Len McCluskey And All That

What a day of fascinating insights. Not only into how insulated by vast wealth Fleet Street is; we already knew that. But also into how insulated by vast wealth they always have been, that they sincerely believe themselves to be in "the middle". Where, therefore, the cuts will be warmly welcomed in principle and unfelt in practice. No, they will not be, because no, you are not.

The affiliated section of the Electoral College is a body of ordinary people rather than of paid politicians or of people whose hobby is going to Labour Party meetings. And once the cuts start to be felt, the country at large will agree with the unions. The middle classes are massively dependent on public spending, and are only in favour of cuts if they are restricted to other people, which they won't be. Get out of the Eighties.

Nothing can save the Coalition in 2015. By then, there will have been three years of thoroughly middle-class "David Cameron Stole My Bus Pass/Heating Allowance/Whatever" stories in the Telegraph and Mail newspapers. It will not matter how well the economy is doing, just as it did not matter in 1997, because the political damage will have been done years before, just as it had been then.

And Ed Miliband knows it. As do those still cheerleading for his less able, less likeable brother. That is why they are so angry.