Taking the True Blue Mickeys in a Blizzard of Golden Brown Hypocrisy - Will Cameron Have the Last Laugh, or are the Tories playing Dealer's Choice?

For what seems like ages everybody has been asking David Cameron if he has ever inhaled. Basically this was a case of press reflexes and bad research. Some lovely young woman in the Guuadian was even defending his right to smoke and not tell us earlier this week and very amusingly too, there was a nice quip about Blunkett at Annabels in fact - which made me wonder if she also had a ghost-writing job on that odd pastiche Norman Johnson column of theirs.

Things inevitably got nastier of course, because this wasn't just about the press going after public figures in a post-Kate Moss universe. Had that been the case, after all, things would have certainly got colder faster, if you get my icy allusion.

No, what was happening was that Cameron had given a surprisingly well-recieved speech to the Tory faithful. Expected to fall flat on his face at conference like an over-inflated Wiliam Hague in a Portillo wig, Cameron had instead left the podium to rapturous applause and by all accounts spent the following evening being metaphorically cluster-fucked by the snowy-haired Sussex massive. In short the boy done good. And the bookies shortened their odds.

David Davis on the other hand, the street-fighter from the backstreets who had expected to enter by the big front steps, suddenly found himself pointed toward the tradesmen's entrance by the high tory glitterati. He was roundly condemned for being too serious, too well-rehearsed and talking over the greying heads of conference to the electorate. Who the HELL did he think he was - anyone would think the electorate decided who was going to be the next Tory Prime Minister. Sussex did not concur. The Davis campaign was in crisis. Liam the Fox even looked like he might slip it through the middle, (every little helps, right Liam?) and Davis' lethargy, bombast and ignorance of the ways of the Tory gerontocracy (not to mention of gerontophilia) was rapidly making him look like a fourth-placed also ran.

This was of course also widely regraded as a fillip for Clarke -the race coalesced around two front-runners. Davis was down and out, Rifkind was readying himself to stand aside.

So no surprise that the candidate who needed a good dusting of drug innuendos was Mr Cameron and by this week everyone had stopped blowing smoke and started talked the crystal clear language of class A's.

Where does Cameron go, he's just said no (comment). He knows there's no danger of Pete Docherty's manager ever appearing at his parties - and that even if he did there would of course be nothing to see (hey, get me, I care about legal action!). But still the inuendo continues, what to do eh?

Leaving aside the facts, because we really don't know them, Cameron has a problem - admitting some minor pecadillo in the past would be an option - in terms of ending the 'why not answer the question' phase - but lets face it the guy lives in Michael Portillo's old constituency and he knows exactly what happened to Mikey P when he decided to answer the gay 'lily' rumours by saying 'I tried it once but I didn 't really like it and I'm better now'. There was no way Davey C was going to end up in media purgatory with Andrew Neil pulling his strings as he danced the sofa shuffle with whomever the appropriate analogy for Diane Abbott would be in his case (Cat Stevens maybe?).

Luckily for Mr Cameron fate has handed him a sword, or at any rate a syringe and a bottle of methadone. So now just try and besmirch his reputation you scumbags, for the man is a saint, or at least an angel, as he valiantly helps his relative overcome addiction; presumably by the sheer force of his moral rectitude and the ability to buy flights to South Africa - the rehabilitation place of choice for the modern British upper classes.

It has to be said this is a good development for Campaign Cameron - especialy after that slight wobble yesterday when he started going on about people's right to make mistakes and learn from it - I mean, crikey, most Associated Newspapers' journalists could smell the blood THERE a mile off, even through blocked noses!

So will Cameron now ride to victory in his Golden Brown ambulance? Or will the high tories find this all a bit hard to bear, a bit too close to home? Think Diana, guys and buy his stock? Maybe - of course they can always play safe and stick with the guy who quite openly admits to being in the pay of international drug dealers responsible for millions of deaths .