Black Wednesday? Who are you kidding?
That's Tony Blair's reaction to coverage of his day of treble troubles (I've just been speaking to him on an election visit to east London - you'll can watch the interview here).
He insists that John Prescott's affair is a strictly private matter and that he has asked the questions that need to be asked about it. He insists he was right not to sack Charles Clarke. He angrily dismisses the idea that Patricia Hewitt should have offered her resignation. Finally, he compared himself with Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger - who months ago faced calls for the sack but now...
Yesterday I said I had been told the story about John Prescott's affair "was a bombshell to Prescott's colleagues and family". A few of you raised eyebrows to that word "bombshell".
Reader George Mason said:
How can you say you Prescott's escapades are a bombshell when the majority of lobby journalists and even research assistants in Parliament have declared this to have been a long-term open secret?
And blogger Guido Fawkes wrote: "It was hardly a bombshell to the lobby or his colleagues."
I should have been more precise. This relationship revealed at this time was a bombshell. The phrase 'long-term open secret' is journalistic code for 'everyone's heard the gossip but no-one's proved it because if they had they would have printed it'.
