Has Cameron got a bit of temper on him?

Nearly four months into his leadership, the first chinks seem to have started appearing in David Cameron's armour.

I listened to his response to the Budget debate a couple of weeks ago and, while I thought it was totally over the top, I dismissed it as routine politicking until I heard some gossip to the effect that, for all his apparent affability, Cameron has a notoriously short fuse.

Today's ill-considered outburst, branding the UK Independence Party "fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists" shows at best lack of judgement, at worst an inability to control his tongue.

Gavin Ayling cites another example from the leadership campaign when he apparently lost it with David Davis.

I'm all for politicians using colourful language when appropriate, but given that Cameron is basing part of his political strategy on being a sunnier, more uplifting character than Gordon Brown, I think this sort of thing could turn out to be significant.

I suspect Labour will now be monitoring Mr Cameron very closely to see just what presses his buttons.

Draper and White go head to head

Following on from yesterday's posts, the two principal points of view on the Blair v Brown story are well represented in an excellent online debate currently taking place on the Guardian's Comment is Free blog.

As I noted yesterday, Michael White takes the view that much of the current round of speculation has been got up by the media, that Blair still wants Brown to succeed him, and that Alan Milburn is not a serious candidate for the succession.

Since then, former Mandelson spin doctor Derek Draper has hit back with a piece provocatively entitled Michael's Whitewash which argues that the relationship has descended to visceral loathing and that Blair has hatched a dastardly plot to prevent Gordon entering No 10.

I'm with Michael up to a point, but top marks to CiF for allowing two of their contributors to tear strips off eachother in this way.

I think Rachel Sylvester puts her finger on it in this article in today's Telegraph, arguing that Blair remains committed to the "orderly handover" so long as it's on his terms.

"The louder Mr Brown, or his allies, shout 'off with his head,' the more intent Mr Blair becomes on staying. Advisers who assumed he would stand down next summer now say they think he will try to stay until 2008. 'He's very angry and it's hardened his position,' one said."

I do in fact still think he will go in May next year - but only if the Brownites stop trying to hurry him along.

Update: The Draper-White exchange on Comment is Free eventually ran to six posts. Here it is in full:

Draper "reveals" Blair's masterplan to block Brown
White says the rivalry is not as bad as all that
Draper accuses the former Guardian pol ed of "Whitewash" (geddit?)
White accuses Draper of "naivety"
Draper says it's going to get worse before it gets better
White urges Draper to calm down

Will Blair and Brown step back from the brink?

"Nobody seriously believes that, in an ideal world, Mr Brown would be his first choice of successor - but Mr Blair is nothing if not a political realist. He knows that a war of succession between Blairites and the Brownites would tear the Labour Party apart and condemn it to certain defeat at the next General Election."

So I argued in my column and accompanying podcast this weekend.

Not an especially original point, I know, but for me, it's still the clincher when assessing the likely denouement of the Blair premiership.

There are a lot of people claiming that Blair is now determined to block Brown, and some of those people are much closer to the action than I am, but for my part I just can't believe Blair would want to inflict on the party the kind of electoral damage a war of succession would cause.

In his Observer column yesterday, Andrew Rawnsley came up with what he thought was an ingenious way for Mr Blair to reclaim his authority and effectively throw down the gauntlet to Brown, by naming a late date for his departure. But that would certainly blow the chances of an orderly handover sky-high in my view.

Meanwhile Labour Watch is speculating that the Alan Milburn leadership bid reported in the Sunday Mirror is really designed to damage Brown and allow David Miliband to come through the middle.

However Mike White, writing on the Comment is Free blog, takes a similar view to me, although I wouldn't quite go as far as he does in attributing most of the current flurry of speculation to mischievous hacks.

White is also dismissive of the prospect of a Milburn challenge, saying: "He has little or no following in the Parliamentary Labour party and he's not daft either."