Memento Mori. The halo has slipped. Tom Watson is mortal.

Some have had their doubts. In the middle of Labour conference a small group of MPs were enjoying lunch in Liverpool’s Albert Dock, when they spotted Rupert Murdoch’s nemesis on the opposite side of the quay. “Shall we tell him to swim over?”, one of them joked. “Swim?” his colleague replied. “Tommy should be able to walk it.”

Until two weeks ago he could have done. Then came James Murdoch’s second appearance at the culture, media and sport select committee, in which Labour’s very own Eliot Ness branded the mini-media mogul “the first mafia boss in history to not know he was running a criminal enterprise'.”

The jibe back-fired. Times Editor James Harding described Watson as “looking like a man who is pursuing an agenda". “Watson really blew it” tweeted the Guardian’s Dan Sabbagh. Custard pies and Wendi Deng’s right hook were not required. Murdoch had escaped.

Then last Friday the West Bromwich Untouchable experienced  a second blow. Former News of the World royal reporter Neville Thurlbeck claimed Watson had “ignored information suggesting Mr [James] Murdoch was not aware of widespread hacking because it did not fit his "pre-ordained" argument”. He  had, Thurlbeck added, reached "such a crescendo of implausible Victorian melodrama as to make Brian Blessed seem like Clement Freud sucking on a mogadon."

So where has all this mogadon munching left Watson’s great crusade? Has he overreached himself? Is the empire finally in a position to strike back?

No. For three very good reasons.

The first is the hacking jeanie is now well and truly out of the bottle. Actually, it’s not so much out of the bottle as reclining in first class, sipping champagne and preparing to disembark at  a distant island paradise with no extradition treaty.

It was Tom Watson who popped the cork. He is to phone hacking what Geoff Hurst is to World Cup finals and James Bond to villainous underwater hideouts. His role is defined. He is the leading man. The superstar. Westminster box office, gliding across the Portcullis House red carpet,  leading lady Louise Mensch in tow.

The second reason is Tom Watson does not comply with the normal rules of campaigning. He makes his own rules.

The “mafia’ jibe is a case in point. Everyone knows that when exposing a scandal you have to be careful not to shoot too high. Make an unfounded allegation, or an unsubstantiated claim, and your whole case can crumble.

Not Tom Watson. Warn him not to shoot to high and the man reaches for an anti-aircraft gun. “Get ready for lots more hacking scandals, says MP whose Mafia jibe rocked Murdoch”, screamed yesterday’s Evening Standard; “ "There is far more to come out," said Mr Watson, who added he was optimistic that the Leveson inquiry will get to the truth. "They seem hell-bent on getting all this stuff out quickly and clearly have access to more than I could see.”

But there is a final more esoteric reason why Tom Watson will not be diverted from his pre-ordained path. Tom is a hero. And we need our heroes.

We are tired of politicians with more mortgages than sense. Weary of ministers with their feet of clay, dodgy best men and reckless, pilot-obsessed civil servants.

And within the Labour Party the hunger for heroes is even more acute. Tony Blair’s reputation lays somewhere beneath the desert sands of Iraq. Gordon Brown’s never re-emerged from that tiny terraced house in Rochdale.

Neil Kinnock is a hero of sorts, but a fallen one. Tony Benn from a different time.  Barbara and Michael have left us. Ken looks weary. We wait in vain for another mullet to walk into a Prescott punch.

Tom Watson is all we have. And we are not prepared to give him up. Yes he is bluff. Of course he is sometimes misguided.

But Tommy is ours. That rare creature. The people’s politician.

There may come a day when it isn’t so. When the rapier sharp cut of Chuka Umuna’s suit, or Rachel Reeves’ masterly grasp of growth figures may steal our gaze. But that is in the future.

The halo may have slipped. But it is intact.

Here’s to you, Mr Watson. Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you.

Tags: Guardian, Murdoch, Nevile Thurlbeck, News of the World, Phone hacking, Tom Watson