These are dark days in Downing Street. But in Tony Blair's inner circle they can still enjoy a joke, even if the humour is increasingly of the gallows kind. The latest is that Gordon Brown, in his efforts to distance himself from the prime minister, is turning into Labour's Al Gore. Mr Gore, it will be remembered, thought that his chances of winning the presidency would be improved if he could convince people that he had nothing to do with his party's most redoubtable election-winner since Franklin Roosevelt. What gives the joke extra piquancy is the rumour that Mr Brpwn is being advised by Bob Shrum. Mr Shrum is not well known in Britain, but his strategic insights have been put at the disposal of nearly every Democratic presidential campaign since George McGovern's ill-fated tilt at the White House.
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