 | 'Cathy Jamieson, Labour's acting Holyrood leader, distanced herself from Mr Brown's call. The PM could have chosen simply to bask in the reflected glory of Beijing's medals bonanza, but has instead dropped the baton by drawing attention to political difficulties in his own backyard.' Douglas Fraser, Scottish Political Editor in the Herald, 25 th August 2008. |  |
Roman emperors used to keep the plebs happy with a combination of bread and circuses. Some things don't change, and two millennia on, it helps distract from the soaring price of bread for the Olympics to provide the ultimate circus.
Yesterday, the torch was handed to London, and a new era of sporting politics and political sport began. That is likely to be a significant theme through the next four years and beyond, to Glasgow's 2014 Commonwealth Games.
Apart from money worries, the Labour Government faces growing uncertainty over what will comprise Great Britain the next time Team GB takes to the Olympic arena. The SNP, unsurprisingly, wants an independent Scotland to have its own Olympic team. But unionists hope the impact of medal success in Beijing will demonstrate Scottish athletes are stronger together and weaker apart from Britain, and that such a sporting message will reach the bits of Scotland that politics rarely does.
Indeed, Gordon Brown hopes to see his Scottish compatriots drawn in to Britain more firmly.
Visiting Beijing, he restated the case for an all-Britain football team to compete at the London games.
You don't have to be a nationalist to have problems with that. It could undermine the case for maintaining the historic anomaly of the UK having four national teams competing internationally.
The First Minister Alex Salmond reckons the Prime Minister has scored an "own goal" with his "extraordinary blunder" ahead of the imminent Glenrothes by-election.
"What does the Prime Minister think the people of Fife would think about putting at risk the future of the Scottish football team?" Mr Salmond asked yesterday. "The fact is that Gordon Brown has become so obsessed with his British campaign he has lost touch with reality."
Cathy Jamieson, Labour's acting Holyrood leader, distanced herself from Mr Brown's call.
The PM could have chosen simply to bask in the reflected glory of Beijing's medals bonanza, but has instead dropped the baton by drawing attention to political difficulties in his own backyard.
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