Brown admits - I'm a terrible PM

Ok, so he didn't actually say that. But having to turn back to the old guard, including the uber-Blairite Peter Mandelson, cannot really be read any other way.

Some will see this reshuffle as shifting the deckchairs on the Titanic. My view is that he wants to prove that the overall situation is so bad that it is not his fault that the Economy is going down the tubes. By bringing in the likes of Beckett and Mandelson he is aiming to show that even the Blairites could do no better. One question is - did he try to convince Prezza to come back?

One line from Des Browne that stands out is this (quote from the BBC):

Mr Browne is to leave the government, the BBC has learned. He was offered another job but he felt it would be an insult to the armed forces to leave as defence secretary but take another job.

Hmm. Nice spin but perhaps the armed forces are delighted to see the back of yet another Defence Secretary who failed to provide them with the vision and the quipment to allow them to do their job properly. To be sacked from the Defence job - even if offered another - is a comdenation of the individual and not of the services. I really don't think they would have viewed it as worse if he had taken whatever role was offered to him.