The wheels are falling off bunkered Brown's bandwagon with the carefully leaked departure of two homes secretary Smith as a raft of ministers jump ship and Brown's cabinet slowly falls apart. Chaos has descended on the Big Brother House. A week is a long time in politics for the struggling Supreme Leader.
Ministers are dropping like flies using the cushy escape route of standing down at the general election to collect their blood money. Not bothering to wait for the humiliation of a Euro defeat and expected reshuffle, they've decided to reshuffle themselves.
The government is clearly out of control. Brown is so weak he cannot even keep the weary troops in order.
Key Brown bag carrier, digital minister, Tom Watson, up to his neck in the Smeargate scandal against the Tories, is the latest in a string of New Labour MPs and ministers quitting at the next election.
Now all it takes is one of the top dogs to join the growing band of angry backbench Labour MPs with a vote of no confidence and leadership challenge and Brown could be toast.
The rats are deserting the sinking ship but the question is did they jump or were they pushed and was Smith's departure craftily leaked to steal Brown's thunder.
Or perhaps it is all part of the Supreme Leader's master plan to create chaos in the Big Brother House, leaving just Brown and his Masters Voice Balls to save the world.
New Labour MPs have latched onto a crafty plan to "step down" at the election to make off with their ill-gotten gains and be rewarded for services to brand Brown with a fat pay off.
The announcement from shamed MP David Chaytor, suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party over his expenses, came as under-fire minister Beverley Hughes and Blair's former health hatchet woman Patricia Hewitt both announced they would be stepping down at the next election.
But the biggest fish to jump out of the net is disposable two homes secretary Smith, the first cabinet minister to announce she is quitting the frontbench. Though it is unclear whether she'll stay on to fight the election or quit to spend more time with the family.
Iffy Smiffy's departure comes as no surprise, only the timing. Her days were numbered. Expenses claims and her husband's penchant for taxpayer porn sealed her fate long ago. She was handed the poisoned chalice of the home office as the fall-guy. It was a dirty job and someone had to do it but Smith was not up to the job.
The leaking of Smith's departure steals the thunder from Brown's reshuffle. Harbouring dreams to be the other man with a plan, today's shenanigans blow out of the water any authority left in the beleaguered prime minister and turns his 'bold, decisive leadership' over MPs' expenses into a joke.
All eyes are now on what this means for Brown's long-awaited cabinet reshuffle expected either this Friday or next Monday after the disastrous Euro elections are announced.
If there's a run of cabinet resignations, then the heat will be on, making a mockery of his plan to use the reshuffle for born-again-Brown.
Brown is making it clear he ain't going anywhere but he's now on a road to nowhere and the plotters and political pundits will be having a field day.
Maybe all it takes is a latter day Geoffrey Howe to savage the ex-Supreme Leader and signal the end of his disastrous premiership? But Brown is a plotter not a quitter. He won't relinquish his iron grip on Downing Street, government, parliament and the people without a fight.
A vote of no confidence seems to be getting closer and louder, either from his own backbenchers or from an alliance of opposition parties in the commons.
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