Inevitably, there is likely to be a backlash against all this idolising of Mr Blair.

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No personality cults are allowed, other than the one idolising Ho Chi Minh, the revolutionary leader, who died in 1969.

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But the rivalry goes much further back, to the days when Mr D'Alema studied the subtle Marxist strategies of Antonio Gramsci, while Mr Veltroni, though barred from the United States because of his red label, was idolising Robert Kennedy.

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