Gordon Brown – Nero Without a Gun (Or the Bullets)

Gordon Brown when he became PM promised us a government of all the talents and set about granting peerages left, right and centre to bring in people to positions as 'ultra special advisers'. But with this latest reshuffle Brown seems to be bringing in more and more talent' to do jobs that others could just as easily do. Mrs Kinnock, while experienced in Europe, gets a great gig to boost her personal standing and do precisely what? Is there really nobody among the 350 Labour MPs who could do the job?

Of course we've already had Mandelson who is now according to reports defacto Deputy Prime Minister. Lord Adonis is the Transport Minister and Alan Sugar has been given a peerage to be 'Enterprise Tsar'. In many ways the appointment and peerage of Sugar is the worst of all. It's a flagrant attempt to cash in on his profile as a TV face and got little to do with 'enterprise'. It's arguable what anyone in a position like his can actually do. I also doubt, among British business leaders, that Sugar has the highest respect quotient.

Democracies are wonderful things; we are blessed in this country with one that is much better than most. However, Brown's actions are making a mockery of the whole thing. Unelected cronies, hangers on, self servers and out of touch is what most of them are. It's the out of touch bit that's probably the worse thing in all this. But that's Brown's Achilles heal. He has been in government for so long that he has lost touch with people. Not content with bringing people into government his bunker mentality is what has done for him.

There's more than a whiff of "I'm going to take you all down with me." The moral compass was lost a long time ago. His emotional radar never has worked and now it seems the 'brain the size of a planet' has gone into lock down. We are about to witness a very unpleasant few months in which Brown finally implodes before our eyes. Do I feel sorry for him? No, not one bit. But I do feel sorry for Britain though. His arrogance and delusional behaviour has brought the office he coveted for so long down to a level of disrespect I never thought I'd see in my life time. Defiance is not strength. Saying you are, "not going to walk away", does not make you a leader.

Fundamentally Brown is a weak man. He's no leader as he's proved, yet again, over his dithering about Alastair Darling's removal. How can a man who cannot command the respect of his party get the respect of the country – let alone run it. It's all going to get very nasty indeed as Brown impersonates Nero. Unfortunately such is the ineptitude of his cabinet that none of them thought to take a gun, let alone the bullets into the bunker.