“His political compass points only at himself.” Well so what? Is that unusual in a politician, the great WSC was devoted to such a principle, as are the 148 Tory ‘moaners’ or so it appears.
Nor is it fair to ask “did Boris kill Conservatism”, in that it had already ‘killed’ itself when it jettisoned Margaret Thatcher. Have we already forgotten those charlatans, Heseltine, Howe, Major & Co? Then to be followed by Cameron and the truly appalling Mrs May?
Boris has in fact shackled himself to a corpse, as last night proved, however he still has plenty of time to complete the resurrection of Conservatism.
His classical education should remind him that the Roman Republic was almost destroyed by three major military defeats inflicted by that genius Hannibal, yet fought on to ultimate victory, despite at one stage having a general whose tactics were “ run away”!
In short Boris needs to discipline his wife, get Cummings back on board, ‘slash & burn’ the Civil Service, and start acting like a Proconsul, and not a well meaning Liberal. “Iacta alea est”.
‘Thou blasphemest’! The ‘great WSC’ certainly believed in his own, unique, destiny. He also believed in other things, like the British Empire, or in defeating Hitler, to the point where he put himself on the back benches as a squawking has-been to stay consistent to those beliefs. Then of course he was incredibly talented (not just at rhetoric), self-disciplined, had a huge capacity for work, provided brilliant leadership in a terrible time, and had or championed many good ideas in the teeth of the establishment (reorganising the Navy, convoying, the tank, …).
Boris Johnson is no more like WSC than a kitten is like a lion. As for ‘disciplining his wife’, how could he do that when he has failed miserably so far and is not able even to discipline himself?
Yes, in view of the fact that WSC has undergone the process of apotheosis, ‘guilty as charged’!
However I did not wish to imply any criticism in self-belief/selfishness, as that is natural order of things. Nor did I wish suggest any equivalence between WSC and Boris, in fact they might be described as polar opposites in many respects. As to his wife the alternatives are either the ‘ Humphrey Bogart treatment’ or compromise.
Sadly we have to accept that, with the notable exception of WSC, we haven’t had a proper Conservative PM since Baldwin and Chamberlain, and currently there is no viable candidate to Boris in sight and thus we must give him our support. “The triumph of hope over expectation” you may say, but what alternative is there?
Incidentally what happened to ‘Sam Sky’?
But why support the Boris when he is not conservative, is unable to lead or govern, and has no principles, ideas, or policies? His main talent seems to be ‘being all things to all men’, rather like a less serious version of Tony Blair. What is there to hope for? Any honest person would be a big improvement over the Boris, even if the replacement was no more energetic, effective or full of ideas than he is. If you can think of no alternative among the current front runners, how about taking back Theresa May? At least her approach to difficult problems is to look them in the face and try to solve them, not to promise the moon, make a joke, and then break her word.
But she did break her word, repeatedly. Her handling of Brexit was a procession of commitments, followed by doing the opposite, often slyly without explanation. Ask any of her procession of ‘Ministers for Brexit’.
I’m not a great admirer of Theresa May, but you’d have to be much more specific than that if you want to attack here in the way you do. I expect you mean, tried to get through a ‘softer’ version of Brexit than you personally wanted! Given the current mess and complete failure to control immigration, (increased since Brexit!) we might just as well have done so!
Notoriously, the 2016 referendum was a vote against something, not a positive vote for a particular settlement. hence the ensuing constitutional chaos. Talking about ‘breaking your word’ and ‘lying’ and the like is practically always used transnationally of politicians who are disapproved of, while the ones supported are let off the hook and called tactical geniuses or something! It is politics, a messy and often murky business. Also, success in politics is a great deal about about controlling the narrative. At one point Nigel Farage was extolling the ‘Norway option’, then later that sort of talk became akin to treason, largely because of the actions of the Conservative Research Group and others. Good on them, they were politically successful, but simply defining Brexit as breaking all formal ties with the EU is not accurate. Norway is not a member of the European Union as a matter of fact, not opinion.
“0 tempts O mores”, but I still hope that an Etonian KS and Balliol man might pull through, after all he managed to get this far up the proverbial ‘greasy poll’.
As a possible alternative what about Lord Frost?. Surely he could bin the HoL and return to the Commons rather like the late Tony Benn?
We have had Thatcher who stands out by miles. True this was followed by bed hopping Major and gay marriage Cameron followed by dithering May but Thatcher was a big difference axed by power crazy Heseltine.
Thatcher was pretty power-crazy too. She trashed the careers of all the ‘wets’ who were not clones of herself.
Her foisting of the poll tax on Scotland, who never voted for her, was the most unprincipled act of a UK PM since World War II. She didn’t have to do it, she knew full well that foisting it on Essex, Kent, Sussex, Surry and Hampshire was a vote loser but she did it anyway.
It proved her indubitable political pettiness and spite and it hoist her ultimately on her own petard…..
Depends on you point of view.
Some historians say that WSC bears a large part of the responsibility for causing this country to enter both the First and Second World Wars when it could have been avoided, possibly driven by his sense of himself as a man of destiny
Had we not joined either of those wars we would have abandoned large parts of Europe, if not all of it, to the most terrible tyranny. The Kaiser was, in his own way, as bad and mad as the Fuhrer.
Two Germans who tried to dominate Europe. Another german Klaus Schwab is attempting the Fourth Reich with his gang but over the whole world. We need more than us to stop that.
Maybe – but that is a different discussion. Whether you think WSC was a hero, a misdirected bungler, or an racist colonialist killer, it is still the case that he was multitalented, self-disciplined, hardworking, an inspiring leader, and a promoter of original ideas (some better than others). All things that the Boris notoriously lacks.
You could do worse for Churchill’s epitaph than the words of George Orwell (an avowed political enemy) written while the war was still going on:
[…] But you don’t hoot at Stalin — that’s “not done” — Only at Churchill; I’ve no wish to praise him, I’d gladly shoot him when the war is won, Or now, if there was someone to replace him. But unlike some, I’ll pay him what I owe him; There was a time when empires crashed like houses, And many a pink who’d titter at your poem Was glad enough to cling to Churchill’s trousers.
WSC wasn’t in government during the 1930s and didn’t enter it until 1939 as First Lord of the Admiralty after war had been declared. He didn’t become PM until May 1940.
Boris does shine considerably on different occasions. I am always proud of him at the times he went to the states representing Britain. He also shined as London Mayor overcoming unseeming odds. A good leader usually has a sense of destiny. Jesus more than anyone. Nothing wrong in that. Oratory is not a fault and is much needed in tense times. Look at Boris and Ukraine. Maybe he is not a chancellor and whatnot but he doesn’t need to be The right delegations should sort other things out. Okay he has had immoral faults in the past which I do not commend, but whoever we get they will not be perfect. At least in Boris what you see is what you get rather than those posturing concern who secretly don’t give a damn. He has chosen some good ministers but the enemy I feel is some in his own party chosen by the local tory party to use a safe seat, but who are not worth their salt. I have had a woke tory MP for about thirteen years now with no way of getting rid of her. Perhaps this is the real problem in the end. Too much emphasis on winning with no care as to who they are putting forward. A case in question is the paedophile they put in in Wakefield. The problem is also at grass roots level.
For a landslide, all the Conservatives need is ANY leader who has the courage to stand up to, and argue with and against the media, in favour of a radical reversal of policy attitude to racism global warming and LBGT obsession, freedom of speech and expression….
Agree. Boris’s obsession with net zero lies at the root of many of his problems and they are all self-inflicted mantra which true conservatives will have no connexion with. If only Lady T could come back.
AND a population that won’t ditch such a person at the first organised smear campaign that the MSM will undoubtedly organise as a result?
You’d be amazed at the self-righteous, puritanical fulminations of Little England and how those fulminations are more important than recalibrating the balance of power away from cokehead prostitutes in the MSM…..
Small problem he is not a Conservative – he is a slippery chameleon, and none of the above will ever happen. It will be loads of BS and not a thing more. You know that.
