It's that man again!

Gordon Brown has, in what can only be regarded as an act of genius (insane genius, perhaps but genius nonetheless) moved decisively to tackle the financial crisis. He says he wants to invent a new way of governing, apparently by replacing the elected government with an appointed one.


Spearheading this new dawn will be none other than Peter Mandelson. This has caused some surprise due to the well known animosity between the great man and the Prime Minister. They both acknowledged that they have 'had their ups and downs', in rather the same way that Stalin had his ups and downs with Hitler.


But, I hear you ask, how can Peter be brought back into government when he is no longer a Member of Parliament? Well, this small problem has been solved by making him into a peer of the realm in accordance with the old British tradition of ennobling failed politicians who the current leadership thinks it needs for some reason. This saves him the bother of getting elected and, as an additional bonus his seat in the House of Lords is, thanks to the Labour Party's far-sighted reforms, a salaried position. After all, who can get by on a mere Minister's salary these days? Especially when your chances of a nice directorship in the City are fading faster every day. They can't even afford to employ useful people anymore!


Lord Mandelson is, of course, uniquely qualified to deal with the current crisis, having once had to resign from government after lying on a mortgage application for a house he couldn't possibly afford.


Also elevated to the House of Lords and given a job in the government is a chap called Paul Myners. His qualification for a job in government is that he is the only person left in the country who has any money – he is the director of a hedge fund firm who have made a fortune at everybody else's expense by short selling shares in banks in a welcome demonstration to the rest of us of how to get by in hard times. He also gave £12700 to Gordon Brown's campaign to become leader of the Labour Party. Some might say that this was rather a large donation considering that there was no actual leadership election as Gordon was the only candidate, so you might think that Paul can't have needed to spend all that much. I hear that the chaps in the city were wondering if he might have lost his knack for making money. How wrong they were! Seats in government don't come cheap, you know! And even a seat in this government is more secure than a job in the City.


Incidentally, for those of you unfamiliar with aristocratic rank, a lord is somewhat lower than a prince but slightly higher than a prince of darkness, so in Peter's case that makes it a promotion.

History Repeating

We live in a terribly cynical age but I for one do not believe that McCain was merely trying to score points when he announced that he would be breaking off his campaign to work on the credit crisis. After all, he is old enough to remember the terrible consequences of that other great stock market crash, when the South Sea Bubble burst in 1720. You can see a young John pictured to the right.

Of course back then people got into trouble by thinking they could get rich through investing in companies that wanted to make guns that fired square cannonballs or buying up the Irish Bogs. There was even a company which convinced speculators to invest £2000 “For carrying on an undertaking of great advantage but nobody knows what it is.” So you can see that people in the eighteenth century made much more sensible investment decisions than those at the start of the twenty first. Of course the big difference is that back then the trouble started as a cunning plan to reduce government debt while this time we are trying to solve the problem by massively increasing government debt. The other difference of course is that back then hundreds of politicians lost their shirts while this time they have cleverly ensured that the taxpayer will carry the can. We've come a long way in three centuries!

The weeks events have had the effect of making the Chinese into the western world's main creditor and they have been celebrating this new status with their flashy new space program. This week they conducted their first ever spacewalk, boldly going where no man has gone for a couple of weeks, successfully dragging the country into the 1950s. Still, it's considerably more impressive than us Europeans. We've had to make do with a chap from Switzerland flying across the English Channel strapped to a jet powered ironing board. You can see him here!

As for myself, I enjoyed a small party at home. My PA Jemima offered to provide the entertainment – she she has been taking dancing lessons and wanted to show off what she had learned. I was a bit concerned when she told me she was going to do the dance of the seven voles. “Don't you mean veils?” I asked. “That's funny,” she replied, “That's just what the man in the pet shop said!” Mind you, I would love to know how she got those voles twirling in both directions at the same time!

It's a Rich Man's World

It's been a tough week in the city, and indeed on Wall Street and around the world, all summed up in the Financial Times' headline on Thursday, “We're all F*****d!!” However, I am happy to say that the worst is over.

I must say that it is very wise of the taxpayers on both sides of the Atlantic to bail out those poor chaps in the financial sector who have had such bad luck lately. After all, if it had not been for the generous lending practices of these great financial institutions many of those same taxpayers would never have had the experience of owning their own home, nor of having that home repossessed. Lending non-existent money to people who can't afford to pay you back may seem like criminal stupidity to the untrained eye but you must remember that bankers have their trophy wives to pay for and the bonuses one makes when one restricts oneself to sane practices just don't cut the mustard. One doesn't want to have to make do with a Filipino. Besides, if the banks go out of business then the government won't be able to borrow the money they need to prop up the banks! Then where would we be?

Some of the chaps have lost their jobs, though. We shouldn't feel too sorry for them, however. After all, they apparently were not very good at it and they will probably all be much happier following careers running whelk stalls, or in politics. The recruitment agencies have been busy – there was great excitement when a rumour went round that there may be one now former banker from Ireland who once successfully organized a piss up in the Guinness factory. Sadly, the story turned out to be apocryphal.