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- INTERVIEW: Watch Darling on his comments on Cherie Blair & Wendy Alexander – can’t find them in the interview below. So where did THAT come from?
- Guardian interview with Darling – “Maybe”, he reflects, “that’s why I’m not a great politician. You know, I’m not very good at looking at pictures and subjecting them to the equivalent of textual analysis.”
Comment at end
KEY:
- ‘THE PPM’ = present prime minister
- ‘THE PREVIOUS’ = Tony Blair
- ‘WHATSISNAME’ = Tony Blair
30th August, 2008
PROFANITIES/ EXPLETIVES and other such pleasantries … read all about it
Apologies if this is a touch short of my usual politeness … I’m taking the Michael … as courteously as is due
Why are they pissed off, Gordon? WHY?
Alistair Darling - "people are pissed off"
The Chancellor, Alistair Darling, has thrown the mangy bl**dy cat amongst the shi**ing pigeons.
He’s told us that the economic downturn could be greater than since the beginning of time, probab-ars*ing-ly! Or at least since before HE was born.
He’s told us that the government has failed to get its message across.
He’s told us that people are pissed off with the government.
Bloody ‘ell …. hadn’t effing noticed any of that!
And he’s hinted, without actually saying so, that perhaps a word or two of Scottish foul language is swirling around Downing Street.
But what’s he really saying, and …
WHY IS IT ALL HAPPENING NOW?
Is the Darling man doing some positioning? Distancing himself from the expletive next door? The eejit … er … little lost lamb, rejected like an unwanted twin.
The love/hate rival of his political life having withdrawn prematurely from the fraternal bloodfest, the party is facing a black hole as big as another 18 years. The PPM is floundering in a communications vacuum that not one of them, clearly, can hope to fill.
Be honest now … when did Brown last say anything memorable? I can only recall him “getting on with the job”. Maybe I don’t listen hard enough.
Or is this business no more than preparation for all the positive changes about to be delivered in a few weeks’ time, just prior to the conference and Brown’s last chance for survival amongst the faithful? An economic package which will turn us back into Prosperity United sooner than we can say “what recession?“
Suddenly the government, having turned the corner quicker than the Blair car leaving Downing Street on that fateful day in June 2007, will again be all things to all men and women, and the answer to everything – especially David Cameron.
Could be. But then again … call me suspicious.
Darling’s confessions have been greeted with all sorts of incredulity, but mainly because the calm bank manager at No. 11 never before gave us a hint that he’d be the sort to say, “oh, blooming blinking!” much less “pissed off”.
Alistair Darling’s true thoughts are probably unprintable, but since I am persuaded that Brown was probably not the happiest man in the world to read his friend and colleague in The Guardian, here’s my gentle version:
‘IT’S THE ECONOMY, WA*K*R
If the PPM thinks he can pass the blame over to me, as today’s chancellor, for the cock-up he handed us after 10 years effing Prudence, he can stuff it!
So what if the cocky son of the manse was taught to be polite and always remember the names of anyone he was bug**ring up? He managed it for a while – Prudence Britain. But he’s forgotten her now!
It was Prudence, not Darling!
AND another thing …
WHY DIDN’T THE PPM TELL US HE’D BE SO BLOODY USELESS WITHOUT THE PREVIOUS? Y’KNOW … WHATSISNAME?
And why didn’t whatsisname leave behind an Idiot’s Handbook for Would Be Prime Ministers? SOMEthing, ANYthing to help the PPM come up with a useful phrase now and again. “Just getting on with the job” is wearing thin!
We never guessed that the PPM couldn’t function without THE PREVIOUS to thump/admire/attack/love. We just never knew it was all so intense! The PPM said he was the one! He certainly effing was!
AND another thing …
ITS ALL BALLS ANYWAY
And where is the little runt? Crawled back into the woodwork where he belongs? Hiding, as did his master when Whatsisname needed support? If Balls thinks he’s going to make an appearance and astound us with his brilliance when Miliband goes for the Brown jugular – I mean really goes for it – he’d better get in the queue! Right at the back! Behind his wife.
AND another thing …
MILIBAND? MILIBAND!? WHAT’S HE UP TO?
Talking big on Russia and Georgia and palling up with the USA! AGAIN?! How many times a day does he ring THE PREVIOUS to find out what to do next? Now if HE thinks he’s going to jump over my head, he can get back there with Balls! The party won’t hack it.
AND THE PARTY?
The Party?
Rather than rediscovering itself after killing off whatsisname and instating their “hero” it’s collapsing all over the joint! Left? Right? And no more Middle Ground! Who effing knows where we go now!?
