'Losers don't get to form coalitions'

Sometimes, your brilliant question doesn't seem so smart when they've answered it.

So it was under a perfect blue sky on the manicured lawn of 10 Downing Street, where the Canadian media pack plotted to ensnare two prime ministers with a question about... of course! Coalitions!

The pack is, alas, normally limited to two questions so we tend to huddle and select questions that will satisfy most editors. Sure, we had to ask about the bank tax. But coalitions? That could make 'em squirm!

On the right stood Conservative David Cameron, fresh from his shotgun wedding with Nick Clegg's Liberal Democrats. Cameron is the very exemplar of contemporary coalition politics.

But next to him stood the scourge of coalitions himself, Stephen Harper. Would Harper continue to damn coalitions while face-to-face with Cameron?

Answer: yes. Harper must have seen this one coming. It's a completely different situation, said Harper smoothly. In Cameron's case, his party got the most votes. In Canada, he went on, the voters clearly believed that "losers don't get to form coalitions." He referred to the Liberals, the NDP and to the Bloc -- the latter, Harper said, being a party that wants to break up the country. So there's no comparison.

If you're thinking that, hey, the Bloc may have supported, but didn't sign that agreement -- too bad. We don't get follow-up questions. No fair trying to ask, well, the wicked coalitionists got more votes than you! And Harper's warm welcome for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was out of order, too. (Tzipi Livni's Kadima Party got the most votes. But Netanhayu managed to form a coalition of..."losers.")

As for Cameron, he dealt with the matter deftly. He, too, used to object to coalitions, he said -- but, now, he admitted, he's "trying to prove myself wrong."

A little candour goes a long way at stilted "press conferences" like this where follow-ups are forbidden. But next time we really must think up a harder question. On to Paris and Nicolas Sarkozy!