Proof, if it were needed, that it is Peter Mandelson who is now running the show in Labour’s pre-election campaign.
In his Today interview with Jim Naughtie on his damage-limitation tour of the broadcasters this morning (a lot of damage, little of it limited), the Prime Minister used the line:
“I accept that we are the insurgents, not the incumbents.”
As I have remarked previously, this turn of phrase sounds bad enough when coming from Mandelson; from the Prime Minister’s lips, it is positively repellent. It is also palpably untrue; Labour manifestly are the incumbents and we are not, thank God, living through an insurgency. Our troops in Afghanistan are doing that.
It’s a silly, Mandelsonian line; Mr Brown should drop it.
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