Save it for Nogoodnik

A quick thought. I have to say I was pretty conflicted reading this. I mean, there’s basically nothing I want more than David Cameron’s downfall, and I’d like to double my lifetime score of downed Tory prime ministers. But then, I’ve already stated my reasons.

Here’s a relevant story. In one of those WW2 comic books that still existed when I was a kid in the 1980s, I remember a storyline in which our SOE hero infiltrated the Nazi nuclear bomb programme. In this timeline, apparently, they hadn’t gassed or exiled or otherwise alienated everyone competent to build such a thing, because the Nazi proliferators were close to testing by the time our man arrived. The plan was to assassinate the project’s Turing figure, Professor von Nogoodnik or whoever. Having just about survived what was either a successful low-yield test or a high-yield fizzle, the sort of thing the North Koreans sometimes pull, our man realises that the Leader himself has unexpectedly shown up to observe the tests.

But – horrors – he only has one bolt left for his crossbow! Did I mention he was using a crossbow? Because, eh, reasons, I think. He hesitated between the targets, but eventually concluded that another fanatic could take over from Hitler but von Nogoodnik was irreplaceable. I guess the timeline stuck close enough to history that the Nazis had gassed or exiled or alienated all the other physicists, but not him. Also, did it matter that much now they’d conducted a successful test or at least a really big bang? And from what we know of Nazi politics, the idea of a seamless transition of power is pretty crazy.

Well, the plot has a few holes, but you can’t realistically have a comic book story with a Nazi nuclear bomb factory without at least one of the things going off, can you. So Nogoodnik gets it between the eyes. The end.

Now, even if Cameron had to resign, that wouldn’t necessarily mean a general election. Some other fanatic could take over. Iain Duncan Smith accidentally having the premiership thrust upon him via a succession of unfortunate events has a sort of queasy plausibility. It’s the sort of thing that happens to him, like writing a terrible novel, or marrying an heiress, or being saved from the political scrapheap…by prominent Yesman Bob Holman, of all people.