The beginning of the endgame

Let us speculate for a moment. What if Gordon Brown were to resign today?
This would immediately place his cabinet colleagues under the pressure of choosing between their short or long term futures. For Darling and Des Browne, there is probably little choice: too closely associated with Brown in the past, they wouldn't be trusted in a new regime. Harriet Harman has already blotted her copybook with the Blairistas. On the other hand, Reid, Clarke, Falconer and Jowell would - for lack of any other option - stick with Blair. Prescott would no doubt regard it as his duty to try and keep the Blair show on the road, but one senses that his influence and perhaps his motivation have diminished in recent months.
The interesting choices would be faced by Ministers such as Straw, Kelly, Hewitt, Hain, Hutton and Johnson. Do they stick with Blair and run the serious risk of being sidelined when Brown - in due course - takes over? And is there a positive incentive to staying with the Blair regime, given its inherent instability and its increasingly arbitrary and irrational policy preferences, even before Brown had departed?
As for Hoon - well who cares...
But if Brown, Darling, Browne and various Brownite junior ministers were to return to the back benches, supplemented by one or two of those mentioned above, the effect on the Labour Party in the Commons and on the NEC might be electric.
But, hey it will never happen, will it?