Cast your mind back twenty months, to the speculation surrounding the successor to Tony Blair. Many commentators thought that there would be some kind of challenger to Gordon Brown. Miliband's name was mentioned; so was Alan Johnson's. But probably the most widely-discussed possibility outside these was one John Reid. Yet in the speculation of the past two months over whether Brown would face a challenge, I have not heard John Reid's name mentioned - except perhaps as a suggested participant in plots against Brown. Why not?
Miliband appears to aspire to the Michael Portillo role - all he needs to do now is to give some embarrassingly jingoistic speech at this years' conference, lose his seat in 2010, discover upon self-reflection that he has actually always been a neocon and start presenting arguments for privatising the NHS, in six years' time spoil his apparently inevitable accession by obsessing about the legalisation of tobacco (doubtless banned by then), and then spend the rest of his life making TV documentaries about his grandfather's period fighting for the Red Army. Meanwhile, Alan Johnson's performance over the past year has exhibited his no-idea(s) approach to politics. The fact that Harriet Harman is even discussed as a potential leader is to many observers a measure of how secure Brown's position is. Whilst Jack Straw has been...well...Jack Straw.
...And all that time, Reid has waited. No comments. No naked disloyalty. No complaints.
He could make an awkward, brutal, nay ugly opponent. But he also might prevent the chaos that could ensue if Brown continues to (mis)rule for another twenty months. For the sake of country before Party, I'm inclined to hope that Reid gets it. What do others think?
(P.S. I know he has announced he will stand down at the next General Election, but in the current political environment, so what?)
UPDATE: I now see that Three Line Whip got in with this thought a couple of hours ahead of me. The perils of having a life and a Sunday afternoon barbeque - last Summer Sunday of 2008!
