Bagehot: Prepared to wound but not to strike

摘要

The notion that history is repeating itself is always hard to resist. It was another ghastly week for Tony Blair, with widespread rumours of a plot by Labour mps to force him into producing a timetable for the handover of power. An emboldened Gordon Brown could not resist resurrecting the memory of Margaret Thatcher's tearful exit from Downing Street. "Remember", said Mr Brown, "when Mrs Thatcher left, it was unstable, it was disorderly and it was undignified." Nobody could mistake the chancellor's threat to the prime minister.