Sharpe's Opinion

The Speech Gordon Brown Should Be Giving

John Redwood has his speech-writing hat, and makes very good reading (he’s also written a letter from the CEO of UK plc to its US investors which is good fun). My favourite paragraph:

Your new President has referred to the relatively brief time in our common history when we disagreed violently. The success of the US in winning its right to independence and democratic self government should no longer give us cause for coolness. You, after all, won. You can be magnanimous and happy in your victory. For our part, we have long taken the view that the Americans were right. We too are proud of the way the American revolution became the ultimate act of free born Englishmen who needed to travel to a new and freer land to create their great society. The tradition of the English settlers here who helped pioneer the revolution also became the winning force in UK politics, as the UK itself widened the franchise and championed democracy.

The War of Independence, it seems, was England fighting England – and England won!