was" was:

He also reveals the chaos caused when Mr Brown made his U-turn on the Election during a TV interview.

‘As he spoke, the fleet of limousines ordered at No10’s behest was circling Parliament Square.
'They had come . . . to collect Ministers and whisk them off on the campaign trail. They were sent away on a pretext, to spare us the humiliation of anyone spotting them lined up outside our offices.

‘We had already spent £1.2million. Somewhere in a mail depot were hundreds of sacks of personalised letters to voters in marginal seats – 1.5million envelopes waiting to go.’

Smoking stuff.


DALE:

Has the 101.

Reloaded: Save Our Gordon!

A long night but enjoy!

Gordon Invades CCHQ

TB's CCHQ eyes got in touch:

Seems Gordon took the Cabinet on a field trip to CCHQ for a lesson in party unity.

Exclusive Footage From NI

Had to be done.

What Were They Thinking?

It's basically an advert but this is very funny:

The morning after the night before...

From

here

.

According to The Telegraph

Harman did have a hand in this. As predicted by TB as soon as it was breaking. Gordon apparently begged for Cabinet support. Ignore their fake blustering, the government is decaying before our very eyes. Come on Gordon, give in, make it all go away.

Go to the Palace.

Best Poster Ever

Prescott

tried it

, Clifford Singer the man behind the hilariously bad "

Other TPA

" site

tried it

(with the

endorsment

of Labour PPC and Second Coming Chuka Umunna and surprise surprise

a man

who drunkenly bragged he coordinated Labour PPC's twitter activities.) Yet this one has to be the most hilarious coat tailing attempt by a

politico

to rip of the Conservatives Cameron poster:

Just wow.

Steve Hilton Nicked

The Birmingham '08 

arrest

of Steve Hilton has been circulating for a while now, the culmination of a week of briefing against him by a member of the Shadow Cabinet. One thing that immediatly came into TB's mind was that who has honestly never been tempted to call someone a wanker during a dispute with a train guard?

It's not like he slapped his wife or slept with a seventeen year old, to mention just two stories about Labour or government staffers that TB has heard... A great little scoop for Cathy Newman but the copy was handed to her on a plate. This story will and should blow over.

Tory Bear Vs LabourList

As requested.. Last night's fun and games:

Keep Calm and Kerry On

Political Scrapbook

have proved their insider credentials by regurgitating the emails from backbenchers in reply to the plot against Gordo, that once again the Cabinet chickened out of. Wonder who was putting those out eh? However their response to

KerryOut

was at least witty and TB is arranging the local printers to have this blown up to A0 for the office wall:

Legendary use of Paint by Labour HQ New Media bods.

Ouch

If Labour can't get behind their leader why should rest of the country?

Election, now, please.

Day Dreaming about the Snow Storm

So it seems Straw is set to wimp out but still Mandy, Miliband and Darling are nowhere to be seen. Mandy is due on Newsnight tonight yet he could easily come out in support before that if he wanted to. Where is everyone? The silence grows...Last time Mandy was straight out of the blocks defending Brown across TV and radio. As  more time passes more and more backbenchers ask for the ballot. Darling goes in time for the 10 0'Clock News and Mandy puts the final nail in the coffin on Newsnight. The final revenge from an old enemy?

Ah a bear can but dream.. go on Labour, get some spine or do you want to go down in history as more cowardly than Gordon-always-dodge-elections-Brown?

Is it Harman?

Still singing from the same hymnsheet?

Someone is pulling the strings on this one. There is no way H and H would put their necks so far out on the line without being vaguely confident of some degree of success. ITV are speculating that Hewitt might well be doing Harman's dirty work. It would make sense, she's threatened to walk before and can't have her dirty paws anywhere near this. If Gordon goes she is the Labour Deputy and would be the caretaker for the duration of any leadership contest - giving her a very string platform to launch her candidacy from.

TB was working from home this morning but is praying there are trains, he wouldn't want to miss out on the fun and games.

What Would Malcolm Tucker Do?

Why have two different CCHQ/Tory sources sent TB pretty much identical texts in the last five minutes:

Leadership criss gets out of hand.

PM goes to the country early.

Just like the Thick of It!

We can but hope! Go on Gordon... do it.

Pickles Puts the Boot In re Hewitt and Hoon

CCHQ quick off the mark:

“We have a situation now where everyday a Labour MP is turning on the Prime Minister. It’s irresponsible to have such a dysfunctional, faction ridden Labour party running the country.
Ministers are more concerned about saving their own political skin than actually getting Britain out of the monumental mess we are in. We cannot go on like this. The only responsible thing the Government can do is call a general election.”

Bet they are praying this goes tits up and Brown stamps it out.

Hacks Caught of Guard - Another Macintyre Blunder

My my what an afternoon. A bloody and comedy draw at PMQs but then Hoon and Hewitt go and stab Brown in the back. Loving the fact that the resurgance of tgeh leadership speculation came just fifteen minutes after BBS's Nick Robinson live on TV said there was no plot and nothing was happening. The plotters have learnt their lessons this time - all about the surprise!

Also another spectacular scoop for The New Statesman's political wizard James Macintyre. Just last night he

outed

, completely incorrectly, that Tessa Jowell was behind the plotting. Something she flatly denied in a statement. Well done James, TB recommends you look through your blackberry contact list and delete everyone who called you yesterday. They are making you look like a fool.

Old fuddy duddy Sir Michael White had no idea about it either, at least he had the good grace to admit the fact live on Sky News moments ago.

"We'll deal with the government, you've got enough to do."

With all this snow it's hard to really remember what all the Copenhagen fuss was all about. Lucky the snow came because it distracted from the fact the summit to save the world was labelled a "good start." This advert

via Prodicus

is brilliant though:



Another classic from the good lads at the

CEI

.

Newsround

Ok so TB has been rather busy for the last few days with err this and that. He ended up speaking to every national newspaper at some point yesterday, except the Guardian who stood their ground and refused right of reply after diving head first into the smears and innuendo from Kerry's hymn sheet.

So what else has been going on? The election campaign is very much underway apparently, though to be fair, if Monday had never happen would the election outcome have been any different? As the dust settled it seemed clear that Labour have little to offer other than poorly conceived attack on Tory policy, but through no merit of their own they managed to land a couple of blows. Darling wasn't exactly enthusiastic about offering up the dodgy dossier and it seems there will be a big role in the campaign for Liam Bryne as chief attack dog. As for Dave and co, well it was going so well until the slight marriage tax hiccup. The poster campaign is great on many fronts - putting the fear of god about finance into Labour HQ for starters. Flaunting the fact they have the cash to run these sort of campaigns again and again. Also it must make for uncomfortable viewing in some red corners that the Tories are so comfortable and proud of their leader, he can be promoted in almost a presidential style and spearhead the entire campaign.

Labour on the other hand are ashamed and embarrassed of the fool, the shamed emperor, who is leading them over the cliff. Still the rumours and gossip about resignations, regicides and plots will not disappear. No10 thought they had nipped this in the bud before Christmas but it has clearly been allowed to boil over, and although there has been no resignation, the very speculation is damaging enough and a most unhelpful distraction.

Either way CCHQ are praying Brown clings on. As TB highlighted yesterday, Tom Harris made the brilliant point that those in the media who complain that the election campaign is going to be too long, tough. The country is crying out for change and has been waiting long enough. The Tories are impatient, they are ready and if it has to be a long march then so be it. They have a golden opportunity to enliven the public and highlight just how much better things could be.