In Saturday's Guardian Gordon Brown changed. For the first time he shed the outward persona of an automaton, and became a human being; one that breathes air and drinks water. His open acknowledgment of the weaknesses of his leadership, as well as the open reference to the toll that the last month has taken on him emotionally have made him infinitely more likeable.
Brown has been unlucky. His ascension to the premiership for which he has worked so hard came at the worst possible time, and yet when left to his own proactive agenda his results are positive. Within weeks of his coming to power, a potential terror threat outside Tiger Tiger was foiled, and he rode the wave well for a few months. He was the first international leader to actually take any action in regards to the economic collapse and has led the way in terms of G20 meetings on the subject. But his problem is also his biggest asset. He is dry and boring, and therein lies the irony.
In a modern culture fascinated with Peter and Jordan, Big Brother, and X Factor, we need our politicians to have a personality to compete for our attention. Because attention to politics is hard. They are often talking about nonsensical things such a fiscal policy and whips and chairs and however many other Whitehall babble that we need translators to even understand what the hell they are saying. The irony I mentioned comes from the fact that the most boring ones are probably the best politicians. They are the best at coming up with a decent plan and then making that plan into a reality. This might not translate well into a smarmy smiles, the likes of which David Cameron seems to have honed at Eton, but at least gets something done.
But this is no declaration of support for Brown per se. His lack of personality leaves his position as an influential statesman wanting, which is fine because that's why Obama was conceived. But in terms of making people like him, his cold 'business like' attitude to the way in which he is presented makes him seem oddly inhuman. And so it is this that his PR department have finally identified. After nearly 2 years of his government, they worked out that they need to make him look human.
And the best way of making someone look human, especially a politician is to show them addmitting they have personal real feelings. Yes - feelings - those things that we normal humans function with on a day to day, but which politicians carefully repress in public so as to best serve the country.
If I have the option I would rather be best served by a human being. And if this means that once in a while I know how he's feeling then fair enough.
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