Even St Paul changed course as I recall. If he is as venal as you say it shouldn’t take much to head off in a new direction.:
Scrap carbon neutral and all associated green tosh, bin the Northern Ireland protocol,
prohibit most immigration and start a fast track process of deportation, ‘slash & burn’ the predominantly parasitical Civil Service, reduce subsidies to NI, Scotland and Wales to the same level as England, and funnel the surplus to the ‘Red Wall, and start ‘ fracking’ with immediate effect.
That’s not much to ask and the more serious stuff can come later.
It will never happen – and net zero is his bird’s pride and joy, Johnson does not even understand the topic, judging on the infantile c rap he has said in speeches.
Correct but wishful thinking with the 1diot in No 10
He wasn’t always like that. Something changed him. Not the type of person to say “This man is not for changing”. I think it is all a false narrative. I cannot believe that people swallow it but they do.
interesting word/ way to describe Raab , Shapps, and all the other poly draylon clad intra M25 petit bourgeois jumped up clerk gaulieters that Boris surrounds himself with
to remove the scales from the eyes of Boris would take a team of salvage men, cables, other equipment and blow torches from at least one Smit Tak salvage tug
Boris is a less able, a less commercial version of the legend Horatio Bottomley MP x 3, whom in hindsight was way ahead of his time? He was almost a pre- hedge fundite?!
Did WSC have a clever and supportive wife who stayed out of politics or did he ask her advice on ‘stuff’? I don’t think he would have been interested in the wallpaper selection.
You always seem prone to extreme statements. I have many differences with their politics, but why are ‘Heseltine’ and others ‘charlatans’ simply because you appear to define Conservatism solely as small state, free market liberalism? For most of history those ideas were more associated with the Liberal Party – and divides over which (the Corn Laws, Imperial preference, the Gold Standard etc etc) led to major splits within the Tories.
The history of the Conservative Party, not to mention ‘conservatism’ is far broader, rich and complex than you seem to think, and I don’t see why one rather noisy side gets to define it, even if I tend to agree with that side! Boris was right to eject people who were actively trying to block his Brexit policy, but Whatever, anathematising a whole lot of Conservatives as something akin to traitors is likely to mean the party losing power for a long time and perhaps our being government by a Labour-SNP coalition or something.
Regarding Fabius Maximums Cunctator (I think you are referring to), his approach to defeating Hannibal was strategic and not tactical, and meant a lot different from “running away”!
The comparison between Churchill and Johnson is ridiculous on any level, and there is no chance that Boris will take any of the measures you suggest, as I think we both realise! For one, he is not, unlike Churchill, really a serious character.
Last edited 1 year ago by Andrew Fisher
Stephen Walsh
1 year ago
Its the authoritarianism of Johnson’s opponents within and outside the Conservative party which frightens. Any Brexiteer Prime Minister would have faced some sort of Sue Grey, and a succession of contrived scandals, blown up out of all proportion by a Progressive Establishment determined to take back control. In each alternative universe, the cast of characters, and their own particular flaws, would be different. But the fundamental driver of a Progressive Establishment horrified by the challenge from vulgarians to their Public Sector / Multinational Corporation stitch up would be the same.
Arbitrary, retrospective, and politically motivated policing of rules for rules sake, regardless of whether there is any ongoing rationale for those rules, is a hallmark of authoritarianism. And there were many other examples of authoritarian tendencies during Lockdown, not least the constant Opposition clamour for more, and harsher, restrictions.
The Johnson government made the rules and insisted they were harshly enforced. You can’t really then accuse the agencies that enforced them of authoritarianism. The only arbitrariness and politicisation shown by the Met was in their failure to enforce the rules when they were repeatedly being broken right under their noses. The rule of law – the principle that no one, not even the PM, is above the law, is what stands between us and authoritarianism
Yeah Labour were guilty of pushing the lockdowns but Boris needn’t have obeyed it. He started out by talking about herd immunity then dumped it for some reason?
Quite so. Johnson is good visually and eloquently but in the long run we need truth, not a performance. I concede that he is churchillian on Ukraine and that wasn’t an act. There is obviously a mixture and it would be dangerous to form an opinion until we really knew. One of the dangers to our country is the remainers in the concervative party.
Regrettably I disagree with you on his Ukraine policy. I agree it is a good policy, but for him it is an act. It is not done from either conviction or calculation but because it allows him to cosplay Churchill and feel good – and diverts attention from Partygate.
Though I agree with you, I find it incomprehensible that a Number 10 reeling from the Barnard Castle saga should, AT THE SAME TIME, have created such an egregious hostage to fortune as the Partygate parties.
I agree entirely. It was Petronella Wyatt his ex at University that has stated Boris hated parties and would always turn up late and then excuse himself as he had another appointment to attend to. Boris’ problems started when he got entangled with an ambitious young woman who believed she could do anything and after she sacked the Brexit team went about bringing in her own Woke team which brought about the chaos that followed. Johnson frightened to death of upsetting his dearly beloved allowed it to carry on. He was finally brought to his senses by Lord Frost who quickly dispatched the Woke mob sending the children on their way.
They did it because they don’t care. They don’t give a stuff about us, only about their position and power. And that comes directly from him. Alexander Boris De Pfeffel Johnson has never truly cared about anyone except himself and his position – which is why he has run through a string of women – his relationships aren’t about others, neither are his politics – they’re solely about what makes him feel good.
You seem to have forgotten Johnson’s lock down, and the fact that all the scandals are due to his appalling behaviour and nothing more. Add in economic incompetence, and the fact he is devoid of policy, you have exactly what you see.
Shame he did not up the ante and try a lot harder, the bs does not work anymore, and with Johnson there is nothing left after that
He has to put up with a lot of flack without responding, especially from Starmer. Surely that takes character. In a democracy you have to adjust to different factions in your party as has been pointed out. I think he has churchillian greatness underneath if it was needed. He just needs to delegate well and put in a good team which I think he is doing.
The Conservative Party and its forerunners has survived by executing an extreme policy turn onto a new path several times. The Brexit Turn was possibly one of the most extreme turns – and it isn’t over yet. There are plenty of people who are fighting to reverse the outcome of the Referendum. David Cameron gave up immediately. Theresa May started well but was being drawn into Brexit In Name Only. Only Boris managed to build an actual Brexit out of the building site he inherited. He is hated by many because he ‘failed’ to lose Brexit down the back of the sofa.
Those that hate him, including many in his own party, are prepared to use any means necessary to bring him down and put someone more pro-EU in his place.
Undoing Brexit is a blind.
Given that Johnson is leading us deep into one world government, which is far worse than membership of the EU, the Brexit thing is now merely a deliberate distraction thrown up to put people off the truth.
Once you start to suspect there are puppet masters pulling Johnsons strings a lot of things start to make sense.
The big giveaway is this whole green agenda.
Most people agree that doing what we can to be environmentally friendly is a good thing, but the rhetoric coming out of Downing Street is more reminiscent of some naive six formers than a grownup adult. What we need are well thought out and clever long term strategies, not hot air and platitudes that make zero sense to anyone who is familiar with energy economics and is capable of using a calculator. It just doesn’t add up.
Who is pulling Johnson’s strings isn’t totally clear at the moment, but his actions are not so much those of a leader but more like someone acting the part of a leader. Not dissimilar to the USA.
I have come to the conclusion that we can only fight this by not voting for these remainers. Yes that may not win an election but it will send a message to the local parties to not keep putting these people up as the only option to vote for. Our MP is actually woke but they put her up every time as it is supposed to be a safe conservative seat.
You are correct of course, Labour (and their propaganda dept in the BBC) always play the man, not the ball. Repeat the lie often enough and it becomes the truth.
My disappointment stems from Boris diverging from his supposed libertarian views early in the pandemic.
Nobody will ever convince me that any Government has the right to confine the population to their homes (house arrest by any other name). Strong advice yes, an offer of furlough perhaps for hospitality businesses. This would have shown leadership.
People will generally use their common sense. For example, if you have been working in a room with someone all day, staying with the same people for a glass of wine (or beer Sir Keir) after hours increases the risk to nobody so is fine. Having petty rules which attempt to cover every aspect of life can only be authoritarian which is why Labour constantly demanded more clarity (i.e. more rules)
Accepting that the Government can remove our right to leave the house means that people are accepting that when they meet friends or go to a shop or hug family, they are ONLY doing so because the Government has allowed it.
