OPINIONRuth Kelly has resigned? Small earthquake in Manchester!, writes Martin Kettle
"HOW MANY divisions has the pope?" asked a sneering Stalin when discussing the power of the pontiff.
It is tempting to ask the same question about Ruth Kelly, one of the pope's most pious political followers, after the leak of her imminent departure from Gordon Brown's government.
For Kelly, in the macho political calculus which comes most naturally to the prime minister, counts for little beyond herself.
She is a low-profile minister, neither brilliant nor useless, proud but not pushy, better than her reputation but not any kind of threat to his leadership. Like the pope, she has no divisions either.
If there is a network of Kellyites out there in the Labour Party, then all I can say is they are well hidden. If they exist at all, they must operate at a level of deep secrecy reminiscent of, say, Opus Dei, of which the transport secretary is supposedly a member herself.
As resignations go, therefore, this one is plainly on the low end of the political Richter scale. Small earthquake in Manchester; not many affected. Kelly says she is leaving for personal reasons and all those who know her (she used to work for the Guardian before she became an MP in 1997) will know that these are real.
She has four young children and it is, quite simply, impossible to combine real parental presence with the 24/7 demands of modern politics. She is not going to go out on to the steps of the Labour conference and denounce Brown and all his works - as her comments today have already made clear.
In that sense, Kelly's going is much less damaging to Brown than the departure a week ago of the far less senior Scotland Office minister (and fellow Catholic) David Cairns.
But it is a resignation nevertheless. And it is absolutely not the story that Brown wanted the world to focus on yesterday. Downing Street will be very angry about it as they jet off to America.
And don't be deceived about the bigger picture. This is, I believe, also a political resignation as well as a personal one. Kelly is a quiet critic of Brown's leadership.
She has spoken out in cabinet against some of his political instincts. She has long been counted in the numbers of those who might resign if a co-ordinated revolt against Brown ever got off the ground (something her departure may accelerate).
The personal things matter, of course, and Kelly's Catholicism is unquestionably at odds with the government's human fertilisation and embryology Bill too (the same was true for Cairns). But in the end she is also going because she is fed up. If things were going better for Labour, or if she felt more at ease with the government's direction under Brown, one senses she would find a way to stay.
And, yes, it's also another woman gone. First Siobhán MacDonagh, then Joan Ryan, then Fiona Mactaggart. Now Ruth Kelly. It may not be a plot, but increasingly it doesn't look entirely like a coincidence either.
To say that Brown alienates Labour women is to put it too crudely, especially on the morning after the Sarah Brown moment, but Sarah was needed yesterday for a reason, to make the Great Leader seem warmer and more human.
His style of politics is not uniquely macho, but it is very, very male indeed. He struggles - certainly in public - to be frank, or honest, or emotionally aware in a way that makes male and female voters identify with him. In that sense, Kelly's departure strips a bit more of something important, but elusive, from Brown's standing.
You can almost hear David Cameron's voice as he taunts Brown about the drip-drip of departures from his government and about the fact that Kelly gave him something like nine hours of good post-speech publicity before her story broke in the early hours. Another relaunch that ran out of gas within the space of a single news cycle.
Kelly's resignation is a reminder that what was true before Brown's well-received speech is also true after it. The speech has not changed the game. The game goes on as before, though where it is headed no one can say. Yet always remember too that, in the end, the pope easily outlasted Stalin.
• Martin Kettle is a political commentator with the Guardian newspaper of London. This piece appeared yesterday on the newspaper's website, guardian.co.uk, in the comment is free section