Blair and Brown snub for the First Minister

I'm no fan of Alex Salmond but it's surely a bad day if you're made to look less gracious than Ian Paisley, as both Blair and Brown have been with their refusal to congratulate him on his election as First Minister:

"BBC Scotland yesterday established that Mr Brown had been quick to congratulate Rhodri Morgan after his appointment as First Minister in Wales last Friday, but had still made no contact with Mr Salmond.

Indeed the Chancellor took questions during a visit to a factory in Dunfermline, but then blanked a follow-up question about how he planned to deal with the Scottish First Minister, abruptly turning his back and getting into his limousine.

Tom McCabe, the former finance minister at Holyrood, defended the Prime Minister's stance, telling the BBC: "I don't think Tony Blair has a great deal of respect for Alex Salmond as First Minister.""

Well, I don't have much regard for Mr Salmond either but if I had the misfortune to be in either Blair or Brown's shoes, I think I could manage to pick up the phone and offer some kind of congratulations. Because this protocol isn't about respecting the winner, it's about respecting the process by which they won. Imperfect certainly - but it still had something to do with democracy, the will of the peepul - that sort of thing.

Is this a taste of what Brown's 'new kind of politics' is going to be like; much the same as the old except grumpier, even more childish, and more than a little contemptuous for the traditions of democracy he claims he wants to invigorate?