And yes, I do believe that it would be better to be wiped out than to accept that we can only do basic human things if we are given permission. It was not, 2 years ago, and never will be any business of the Government whether I visit friends and family.
Albireo Double
1 year ago
We need another Thatcher. No more weak second-rate losers.
Preferably not the one portrayed by the wildly (deliberately?) miscast Gillian Anderson in “The Crown”. I remember and greatly admired the real deal, but if her own countrymen portrayed her like a frail old lady with daddy issues, God only knows what they’d do to a Thatcher 2.0.
They actually have a compulsive NEED to lie these days. They’ve already told so many lies that to start telling the truth now would incriminate them from their own mouths!
Paul O
1 year ago
Boris Johnson will go down in history as one of the most deceitful, duplicitous and incompetent prime minister’s in history. People are starting to see through the charade.
But do we have a leader in waiting?
Alas we have a political pool of low-grade, unprincipled career politicians to choose from. The only glimmers of hope are hidden away from public view on the back benches.
Maybe we need a whole new paradigm. Quite what I don’t know, but the reality is that we have covered up the cracks for far too long. We desperately require a strong leader with a capable team around him/her to help us navigate the truly treacherous times ahead.
Boris may be deeply flawed but was he more duplicitous than false dossier Blair? I think that Boris’ competencies as regards the Covid response and the Ukraine war are average to good rather than dire.
Blair had his weaknesses, mostly a tendency to introduce major reforms that had not been thought through. But there is no evidence that he had any inkling that the dossier put in front of him by those who ought to and were assumed to know was so inaccurate
Everyone knew the Iraq War was one big US/Israeli lie from the very beginning when the Bush creature uttered the immortal words “ Saddam did 9/11.”
So why not you and Blair?
I think you mean ‘I and everyone I knew’. I knew that, but I was always aware of plenty of PhD scientists who didn’t. They genuinely thought the Iraq war was a good thing.
I believed it at the time but now see that it was very unwise. It dealt with Sadam but caused a lot of far worst horrors to arise which were conveniently supressed underneath.
Nah. If Blair did not know it is because he did not ask the questions. And if he did not ask the questions it is because he did not want to know. It was part of his schtick to be convincing because he seemed so sincere, and it is a lot easier to be sincerely convinced if you only ever hear one side of the story. He wanted a convincing case to put to the nation, and made sure his minions gave him a convincing case. No one ever asked or cared if the case was true.
At the time I was attending a dinner party in Quislington, amongst the other guests was a recently retired very senior British diplomat. He was of the opinion that Blair appeared so convincing because he was privy to the fact that the Israeli’s were going to “Nuke Saddam off the Planet” unless a viable alternative could be put together. QED: Iraq War II.
It wasn’t until after the invasion of Iraq that we realized what a deceitful liar Blair was. We know full well that Johnson is a liar, we just don’t yet know all the lies he has told about Covid and Ukraine.
I think at this stage anyone who believes what Johnson and the BBC are saying about Ukraine are being very naive.
Hopefully one day soon we will have PM, a govt and a public broadcaster that we can trust. We can but dream.
What we need is a populace who don’t form instant opinions based upon corrupt and unprincipled headlines in the Sun, the Daily Mail and the Express.
Graham Campbell
1 year ago
Can a prime minister whom nobody trusts persuade the people of this country to make the sacrifices necessary to bring inflation under control? And what future does the UK have if inflation continues? An honest answer to these questions should lead us to one conclusion; the best that Boris can do for the country is to resign.
Not Jeremy (NHS disaster) Hunt. But the next few months will produce potential leaders and winnow away others. And hopefully a competent visionary of principle will emerge.
The problem seems to be that old one that the Conservative Party has no principles unless a strong leader lays them down. Hence the disasters of Cameron, May, and Johnson.
The problem is that Britain is unable to run its own affairs without isolating itself along the lines of North Korea.
You want Britain to run itself, rather than be run by globalists, Americans and Middle Eastern trillionaires, you need to think through the logical consequences of that.
Globalist policies beget globalist leaders.
And you won’t find many of them here…..the USA has closed markets at home and enforces ‘free markets’ abroad. That’s why they are the hegemonists…..
Davis, Duncan Smith or Redwood would all make solid caretaker/interim leaders, sitting in place for perhaps 12 months, while the party developed the viable successors.
Boris has upset enough of the core vote that his rule is untenable. But as yet, they don’t have another prospect “oven ready”. That is fine. Rather than shoving someone not ready into the role, pick a steady hand to act as interim leader while they sort the prospects, and more importantly their core governing philosophies. It’s been done before, and it’s probably the best route. At least it seems so to me.
The last thing we need is to be flung from the frying pan into the fire. Tory voters and ‘red wallers’ are mainly upset that he’s betraying his manifesto (of small ‘c’ conservatism). So the best route seems to me to be to get shot of Boris, who’s let everyone down (a lot) and replace with a leader who can hold the tiller and follow the manifesto, and then later be replaced by a leader also willing to do that (or we have an election, whichever comes first).
Starmer et al are equally responsible. The inflation comes entirely from the Lockdowns, which saw the whole employment market ripped up and disjointed.
All the supply chain issues are due to lockdowns and that’s where the inflation is coming from.
Oh, and from sanctioning Russia.
Tell me now that Starmer is a Putin apologist and I’ll collapse in mirth. The man is the first true Israeli puppet in UK politics. And god help us all if he ever becomes Prime Minister.
Starmer an Israeli apologist? How did you work that one out?
Gavin Thomas
1 year ago
Boris was elected on the promise of delivering Brexit, tighter immigration control, not raising taxes, extra funding for the NHS for more nurses and GP appointments, tough on crime and ‘net zero’ nonsense.
We are still bound by the Protocol and other EU rules; 1 million immigrants under his ‘watch’ – many illegal; most taxes have increased; the NHS extra funding has gone straight into the pockets of administrators and city crime (and homelessness) is at record levels…
…but he is delivering on his ‘net zero’ nonsense at huge cost to the economy (and the public) whilst lining the pockets of those promoting ‘green energy’ and with no hope of making any difference towards AGW whatsoever.
He was gifted an 80 seat majority – which he will certainly lose at the next election.
What an idiot?
Yes bankrupt the country on a contrived globalist theory about global warming whilst other countries like China and India carry on as normal. It’s one thing to be wrong about global warming but quite another to bankrupt your country for it.
Where does one start?… In the late 19th Century great men would leave the comfort of their servants and estates, and travel hours by coach and train, for no financial reward, to change Britain via The Lords of The Commons.. ” noblesse oblige”.. a sense of duty, magnanimity and service…. then, after the Profumo Affair, the Conservative’s nerved cracked… and it was over to the Pooteresque lower middle class Heaths, Maudlings and others… and this “Heome Ceounties peower base” has held sway ever since, now divided in two. There are the ‘ line manager’ element who have chips about toffs and privelige, and the ” We need the woke vote” who are craven to the racist, LGBT and global warming left zealots……
Yes, this is an often overlooked point. We hear much railing against the entire concept of hereditary privileges (such as a seat in the Lords), yet we retain the system, just with a more cretinous and partisan makeup.
The Lords is now the elevation of cronies to join the graveyard of failed political careers. Yes, the prior Lords were hereditary peers, and that seems unfair. But they at least had some obligation and weren’t in it for the money and prestige (they lacked neither).
The current peers are a collection of the callow, grasping fools, who represent no-one but themselves and their failed careers/attempts to buy in to the gentry.
What the upper chamber is today, I think should be abolished in favour of an elected upper House of 100 seats. Perhaps elected by PR, to balance the scales.
I said precisely the same thing a decade ago and the MSM prostitutes organised themselves to ensure that it never happened. Put forward something totally stupid instead, so that they could retain the ridiculous present.
Never under-estimate the difficulty of introducing common sense into London life.
Line managers have chips about anyone capable of strategic thinking, not just ‘toffs and privilege’. Line managers are in general unimaginative ‘completer finishers’, obsessive on detail and control-freak where possible.
