Thinking Paper #167 - Gaddafi is dead, Long live Philip Hammond

By Jacinta Burrow

Abstract

Philip "The Haircut" Hammond. Wow. I mean. He’s been Defence Secretary for under a week and he’s had one MISSION ACCOMPLISHED moment already. It’s a lesson to us all in what can be achieved if you don’t spend the working week lusting after a colleague and get on with popping a cap (or 17) in the splanchnocranium of the North African despot at hand.
The middle bit

Plucked from the living death that is the Department for Transport, Philip Hammond has answered his critics: he may be formed almost entirely of shades of grey, but he knows how to give the world what it wants. “I want his head on my desk by a week on Tuesday” is how Big Phil is said to have greeted the top brass. The IIPBA has thus far been unable to confirm reports that Gaddafi was shot in the head by a man with a heavy, Herefordshire (“who dares wins”) accent.

Phil “The Hammer of Tripoli” Hammond is also a millionaire with a background in the oil trade and it just so happens that there are 41 billion barrels of the stuff in Libya! The IIPBA lost faith with Big Dave after he appointed a barely potty-trained toddler to be Economic Secretary to the Treasury, but this is cabinet shuffling at its old school best.

Concluding remarks

The IIPBA looks forward to snaps of The Phil-ulator glad-handing in downtown Sirte and looking slightly uncomfortable in a pair of khaki slacks. Oh, and we really hope Wikipedia is right about the fact that our new Man at the MoD owns a budgie called Lilly.