I just posted this thread on Twitter:
If there is one thing Boris Johnson is good at it is getting what he wants, without concern for the consequence. He made clear yesterday that he wants to remain as prime minister. Is he plotting to do so? A thread….
That Johnson is contemptuous of those who have forced him to resign as Tory leader (but not prime minister) was apparent yesterday in his resignation speech and in his appointment of a new cabinet. The speech was all about a manifesto. So what is he doing?
I think Johnson has a plan. It is based on his own belief, backed up by some around him and the Mail, Telegraph and Express, that he is the only possible prime minister for this country. In his thinking some of unsound mine have simply suffered a slight blip of doubt about this.
His belief is backed up by the idea that every Tory leadership challenger is as talentless as him, and at least as lacking in any relationship with reality as him. Look at them, and for once it is apparent that he has perceived a truth.
So, what Johnson will do is let the leadership race begin, and wait for it to become bitter, chaotic, and frankly nasty as the rats fight it out with each other, as they will.
When that becomes more widely apparent he will make his move. As remaining prime minister he will tell Tory MPs that they do, of course, have another option, which is to continue with him. They need only end their silly party leadership election and they can have him back.
Will they fall for that? I rather share Johnson's view that they are stupid enough to fall for anything right now. They might, just.
Then what? If Johnson comes back we get full throttle fascism. And you can be sure that the leading opponents - from Sunak and Javid onwards - will be culled from the party, which he had done before.
I am aware this might seem for fetched. But then most things Johnson has done are ridiculous, and he has got away with too many of them. Don't rule it out in other words. If such a plan can be thought up it could be on his agenda. I can't see why it isn't, to be candid.
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I would like to think if that happened, at least 40would cross the floor, enabling a vote of no confidence and a GE to be called.
Of course, he still might win, and therefore stuff the chamber with loyalists. That would be bigger problem….
My hope too
How the hell is he still PM? And How the hell is Pincher still a MP?
Pls take a few moments to think very hard and deep about this question and its consequences.
Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed.
This is no victory. There was never going to be one.
Instead these are very very very very dark times indeed.
It is the beginning of the onslaught, terror and plundering. The date will be marked as a critical turning point in years to come.
The dark forces are without any shadow of doubt stronger, wiser, more powerful than ever and are now even more emboldened as a result of their success.
They will now intensify their efforts to crush all semblance of normality and continue to create chaos, and carnage.
Make no mistake they WILL force through change that will destroy the economy, climate, civil society, equality, justice, fairness.
And there appears to be nothing and nobody that can stop their vile, evil, pillaging.
Steady on.
If they elected Steve Baker it would be terrible, but he would quickly be stymied by his own decisions. Baker’s answer to Northern Ireland is to put the border across the island of Ireland, for example.
The country is no longer going along with culture wars and is dying for a period of uncontroversial competence and of complete absence of combat with our neighbours.
Our system of democracy is poor, but if the country becomes more moderate and once again feels able to give expression to its generous nature there is no way we will experience the horror you describe.
The reason Johnson is still PM and Pincher is still an MP is simple. Neither has resigned those positions. There is no rapid (or certain) mechanism to remove either of them against their will.
Should there be?
The only modification I would be make to your assessment is never underestimate the part that the British media will play in a Johnson revival.
They always do the real heavy-lifting in Tory campaigns.
When Johnson starts making noises about a comeback it will only be after the ground for such an idea has been comprehensively prepared, sown and watered into life by the newspapers you mention, the TV stations that slavishly follow their news agenda and all the other media outlets too terrified to tell the truth.
Johnson will only lend his weight to the idea after enough of the deluded have started to believe that it is a good idea that they have just thought of.
Quite right about the role of the media…. just wrote about this in my blog. It’s shocking that many only get their news from the BBC, say, and on all news bulletins and programmes they’re pushing the narrative that he’s resigned eg references to ‘post prime ministerial life’ etc. And I see there’s even a petition going around on Twitter to reinstate Johnson as PM. What planet?
I never thought I would post a Daily Mail article but this one by Sarah Vine-Michael Gove’s ex-wife- is quite revealing.
one extract ” Johnson’s biggest problem, one that lies at the root of all his troubles: he just can’t take anything seriously.”
In the last few days we have dozens of letters from resigning ministers , de-crying his lack of integrity and values.
Have they only just noticed?