It’s very hard to rise up as a strategic thinker without a privileged hinterland you know…..
It can be done if you start from the bottom at local level and have the ability and calling. Not many want to risk that.
Henry Haslam
1 year ago
This essay is a fair reflection of Johnson’s political opinions – or his lack of them – but it fails to mention the principal reason why he should go.
There is plenty to disagree about in his politics – or to agree with. High taxes, high government spending, the green agenda and levelling up can all be supported, in present circumstances, by some Conservatives, whereas others regard all such policies as profoundly unConservative. We cannot know whether another prime minister, over the last few years or over the next few years, would be following similar policies or different ones.
For many, however, policies are not the point. We have a prime minister whose casual regard for truth, trustworthiness and decent behaviour demean the office that he holds, bringing into disrepute his party and his country. It will be a long haul for the party to regain its reputation for integrity and trustworthiness, and the process cannot start until Johnson has gone.
Last edited 1 year ago by Henry Haslam
Adam McDermont
1 year ago
A good read. Perhaps the solution is more simpler than some might think. What if he just becomes a conservative? He needs to stop mass immigration, come out against woke and lower taxes.
Boris has such a unique charisma/talent that even now he could turn it around and stomp back to victory and fame, just by pivoting back to what he had promised (or rather Dom Cummings promised, and Boris evangelised).
But I think it’s not possible, because above all Boris is a creature of comfort. And comfort these days means pleasing Carrie and her friends, many of whom make up the London social set and mainstream media.
Richard Brady
1 year ago
Unfortunately Conservatism is a message that doesn’t inspire the young.
It values stability with economic realism and people generally do not do realism..
I’m not sure that’s accurate. Even despite being soaked in left wingery, there is a growing movement of kids leaning right, and asking questions.
Perhaps because in your youth you innately desire to challenge the orthodoxies. And now the orthodoxies and hegemonies are all left wing, which means the counter-culture is on the right.
Strange times, but the idea that all young people are lefties I think is certainly untrue.
If you were a hard-nosed realist aged 22, do you seriously think you would breed and take on a big mortgage??
Creating the next generation requires more c**k-eyed optimism than anything else in a culture which bans selling off your most saleable offspring to the highest bidder….
Lancastrian Oik
1 year ago
“Tax rates, wage bills, fuel costs and supermarket bills are not susceptible to his peculiar brand of verbose bullshit“. Fixed that for you.
Allison Barrows
1 year ago
Conservatism is in a parlous state because that is the condition of the entire world run by kakistocratic criminals. There are few if any noble competents with genuinely good ideas and intentions who would be allowed anywhere near the great piles of wealth and power controlled by malevolent Morlocks. Clinging to or blaming political parties may make some feel they still have even scant ability to “turn it all around”, but that’s a threadbare safety blanket that has finally disintegrated in the churn. What’s that we hear? Elections matter? No. No, they don’t. That’s been over for a long, long time.
More like marching with pitchforks on College Green….
Rachel Taylor
1 year ago
Being a Labour politician is a fairly understandable career choice. The pay is probably as good as they would earn elsewhere, or better. But being a Conservative politician is an odd choice. It seems to be one made through a peculiar mix of ego and connections. People like Rudd, Grieve, Hancock, Hunt, Stewart, Mitchell, Wragg: it’s very difficult to see what core conservative beliefs they hold. If anything, Johnson’s cabinet seems to consist more of outsiders, and conservatives: Patel, Zahawi, Javid, Dorries. And the established types don’t like it one little bit.
“every choice Johnson makes on tax rates, energy bills or public spending infuriates some wing of his party, eager for higher spending, lower taxes, more intervention or more deregulation.”
And that is true, Brexit or no. The two are unrelated.
My gripe with Johnson is simple. I see through the distraction and rhetorical fluff. I want to hear his analysis of our current situation and what he proposes to do, given our national priorities and constraints. And I expect detail from our allegedly world class civil service.
Don’t put much hope in the Civil Service. They are a law unto themselves and have ceased to be servants of the government. It doesn’t behove a servant to be too opinionated.
Ludwig van Earwig
1 year ago
“He is a symptom of the party’s loss of direction”
No, he isn’t. Boris is a symbol of The Great Realignment.
I see there are a few comments from those who pine after Maggie. Which of her lovely policies do you Thatcherites miss most – the Poll Tax?
Last edited 1 year ago by Ludwig van Earwig
Peter Mott
1 year ago
In the 1970s people used to say the Britain was ungovernable. The same sort of discourse is returning now.
Melissa Martin
1 year ago
The Sex Recognition Act of 2025 would be my advice.
Maybe it’s recognising those who think they are the opposite sex?
Adrian Doble
1 year ago
Spoken like a true Remoaner. Thatcher gave people the right to own property and choices untold compared to the decade before. Johnson’s model is a hybrid copy of Thatcher, Blair and Churchill and if you cannot see where that fits in you shouldn’t be writing these narratives.
Last edited 1 year ago by Adrian Doble
Toth Andras
1 year ago
Britain needs a Thatcher-like pro-market economic policy. But the condition of success is restore peace as fast as possible in Europe and restore free trade. Otherwise supply chain disruptions would doom the economy,
Rhys Jaggar
1 year ago
I’m afraid that Conservatism has always been a church sufficiently broad to embrace the dodgy ‘speculators’ of the City, the philandering cads of the Upper Classes, the dodgy imperialists of the warmongering class and the ‘education equals rote learning’ nincompoops who just want the masses to do what they are told.
The whole point of the word ‘conservatism’ is that it implies that you wish to conserve something. What, exactly, you wish to conserve is never enunciated with clarity. It would be too hard to secure an electoral mandate if you did.
You want to conserve marriage or sexual freedoms?
You want to conserve women’s rights or the rights of the unborn child?
You want to conserve western imperialism or the ancient cultures of Africa, the Americas and Asia?
You want to conserve homophobic, Russophobic Zionism or local democracy on a global scale?
You want to conserve the squirearchy of the Church or the radicalism of Jesus Christ?
You want to conserve the ecology of the soil or the profits of global GM monopolists?
You want to conserve the rainforests or the beef industry?
Sooner or later, those choices have to be enunciated, because even the Labour Party wants to conserve quite a lot, you know….
At last, a fair and rational assessment of BJ from the DT. I think we can drop our old conceptions of Labour and Conservative. More like big state, little state. I think BJ is influenced by the Great Reset and WEF, but he also needs to keep his voters on board. I think this is what causes his uturns and seeming lack of direction. Tax rises and inflation – I don’t think we can lay at his door – most countries are having to pay for covid and global energy price hikes. We could perhaps do with a cleverer Chancellor of the Exchequer.
“His political compass points only at himself.” Well so what? Is that unusual in a politician, the great WSC was devoted to such a principle, as are the 148 Tory ‘moaners’ or so it appears.
Nor is it fair to ask “did Boris kill Conservatism”, in that it had already ‘killed’ itself when it jettisoned Margaret Thatcher. Have we already forgotten those charlatans, Heseltine, Howe, Major & Co? Then to be followed by Cameron and the truly appalling Mrs May?
Boris has in fact shackled himself to a corpse, as last night proved, however he still has plenty of time to complete the resurrection of Conservatism.
His classical education should remind him that the Roman Republic was almost destroyed by three major military defeats inflicted by that genius Hannibal, yet fought on to ultimate victory, despite at one stage having a general whose tactics were “ run away”!
In short Boris needs to discipline his wife, get Cummings back on board, ‘slash & burn’ the Civil Service, and start acting like a Proconsul, and not a well meaning Liberal. “Iacta alea est”.
‘Thou blasphemest’! The ‘great WSC’ certainly believed in his own, unique, destiny. He also believed in other things, like the British Empire, or in defeating Hitler, to the point where he put himself on the back benches as a squawking has-been to stay consistent to those beliefs. Then of course he was incredibly talented (not just at rhetoric), self-disciplined, had a huge capacity for work, provided brilliant leadership in a terrible time, and had or championed many good ideas in the teeth of the establishment (reorganising the Navy, convoying, the tank, …).
