Brown Blows Death Penalty Dog Whistle

A typical bit of Gordon Brown sleight of hand in The Sun today on the Death Penalty debate. Apparently "he was moved to speak out after more than 100,000 Sun readers backed the return of capital punishment. Translation: Sun journalist rings Number Ten Press Office desperate for quote on orders of editor.

Here's what Gordon Brown's (Press Officer) said: "Over the last 40 years, Parliament has decided that it is not the best way forward. But that is not to underestimate the feelings that people have - and particularly loved ones, when the worst crimes have been inflicted."

That would be why his government is letting murder suspects out on bail then....

Translated, that quote says: "I can't actually tell Sun readers I'm really against the death penalty because a) it doesn't fit with their story and b) they'd want to lynch me." It's such a clever formulation of words you just know they didn't spontaneously emerge from the lips of the Prime Minister. Well done to the press officer who no doubt spent half an hour carefully honing them. Well done indeed

Proof that the Brown Era of Spin is Beginning

Last week in TIME Magazine Tom Stoddart did a gushing photo essay that then appeared in various papers including both The Sun and The Mirror yesterday. The spin Brown's people have put on this is that Gordon travelled on a rush hour train with ordinary people. His team then made sure that the girl to his left on the train offered quotes to the few journalists in attendance. Clearly Brown's people are pushing this as him being an 'ordinary Londoner'. Sadly it is complete rubbish.

1. It wasn't rush hour it was late morning on the way to his launch event
2. He surrounded himself with friendly Labour activists and then sat there ignoring them in an attempt to look normal
3. He spent the week before last talking about how he wanted to see an end to spin

Something troubled me about this photo when I saw it. Look at the photo carefully. Sue Nye (Mrs Gavin Davies), his Political Secretary, is sitting to his right on the train, but the girl on his left is not exactly an ordinary member of the public either. She is Rohini Simbodyal and she is a 20 year old student at the London School of Oriental and African Studies. But not only that.

Rohini is backing Hazel Blears for the Deputy Leadership and is the Youth and Student Officer for the Enfield Young Labour Party. She is also chair of the SOAS Labour Party and is the black, minority and ethnic officer for Labour students. Clearly not just an average punter on the tube!

This is how she was quoted in the media.

Brown took the London subway, known as the Tube, to the event, impressing at
least one student, Rohini Simbodyal."We got on the Tube and people were looking
at Gordon Brown," Simbodyal, 20, said. "People were amazed, saying: 'It's
Gordon.' But everyone was very British, they looked and then looked away. A few
people came up and shook his hand and said 'Good luck.' "He was just like a
normal guy," she said.

She also appeared in one of Brown’s video pieces on his campaign site.

OK, so it's not exactly Watergate, but if the era of spin is over, why is Gordon Brown's campaign resorting to these sort of tactics to make him look like a common punter? It's not clever and it backfires.

UPDATE Wed: I have removed the photo from this story after the photographer complained about its use.