Max Hastings claims Osborne backed down from taking tough decisions, and Peter Oborne suggested that he abandoned fiscal discipline because he has an eye on the premiership, comparing him unfavourably with Margaret Thatcher's Chancellor in the 80s, Sir Geoffrey Howe.  (both in the Daily Mail).  Oborne further claimed that David Cameron's decision to announce he was not going to serve a full term as PM was "an act of pure, unalloyed political insanity".