And so, a slippery, malodorous and rather unpleasant part of the country’s anatomy is finally going to be douched.

(Incidentally, is this photo really the best BBC online news could find of the Prime Minister? It’s chilling.)

But Christ, it’s taking long enough. It’s like watching someone with Dartitis. Don’t be fooled into thinking that this is the beginning of the end. It’s more the end of the beginning of the beginning of the end of the beginning of the end. Blair might be leaving the Labour Party in the shit today but we still have somewhere around six weeks of him left as Prime Minister.

He could still do a lot of damage in that time although, if reports are to be believed and with a little bit of luck, he’ll be spending the rest of his time in office mainly on the ‘plane.

And so, the millions of words that will be penned about the Blair legacy today (these are some of the best so far, I think) are jumping the gun somewhat and will be incomplete. Blair may yet (pleasantly) surprise us in the coming weeks by handing himself in at the Hague or declaring his plans to join a trappist order when he finally, absolutely, positively, really, really, really steps down.

Update: Nosemonkey on that speech:

Not only does he seem to have confused pre-Blair British politics with late-20th century American politics (liberal vs. conservative rather than socialist vs. capitalist, etc.), but also please note how none of the words “unions”, “workers”, “democracy”, “the poor” or “socialism” appear even once in the entire speech… (”Iraq” appears once, “education” once, “the NHS” not at all…)