Iqra’i

I am to Maureen Dowd columns as kids with drunkard nursemaids are to whiskey: my grandmother used to clip her columns and mail them to me during the Starr Report years. (I turned 10 years old in 1998, so the politics and sex were every bit as exotic as the snark.) So while I’m sure that my blood ought to be boiling at the faux-intimacy of her column today (and its totally vapid Homer references), I’m instead gushing over the insight she’s given me into New Toryism, as revealed by Barack Obama’s party favors:

The British opposition leader David Cameron gave Obama a copy of Winston Churchill’s “A History of the English-Speaking Peoples” and a box of CDs by British bands, including the Smiths, Radiohead and the Gorillaz.

Radiohead, I concede, is a fairly safe choice in general and for Obama in particular: it’s the sort of act that a man whose passions are for jazz and the Stones would find to be intriguing and worthwhile, though he might admire it more than he liked it in the end. (I’m assuming Cameron chose In Rainbows rather than, say, Hail to the Thief.) But the other two are legitimately inspired choices. I find Gorillaz to be consistently underrated and just plain fun — furthermore, by turning up the bass a bit more than Radiohead does, the songs are probably a bit more likely to hit Obama’s sweet spot.

And the Smiths? That’s just a matter of consciousness-raising, man. Though I’m concerned that Mr. Cameron may be trying unfairly to influence the veepstakes.

Admittedly, Reggie Love is the man responsible both for keeping Obama’s iPod hip and for presenting gifts to foreign dignitaries, so Cameron might have someone equivalent on his side. Still, though, someone out there in Toryland has very good taste — yet another thing major parties here would do well to emulate.