Flannelled Fool Makeover Flops

It has been noted by many other than me that in the recent past, the increasingly circumferentially challenged state of the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines, aka Guido Fawkes, has been matched only by the girth-expanding tendency of his tame gofer, the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole. Was there some kind of multiple bellies arms race afoot? Well, now it seems that there is not.

Fart in lift inquiry requires broadening

Because word has arrived on Zelo Street hat Master Cole has been on a pre-Christmas crash diet, and that the leering photo of Himself Personally Now that he has recently adopted as his Twitter avatar has not been Photoshopped to make him look slimmer of face; it is in fact reality.  Why this should be is not known, but it is more than a little eyebrow-raising in light of recent events.

Snarking at makeovers is OK, right? OK ...

One of The Great Guido’s most endearing vendettas is against Labour MP Tom Watson: this has frequently veered across the line into the personal, and indeed prurient, an area which the Fawkes rabble enjoys discussing rather more than is usually necessary. And, as can be seen, part of this singularly distasteful exercise has been to poke fun at Watson’s recent makeover.

BEFORE: unshaven slob ... bad

The Watson-bashing exercise even included the suggestion – unfounded, as with so much of the drivel that emanates from the Fawkes folks – that their target was billing taxpayers for that makeover. “These [expenses] payments mirror the rise in Watson’s campaign against News International as well as a shake-up in his personal image” told the Fawkes blog, as they begged Creepy Uncle Rupe for a column.

AFTER: stuffed shirt ... worse

Now, Master Cole’s makeover is most likely the product of the private sector, and so more in tune with the ideological purity that The Great Guido demands of others: one would hate to think that he had to resort to gastric band treatment or any other kind of intervention involving the hated NHS. But ridicule is universal, and the new Cole persona is certainly deserving of that.

While the transformation from unshaven slob, with bogbrush hair whose style can best be described as impressionistic, to leering stuffed shirt may impress all those Clever People Who Talk Loudly In Restaurants, one gets the distinct impression that Master Cole is trying a little too hard. And, as to what he is trying too hard to achieve, God Only Knows the answer to that.

One thing is for certain: all the presentational gloss in the world will not alter the fact that, in Henry Cole, we have a pretend journalist who is utterly devoid of honesty or principle, and whose eventual demise – and that will come with the certainty of night following day – will be cheered long and loud by the better class of people, who would rather he had not bothered in the first place.

Until that time comes, he has no room to call out Tom Watson for anything.