Hell hath no fury...

...like a Sweaty Baboon scorned - the ever thuggish Charles Clarke openly questions his former boss's future at the same time as lashing out at John Reid.

Which is all tremendous fun. I love watching NuLabour MPs bitch at each other when their unrealistic aspirations are ended by their control freak Prime Minister. In the words of Guido, they are "fighting like ferrets in a sack."

But there is a danger that Clarke takes on almost cult status, as he is actively attacking an unpopular Prime Minister. We all (and I do mean the vasy majority of the population) dislike Blair, and as soon as someone has a go at him it is tempting to feel affection for that person. However Clarke remains a reprehensible, miserable excuse for a human being - the kind of politician who would not be out of place in Stalin's Russia (except Stalinism might be too left wing for Clarke). The fact that he has now stood up against Blair is neutered by his odious personality, his lust for ID cards, the foreign prisoner scandal, his refusal to back an enquiry into the 7/7 murders and the fact that it is only when he gets sacked that he realises that Blair is a waste of space who is desperately, and fruitlessly, clinging to power (in fact, fairly similar in many ways to Clarke himself up until May 5th).

As great as it is to see a former ally rip into Bliar, Clarke comes across as little more than a frustrated, bitter, little office Hitler who is throwing his toys out of the pram because no-one likes him anymore. Think David Brent in The Office Christmas Specials, only with added evil.

Because the truth is (and as much as it pains me to say this) Blair was right to sack Clarke. He was an incompetent, ham fisted, ignorant Home Secretary. Of course, whether it was right to wait until after the local elections solely for reasons of political expediency to dump the baboon is a completely different question. As is whether it was right to make the brazenly populist and constantly aggressive Reid Home Secretary...