ZP, who graciously travelled to Brighton to bestow some glamour on the otherwise dull Labour conference (ole Prince of Darkness Mandelson comedy routine excepting), shared a few tips with Brown on how to win the next elections.
No, nothing about using the Police and Judiciary to hound your political opponents into the ground. Nor did he advise him to change his name to David Cameron to confuse the voters.
Apparently Brown must be “loyal” to the “true spirit” of the “European left”, whatever that means.
Brown returned the compliment by presenting ZP as a man whose grandfather had been shot by fascists, and said he was an inspiration to us all. ZP return the compliment by talking about how Brown had saved the world during the recent financial crisis.
All in all, a complete ’60s left wing hippie love in, it seems.
Until, according to El País, someone brought up the matter of the Czech President, a man with the scary sounding name of Vaclav Klaus, who, in true Transylvanian spirit (yet, I know where Czech is, it’s poetic license), threatens to destroy the harmonious spirit of Europe by throwing the EU treaty out.Many black looks all round at the mention of this party pooper.
Someone then mentioned David Cameron again, and for some reason ZP seems to think that when Cameron gets in he’ll cast a shadow over Spain’s EU presidency. Not sure why?
Labour is always a little disconcerted when a true member of the European Left turns up; they know they should share the same ideals, but can never quite screw up the courage to face their dark little souls and say “should we embrace the whole concept of social totalitarianism and really go towards the legislation of every little thing that comes to mind?”
As opposed to just faffing around passing useless laws that people can ignore but go down well in the soundbites on TV. Like the proposed regulation of banking bonuses.