Time for the political beasts of the past to roar once more
FANS of computer-generated dinosaurs are excited about the latest Jurassic World movie, and politics aficionados also enjoy moments when big beasts of past ages resurface with a roar.
Gordon Brown and David Miliband are out and about, swinging their mighty tails with new books on the market.
The publication of the former Prime Minister’s memoir, My Life, Our Times, has kindled memories of the truly tumultuous period from 2007 to 2010 when he occupied Downing St.
For much of that time there was speculation as to whether David Miliband, the then Foreign Secretary, would make his own run at the leadership as an heir to Blair.
Mr Miliband also has a book out, too – Rescue: Refugees and the Political Crisis of Our Time.
The two men are outside Westminster but not quite outside politics. Just as Darth Vader would always be part of the Star Wars universe even if he retired to a cottage in Pwllheli, these men are creatures of the Commons.
Brown fascinates because as Chancellor he presided over one of the most memorable periods of prosperity in our lifetimes but as Prime Minister had to deal with a terrifying financial crisis which shook capitalism to its core.
There is also the unforgettable human drama of a brilliant and deeply complex person who hungered for the top job so deeply that for years his rivalry with Tony Blair seemed a more powerful dynamic in politics than any opposition the Conservatives could provide.
If connoisseurs of psychodramas found the Blair-Brown relationship compelling, the Miliband brothers provided a spectacular follow-up. Ed’s victory over David in the 2010 leadership race won the younger brother the reins of the Labour party but at what personal cost?
In 2011, when David Cameron referred to him “knifing” his brother during a typically pugnacious session of Prime Minister’s Questions, Ed’s expression flashed with such hurt it looked as if he carried around a personal ocean of pain.
Today, the younger Miliband is still in the Commons but David is in New York as president of the International Rescue Committee. Mr Brown has won respect for global efforts to improve education.
The ex-PM doubtless spends a lot of time in aeroplanes but he is not one of the jet-set, and getting filthy rich does not appear to excite him in the way that other past premiers have pursued commercial opportunities. It would be a great surprise but not a total shock if he reemerged in a political role.
It’s a similar story with the former Foreign Secretary. He has used his enduring political celebrity to raise the profile of one of the most important challenges facing the world.
The number of refugees is roughly equal to the population of the United Kingdom. Massive people movements constitute not just a humanitarian crisis but dilemmas of morality, security and justice.
If the opportunity arose for the 52-year-old to jump into the political ring once more, even his fiercest critics could not accuse of having wasted his time outside Westminster.
The two men entered politics at a time when it seemed Labour’s challenge was to accommodate its traditional aspirations with the realities of globalisation.
Socialism’s core values – primarily caring for one’s neighbour and encouraging equal chances in life – might be timeless, but the idea that Marx offered a prescription for how to build that society seemed buried beneath the rubble of the Berlin Wall.
But now the Labour party has been transformed. Jeremy Corbyn, a left-winger who was tolerated as an eccentric on its margins in the days of New Labour’s super-majorities, is now at the helm with Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell yearning to implement his policy programme. They may be a good distance away from winning power in the Commons but party membership has rocketed and they lead a powerful political movement.
It is unclear whether Oxford and MIT-educated Mr Miliband would find an easy niche in this tribe today, where there is no sign of any hunger to appoint anyone who was in government at the time of the invasion of Iraq.
But if he found himself in an elevator with Nick Clegg and a few passionately pro-European Conservatives, it is easy to picture them imagining how they could work together in a post-Brexit future when the identity, mission and soul of the UK is up for grabs.
Could Mr Brown, who is just 66, ever be tempted to sit in the Scottish Parliament? It would be an extraordinary bid to rescue Labour in Scotland and keep the country in the union; it would be a thing and a half to have on your CV time as both a Prime Minister and a First Minister.
It is not just the New Labour brand of politics which has faded from the Westminster frontbenches. The creative tensions which characterised so many relationships from this era seem to have also evaporated.
Mr Blair and Mr Brown, backed by the likes of the Miliband brothers, had a discipline that was as ruthless as their ambition. They knew where they wanted to take their party and their country and the human rivalries were the smoke, steam and sparks generated by a fearsome political machine.
Today, remaining champions of New Labour ideas are unlikely to get to impose their preferred policies on the party. There are plenty of useful things you can do in Parliament if you are far from the frontbench but opportunities to influence the destiny of a nation are rare.
And while there are clear rivalries in the Conservative cabinet, there is no sense of a cast-iron consensus about the ideal end-goal for the UK as Brexit Day nears. A new Britain is coming, but Amber Rudd probably has a very different notion of what that should look like from Boris Johnson. But this could change. Amid the chaos and anxiety inside and outside our legislatures, people of brains and ambition will right now be forging intense friendships and talking about how Wales, Britain, parties and the economy need to change to meet the challenges ahead. And if they have the determination and the opportunity to turn their ideas into action, it may not be long before they are transforming our democracy with political adventures they will one day detail in memoirs we’ll give one another as Christmas presents.