As I read through your points – the impression was of a one-party state – where the party (via in-fighting) decides who is the leader and the populace is largely a groomed-rabble that might have a vote from time to time (provided they have the right documents) and are told by their groomers (the Uk meeja) how to vote.
Another poster on the blog noted that we might only be seeing the tip of the fat-berg in terms of wrong doing & that once Mendacious Fat is gone – more & more wrong doing may emerge. This could cause immense problems for the tory-vulture MPs and party – the steady poisonous drip of scandal. In turn the commentor noted that this may be one reason why M-Fatberg is clinging on.
In his – and maybe Paul Dacre’s(?) – wet dreams, but not I think in the real world, despite the clues being all over that dreadful piece of juvenile faux ‘theatre’ in Downing Street yesterday.
I noticed, particularly, his singling out of “the Parliamentary Conservative Party” and then pointedly refering to it as “that party” – plainly indicating that this was quite different from the Party of his assumed worshippers in that great Tory mythland “the country”. (Always bear in mind the allegedly overheard lady in the Savoy responding to the election result in 1945; “they’ve elected a Labour government – and the country will never stand for that.”)
Despite the slavish adulation of the two rags you’ve featured, that level of nauseating adoration isn’t where people are. There are polls now showing the public mood is –
A) Resign properly and leave now and
B) When you’ve done that – resign as an MP as well. Johnson has yet to discover that his name is now, as Billy Connolly might have said, ” the best emetic known to man “.
I suppose the real question is now which of the ‘Tainted Ones’ will enjoy the dubious pleasure of these muck-sheets fawning approval. Then we’ll really know who most to fear – and despise.
The lady in the Savoy has been proved right, though it took decades to achieve the overthrow of the welfare state and social democracy. Good ideas, not fought for hard enough and now lost and gone forever.
There is no reason for gibe forever
Sonia Purnell, who wrote a brilliant biography of Johnson and worked with him in Brussels decades ago for the Daily Telegraph, said Johnson would push the self-destruct button if forced to resign. He has not done this, and for that reason I think Johnson might still be planning on some kind of comeback, or even, as suggested by Richard Murphy, some kind of never-leave.
But I think Johnson has indeed had it, and for a perhaps left-field reason. The shires have had it up to here with embarrassment and failure and mockery. And my quite well-informed feeling is that at least part of this is to do with a realisation that Brexit isn’t going to work, and the United Kingdom has been harmed by it. I’m sure that is why the clever Labour backbencher Chris Bryant thinks the Tories will now elect a Remainer. Wallace doesn’t want the job, and has unfortunate baggage, but Tugendhat does want it, and is as clean as a whistle.
Johnson might think that, after a while, when short attention spans have moved on, he will be able to sidle back into the top job. This is his only modus operandi after all. MPs that listen to their constituents might well find at that stage that Johnson is simply not wanted, not just because he is revolting, but because he is out of step with the membership.
By the end of the year the Conservatives might be fully in favour of rejoining the single market while Labour is still messing about.
Boris was elected for a very simple reason. To, as he said, and the gullible masses willingly believed, to “Get Brexit Done.” How did Boris try to get Brexit done? By proceeding to rip up the very Brexit deal that…Britain had agreed on…with the EU. That deal meant there had to be customs borders in Ireland. That was proving too costly for Britain. Britain wanted to be back in the EU, and have frictionless trade again — it just couldn’t admit it.
How head-shakingly stupid is that? Why was Britain trying desperately to undo Brexit…to “get Brexit done”?
Because it was a Big Lie. Brexit.
And nobody could deliver it. Hence, Britain had cycled furiously through a series of the most disastrous governments in modern history, in any country. David Cameron, who foolishly made Brexit happen, Theresa May, who tried to figure out how to deliver it, then Boris, who vowed to get it done…by undoing the very deal he’d signed just a few short months back.
What does that tell you? That even Britain was desperately trying to “get Brexit done” by undoing Brexit? Brexit can’t be done. Ever. It is as it always was, a Big Lie.
When people are seduced by Big Lies, they don’t often want to admit they were wrong. And yet today, the majority of Brits oppose Brexit. They’re being thoroughly sensible. They’re beginning to understand the head-shattering calamity of it.
Imagine that your country was…in the EU. That you could buy European goods, at European prices. That means everything from the world’s best food to its finest fashion to ultra high quality manufactured goods to musical instruments to medicine and beyond. Goods of incredibly high standards, from French cheese to German machinery…tax, duty, tariff free. Most people in the world would celebrate in a giant roar. For Americans, who pay immense prices for terrible food to criminal banking.
