Every party faction knows that the party got its first reaction wrong and belatedly knows that its legitimacy now depends on presenting itself as being on the people's side as fast as it can.
Sir Nicholas Winton, who has died aged 106, became known belatedly as "the British Schindler" for his part in rescuing more than 600 children in Czechoslovakia from the Nazis in the months before the outbreak of the second world war.
It was an ambitious attempt to braid two stories, set in two periods: 1997 to 2002, when Oliver Ewan McGregorr) and his father, Hal Christopher Plummerr), belatedly get to know each other; and 2003, after Hal dies, when the grieving Oliver tries to establish a relationship with a French actress named Anna Melanie Laurentt).
Also known as Robin Hyde, Wilkinson has belatedly won status in New Zealand as a pioneering feminist.
The unexpected discovery was too good not to be widely known, and to enter belatedly into the history of cinema intact.
You might even have known a public school type who belatedly discovered club culture, bought a mixing desk and started dropping their "h"s.
Belatedly, the government lumbered towards an application to join the European Economic Community, universally known as the Common Market, but the nation was less and less enamoured by ministers who seemed to represent a bygone age.
And if the great mouse-nest-in-the-car incident of 2004 doesn't constitute a reason to ban in-car snacking (even if a little belatedly), I don't know what does.
Belatedly, the Catholic Church is responding with a movement that has come to be known as Charismatic Renewal, borrowing Pentecostal thunder, including speaking in tongues.
Belatedly, she made a sober television address and joined the mourners, letting it be known that she had been caring for Diana's children, Princes William and Harry.