Boris Johnson is no more like WSC than a kitten is like a lion. As for ‘disciplining his wife’, how could he do that when he has failed miserably so far and is not able even to discipline himself?
Yes, in view of the fact that WSC has undergone the process of apotheosis, ‘guilty as charged’!
However I did not wish to imply any criticism in self-belief/selfishness, as that is natural order of things. Nor did I wish suggest any equivalence between WSC and Boris, in fact they might be described as polar opposites in many respects. As to his wife the alternatives are either the ‘ Humphrey Bogart treatment’ or compromise.
Sadly we have to accept that, with the notable exception of WSC, we haven’t had a proper Conservative PM since Baldwin and Chamberlain, and currently there is no viable candidate to Boris in sight and thus we must give him our support. “The triumph of hope over expectation” you may say, but what alternative is there?
Incidentally what happened to ‘Sam Sky’?
Point taken, on the apotheosis.
But why support the Boris when he is not conservative, is unable to lead or govern, and has no principles, ideas, or policies? His main talent seems to be ‘being all things to all men’, rather like a less serious version of Tony Blair. What is there to hope for? Any honest person would be a big improvement over the Boris, even if the replacement was no more energetic, effective or full of ideas than he is. If you can think of no alternative among the current front runners, how about taking back Theresa May? At least her approach to difficult problems is to look them in the face and try to solve them, not to promise the moon, make a joke, and then break her word.
But she did break her word, repeatedly. Her handling of Brexit was a procession of commitments, followed by doing the opposite, often slyly without explanation. Ask any of her procession of ‘Ministers for Brexit’.
And much more. Particular her backing of the woke culture in the schools and LGBT stuff which she pushed very strongly.
I’m not a great admirer of Theresa May, but you’d have to be much more specific than that if you want to attack here in the way you do. I expect you mean, tried to get through a ‘softer’ version of Brexit than you personally wanted! Given the current mess and complete failure to control immigration, (increased since Brexit!) we might just as well have done so!
Notoriously, the 2016 referendum was a vote against something, not a positive vote for a particular settlement. hence the ensuing constitutional chaos. Talking about ‘breaking your word’ and ‘lying’ and the like is practically always used transnationally of politicians who are disapproved of, while the ones supported are let off the hook and called tactical geniuses or something! It is politics, a messy and often murky business.
Also, success in politics is a great deal about about controlling the narrative. At one point Nigel Farage was extolling the ‘Norway option’, then later that sort of talk became akin to treason, largely because of the actions of the Conservative Research Group and others. Good on them, they were politically successful, but simply defining Brexit as breaking all formal ties with the EU is not accurate. Norway is not a member of the European Union as a matter of fact, not opinion.
“0 tempts O mores”, but I still hope that an Etonian KS and Balliol man might pull through, after all he managed to get this far up the proverbial ‘greasy poll’.
As a possible alternative what about Lord Frost?. Surely he could bin the HoL and return to the Commons rather like the late Tony Benn?
You have to be kidding or just blind. Personally I think David Davies was the best leader we never had.
You have got to be kidding. Theresa May? Boris is a thousand times better than her with all his faults.
We have had Thatcher who stands out by miles. True this was followed by bed hopping Major and gay marriage Cameron followed by dithering May but Thatcher was a big difference axed by power crazy Heseltine.
Thatcher was pretty power-crazy too. She trashed the careers of all the ‘wets’ who were not clones of herself.
Her foisting of the poll tax on Scotland, who never voted for her, was the most unprincipled act of a UK PM since World War II. She didn’t have to do it, she knew full well that foisting it on Essex, Kent, Sussex, Surry and Hampshire was a vote loser but she did it anyway.
It proved her indubitable political pettiness and spite and it hoist her ultimately on her own petard…..
How could you forget Maggie?
Depends on you point of view.
Some historians say that WSC bears a large part of the responsibility for causing this country to enter both the First and Second World Wars when it could have been avoided, possibly driven by his sense of himself as a man of destiny
Had we not joined either of those wars we would have abandoned large parts of Europe, if not all of it, to the most terrible tyranny. The Kaiser was, in his own way, as bad and mad as the Fuhrer.
Two Germans who tried to dominate Europe. Another german Klaus Schwab is attempting the Fourth Reich with his gang but over the whole world. We need more than us to stop that.
Cecil Rhodes, of course, was just a visionary?
Or Stalin
And it does not last forever
Maybe – but that is a different discussion. Whether you think WSC was a hero, a misdirected bungler, or an racist colonialist killer, it is still the case that he was multitalented, self-disciplined, hardworking, an inspiring leader, and a promoter of original ideas (some better than others). All things that the Boris notoriously lacks.
You could do worse for Churchill’s epitaph than the words of George Orwell (an avowed political enemy) written while the war was still going on:
[…]
But you don’t hoot at Stalin — that’s “not done” —
Only at Churchill; I’ve no wish to praise him,
I’d gladly shoot him when the war is won,
Or now, if there was someone to replace him.
But unlike some, I’ll pay him what I owe him;
There was a time when empires crashed like houses,
And many a pink who’d titter at your poem
Was glad enough to cling to Churchill’s trousers.
So Orwell wasn’t perfect either.
Asquith bears the primary responsibility for us entering the Great War, and Churchill for WWII.
WSC wasn’t in government during the 1930s and didn’t enter it until 1939 as First Lord of the Admiralty after war had been declared. He didn’t become PM until May 1940.
So that settles it. Well done.
Some historians say doesn’t prove anything.
Disciplining which wife? ABJ has so many.
The third one? Or is it the fourth?
Boris does shine considerably on different occasions. I am always proud of him at the times he went to the states representing Britain. He also shined as London Mayor overcoming unseeming odds. A good leader usually has a sense of destiny. Jesus more than anyone. Nothing wrong in that. Oratory is not a fault and is much needed in tense times. Look at Boris and Ukraine. Maybe he is not a chancellor and whatnot but he doesn’t need to be The right delegations should sort other things out. Okay he has had immoral faults in the past which I do not commend, but whoever we get they will not be perfect. At least in Boris what you see is what you get rather than those posturing concern who secretly don’t give a damn. He has chosen some good ministers but the enemy I feel is some in his own party chosen by the local tory party to use a safe seat, but who are not worth their salt. I have had a woke tory MP for about thirteen years now with no way of getting rid of her. Perhaps this is the real problem in the end. Too much emphasis on winning with no care as to who they are putting forward. A case in question is the paedophile they put in in Wakefield. The problem is also at grass roots level.
For a landslide, all the Conservatives need is ANY leader who has the courage to stand up to, and argue with and against the media, in favour of a radical reversal of policy attitude to racism global warming and LBGT obsession, freedom of speech and expression….
Precisely, thus Boris had better start ‘drinking from a different well’ before it is too late.
Agree. Boris’s obsession with net zero lies at the root of many of his problems and they are all self-inflicted mantra which true conservatives will have no connexion with. If only Lady T could come back.
His obsession with net zero is frightening but there are signs he is compromising a little.
You are absolutely correct. Said in one sentence.
AND a population that won’t ditch such a person at the first organised smear campaign that the MSM will undoubtedly organise as a result?
You’d be amazed at the self-righteous, puritanical fulminations of Little England and how those fulminations are more important than recalibrating the balance of power away from cokehead prostitutes in the MSM…..
Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know but one wouldn’t really equate Boris with a devil.
Small problem he is not a Conservative – he is a slippery chameleon, and none of the above will ever happen. It will be loads of BS and not a thing more. You know that.
Even St Paul changed course as I recall. If he is as venal as you say it shouldn’t take much to head off in a new direction.:
Scrap carbon neutral and all associated green tosh, bin the Northern Ireland protocol,
prohibit most immigration and start a fast track process of deportation, ‘slash & burn’ the predominantly parasitical Civil Service, reduce subsidies to NI, Scotland and Wales to the same level as England, and funnel the surplus to the ‘Red Wall, and start ‘ fracking’ with immediate effect.
That’s not much to ask and the more serious stuff can come later.
It will never happen – and net zero is his bird’s pride and joy, Johnson does not even understand the topic, judging on the infantile c rap he has said in speeches.