That’s what Britain gave up.
Who on earth would give all that up? Why? What force in the world could convince people all that was a bad thing? If I went to any country in the world, from India to Chile to Mali to America — and told people “now you have the right to just go and live and work anywhere in Europe you like,” can you imagine what the result would be? Cheers of disbelief and roars of life-changing delight.
People would be thrilled, so how did Brits end up painfully stupid enough to think all that was a bad thing?
Big Lies. They were told, through a series of carefully orchestrated, viciously planned, ultra sophisticated propaganda campaigns that…Europe was the bad guy. An enemy, a rival, an adversary. A cheater and liar and thief, even. Lie after lie. The biggest, most foolish one of all, other trade and movement deals would replace the EU and be even better for Brits.
Nations come together and form larger political and economic entities precisely to provide public goods and make trade easier and create more opportunities for people.
But Britain, out of hubris, arrogance, the pride of a lost empire, can’t accept this humble truth and this is the price it is paying for Brexit.
Derek , when you say “ But Britain, out of hubris, arrogance, the pride of a lost empire, can’t accept this humble truth and this is the price it is paying for Brexit.“
Surely
you mean England
It’s so annoying when people refer to to England and Britain as if they are the same thing
I agree with you Terence. Mostly English.
As prime minister Boris can ask the Queen to dissolve Parliament and call a General Election. He would then announce that he was standing as the British Conservative (Brexit) Party and challenge existing Tory MPs to choose ‘back Boris or the ‘herd of traitors’. Brexit is in danger your country needs you’….
It’s true. It was a very clever deception, framed to perpetuate The domination of the elite, but it was always nonsense. Now, as its victims recognise the reality, it’s reversal will become inevitable. But it may take a very long time, involving so much waste and suffering, until a Gorbachev figure emerges. And even then, stubbornness and pride, and lots of extracranial thinking, may produce a Putin figure.
No need to say much on this except I strongly suspect you’re right – which is why Johnson never said ‘I resign’. And it’s clear that sections of the media are now backing Johnson remaining. So, ultimately, it’ll come down to Tory MPs to deal with Johnson’s attempt to twist his defeat into victory. And none of us can have much faith in their willingness or ability to stand up to him.
It has not escaped anyone’s attention then that Boris has always been one to say one thing and do another.
Maybe those with their hat in the ring might actually just mess it all up on purpose and then create openings for Boris to come back? I’d love to see the scenario’s being ran through by the strategists behind the scenes.
But strategy or not – this is truly a farce isn’t it? A farce hiding awful secrets and incriminating information about the last 12 or so years of Tory rule right up to dodgy parties, dodgy Russian relationships and dodgy PPE management.
There is I think a misconception that Johnson still commands enough voting support among the electorate to get himself and some sort of Conservative Party re-elected. I do not think that is the case. The majority of this wrangling is internal Tory Party politics and it is quite possible that they will rip themselves apart as the disparity between the views of the extremes of the Party get tested to breaking point. This issue is more usually one for the Labour Party where a radical left and a moderate right end up weakening support for the Party in elections. This so called leadership fight will be based on who can out Tory who. Who can propose the hardest of hardlines in relation to tax cutting, spending cutting, immigration cutting, Brexit severance, military spending etc etc all of which appeal to the very small group of Party members who will end up choosing the person all of us will be affected by. The only hope for whoever is leader including Johnson himself would be to use the time before the next election to ensure that no election ever takes place. That is how Fascists normally obtain power. Various special laws would be enacted for the preservation of the nation which allow the incumbent to remain. I don’t think that likely either for the simple reason that Johnson has failed and no longer commands the support of voters as a national saviour despite what he clearly believes that “the people” support him. There will of course always be a place for him in Reform UK as the Marine Le Pen of the UK right
I’m not so sure – Spalding in Lincs was trending on Twitter earlier for all the comments of folk there still trotting out the same deluded stuff about ‘Boris’ eg how he was shafted by traitors etc andthat’s just one example. The degree of political ignorance in this country (not totally their fault) means that many are gullible and vulnerable to all the relentless Daily Mail messaging.
I read the Observer article. I recognise those Fenland sentiments. They are misplaced but people have the right to hold them. I have the right to disagree with them.