The New Line Up

There appears to have been some “leaking” overnight.  The BBC reports:

Prime Minister Gordon Brown is set to begin his first full day in office with an overhaul of the Cabinet.

Mr Brown, who has promised a “new government with new priorities”, is expected to make long-time ally Alistair Darling his chancellor.

Assuming this to be true, that choice for Chancellor is not a huge surprise. But one hardly could call it a ”younger, fresher look” at the second most important post in the Government. 

One of the other potential changes, however, appears somewhat to fit that description:

…Environment Secretary David Miliband is thought likely to be promoted to foreign secretary…

If that also turns out to be true, it ought to be amusing to see a British Foreign Secretary who, if a video linkup (powered by wind or solar) is unavailable, walks or sails to overseas meetings . . . or it will be endlessly fascinating to listen to detailed explanations on how this one ”carbon offsets” ALL of his international air travel. 

Come to think of it, though, few are probably better prepared to take on this job in the early 21st century.  Indeed, Mr Miliband might well invoke the very same words used by his early 20th century predecessor:

Dec 1905-Dec 1916

Grey, Sir Edward, later Viscount Grey of Fallodon: holds the longest continuous term of any Foreign Secretary, and it was from his room that he observed ‘the lamps … going out all over Europe’.

Although, ummm, nearly a century on, that same observation now has a decidedly different meaning.  (And fortunately so.)

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UPDATE: Mr Miliband was given the job. Regarding his stance and possible impact on another vital issue, Reuters tells us:

…”Miliband wasn’t closely associated with the decisions that were taken in the Iraq war,” said David Mepham, head of the international unit at the Institute for Public Policy Research.

“It’s an asset when meeting foreign secretaries in other countries in getting people to focus instead on the problem of how to move things forward in Iraq,” he said…

Speaking of getting to other countries, given Mr Miliband’s known aversion to “carbon creating” transport, it will likely take him quite a lot of time to reach Washington for his first meeting with Secretary Rice:

…Prior to the institution of regularly schedules sailing packets, early 19th century, travelers might have waited weeks for their vessel to fill its hold or its cabins. Once started, these trips often lasted much longer than anticipated since even the fastest vessels could become oceanic prisons when the wind stopped blowing…

However, if he finds a sturdy ship now . . . Mr Miliband could still get there for talks with Secretary Rice by September.  (Thomas Jefferson — who knew a little something about Atlantic sea journeys – had reckoned that most ships lost at sea were older ships; so he preferred one that had made at least one Atlantic crossing, but was also less than five years old.)  And if Mr Miliband is lucky to quickly fall in with another good ship for his return, he might even make land at Portsmouth before Christmas . . . just before winter in the North Atlantic makes that return crossing too dangerous to attempt unless absolutely necessary.