Tony Burman writes that it is now virtually certain that British Conservatives will choose Boris Johnson as their country's Prime Minister. Think of that for a moment. The next British prime minister will be "Bo Jo the Clown:"
Yes, during this next stage of Britain’s painful slow-motion national suicide, we can at least be consoled that the country’s blond-haired class clown will leave ’em laughing as Britain fades resolutely into obscurity.
How about the time at the London Olympics when, as the city’s mayor, he ended up dangling on a zipwire waving two plastic flags in a silly helmet, pleading “Can you get me a rope?” Or when he tried to convince the Chinese at the Beijing Olympics that the British invented ping pong “on the dining tables of England in the 19th century and called it ‘wiff waff’ ”?
If there ever was a man who says the wrong thing at the wrong time, it's Boris Johnson:
Last year, Johnson described Muslim women who wore burqas and niqabs as “looking like letter boxes (and) bank robbers.” He once wrote that the Queen loves the Commonwealth because “it supplies her with regular cheering crowds of flag-wearing picaninnies.” And, as foreign secretary, he wrote an insulting poem about the president of Turkey suggesting he had sex with a goat.
Why has Britain been given such a "gift?" Consider the party which he will lead:
For a large, diverse country such as the U.K., the Conservatives have come up with a narrow process to choose a new prime minister. Eligible voters will only include the 160,000 grassroots members of their party — in a country of 67 million people.
Even worse is the demographic breakdown of those people. They are largely older voters (56 per cent over the age of 55), overwhelmingly white (97 per cent), mainly male (70 per cent), very well-off and far more right-wing than the country at large.
Another Donald Trump will tread upon the world stage. Shakespeare was right. Oh, what fools these mortals be.
Image: Daily Mail
10 comments:
We visited England last fall, Owen, our second trip there. Signs of decay abounded, especially as it pertained to the number of people living on the streets. As well, we got an indication of the shortcomings of their public health system when my wife had a fall and there was no hospital in a city of over 100,000. Add Boris Johnson to the mix, and Britain's decrepitude will be assured.
As I wrote this post this morning, Lorne, I recalled something that a vice principal I worked with said decades ago. "Stupidity," he said, "is its own curse."
Britain has produced some great comedians in the last half century. For some of the second-raters who can’t crack a lineup in America there’s always a career in politics.
Boris is relentlessly pro-Boris, interested only in what Boris has to say. He is, of course, grossly incompetent but dashing, sucking in the rubes.
Since 2010 when Cameron became the austerity PM, the Cons have practised what Doug Ford is up to now. Cutbacks with no social conscience to "balance the budget" and keep the rentier class onside with extra tax relief. People have lost public housing and been dumped on the street for not using both bedrooms of their flat. 22,000 police have been cut. NHS funding cut back. The list is endless. Have those 200 council tower buildings with flammable exterior cladding been reclad as promised? Of course not - they house only lower class people and immigrants who probably vote Labour. Many local councils, the equivalent to our provinces, are Tory-run and not predisposed to help. They face funding shortfalls themselves.
Boris will bound headlong into the EU bureaucracy insulting everyone in sight, and the head of that bureaucracy Junckers will implacably tell him the deal May negotiated is it. Boris will inform those damn Euros they're fools to rousing cheers from the complete a*sshat brigade at home, like all the papers who are all on one establishment page, refuse to pay termination fees, and find he has exactly zero bargaining power. The EU can ruin the UK in about two weeks and will get its money one way or another. The entire (foreign-owned) car industry is intent on pulling up stakes as it is - Honda has announced it already. The industry's main market is the EU, so why hang around and go through Customs dramas because of a hard Brexit? They just won't. Ireland will not tolerate Ulstermen and their idiocy, so there'll be a border again at that EU junction. Bombardier is trying to sell off its Belfast aircraft parts plant with 4,000 jobs. British Steel went bankrupt two weeks ago just to compound the malaise. There is very little industry in the UK beyond islands here and there. When the banksters/stock market types depart for Europe as the place further deteriorates, the country will find it has no money-making ability left. It'll be victory garden time again. Allotments, spuds and runner beans. Just in time for real climate change.
When you have stupid people in charge, your country/province goes downhill fast. And Boris is nothing if not essentially stupid. He can be counted on to do exactly the wrong thing virtually every time.
Trump and the Americans want to tear down the EU because it's been showing signs of independence from US dollar hegemony, NATO, US sanctions policy on Iran and Russia, fining Google and Facebook for not following privacy rules, etc. Get the EU countries arguing among themselves and the US machine can pick 'em of one by one goes the thinking. So Britain sinking is just Round One of their attack, and they'll lie about it being a good idea for Blighty and praise Boris, who'll preen until he finds no assistance for having been a poodle for America. Hung out to dry in fact.
I was born there, left at 11 with family for Canada, went back for post grad. So it's sad to see the place go all to hell. The real unknown is how the military will react - officers pledge allegiance to the monarchy, not the government. The army poobahs are conservative beyond belief. Chaos ahead, and how will any civil unrest be handled? What about public and civil servant pensions as finances disappear? Next thing you know, there'll be top Brits trying to milk the Commonwealth for a quid or two, using the finest flannelling techniques and insincere compliments. It would, unfortunately, be wise to resist all attempts at their suddenly trying to become buddy-buddy with us. No point doing ourselves in to keep Britain from turning into a nation of serfs. We have homegrown Tory idiots of our own.
BM
They in "Merry Olde" suffer from the same things we do when it comes to election. An apathetic electorate, dwindling voter turnout, lack of choice in leadership, fake news, lies, scandal, need I go on. I still maintain that this "populous cess pool" is a global phenomenon. My heart now lies with my friends in Hong Kong fighting a real fight.
In any other line of work, some would find Johnson harmless, John. But as prime minister, he'll be absolutely toxic.
Idiots abound everywhere these days, BM. I suppose there's no reason Britain shouldn't grow its own crop of them.
In Hong Kong, zoombats, the fight is desperate. We may all soon know their desperation.
Canada will find out sooner than most what the Hong Kong situation means as its favourite economic citizens wave a quarter million passports in its face. How many rusty old tubs can we hire that have a chance of making it across the Pacific or maybe just to one of those islands where we can pay the Aussies stack them while the better-off among them make arrangements to occupy their digs in Hongkouver? Lebanon was a walk in the park.
It's all part of massive migration around the world, John. And the numbers will grow as the planet heats up.
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