GORDON BROWN CELEBRATES his 70th birthday on 20 February. My guess is he will find a purposeful way to do that, perhaps by re-reading some of the notes John Maynard Keynes left in the Treasury’s archives, as Gordon was fond of doing during his reign over British economic policy. Brown got many things wrong, among them the idea that he could somehow bring an end to “boom and bust”, and the belief that he could restrain his impatience with lesser mortals to become a completely successful Prime Minister. But on the most important issues — the need for an independent Bank of England, whether Britain should retain control of its financial and economic destiny by retaining its own currency, how to save the international banking system from collapse, who to select for important jobs — he got it right.
Brown gained control of British economic policy from the Prime Minister in much the same way as Bernie Sanders gained control of U.S.
