Tom Shields On Gaddafi, Saddam, Gordon Brown, Goodwin and Other Despots

WITH Gaddafi down (if not yet out) and Saddam Hussein a distant memory, it seems Britain is still able to oust a foreign despot.
But not dispose of an in-house tyrant.
This thought occurs on reading the leaks from Alistair Darling’s book Back From The Brink: 1000 Days At Number 11. Mr Darling tells us a few things we had already guessed at. Gordon Brown’s behaviour could be “brutal and volcanic”. Many British bankers are “arrogant and stupid”. Sir Fred Goodwin “deserves to be a pariah”.

Why were both tinpot dictators (a fair description of Brown and Goodwin on available evidence) not deposed in very British coups?
Senior Labour MPs attempted a revolt against Prime Minister Brown but failed in a manner reminiscent of the Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight.
Darling will no doubt be accused of culpability in supporting the Brown regime. But when, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, he spoke realistically of the dire state of the economy and was subjected to Brown’s “forces of hell”, Darling stood his ground.

Sir Fred led the Royal Bank of Scotland down a path to perdition without interference from his board. But then non-executive directors are not there to execute the boss, merely to collect their remuneration.
Back in Downing Street, there was a man who could have put an end to Brown’s “brutal” ways: Tony Blair, his superior officer at least in name.
As writer of a small Scottish column which occasionally tapped into the darker side of politics, I was struck by the regularity and vehemence with which the Blair camp attempted to drum up bad publicity for Brown in his own back yard.

It seems that Tony Blair was just too scared to take on Gordon and his weapons of New Labour destruction. He went for Saddam instead.