The death of things
I read a few days ago that 2007 was a vintage year for pronouncing the death of things. You know the kind of 'things' I mean - family, tv, adverbs ('it happened real quick'), grown-ups, the music industry. An awful lot of 'things' were on their last legs or dead as a dodo.
The political death of Hillary Clinton's campaign wasn't on the list and that's just as well, given the overnight news from New Hampshire. Lobbyist Steve Morgan, helping hand to Hillary and Peter Hain's deputy leadership campaign manager, might be starting to wonder whether this time, at last, he may even be on the winning side.
He might not be so pleased that his version of events surrounding the non-declaration of donations to the Hain campaign has been challenged head-on today.
Phil Taylor, who ran the campaign until April 5th - a good 11 weeks before the contest came to its costly climax - has given an interview in which he blasts Morgan's claims that he was called in 'to sort out the chaos'. There was no chaos on his watch says Taylor, neither financial nor political.
Here's a taste of what's to come:
>"I just in all conscience and honesty couldn't stay on board with the campaign and work with Steve Morgan. It gives me no pleasure to say but the things that are becoming public now in a way vindicate that feeling I had at the time. "This was a minefield and a territory I wanted to keep close to my chest and manage myself. As soon as I became clear I wouldn't have total control over that area of the campaign, that combined with my concerns over the direction of the campaign, meant that I felt no option but to leave".
"You know it's widely believed there were a number of donations made during that period in June that weren't declared. Now I can't prove that. I don't know that. We need to wait and see what the campaign actually says when they finally publish their list of results but I think it's inconceivable to suggest that the person who ran the campaign throughout that period didn't know that donations were coming in and failed to declare them and at the end of the day, if you choose to run a campaign you have to take that responsibility yourself."
And as for the Secretary of State? He is, after all, legally responsible for whatever chaos did reign ...
"I've worked for him for a number of years and consider him to be a friend and the Peter I know would have had nothing to do with any of this. He is one of the most straightest, honest, decent men that I have ever met and I just cannot understand what went on in that campaign but I can only assumed that decisions were taken by his campaign manager that he knew nothing about because the Peter that I know would never in a million years have ever accepted any donation and not declared it and not followed the rules and in that sense when Peter says there was chaos, that must absolutely be true. That chaos has to be the responsibility of the person running the campaign and that was Steve Morgan."
So are those predicting the death of his government career getting ahead of themselves?
"So what I'm clear about is that there won't be any guilt attached to Peter personally. You and I both know that politics doesn't work like that and we'll just have to wait and see what the fall-out is when it becomes public about the donations that weren't declared."
That may be as soon as tomorrow.
I'm Betsan Powys, ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Wales' political editor. I'll be blogging the inside track on .
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I believe the most damning assertion in all of this is Peter Hain's endorsement of a financial services company who then donated £5000 to his campaign...that most certainly needs further investigation.