What is Blair's exit strategy?

You're never really finished," goes the old political joke, "until you receive a vote of confidence". Well, recently Tony Blair, Britain's Labour Prime Minister and America's favourite foreigner, received a string of confidence votes from ministers in his government.

Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell said that the prime minister should be allowed "to get on with the job". Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt added he should "go in his own time". And the government's Chief Whip, Jacqui Smith, threw in the thought that it would be "undemocratic" to drive Blair from office.

Such expressions of confidence were needed because so many other voices were urging Blair to depart from office as quickly as possible.

These hostile commentators included the usual suspects - leaders of other parties - who see the chance to inflict a defeat on the government.

But new recruits are joining the choir: The London Times, which generally has been a supporter of the prime minister, recently called for his resignation in the national interest. Added to this public chorus is a series of quiet rebellions from Labour members of parliament who think the entire Labour Party will suffer if Blair continues much longer in office.

What makes these rebellions so significant is that Blair has promised to leave office some time around the middle of this year. Usually, even political opponents would be content to wait a mere 20 weeks for the departure of someone who has dominated the political scene for a decade.

In addition, there is one very solid reason why Labour MPs should want Blair to stay on until mid-May. Local government elections are scheduled for early May. Everybody expects a disaster for the Labour Party. Why not wait until then, pile the responsibility for these losses onto Blair's shoulders, drive the scapegoat into the wilderness and allow his successor to enter office with a clean slate?

Blair's likely - almost certain - successor is Finance Minister Gordon Brown, who seems to be acting on this logic when he studiously avoids joining the anti-Blair rebellion but waits for the crown to fall unbloodied into his hands by midsummer.

All these Machiavellian calculations are beginning to look irrelevant, however, as the scandal undermining Blair continues to grow. This is the so-called "loans-for-peerages" scandal.

Questioned twice

Blair has now been questioned twice not as a "suspect" but as a witness by the police. And a leak from the British prosecuting authorities suggested, the other day, that charges might be brought against Labour's chief fund-raiser Lord Levy, Blair's director of government relations Ruth Turner, and one of the donors, Christopher Evans, who founded Merlin BioSciences. Moreover, Michael Levy and Turner might be charged not only with corrupt practices but also with the more serious charge of perverting the course of justice (ie, a cover-up.)

If these charges are actually brought, Blair's position might well become untenable. But his position is only slightly better if the charges are never brought or delayed well into the year. The rumour mill would then spread an exaggerated version of these charges that might even tie them more closely to the prime minister and other ministers. And the continued erosion of public support for Labour would ever worsen.

Some leading Labour figures are already warning that Labour will become unelectable at some point if the bleeding is not stopped.

That must impel Brown to consider his own position. The longer he waits to become prime minister, the more meagre, tawdry and hopeless his inheritance. He must also know what everyone else knows: that he could effect a change of prime ministership by the end of the week by simply going next door and telling Blair he will resign immediately if the prime minister refuses to do so.

Should Brown fail to do so as the government sinks further into unelectability, others will draw a natural conclusion about him: namely, that he is no leader. They will look, even at this late date, for alternatives.

As the dying king breathes out his last centre-stage, the attention of the audience will shift inevitably to the scene in the wings where four or more steely-eyed men watch each other coldly in case one of them makes a sudden move.

As for the dying king, he still nourishes fantasies that he will recover and create the lasting legacy that he somehow failed to construct in his 10 years of undisputed power. But there is life after politics.

And contrary to what you may have heard, prime minister, there are second acts in American lives.

John O'Sullivan, former adviser to prime minister Margaret Thatcher, is the author of The President, the Pope, and the Prime Minister, Regnery 2007. He is also a member of Benador Associates.