The first meeting of the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, with Hillary Clinton confirmed fears that what has been signaled as change is in actuality no change. It was said that the U.S. told the U.K. that they would stop sharing intelligence with us if we put their security at risk by disclosing evidence of torture of a British resident holed up at Guantanamo Bay.
So this is the “special relation”. Someone thought it had been upgraded from one of enslavement to one of “servitude”, but what evidence there is for that escapes me. There’s a simple answer to this which is if the U.S. won’t share intelligence with U.K. we won’t share intelligence with them. Unfortunately however the die is cast and it is long since that Tony Blair painted a target on his chest (or more to the point the collective nation) saying “shoot here”, which is precisely what has happened. As far as I’m concerned the sooner we get out of sharing and fawning the better.

The question for me seems to be is Miliband up to the job. He appeared to be overawed by Hillary Clinton and by his off putting manner of constantly looking at her for assurances betrayed his discomfort. A very bad sign from a man who had (or has) designs on the top job in British politics.