What has turned the leader of the Labour Party into a flag waver? Well, London is under more grievous threat from Islamist terrorists than any city in Europe, and Brown understands that patriotic fervor is apt to bring the British citizenry -- Christian, Jew, non-believer, and Muslim -- together and isolate the terrorists. But this will not be sufficient to repress the suicide bombers. Hence, this week in London we are hearing a refrain that Americans have been hearing for several years, the refrain lamenting "our porous borders." "Terrible price of our porous borders," is how Monday's Daily Telegraph titled its lead editorial.
It is fascinating to see how Labour has moved away from so many of the misconceived ideas of progress. Brown seems to have little in common with the bubble-headed socialists, pacifists, vegetarians and other zanies who founded his party. I suppose this should not surprise us. Any party of the left that has wanted to win high office has discarded its left-wing enthusiasms of yore. Think of the Clintons in the Democratic Party. They came to political maturity -- if that is the term for it -- in the late 1960s abounding with the ideas of the likes of Saul Alinsky, various Marxists, and other proponents of utopia. Those of us who in the 1960s adhered to the ideas of William F. Buckley and Milton Friedman have never had to cover our intellectual tracks. The Clintons have, and today, at least on a good day, they intone some of the values of Buckley and Friedman. Alinsky and Marx are forgotten.
How far to the left Brown was in his youth I do not know. But there was one embarrassing lapse during his summons to the flag. When he first brought the matter up in public he said there was a rule against government buildings flying the Union Jack more than 18 days a year. "We've got to get rid of the rule," he vowed. A day later he embarrassedly admitted that no such ban existed. The actual rule required the flag to be raised on buildings on 18 specific days. Well, cheerio, now the flags are flying from every government flagpole. They look very good to me. Not only is it a handsome flag, but it is an indication of British grit against terror, which frankly I never doubted.