Correct but wishful thinking with the 1diot in No 10
He wasn’t always like that. Something changed him. Not the type of person to say “This man is not for changing”. I think it is all a false narrative. I cannot believe that people swallow it but they do.
His insatiable lust for vaginas new led him into the arms of a Green Nutter…..
interesting word/ way to describe Raab , Shapps, and all the other poly draylon clad intra M25 petit bourgeois jumped up clerk gaulieters that Boris surrounds himself with
Most of that has been a hope for a long time now but the will is not there it appears.
Has the time come to sort the predominantly parasitical Civil Service?
to remove the scales from the eyes of Boris would take a team of salvage men, cables, other equipment and blow torches from at least one Smit Tak salvage tug
Keep an open mind it’s not over until it’s over.
Boris is a less able, a less commercial version of the legend Horatio Bottomley MP x 3, whom in hindsight was way ahead of his time? He was almost a pre- hedge fundite?!
Did WSC have a clever and supportive wife who stayed out of politics or did he ask her advice on ‘stuff’? I don’t think he would have been interested in the wallpaper selection.
You always seem prone to extreme statements. I have many differences with their politics, but why are ‘Heseltine’ and others ‘charlatans’ simply because you appear to define Conservatism solely as small state, free market liberalism? For most of history those ideas were more associated with the Liberal Party – and divides over which (the Corn Laws, Imperial preference, the Gold Standard etc etc) led to major splits within the Tories.
The history of the Conservative Party, not to mention ‘conservatism’ is far broader, rich and complex than you seem to think, and I don’t see why one rather noisy side gets to define it, even if I tend to agree with that side! Boris was right to eject people who were actively trying to block his Brexit policy, but Whatever, anathematising a whole lot of Conservatives as something akin to traitors is likely to mean the party losing power for a long time and perhaps our being government by a Labour-SNP coalition or something.
Regarding Fabius Maximums Cunctator (I think you are referring to), his approach to defeating Hannibal was strategic and not tactical, and meant a lot different from “running away”!
The comparison between Churchill and Johnson is ridiculous on any level, and there is no chance that Boris will take any of the measures you suggest, as I think we both realise! For one, he is not, unlike Churchill, really a serious character.
Its the authoritarianism of Johnson’s opponents within and outside the Conservative party which frightens. Any Brexiteer Prime Minister would have faced some sort of Sue Grey, and a succession of contrived scandals, blown up out of all proportion by a Progressive Establishment determined to take back control. In each alternative universe, the cast of characters, and their own particular flaws, would be different. But the fundamental driver of a Progressive Establishment horrified by the challenge from vulgarians to their Public Sector / Multinational Corporation stitch up would be the same.
Applying the rules and demanding accountability isn’t ‘authoriarianism’.It’s how you stop authoritarianism
Arbitrary, retrospective, and politically motivated policing of rules for rules sake, regardless of whether there is any ongoing rationale for those rules, is a hallmark of authoritarianism. And there were many other examples of authoritarian tendencies during Lockdown, not least the constant Opposition clamour for more, and harsher, restrictions.
The Johnson government made the rules and insisted they were harshly enforced. You can’t really then accuse the agencies that enforced them of authoritarianism. The only arbitrariness and politicisation shown by the Met was in their failure to enforce the rules when they were repeatedly being broken right under their noses. The rule of law – the principle that no one, not even the PM, is above the law, is what stands between us and authoritarianism
Yeah Labour were guilty of pushing the lockdowns but Boris needn’t have obeyed it. He started out by talking about herd immunity then dumped it for some reason?
Quite so. Johnson is good visually and eloquently but in the long run we need truth, not a performance. I concede that he is churchillian on Ukraine and that wasn’t an act. There is obviously a mixture and it would be dangerous to form an opinion until we really knew. One of the dangers to our country is the remainers in the concervative party.
Regrettably I disagree with you on his Ukraine policy. I agree it is a good policy, but for him it is an act. It is not done from either conviction or calculation but because it allows him to cosplay Churchill and feel good – and diverts attention from Partygate.
Seems pretty consistent to me. He even speaks Ukrainian. Some act.
Though I agree with you, I find it incomprehensible that a Number 10 reeling from the Barnard Castle saga should, AT THE SAME TIME, have created such an egregious hostage to fortune as the Partygate parties.
The progenitor of most of the Partygate stuff was that immature airhead, otherwise known as Princess Nut Nut.
I agree entirely. It was Petronella Wyatt his ex at University that has stated Boris hated parties and would always turn up late and then excuse himself as he had another appointment to attend to. Boris’ problems started when he got entangled with an ambitious young woman who believed she could do anything and after she sacked the Brexit team went about bringing in her own Woke team which brought about the chaos that followed. Johnson frightened to death of upsetting his dearly beloved allowed it to carry on. He was finally brought to his senses by Lord Frost who quickly dispatched the Woke mob sending the children on their way.
He will have to follow the example of Henry VIII or all is lost.
Ha Ha!
They did it because they don’t care. They don’t give a stuff about us, only about their position and power. And that comes directly from him. Alexander Boris De Pfeffel Johnson has never truly cared about anyone except himself and his position – which is why he has run through a string of women – his relationships aren’t about others, neither are his politics – they’re solely about what makes him feel good.
How depressingly unreal.
You seem to have forgotten Johnson’s lock down, and the fact that all the scandals are due to his appalling behaviour and nothing more. Add in economic incompetence, and the fact he is devoid of policy, you have exactly what you see.
Shame he did not up the ante and try a lot harder, the bs does not work anymore, and with Johnson there is nothing left after that
He has to put up with a lot of flack without responding, especially from Starmer. Surely that takes character. In a democracy you have to adjust to different factions in your party as has been pointed out. I think he has churchillian greatness underneath if it was needed. He just needs to delegate well and put in a good team which I think he is doing.
Just? Some mean trick? That simple? Wow!
The Conservative Party and its forerunners has survived by executing an extreme policy turn onto a new path several times. The Brexit Turn was possibly one of the most extreme turns – and it isn’t over yet. There are plenty of people who are fighting to reverse the outcome of the Referendum. David Cameron gave up immediately. Theresa May started well but was being drawn into Brexit In Name Only. Only Boris managed to build an actual Brexit out of the building site he inherited. He is hated by many because he ‘failed’ to lose Brexit down the back of the sofa.
Those that hate him, including many in his own party, are prepared to use any means necessary to bring him down and put someone more pro-EU in his place.
Undoing Brexit is a blind.
Given that Johnson is leading us deep into one world government, which is far worse than membership of the EU, the Brexit thing is now merely a deliberate distraction thrown up to put people off the truth.
I know he quotes “Build back better” from Davros. If his one world government leanings could be proved that would be it for him I would think.
Once you start to suspect there are puppet masters pulling Johnsons strings a lot of things start to make sense.
The big giveaway is this whole green agenda.
Most people agree that doing what we can to be environmentally friendly is a good thing, but the rhetoric coming out of Downing Street is more reminiscent of some naive six formers than a grownup adult. What we need are well thought out and clever long term strategies, not hot air and platitudes that make zero sense to anyone who is familiar with energy economics and is capable of using a calculator. It just doesn’t add up.
Who is pulling Johnson’s strings isn’t totally clear at the moment, but his actions are not so much those of a leader but more like someone acting the part of a leader. Not dissimilar to the USA.
It’s Gates and Soros who are pulling his strings. Nothing unclear about any of it….
If that was true it would be the end of him but where is the proof? I would add Klaus Schwab to it. The leader of WEF or Davos.
I have come to the conclusion that we can only fight this by not voting for these remainers. Yes that may not win an election but it will send a message to the local parties to not keep putting these people up as the only option to vote for. Our MP is actually woke but they put her up every time as it is supposed to be a safe conservative seat.
You are correct of course, Labour (and their propaganda dept in the BBC) always play the man, not the ball. Repeat the lie often enough and it becomes the truth.
My disappointment stems from Boris diverging from his supposed libertarian views early in the pandemic.
Nobody will ever convince me that any Government has the right to confine the population to their homes (house arrest by any other name). Strong advice yes, an offer of furlough perhaps for hospitality businesses. This would have shown leadership.
