The end of an era

[Dave Lenton]

Tony Blair has just resigned. Without getting into any politics, it is undoubted that Blair has been a colossus in British politics for the last decade, and it will seem very strange indeed to have someone else at the top. Despite this being a long anticipated and planned event, it was still odd a few minutes ago when I heard "Blair, the former Prime Minister...." on the radio.

[David O'Meara]

he already has a movie about him, for starters.

[Ulf Dittmer]

A few weeks ago he wrote an article for the Economist, What I've learned, which makes for interesting reading.

[Ashok Mash]

Noticed Gordon Brown doing his acceptance speak (kinda) in front of No 10 yesterday and something about him, I don't like him already! I don't know much him other than what I saw in 'Bremmer, Bird and fortune', but yesterday's speech was, well, just full of jargons, and not really engaging anyone - slight resemblance to George Bush too!

I hope I am wrong about him!

[Dave Lenton]

I think Brown looked a little awkward giving his speech. I guess that is to be expected - Blair was undoubtedly a good performer, and was very comfortable in front of the press. In comparison, Brown will most likely not be as good.

I wonder if he did it deliberately though. He is probably aware that Blair got a reputation of being almost too good with the press, that he was telling them what they wanted to hear all the time and not being sincere. Maybe Brown wants to portray himself as a serious politician rather then the old media-friendly one.

[Ulf Dittmer]

Yes, Brown in certainly smart enough not to try to be the public performer Blair is. Sooner or later his appearances will be measured against the ones of David Cameron, though, and he may have to up the ante. But after (mostly) being in someone else's shadow for so long, I think it's too early to say that we've seen the real Gordon Brown.

[Ulf Dittmer]

Quiz: WHat do you know about Gordon Brown?

in-depth profile of Gordon Brown

[Dave Lenton]

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:
Sooner or later his appearances will be measured against the ones of David Cameron, though, and he may have to up the ante..

So far neither have said much in the way of policy, so it will be good to find out what they have in mind. It will also be quite interesting to see how their contrasting styles match up, one of them saying "style versus substance" and one saying "new versus old".

[Frank Silbermann]

When I was visiting England a couple of years ago, I enjoyed watching Tony Blair and his assistant on the documentary "Little Britain." Do you think his assistant will now work for Brown, or will he continue to work for Blair?

[Dave Lenton]

maybe

[Ulf Dittmer]

Slightly off-topic, but I just read somewhere that the intermittent squabbles between Blair and Brown were being referred to as the "TBGBs" by aides of them.