Nonsense, nonsense. (Brown laughs) Can I turn to another big area, which you mentioned yourself, which is Copenhagen, briefly, because that has been seen - and no doubt you worked very hard - as a failure.

BBC: Take your politics too seriously

Failure is hard "when you work in a close-knit group, because people influence each other a lot, " says Ms. Edwards, a Tallahassee, Fla.

WSJ: Office Weight-Loss Contests Rise, Saboteurs and All

Successful trading is hard work, and any other line of thinking is a one-way ticket to failure.

FORBES: Four-Step Plan For Trading This Market

Meanwhile Bulgaria coach Stanimir Stoilov has suggested England's World Cup failure can be blamed on Capello pushing the players too hard with a pre-tournament training camp.

BBC: Fabio Capello undaunted by England Euro 2012 pressure

When it comes to negotiation, it would be hard to retreat from asking for those opt-outs, but he should not make too much of a failure to win. (There is precious little new social legislation in the pipeline, and Britain already has the right to opt out of most new judicial measures.) A reprieve for the City from the proposed financial rules would be a coup.

ECONOMIST: Britain's European problem

The Dems. would emerge from the process able to say that they fought hard and succeeded in protecting Medicare and Medicaid- the entitlement programs that can have a huge impact on electoral success or failure.

FORBES: Connect