British Prime Minister Gordon Brown earned howls of laughter from the opposition benches for a slip of the tongue Wednesday in which he appeared to claim to have "saved the world" from economic disaster. He declared in parliament: "The first point of recapitalization was to save the banks that would have otherwise have collapsed." He went on to say: "We not only saved the world, er, saved the banks and led the world. .." - but his attempts at correcting his verbal faux-pas were drowned out by laughter.
The gaffe proved an instant hit with his political opponents and newspaper cartoonists who portrayed him as a superman in tights who is convinced that only he can save the world from financial ruin.
Opposition leader David Cameron joked: "Well, it's now on the record. He is so busy talking about saving the world, he has forgotten about the businesses of this country."
