Please keep your hands where I can see them Mr. Brown

I can't say I was surprised to hear that U.S. president Barak Obama had become the latest in a long line of foreign politicians who want nothing more to do with Gordon Brown.

I suspect that Obama, like most of the others, is concerned about the damage to his reputation and his own chances of re-election should he be perceived as being too closely associated with Brown.

Of course, the U.S. Secret Service expressing concerns about the state of Gordon Brown's mental health and his increasingly erratic behaviour may have also have been taken into consideration.