Logo insanity stalks the land – and Mr. Miliband moves us all to tears

How does design affect results?

Take the 2011 Olympics logo – the visual equivalent of dogshit on a pavement. It’s hard to believe it can have done anything but harm, managing as it does to combine so deftly the hideous with the incomprehensible.

This thought occurred to me because yesterday I read – or was it a freakish dream? – that the Labour Party, currently having a back-slapping get-together in Scotland, has been discussing its logo, a pretty red rose.

This visual masterpiece was introduced by Peter “where did all your millions come from, dearie?” – Mandelson. I doubt that it resonates much among the kilt-wearing faithful or the rugby players of Wales, but I doubt even more that cosmetic changes would help.

There was talk about whether the rose should have thorns on its stalk or no stalk at all, it seems. This is the sort of bilge that should be kept for meetings among advertising agency poseurs, but the fact is that no symbol can make much difference to the facts.

These are that with the unions about to run amok the Labour party is likely to end up in deep sewage for at least a decade. Last time they tried this on they let in Mrs Thatcher. But when eventually the country was fed up with the Tories nothing could have helped John Major – a much underrated man – as he came up against one of the best liars of the last century – the Great Bliar.

Nothing can undo the folly of the Brown years. And nothing can overcome the fact that Ed Miliband has all the charisma of a supermarket check out operator.

The only hope lies in Cameron doing something exceptionally stupid – always on the cards.

But you do have to wonder about someone so remote from reality as our boy Ed, who in a quite exceptionally deranged speech said of The Great McToad:

“He has an incredible legacy: he improved the lives of millions of people here and around the world.

I am proud to call him my friend. We should pay tribute today to Gordon Brown for his leadership of our party and our country.”

After that came a steady trickle of oratorical vomit:

“I remember visiting Gordon at his home in Fife and looking over the River Forth where my father served in the Royal Navy during the war.

Along with my mum, he came as a refugee from the Nazis and built a life here.

It was his values – it is my mum’s values – that explain why I am standing on this stage today.”

And so on.

I wonder how many who heard that had read Alastair Darling’s damning description of what Brown is really like.

Or for that matter how many reflected that little Jug Ears is there not because of his Mum and Dad but because with the help of the unions he demolished his brother’s chances.