Sir Fred Goodwin the erstwhile Chief Executive of HBOS has become a love-to-hate figure for large sectors of the population.You may feel that he has gained this status rather more deservedly than he has the millions he is being paid for his general incompetence.
The Brown government is delighted with this development, however. Goodwin is just one portion of a much bigger problem - and that is that this government has 'fiddled whilst the economy crashed and burned'.
No. The government are simply chuffed silly that such a welcome diversion has fallen so easily into their lap.
Labour supporting newspapers such as The Mirror do not have a clue how to assess all of this because they have praised the 'Brown phenomenon' to high heaven at the same time as the rest of us have been issuing warnings, Cassandra-style, of what was really happening.
The Guardian & Independent are getting off slightly easier by lending support (albeit rather belatedly) to the new guru, Vince Cable, who has emerged from all of this with reputation enhanced.
