I hope you don't mind but, before I start this, I just wanted to ask you what you think about how I should start this. I mean I've got a few ideas. Not terribly well thought out. I want to write about dithering, you see. David Cameron keeps saying that Gordon Brown is a ditherer in the same way that he might say that Gordon Brown is an axe-murderer. But is dithering so bad?

Oops, sorry, got off track there. Beginnings. Hmmm. Yes, well, so tell me what you think. If I were Gordon Brown, at this point, I'd probably set up a review to find out what you thought. Is that such a bad thing? Obviously it would be for my Editor, who'd have to wait three months for the focus groups to report, but at least at the end of it all we'd know something about how I should begin a piece on dithering.

Pause. Deep breath. Start again.

OK. So that's what's wrong with dithering. It's irritating for everyone but the ditherer. I could have gone on for many more paragraphs except that I knew that I was already on borrowed time with you, dear reader, and that after one more sentence of shilly-shallying and dilly-dallying, you would shout “Just get on with it woman!” and throw the paper down in disgust.

Yes, disgust. That is how most people feel about ditherers. I have tried to think of the upside of dithering and I have come up with precisely nothing. The truth is there are no positive role models for ditherers. We see them only as comic figures, frightened of their own shadow, desperate to avoid responsibility. For those who dither there is no redemption, no salvation, no last-minute reprieve at the pearly gates. At least axe-murderers have done something with their lives.

All of this is very bad news for Gordon Brown. Only a year ago, no one would have dreamt of calling him a ditherer. Instead, they called him other things that seemed much worse. He was branded “psychologically flawed”. Then there was Macavity. And the Great Clunking Fist. Or, my favourite, Stalin: who was, of course, a mass murderer.

Mr Brown may not have liked these names but they all, except perhaps psychologically flawed, infer that he is a man of strength, power and mystery. And, in the old days, this is exactly who he seemed: a thrashing angry bear of a man who crushed all in his wake. I wouldn't have been surprised to hear that he prepared for Treasury Questions not by crunching numbers but by crunching heads.

The Tories were convinced that this growling grizzly was, actually, the real Gordon. Their attack plan, when he became Prime Minister, was to hammer home the message that he was a Great Clunking Fist. Labour took this and made a positive out of it: the slogan at their party conference last autumn was one simple word, “Strength”. It didn't do much for me (at first I thought it said Strewth) but I could see why Labour thought it might do something for the country.

In retrospect, this campaign was the end of “Strength” and the beginning of “Strewth!” For that conference was a masterclass in dithering. The election flicked off and on like a faulty light switch. But the real damage came afterwards when Mr Brown refused to admit that he had, actually, dithered.

This was obviously crap (sorry but it's the only word that does it justice) and it raised questions about the man. Other traits, previously overlooked, loomed larger. Why were his travel arrangements so chaotic? Why couldn't he decide what time he was going to go to Lisbon to sign the EU treaty? Why couldn't he make a decision about something that small?

Then there was the Brownian habit of setting up reviews. At first, his desire to set up a working party, review or forum to look into any and all questions seemed refreshing. Tony Blair's bronco-riding management style was more suited to the rodeo than No 10: basically Mr Blair decided what he wanted (the Iraq war, supercasinos, 24-hour drinking) and then developed a strategy for getting there. Mr Brown approached decisions from the other end: he set up a review, headed by an expert (he adores experts) to gather masses of information. Seasons change, people grow old, and, eventually, a consensus grows until - sometimes - a decision is formed.

Suspicions were growing that the Prime Minister had “issues” with decision-making. These were confirmed by the Northern Rock crisis, the lost discs, the bizarre Abrahams funding scandal with all those women named Janet. Finally, amid all this mayhem, Vince Cable stood up during PMQs one Wednesday in November and remarked: “The House has noticed the Prime Minister's remarkable transformation in the last few weeks from Stalin to Mr Bean.”

The collective belly laugh was instantaneous and, looking back, fatal. To his credit Gordon at least looked alarmed, which made him look, yes, like Mr Bean.

The Tory dither campaign began months ago. In the first week of February, David Cameron opened PMQs by demanding: “Can the Prime Minister tell us how many reviews he has set up?” The PM jumped up, knocking over his water glass (Mr Bean!) and said: “There have been a number of reviews and it is right to do so!” At this Mr Cameron told him there were 52 reviews and then taunted: “Who is the source of this dithering or does the Prime Minister need a bit more time to find out?”

Every week Mr Cameron plugs away with his “dither and delay” strategy and it is beginning to stick. For, like all the best slurs, there is truth in it. Just as alarmingly for No 10, there also seems to be an almost uncanny growing resemblance between Mr Brown and Mr Bean.

Take, for instance, this week's little local difficulty with the Palace. The “Gordon gets lost at Windsor Dinner” story was the the main topic among hacks as we waited for the Brown-Sarkozy press conference. It raced round the room like wildfire, causing much mirth and eye-widening excitement.

We all heard about how the Queen, who apparently loves a little drama, had noted drily: “The Prime Minister seems to have got lost.” The Sarkozy leant forward to say something, only to be told that the flower arrangement was bugged. Then he turned to Carla and said: “That's Gordon!”

No, that's not Gordon. That's Mr Bean. A bumbling man who can't even get from his car to a dinner with the Queen. A man who needs a sat-nav to find a chair. A man who specialises in creating chaos out of order. Dither, dither, dither. Oh dear, oh dear. Mr Bean is going to have to do something about this. Where's Stalin when you need him? Perhaps it's time to set up another review.

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