Not so fast, Dave

The body language between Gordon Brown and Barack Obama is going to be interesting to watch at the upcoming G20 summit in Pittsburgh. As both the US and Britain remember the eighth anniversary of 9/11 today, the relationship between the two leaders appears to be going from bad to worse.

Yesterday, Downing Street let it be known that the two men had enjoyed a "warm and substantive" telephone conversation. There was no mention of the hot topic of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi's release from jail being on the agenda.

Minutes later we got a rather different story from the other end of the hotline: that Megrahi was part of the conversation and, indeed, the President had "expressed his disappointment over the Scottish Executive's decision to release convicted Pan Am 103 Bomber Al Megrahi back to Libya".

While Downing Street had said the historic "special relationship" between London and Washington was "as strong as ever", the White House spokesman described the call as merely "productive".

The Daily Mail jumped on this with glee, making the point that the release of two such divergent statements was a sign in itself that all is not well. Diplomatic statements of this kind are normally coordinated.

If Obama is still pissed off about Megrahi's release then he is only reflecting American media coverage of the issue. Brown has been accused of being "cowardly, unprincipled, amoral and duplicitous" in his refusal to intervene over Megrahi - and those are just the friendly comments.

Like the Daily Mail, David Cameron, is, of course, rubbing his hands in glee. The diplomatic faux-pas follows reports earlier this week from Newsweek correspondent Richard Wolffe that Obama found Cameron "more energetic and engaging than the downbeat Brown" when the two men met in London.

But the Mole would advise Cameron not to get over-excited by all this. However depressing Brown may be in company, he has stood shoulder to shoulder with Obama through the financial meltdown, while Cameron and the Tories have been way off the Obama-Brown line with their proposals - or lack of them - to tackle the crisis.

There is, too, a strong tradition of friendship between the Democrats and Labour - manifested most recently in Bill Clinton's relationship with Tony Blair and in Brown's friendship with the late Ted Kennedy, the man Obama described at his funeral as "the soul of the Democratic party". Before he became prime minister, Brown used to holiday on Cape Cod and talk politics with Kennedy.

Anyone can go to Pittsburgh - an invitation to Hyannis Port is another matter. ·