People will generally use their common sense. For example, if you have been working in a room with someone all day, staying with the same people for a glass of wine (or beer Sir Keir) after hours increases the risk to nobody so is fine. Having petty rules which attempt to cover every aspect of life can only be authoritarian which is why Labour constantly demanded more clarity (i.e. more rules)
Accepting that the Government can remove our right to leave the house means that people are accepting that when they meet friends or go to a shop or hug family, they are ONLY doing so because the Government has allowed it.
And yes, I do believe that it would be better to be wiped out than to accept that we can only do basic human things if we are given permission. It was not, 2 years ago, and never will be any business of the Government whether I visit friends and family.
We need another Thatcher. No more weak second-rate losers.
Preferably not the one portrayed by the wildly (deliberately?) miscast Gillian Anderson in “The Crown”. I remember and greatly admired the real deal, but if her own countrymen portrayed her like a frail old lady with daddy issues, God only knows what they’d do to a Thatcher 2.0.
Yeah the media have a great capacity to lie these days and even change history.
They actually have a compulsive NEED to lie these days. They’ve already told so many lies that to start telling the truth now would incriminate them from their own mouths!
Boris Johnson will go down in history as one of the most deceitful, duplicitous and incompetent prime minister’s in history. People are starting to see through the charade.
But do we have a leader in waiting?
Alas we have a political pool of low-grade, unprincipled career politicians to choose from. The only glimmers of hope are hidden away from public view on the back benches.
Maybe we need a whole new paradigm. Quite what I don’t know, but the reality is that we have covered up the cracks for far too long. We desperately require a strong leader with a capable team around him/her to help us navigate the truly treacherous times ahead.
Cometh the hour cometh the man (or woman).
But do they have to leave it to the last minute?
Boris may be deeply flawed but was he more duplicitous than false dossier Blair? I think that Boris’ competencies as regards the Covid response and the Ukraine war are average to good rather than dire.
Blair had his weaknesses, mostly a tendency to introduce major reforms that had not been thought through. But there is no evidence that he had any inkling that the dossier put in front of him by those who ought to and were assumed to know was so inaccurate
Everyone knew the Iraq War was one big US/Israeli lie from the very beginning when the Bush creature uttered the immortal words “ Saddam did 9/11.”
So why not you and Blair?
I think you mean ‘I and everyone I knew’. I knew that, but I was always aware of plenty of PhD scientists who didn’t. They genuinely thought the Iraq war was a good thing.
I believed it at the time but now see that it was very unwise. It dealt with Sadam but caused a lot of far worst horrors to arise which were conveniently supressed underneath.
Nah. If Blair did not know it is because he did not ask the questions. And if he did not ask the questions it is because he did not want to know. It was part of his schtick to be convincing because he seemed so sincere, and it is a lot easier to be sincerely convinced if you only ever hear one side of the story. He wanted a convincing case to put to the nation, and made sure his minions gave him a convincing case. No one ever asked or cared if the case was true.
At the time I was attending a dinner party in Quislington, amongst the other guests was a recently retired very senior British diplomat. He was of the opinion that Blair appeared so convincing because he was privy to the fact that the Israeli’s were going to “Nuke Saddam off the Planet” unless a viable alternative could be put together. QED: Iraq War II.
The Israelis were more likely to nuke Iran off the planet.
The Israelies only defend themselves. Any attack is for defence and always has been.
Which includes a ‘ pre-emptive strike” does it not?
Yes. You are right and that may well happen the way it is going.
That’s the typical Zionist hysterics, isn’t it? Violet Elizabeth Botts incarnated into a religious state.
David Kelly might have asked inconvenient questions and tipped off the press. How quickly we forget.
But surely he was paid to know. Not any better than Boris listening and acting on the health officials advice who got it wildly wrong.
It wasn’t until after the invasion of Iraq that we realized what a deceitful liar Blair was. We know full well that Johnson is a liar, we just don’t yet know all the lies he has told about Covid and Ukraine.
I think at this stage anyone who believes what Johnson and the BBC are saying about Ukraine are being very naive.
Hopefully one day soon we will have PM, a govt and a public broadcaster that we can trust. We can but dream.
On those two subjects. Yes.
Hear hear!
David Davies? The best leader who never was. We got Cameron instead.
What we need is a populace who don’t form instant opinions based upon corrupt and unprincipled headlines in the Sun, the Daily Mail and the Express.
Can a prime minister whom nobody trusts persuade the people of this country to make the sacrifices necessary to bring inflation under control? And what future does the UK have if inflation continues? An honest answer to these questions should lead us to one conclusion; the best that Boris can do for the country is to resign.
In favour of … who?
The left’s penitent knee-takers and moralistic doomsdayers? Sir Beer Korma?
Nah. He doesn’t know what a woman is and had to apologise to his party for visiting a church.
Not Jeremy (NHS disaster) Hunt. But the next few months will produce potential leaders and winnow away others. And hopefully a competent visionary of principle will emerge.
The problem seems to be that old one that the Conservative Party has no principles unless a strong leader lays them down. Hence the disasters of Cameron, May, and Johnson.
I agree about May and Cameron but I don’t think Boris has had a proper chance yet with Covid happening so early in his tenure.
He had a unique chance, he just showed the world that he grovelled to Bill Gates et al instead of doing his job as Prime Minister.
You may be right but it remains to be proved before we judge.
The problem is that Britain is unable to run its own affairs without isolating itself along the lines of North Korea.
You want Britain to run itself, rather than be run by globalists, Americans and Middle Eastern trillionaires, you need to think through the logical consequences of that.
Globalist policies beget globalist leaders.
And you won’t find many of them here…..the USA has closed markets at home and enforces ‘free markets’ abroad. That’s why they are the hegemonists…..
David Davies.
Not the (failed) ‘ Brexit Bulldog’ surely?
Davis, Duncan Smith or Redwood would all make solid caretaker/interim leaders, sitting in place for perhaps 12 months, while the party developed the viable successors.
Boris has upset enough of the core vote that his rule is untenable. But as yet, they don’t have another prospect “oven ready”. That is fine. Rather than shoving someone not ready into the role, pick a steady hand to act as interim leader while they sort the prospects, and more importantly their core governing philosophies. It’s been done before, and it’s probably the best route. At least it seems so to me.
The last thing we need is to be flung from the frying pan into the fire. Tory voters and ‘red wallers’ are mainly upset that he’s betraying his manifesto (of small ‘c’ conservatism). So the best route seems to me to be to get shot of Boris, who’s let everyone down (a lot) and replace with a leader who can hold the tiller and follow the manifesto, and then later be replaced by a leader also willing to do that (or we have an election, whichever comes first).
Inflation that he and his cronies, who have all enriched themselves in bringing it about, are directly responsible for.
Starmer et al are equally responsible. The inflation comes entirely from the Lockdowns, which saw the whole employment market ripped up and disjointed.
All the supply chain issues are due to lockdowns and that’s where the inflation is coming from.
Oh, and from sanctioning Russia.
Tell me now that Starmer is a Putin apologist and I’ll collapse in mirth. The man is the first true Israeli puppet in UK politics. And god help us all if he ever becomes Prime Minister.
Starmer an Israeli apologist? How did you work that one out?
Boris was elected on the promise of delivering Brexit, tighter immigration control, not raising taxes, extra funding for the NHS for more nurses and GP appointments, tough on crime and ‘net zero’ nonsense.
We are still bound by the Protocol and other EU rules; 1 million immigrants under his ‘watch’ – many illegal; most taxes have increased; the NHS extra funding has gone straight into the pockets of administrators and city crime (and homelessness) is at record levels…
…but he is delivering on his ‘net zero’ nonsense at huge cost to the economy (and the public) whilst lining the pockets of those promoting ‘green energy’ and with no hope of making any difference towards AGW whatsoever.
He was gifted an 80 seat majority – which he will certainly lose at the next election.
What an idiot?
Yes bankrupt the country on a contrived globalist theory about global warming whilst other countries like China and India carry on as normal. It’s one thing to be wrong about global warming but quite another to bankrupt your country for it.
He’s not an idiot, he’s just a totally corrupt creature of the Global Lobbyists.
