This column abhors cliché, which is why, in the miasma that British politics has become in the last few weeks, we have not invoked Caligula's horse. Those who were spared socialist education policies will recall that the emperor, to show the Roman people what he thought of them, planned to make his horse consul. The Labour Party has just gone one better, by actually making John Bercow Speaker.
One must be careful in the tribal world of Westminster in accepting that disdain of anyone is inevitably rational. In nearly a quarter-century of writing about the madhouse, I have seen, and heard, many respectable and intelligent people vilified for no cogent reason at all: other than their being right, being honourable, being principled and being brave. If anybody thinks that the near-unanimous opposition to Mr Bercow among Tories is rooted in such spite, I implore him or her to think again. I couldn't care less about Mr Bercow's youth; I don't care very much about his bizarre political journey from what he thought was the ultra-Right to what some of his colleagues think is the ultra-Left. I do care – and perhaps we have some evidence for this assertion in that "journey" – that he is not remotely serious.
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