A Tremendous Honour And Privilege

It has been a tremendous honour and privilege to take part in the period drama of national transition.

I am watching today's TV with tea and ice cream, laughing at Peter Snow and the mad BBC Graphics.

Chastised Blair, biting his lip, promising to do better - like Thatcher he's adopted the royal "we" - "We.. I, the Government" he said on the steps of Number 10, and "we've got to listen to the people" in that earnest voice of his. And that about summed it up for me. King Blair let off with a spanking. Pull your socks up, bring the troops home, stop the US bombing Iran, and make sure Palestine gets the West Bank back in full, you bad man.

Then the surprise of Michael Howard's magisterial statement of stepping down, having turned around his party's fortunes, determining to make sure the Conservative leadership selection process was reformed before he did so.

The LibDem massive has been bigged up, Charles Kennedy's frowning red face and confident stomp making him look just like a ginger partridge. He looks so lary! He's promising to make 3 party politics a reality. Actually that's a big change on the political map, and they won't be able to force ID cards on us so easily. A return to more truly parliamentary government is surely a good thing.

It took all the Labour big guns to win this, from Gordon Brown, instantly brought in from the cold to be a massive electoral asset, to prominent anti-war politicians like Robin Cook and Tony Benn. Will there be enough cohesion in the Labour party to survive Blair's passing?

This ritual loss of a night's sleep and obsession with minutiae is something 24 hour news media has bred in some of the population but by no means all.

Earlier I overheard the following conversation: "Who won?" "Same lot." "You vote?" "Na." "Me neither."

I think I might have another cup of tea.