So it's back to the future. That seems to fit. While the cover of Gordon Brown's manifesto, depicting a family gazing at a rural horizon, reminds some pundits of a Hovis advert, I see a sci-fi movie in which the eerie shafts of sunlight on pasture herald the descent of an alien spacecraft.
The contents are less portentous. Manifestos contain a Tarot deck of cards that leaders hope to play but often can't. They do not predict the unpalatable (Margaret Thatcher's VAT hike) or the unthinkable (Tony Blair's Iraq war.) This time round, all party leaders are being coy about the economic reckoning that may subvert their best-laid plans.
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