Flash Gordon

Every now and again there are truly "cringe-worthy" moments. Episodes that are so awful and embarrassing that they go beyond the mere horrific and find a deep, dark place of shuddering discomfort.

We just had one.

It was bad enough for poor beleaguered Gordon Brown to be paraded up and down a highly decorated hallway with the three presidential hopefuls. Each one of them looking confident and elegant and Brown along side, lumpish and graceless. It reminded me of the scene in the film "About a boy" when the young lad is warned that his attachment to the punk girlfriend looks "more like owner and pet".

No, the real moment of horror was saved for the surreal press conference in the Rose Garden. The two unpopular leaders, trapped in the civility and grandeur that holding positions of state require were forced into an exchange of platitudes.

George Bush, with presumably nothing better to say, offered to cook supper that night. Nothing special in this manifestation of the peculiar idiocy for which Bush is justly celebrated. And with that entree, Brown could have simply thanked him and offered to do the washing up.

But no. Brown opened his mouth and then in the full view of the world's press thanked Bush...."for his leadership."

I looked around to see if anyone else heard it. The Labrador continued to snooze blissfully.

Maybe, I wondered, was Brown being disrespectfully sarcastic? Maybe, by his choice of the word "leadership" he was implying that we all ( including the majority of the US public) can't wait to see the back of him?

Bush and Brown share a strikingly similar world view for two politicians that appear to be poles apart on the political spectrum, and where better to illustrate this than their approach to small business. Neither like small business as they are generally run by independently minded individuals operating in the "true" market place. Small business leaders want real action on real problems, the type of action that politicians are unable to provide. You know, decisions and stuff like that.

Large corporations love these types of politicians because large business doesn't really exist in a free market world. We have proof of this now. Big companies, especially big financial companies are considered too big to fail. Wouldn't it make life easier for all of us if that overdraft we had was actually underwritten by the Government!

And then there are taxes. Browns approach to this provides even more illustration. Remove the 10p tax band from the least well off and tax the Billionaire Non-Doms £30,000. Thirty grand off a billion is a few hours of interest payments. And let's not even go there on the subject of business taper relief.....

No, none of it makes much sense. But then Gordon Brown praising George Bush for his leadership is a bit of science fiction anyhow.