Challenged

It is difficult to articulate just how out of touch with reality must be anyone who seriously suggests that Alan Milburn, David Miliband or someone called James Purnell should become Prime Minister.

But as for Alan Johnson, bring him on. The old archenemy of church schools would at once annoy the Old Labour Catholics even more than is already the case (which is quite a feat) and have the same effect on the New Labour C of E types.

There are not enough Blairite MPs to get anyone onto the ballot paper (you'd have thought that they'd have worked that one out after last year's goings on), although a failure to do so would still not be as welcome as the actual defeat of such a candidate.

Just as the Clintons and their menagerie of an entourage need to get the message that they no longer own, or even matter in, the Democratic Party, so the Blairs and their menagerie of an entourage need to get the message that they never did own, and certainly no longer matter in, the Labour Party. Will they?