In a 2005 New Statesman book review, Sir Peregrine Worsthorne referred to former New Yorker editor Tina Brown's appointment of an "old friend" to edit "The Talk of the Town" as "only a little less outrageous than Caligula's appointment of his horse as consul". Interestingly, the same edition of the New Statesman notes, in "Trouble in the Ranks", that :
"By the time Margaret Thatcher finished with the Conservative Party, the aristocrats had been banished by free-market zealots who made it unelectable. Peregrine Worsthorne laments the demise of the old-style Tories, who at least served to restrain corporate greed."
The comparison to Caligula's horseresurfaced last weekend, this time with reference to the appointment of Peter (now Lord) Mandelson as Business Secretary by Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
However, from my perspective, Caligula's appointment of his horse as consul was probably one of the Roman's more sensible decisions, and so it may be with Gordon Brown's appointment of Peter Mandelson as Business Secretary.
If this appointment has upset Ed Balls (and his wife, Treasury Secretary Yvette Coooper, no doubt); and, for that matter, the Conservative Party, then, as far as I'm concerned, so much the better.
With regard to the Conservatives, I have to say that their Leader David Cameron shrunk in my estimation when, in his closing speech to the party conference, he tied the fortunes of " David Cameron's Conservatives" firmly to the legacy of Thatcherism.
Returning to Peter Mandelson, I would nevertheless suggest that readers consult the Postscipt to my E-Pantomime, Carry on Communities, where the "Lord" appears in the guise of Mephistopheles, and a post of around the same time entitled "Know the Difference between Objectivity and Aspiration" which I have re-produced at : http://janetmackinnon.wordpress.com/
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