Still can’t quite get my head around what the point of this whole outing thing was.

I mean John Major/Edwina Curry, yes – scoop. News. Potential extra angle on policy decisions. Important.

Blunkett and wassername, yes – scoop. News. Potential conflicts of interests. Highlights interconnectivity of government and media. Abuse of ministerial power to aid private life. Important.

Robin Cook/his secretary, not really. “Man away from home for extended period makes bond with someone he sees daily” is hardly news.

Oaten / some younger man, no. No conflict of interest. No extra angles on policy decisions. “Married man is secretly gay” likewise hardly news.

Guido claims the scoop, anyway. Not much to be proud of, I’d have thought, destroying the life of a minor politician and doubtless his family to boot… Still, Guido’s commentors seem to be having fun – latent homophobia or just the repression of wishing they had the guts to hire some arse themselves? How about this from “Delves Broughton Jocelyn Victor Hay”? (I really hope I’m just misreading a parody here…)

“I think Oaten’s prostitution policy not hypocritical rather stealthily pandering to his own homosexual interest. Another thing, the ‘Right Honourable’ Mark Oaten is a gross moral coward and prevaricator, unwilling to confront his deviance”

This has also made Menzies Campbell go down in my estimation. I mean, what’s this crap about?

“No party is entirely subject to what happens to any one individual. The party is much bigger than that and my task as acting leader is to restore a sense of unity and purpose”

Fuck off, Ming – your job as a decent human being is to back your colleague by stating that it’s a private matter and you’re not going to comment, not to try and make political capital out of it to bolster your leadership bid.

I had no particular time for or interest in Oaten, and still don’t. He always struck me as a tad smug. But if his parliamentary colleagues are going to shun him over this due to pathetic fears that their tiny party might suffer electorally (newsflash, guys – you’re already at your peak, and it’s downhill all the way from here no matter what you do), then any sympathy I had for the little orange bastards will entirely vanish.