Dave isn’t backing down over Jean-Claude Juncker. Craig Oliver will be pleased that in the news clips being played this morning, he’s in full on plucky Englander mode, sticking it to Johnny Foreigner even if  he was outnumbered all along. It all sounds good, but Labour have been left with what they think is an open goal:

“[Cameron has] turned a Europe divided over Jean-Claude Juncker into a Europe apparently united against David Cameron”.

Opportunistic from Wee Dougie as both Labour and even the LibDems quietly support the principle that Dave is fighting for, namely that national governments determine who is to be president of the European Commission, rather than the corrupt overgrown student union that is the European Parliament putting one of their own in charge.

Juncker is the past. As Fraser Nelson says this morning:

“The idea that the correct response to last month’s Euro elections is the enstoolment of a technocratic federalist is, of course, preposterous – but Cameron is the only leader with the courage to say so openly.”

Europe is moaning because the Prime Minister is not playing ball with them – no bad thing. The implication of their attack is that Labour are siding with the EU. Something they must realise is voter repellent right now, whatever misty-eyed ideological commitment to the project Miliband holds.

Meanwhile, “fears over Juncker’s drinking” have finally cut through to the front pages, with the Telegraph reporting his “drinking habits have been discussed at the highest levels by European leaders who privately have concerns over the lifestyle of the continent’s president-in-waiting“. Guido sees Juncker’s penchant for breakfast wine as his one redeeming quality…