Scotland’s gone nationalist – Wales is moribund – England’s gone for ‘THE PREVIOUS Mark ll’ - El Cameroon!
WHY DON’T WE ALL JUST APOLOGISE AND HAND OVER TO THE TORIES, RIGHT NOW?! Then we can regroup and come back in 2014, once we get rid of the SNP and work out what the f**k we’re for.
Pass me Tony’s number.’
A LITTLE ASIDE – TALKING ABOUT SWEARING – AND F**KING FRIENDS
I have known two friends in my life who swore with the poshest voices imaginable, and I found them a joy to listen to, once I’d got over the initial shock. One, in my student days, was a Liverpudlian from a nice family, whose parents sent him to speech therapy for a slight lisp (why is that so difficult to pronounce when you’ve got one? – “pardon me I have a thlight lithsp“.)
His cursing style was incomparably high class as a result and a real smile maker. But so polite was he that he frequently shortened words in order to soften their effect – “…king hell” being a favourite. He was known as ‘King Billy’. He also extended the swearwords in order to split, splice and spice up the odd word. For effect, I suppose, or in the vain hope that we wouldn’t notice the rude bit in the middle:
“You are taking the mich-f**k-ael, dearly be-cu**ing-loved.”
All said slowly and deliberately.
My other cursing friend was a classical musician whose tears rolled relentlessly at any moving piece of Bach or Schubert, even though she played them herself regularly, and beautifully.
“Je*us Blo*dy Chri*t”, she’d pronounce, in immaculate tones, “doesn’t that just get you right here”, she’d moan ecstatically, fist thumping her chest rhythmically … “in your furk*ng SOUL?
Agitated and relaxed at the same time, she seemed in coitus extremis. I’d nod in feigned agreement, no heart to interrupt her moment, or mention that words moved me more.
It was all so deeply f*rk*ng imPORTant to her. It seemed churlish and unnecessary to puncture her almost orgasmic moment. For a woman they are hard to come by, by some accounts.
NOTE: THE infamous and widely used four letter word seems to have its origins in Scottish English - if not Scandinavian. So, as often before, my dearly beloved English friends, the Scots got there first.
“Yes”, I hear you utter. “And they’ve really *ucked it up this time!”
OTHERS’ THOUGHTS ON THE DARLING BUDS OF MAYBE’S MOMENT OF TRUTH
EXCERPT:
“Tellingly, before the interview started, this is what his press adviser [Catherine Macleod] said to him…
“Now Alistair,” Catherine tells him firmly when eventually we sit down for the interview, “tell her everything. Make sure you tell her everything.”
What an astonishing thing to say. She’s effectively saying, go on, dish the dirt, and don’t worry about that the man in Number Ten might think – save your own reputation.”
The Osterley Times – “at a loss”
EXCERPT:
“The British Labour Party have been famous for spinning situations to their advantage, which only makes Alistair Darling’s recent outburst make one suspect that he must be taking truth gas before he spoke to the Guardian.
I’ll say they’ve got their work cut out. I’ve literally never heard of anyone winning the electorate over by stating that the country is facing “the worst economic downturn in sixty years”.
Whether it’s fair or not people will hold the government that has been in power for the last eleven years completely responsible for any economic downturn, so Darling’s honesty is startling to say the least.
I’m at a loss to work out what Darling was thinking of.”
Tony Hatfield’s Retired Ramblings dissects the actual language used by Darling, and he says, have been omitted in many reports. Ah but it’s the ‘pissed off’ bit we’ll remember, is it not, Mr Hatfied?
EXCERPT:
‘The evidence is clear. The recessions in both the seventies and the nineties were far, far worse than we are experiencing today!
Darling then continues with this:
The last three words are important here. ” Than people thought”- who are these people the Chancellor refers to? The Government, the Treasury, a group of economists on board a celestial teapot in an orbit between Earth and Mars or even the Opposition treasury spokesmen?’
PRIME MINISTERIAL CUSSING … BLAIR COULD HACK IT WITH THE BEST OF THEM
Even THE PREVIOUS was known to rely on descending to expletives at times, according to Andrew Rawnsley. He says that Blair was concerned that Alastair Campbell would be including some choice Blair outbursts in his diaries. Well, I’ve read it, and Campbell must have considered his friend’s sensitivities. There wasn’t much to excite. Not in that way anyway!
But we’d forgive him if today WHATSISNAME is quietly moaning … “Jesus wept”.
Tags: alistair darling chancellor, argument, Brown (Gordon Brown & his Labour Government, from June 2007), brown darling mortgage package, cabinet split, cursing politician, disagreement, economic slump, others thoughts on darling, people pissed off, swearing, worst in 60 years
