“Bring me sugary cakes,”

[LargeDeviation]

said Rachel Reeves to an FT journalist. "That way I'll be more jolly."

Another classic showing her sense of self-importance:
“Chop, chop,” she says. “I haven’t got much time.”

And when business leaders have the temerity to question her eyewatering tax rises:

“Talk to me with respect,” Reeves says, glaring at her interlocutor. Eyes shift nervously towards the floor. “I’m the chancellor of the exchequer.” There are no cameras to record the extraordinary exchange. Is everything all right? Surprisingly, Reeves seems to have enjoyed the moment. “He wouldn’t have spoken like that to George Osborne or Gordon Brown,” says Britain’s first female holder of the 800-year-old office, referring to two of her predecessors. “He deserved it,” she guffaws, heading out to the waiting car.

Reeves is sounding quite Marie Antoinette - AIBU?

She's probably right though, they probably wouldn't have spoken to her predecessors like that.

Hard to say without being there, hearing her tone or knowing the attitude of the other person she is responding to. Could be assertive and challenging people who are disrespecting her, could be needlessly rude and putting other people down to get ahead. If the latter is true, I'm sure many men in positions of power have done the same and far worse to get there. We needn't hold women to a higher standard than men and expect high -profile women to behave like angels. Demanding sugary cakes seems like a power move I can get behind.

Marie Antoinette who was the victim of propaganda and circumstance? Who was one of the few French royals to ever exhibit sympathy for the poor throughout her life? Who became a scapegoat for looming financial ruin? Who was accused of bathing in the blood of French people and of holding lesbian orgies because she like to take walks in the grounds of Versailles with her friends? Marie Antoinette who because she was female and a foreigner was fair game to throw all manner of baseless accusations at.

That Marie Antoinette?