The Guardian Tony Blair often bemoans the lack of clear enemies who can be used to help define his New Labour project - but not this week, when he was beset by enemies, some on his own side, at Labour's 101st conference. Some of those indiscretions may have been the result of naivety, but others were mere score settling.
Few people are involved, but the damage is disproportionate.
Yet the Blairites and their allies, including the feuding Browns and Mandelsons, left the conference in good heart despite the buffeting they got - indeed partly because of it. Labour activists and Labour voters could be under no illusion now, they explained. The election was coming, and another thumping Labour victory could not be assumed. By Wednesday afternoon the conference had acquired a nostalgic air for everyone old enough to remember Labour conferences in their fratricidal prime, the late 1970s and the 1980s. Hotel huddles between ministers and TUC chiefs, elaborate verbal compromises and a riveting conference debate on pensions between Labour's heart and its head.