Damian McBride’s book has its first previews in the papers this morning. The Blairite response has been for Benjamin Wegg-Prosser, former Blair aide and now managing director at Mandy’s consultancy firm Global Counsel, to leak a load of internal Downing Street emails to the Guardian. The highlight of which reveals Wegg-Prosser’s nickname for McBride:

“No 10 has been told by HMT that they are denouncing Henderson. Damian McPrickface denying [Doug] Henderson briefing – we have got them on the run. McPrickface will be going spare.”

“McPrickface”‘s book itself will confess to how he took out the Prime Mentalist’s rivals one by one. Starting with John Reid:

“I decided to unearth from my black book some of the stories I’d gathered over the years about Mr Reid’s escapades from the ’80s and early ’90s… drinking, fighting and carousing”

Charles Clarke:

“For several weeks in succession in 2005 when Charles Clarke was Home Secretary and a declared opponent of Gordon’s succession to the premiership, I orchestrated what looked like a briefing war between Charles and Tony Blair’s anti-social behaviour guru, Louise Casey.”

Ivan Lewis:

“the News Of The World duly splashed a story – quite obviously from me – about his supposed pestering of a young civil servant who used to work in his private office.”

Wee Dougie Alexander:

“How we going to play this? I presume we’ll just blame wee Dougie again? We’ll f*** over wee Dougie”

McPoison is finally admitting what we knew all along, for cash. Polly Toynbee has just been on the Today programme admitting that she knew what was happening as well. So why did she never say anything? McBride talks of an “unspoken agreement” that he could do what he did, that Brown would not “question my methods”. Miliband and Balls were his closest other advisers. What did they know about what was going on?  Roll on conference…