A conspiracy theory until it’s proven.
Where does one start?… In the late 19th Century great men would leave the comfort of their servants and estates, and travel hours by coach and train, for no financial reward, to change Britain via The Lords of The Commons.. ” noblesse oblige”.. a sense of duty, magnanimity and service…. then, after the Profumo Affair, the Conservative’s nerved cracked… and it was over to the Pooteresque lower middle class Heaths, Maudlings and others… and this “Heome Ceounties peower base” has held sway ever since, now divided in two. There are the ‘ line manager’ element who have chips about toffs and privelige, and the ” We need the woke vote” who are craven to the racist, LGBT and global warming left zealots……
Yes, this is an often overlooked point. We hear much railing against the entire concept of hereditary privileges (such as a seat in the Lords), yet we retain the system, just with a more cretinous and partisan makeup.
The Lords is now the elevation of cronies to join the graveyard of failed political careers. Yes, the prior Lords were hereditary peers, and that seems unfair. But they at least had some obligation and weren’t in it for the money and prestige (they lacked neither).
The current peers are a collection of the callow, grasping fools, who represent no-one but themselves and their failed careers/attempts to buy in to the gentry.
What the upper chamber is today, I think should be abolished in favour of an elected upper House of 100 seats. Perhaps elected by PR, to balance the scales.
I said precisely the same thing a decade ago and the MSM prostitutes organised themselves to ensure that it never happened. Put forward something totally stupid instead, so that they could retain the ridiculous present.
Never under-estimate the difficulty of introducing common sense into London life.
They have a few gooduns who slipped in but the majority would fit your description.
Line managers have chips about anyone capable of strategic thinking, not just ‘toffs and privilege’. Line managers are in general unimaginative ‘completer finishers’, obsessive on detail and control-freak where possible.
It’s very hard to rise up as a strategic thinker without a privileged hinterland you know…..
It can be done if you start from the bottom at local level and have the ability and calling. Not many want to risk that.
This essay is a fair reflection of Johnson’s political opinions – or his lack of them – but it fails to mention the principal reason why he should go.
There is plenty to disagree about in his politics – or to agree with. High taxes, high government spending, the green agenda and levelling up can all be supported, in present circumstances, by some Conservatives, whereas others regard all such policies as profoundly unConservative. We cannot know whether another prime minister, over the last few years or over the next few years, would be following similar policies or different ones.
For many, however, policies are not the point. We have a prime minister whose casual regard for truth, trustworthiness and decent behaviour demean the office that he holds, bringing into disrepute his party and his country. It will be a long haul for the party to regain its reputation for integrity and trustworthiness, and the process cannot start until Johnson has gone.
A good read. Perhaps the solution is more simpler than some might think. What if he just becomes a conservative? He needs to stop mass immigration, come out against woke and lower taxes.
Yeah, fair point.
Boris has such a unique charisma/talent that even now he could turn it around and stomp back to victory and fame, just by pivoting back to what he had promised (or rather Dom Cummings promised, and Boris evangelised).
But I think it’s not possible, because above all Boris is a creature of comfort. And comfort these days means pleasing Carrie and her friends, many of whom make up the London social set and mainstream media.
Unfortunately Conservatism is a message that doesn’t inspire the young.
It values stability with economic realism and people generally do not do realism..
Not these days unfortunately but they will grow up as people do.
I’m not sure that’s accurate. Even despite being soaked in left wingery, there is a growing movement of kids leaning right, and asking questions.
Perhaps because in your youth you innately desire to challenge the orthodoxies. And now the orthodoxies and hegemonies are all left wing, which means the counter-culture is on the right.
Strange times, but the idea that all young people are lefties I think is certainly untrue.
If you were a hard-nosed realist aged 22, do you seriously think you would breed and take on a big mortgage??
Creating the next generation requires more c**k-eyed optimism than anything else in a culture which bans selling off your most saleable offspring to the highest bidder….
“Tax rates, wage bills, fuel costs and supermarket bills are not susceptible to his peculiar brand of verbose bullshit“.
Fixed that for you.
Conservatism is in a parlous state because that is the condition of the entire world run by kakistocratic criminals. There are few if any noble competents with genuinely good ideas and intentions who would be allowed anywhere near the great piles of wealth and power controlled by malevolent Morlocks. Clinging to or blaming political parties may make some feel they still have even scant ability to “turn it all around”, but that’s a threadbare safety blanket that has finally disintegrated in the churn. What’s that we hear? Elections matter? No. No, they don’t. That’s been over for a long, long time.
It’s down on our knees then.
More like marching with pitchforks on College Green….
Being a Labour politician is a fairly understandable career choice. The pay is probably as good as they would earn elsewhere, or better. But being a Conservative politician is an odd choice. It seems to be one made through a peculiar mix of ego and connections. People like Rudd, Grieve, Hancock, Hunt, Stewart, Mitchell, Wragg: it’s very difficult to see what core conservative beliefs they hold. If anything, Johnson’s cabinet seems to consist more of outsiders, and conservatives: Patel, Zahawi, Javid, Dorries. And the established types don’t like it one little bit.
I think that shows Boris has some things right.
“every choice Johnson makes on tax rates, energy bills or public spending infuriates some wing of his party, eager for higher spending, lower taxes, more intervention or more deregulation.”
And that is true, Brexit or no. The two are unrelated.
My gripe with Johnson is simple. I see through the distraction and rhetorical fluff. I want to hear his analysis of our current situation and what he proposes to do, given our national priorities and constraints. And I expect detail from our allegedly world class civil service.
Don’t put much hope in the Civil Service. They are a law unto themselves and have ceased to be servants of the government. It doesn’t behove a servant to be too opinionated.
“He is a symptom of the party’s loss of direction”
No, he isn’t. Boris is a symbol of The Great Realignment.
I see there are a few comments from those who pine after Maggie. Which of her lovely policies do you Thatcherites miss most – the Poll Tax?
In the 1970s people used to say the Britain was ungovernable. The same sort of discourse is returning now.
The Sex Recognition Act of 2025 would be my advice.
What’s that?
Are you saying that to graduate from university from 2025, you are required to identify on video what heterosexual sex looks like?
Maybe it’s recognising those who think they are the opposite sex?
Spoken like a true Remoaner. Thatcher gave people the right to own property and choices untold compared to the decade before. Johnson’s model is a hybrid copy of Thatcher, Blair and Churchill and if you cannot see where that fits in you shouldn’t be writing these narratives.
Britain needs a Thatcher-like pro-market economic policy. But the condition of success is restore peace as fast as possible in Europe and restore free trade. Otherwise supply chain disruptions would doom the economy,
I’m afraid that Conservatism has always been a church sufficiently broad to embrace the dodgy ‘speculators’ of the City, the philandering cads of the Upper Classes, the dodgy imperialists of the warmongering class and the ‘education equals rote learning’ nincompoops who just want the masses to do what they are told.
The whole point of the word ‘conservatism’ is that it implies that you wish to conserve something. What, exactly, you wish to conserve is never enunciated with clarity. It would be too hard to secure an electoral mandate if you did.
You want to conserve marriage or sexual freedoms?
You want to conserve women’s rights or the rights of the unborn child?
You want to conserve western imperialism or the ancient cultures of Africa, the Americas and Asia?
You want to conserve homophobic, Russophobic Zionism or local democracy on a global scale?
You want to conserve the squirearchy of the Church or the radicalism of Jesus Christ?
You want to conserve the ecology of the soil or the profits of global GM monopolists?
You want to conserve the rainforests or the beef industry?
Sooner or later, those choices have to be enunciated, because even the Labour Party wants to conserve quite a lot, you know….
To choose or not to choose. That is the question.
At last, a fair and rational assessment of BJ from the DT. I think we can drop our old conceptions of Labour and Conservative. More like big state, little state. I think BJ is influenced by the Great Reset and WEF, but he also needs to keep his voters on board. I think this is what causes his uturns and seeming lack of direction. Tax rises and inflation – I don’t think we can lay at his door – most countries are having to pay for covid and global energy price hikes. We could perhaps do with a cleverer Chancellor of the Exchequer.