Brown crestfallen after gaffe
here it is guys...
total disaster..i couldnt believe my eyes and ears this morning on sky news.........
Gordon Brown is usually pictured outside the black door of 10 Downing Street. But it was outside the white door of a modest home in Rochdale that he endured the most humbling moment of his premiership yesterday.
Mr Brown had hoped to go to the polls next week judged on his performance on the world stage - as a global statesman whose stamina and intellect supposedly helped save the financial system from collapse.
Instead, he was forced to beg forgiveness at the home of a 66-year-old Labour-voting widow whom he had insulted as a "bigot" - mistakenly believing that he was out of earshot.
In scenes reminiscent of The Thick of It , the television political satire, the prime minister spent 40 minutes apologising to Gillian Duffy, before emerging - an awkward fixed smile across his face - to apologise via the media throng.
"I am a penitent sinner," he said.
The incident is particularly damaging for Mr Brown and his party - "a disaster", in the words of one rueful Labour MP - precisely because Mrs Duffy exemplifies the type of person on whom it is relying for support at the ballot box next Thursday.
Her concerns were far from irrational and are shared by millions of people. She told Mr Brown that there were too many east Europeans in the country and that she was worried about imminent tax rises to deal with the deficit.
He had appeared to handle her well, before stepping into his car - unaware that his comments were still being broadcast. The meeting had been "ridiculous" and a "disaster" because the woman was "bigoted", he fumed.
Not only had Mr Brown slammed an innocent member of the public for her views, he had also blamed a member of staff - apparently Sue Nye, his longstanding gatekeeper - for the encounter.
He also appeared to let slip that he had presumed the woman would be an entirely uncritical Labour voter. Mr Brown's campaign has been criticised over the past fortnight for a succession of meetings with party supporters. During a BBC radio interview following the incident, the prime minister appeared visibly crestfallen. Unaware that he was being filmed, he slumped over the microphone as he blamed broadcasters for releasing a "private conversation".
At about 3pm, against the advice of some aides, he entered the home of Mrs Duffy, emerging 45 minutes later to say she had accepted his apology.
The prime minister's predicament may attract sympathy in some quarters, given the enormous pressures of the campaign.
Other politicians have been caught out by microphones. John Major once described his colleagues as "bastards", while the late Ronald Reagan joked that he would "bomb Russia".
Opposition parties largely refrained from weighing in, knowing that the damage was done. "Elections reveal the truth about people," said George Osborne, the shadow chancellor.
But there was barely concealed despair within the Labour ranks and among Mr Brown's closest advisers.
"Last week Brown's people were moaning that [Lord] Mandelson [party campaign chief] wouldn't let him meet real people," said one Labour MP. "Well, you've now seen what happens when he does. This is a big political catastrophe."
In an e-mail to supporters last night Mr Brown acknowledged the damage that his blunder had done to their campaigning.
"The worst thing about today is the hurt I caused to Mrs Duffy, the kind of person I came into politics to serve," he wrote.
By then, it was too late.
Verbal slip
After returning to his car following a conversation with Mrs Duffy, the prime minister was overheard saying:
GB; That was a disaster. Should never have put me with that woman. . . whose idea was that?
Second voice; I don't know, I didn't see her.
GB; It's Sue, I think. It's just ridiculous. (Muffled sounds)
Second voice; What did she say?
GB ;Ugh, everything - she's just a sort of bigoted woman. Said she used to be Labour. It's just ridiculous.