We’re in the US, so our chronicles of fail do tend to be US-centric. However, we have yet to get any good mudslinging between Fed/Treasury/White House, so the UK has us beat right now.

BoE governor Mervyn King, obviously not a fiscal policy enthusiast, came out and said hey, all this spending you are doing is getting a little out of control:

The unusual foray into politics by Bank of England Governor Mervyn King, in suggesting there should be no more tax cuts or spending rises in next month’s budget, has been widely interpreted by the newspapers as a blow to Gordon Brown but a source of secret satisfaction to the Treasury.

Chancellor Alistair Darling, several say, was not happy with Brown’s reported budget plans to offer voters more jam before they had digested the 25 billion-pound fiscal package in last Autumn’s Pre-Budget report.

King’s message was interpreted as bad news for Brown just as the Prime Minister embarks on a whrlwind tour of the Americas to drum up support for agreement at next week’s G20 meeting on a major international programme of fiscal stimulus.

Kinda leaves Gordon Brown with some egg on his face courtesy of Nervy Mervy, but at least he can purchase a hand towel to wipe it off now and pay 2.5% less in VAT. But, you know, this is just bickering. It wouldn’t be LOLFed-worthy if not for the fact that it contributed to FAIL.

Mervy got everyone in the UK wondering if maybe the government was, indeed, taking on too much debt. And so yesterday when the government came out with an auction for some bonds obviously inspired by Longcat (40 year notes, folks!) investors had two words, and the first one started with “F”, and the second one was “that”:

A UK government bond auction failed for the first time in seven years on Wednesday as investors refused to buy the securities because of worries over the country’s deteriorating public finances.

Alarm over rising UK debt levels and renewed fears over inflation saw investors shun the auction, with bids for the long-dated bonds, due to mature in 2049, falling short of the £1.75bn wanted.

BoE won’t include the long bonds in its buyback program either, so this auction was hosed in more ways than one. Epic fail.

Edited to add – it appears that pwning Gordon Brown is becoming a national pastime in the UK: