The Last Ditch by Tom Paine

Gordon Brown withdraws plan to keep details of MPs' expenses secret | Politics | guardian.co.uk.

Now this is (if there is no devious small print) a "green shoot" of democratic recovery. Faced with a real debate on the subject (after the Conservatives decided to issue a three line whip to vote against) Brown bottled. I do not doubt that the Tories, whose record on these matters is little or no better than Labour's, were pressured to do so by constituents. So well done to everyone who raised the matter with their MPs.

Rather than revel in this tiny triumph after 11 years of steadily-weakening democracy in Britain, let us all fall like wolves upon the expense data which will now, after all, be revealed. We should shame Members of Parliament back from their troughs into the chamber of the House of Commons to do what they were elected to do.

h/t Mr Eugenides