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While we wait for Johnson’s “road map” is Carrie the one who is really in charge? – politicalbetting
While we wait for Johnson’s “road map” is Carrie the one who is really in charge? – politicalbetting.com
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Is there any word on universities?
Either way though the operations and PR of the government seem to have got a lot sharper since "Carrie took over". Is there anyone here who'd prefer Cummings back instead?
This year, and in this case, is Carrie on the cusp of becoming that fairly uncommon thing, a prime ministerial (or presidential) spouse/partner who did NOT help (for the most part & with most voters) their beloved's image & popularity. For example, Nancy Reagan, Hillary Clinton & Cherie Blair.
My own guess is, Carrie is NOT heading down that route, manly because she is NOT doing things that most (or mostly) normal people find offensive or strange. Her giving Boris a piece of her mind from time to time might strike the Bow Group as suspicious, but hard to think the Great British Public is gonna feel the same way.
AND keep in mind that Nancy Reagan DID get Ronnie to fire his chief of staff, Don Regan, and with scant ceremony, when he tried to best her in the White House wars. He found out (as did others during the Clinton administration) that briefing and leaking against the First Lady was NOT a smart thing to do, as the Family Quarters can beat the West Wing almost every time. It's (literally) trying to beat the house.
In the meantime who'd you prefer advising him?
https://news.sky.com/story/william-hague-says-you-can-smell-the-improvement-in-government-without-cummings-and-cain-12224463
Was that true for Kate. both way? And is it true today for Carrie?
I am no fan of Johnson even now but this is just petty and pretty cowardly.
Advisors advise, ministers decide.
0/10 must try harder.
I found myself thinking last night that there's a reasonable chance that I might finally be able to travel and do parental visits in June - but that's still about four months away, and it'll be the best part of a year since the last ones by the time that rolls around, so yes it is total bloody rubbish. The only good thing to be said about the whole rotten situation is that at least we are getting there and we can have a reasonable expectation that these evil lockdowns aren't going to continue indefinitely.
Now we just have to keep everything crossed that throwing all the schools open at once isn't too precipitous an act.
Admittedly he may be listening to the advice of the DfE instead given they are absolutely desperate to reopen schools at once at any cost (except financial ones, which they are refusing to meet).
It could be a terrible blunder given how useless they all are, but it does show the idea that SAGE are lizard people who have captured the government is well wide of the mark.
What we need to hope instead is that it doesn’t lead to a spike in cases among vulnerable parents. That’s the danger point (and I think is why the age group with most parents in it is reluctant to see schools reopened fully).
And gloriously indiscreet. She might have to rein that in a little!
For example, a subterranean water tunnel for commuter & pleasure traffic from Lutton to Liverpool Station that can double as an emergency sewer & storm water drain. Imaging traveling to work (or play) in a fast-moving glass-covered cigar-shaped tube, observing the profusion of aquatic life (and death) swimming - floating - decomposing just inches outside of the window as you hurtle through the murk toward adventures yet unknown, a modern-day Captain Nemo!
At their age there's always a nagging thought that any time I see them has the potential to be the last but never did I seriously think a year could pass without seeing them again. *Touch wood* they'll continue to outlast this bastard bug but this time, time for them to get to see their great grandchildren grow up - and their great grandchildren to form memories with them - is precious time lost that will never be regained.
The sooner we can put this all behind us the better.
Believe it was former Vice President John Nance "Cactus Jack" Garner who used to say to Senators who criticized his proposals (or his president, at least before 1938) "Now don't you go kickin' my dog around!"
Still good advice.
I think OGH has been reading Private Eye. Carrie, and Allegra's, domination of No 10 has been the subject of their regular feature on the PM ....... think Mrs Wilson's Diary ..... since shortly after Cumming's departure.
And IIRC, while there were allegations of an 'special' relationship between Wilson and his secretary they were never admitted, and indeed Wilson sued someone who suggested it, and won.
The next morning my mother phoned again to say that Grandma ha died overnight!
Now there are openly warring factions.
It is not clear who will win the Game of Thrones, but the best solution remains (as ever) to replace BoZo
We can feel your pain.
Wonder if it's the same now with Carrie & the PM's pup? The Top Dog of No. 10 Downing Street?
Hilarious.
Hilarious.
Morning all, and I'll see you again for the speech.
Jordan Brown beats Ronnie O'Sullivan in the final frame to win 2021 Welsh Open
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/snooker/56142654
Carrie on governing
Children have suffered enough blows to their education. If the NHS isn't at risk of collapse then schools should be open.
Johnson wasn't even PM a year before this. Between vaccines and genomic sequencing he's ensured we are well placed to come out of it first though.
Why they chose now to go public, I cannot guess.
BoZo must have visited every vaccine centre in the land by now. He has even being trained in how to wipe down a chair. Who can doubt his scientific nous?
Have good day.
In Harry Enfield's hugely underestimated 'Norman Ormal' parody of 90s politics, Norman Ormal MP is told to leave his mistress and go back to his wife. The parody of Julian Critchley explains this by saying "My dear, the Conservatives have never been fond of the permanent partner".
"Spike Milligan's epitaph includes the phrase Dúirt mé leat go raibh mé breoite, Irish for "I told you I was ill"....
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spike_Milligan
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/oct/16/jennifer-arcuri-admits-to-boris-johnson-affair
If we can thank Carrie for the new depths of stupidity then she has done a Good Job.
Can’t believe it was 24 years ago that Rocket made Mick Price sit down for only five minutes, I remember watching this like it was yesterday.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=55UhJ18RA-A
You think Boris had nothing to do with setting up and paying for the vaccine taskforce?
You think Boris had nothing to do with the decision to reject opposition advice about joining the EU scheme instead?
It is all rather like a former teacher wondering why their previously wayward pupil is suddenly giving his homework in on time.
If he was the driving force behind COGUK then logically the argument is that the genomic sequencing body had no idea that it needed to sequence Covid until Boris suggested they do so.
Really? Its as laughable as the "argument" that Jezbollah was a driving force behind peace in Norniron.
If the EU had vaccines and we didn't would you be saying that had nothing to do with him?
COGUK didn't exist pre pandemic. Pre existing expertise did but it was set up and given funding and priorities under Boris's government. That the UK by December had generated half the world's sequences and you think it has nothing to do at all with the UK PM shows you've lost all impartiality.
If Jezbollah had been PM then he'd have deserved kudos for NI. He wasn't don't be ridiculous.
When asked, he paused, thought, then said that he was quite sure that if he had been defeated, he would have been given all the blame.
If not for Covid, he might not have lasted so long...
I know as little as the next person on this and certainly less than some on this board but it does seem to me that the appointment of Allegra Stratton in November was the changing point and I would be minded to give her a lot of the credit. If Carrie played a role in getting her appointed and in giving her the political heft to bring others into line she has done Boris a considerable favour.
Today will be a good test. Pre November Boris would have been bombastic, overly optimistic and too ready to let his natural inclination to let people get on with it be evident. I suspect we will see a more measured, Prime Ministerial performance today with caution and more consistent messaging with just the odd Borisism to remind us who he is.
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/nation/2021/02/119_304407.html
Less than half of South Koreans are willing to receive COVID-19 vaccine shots immediately, without waiting for further reports on those vaccines' effects, an opinion poll showed Monday.
In the survey conducted on 1,020 people aged 18 or over by the Korea Society Opinion Institute from last Friday to Saturday, only 45.8 percent said they are willing to be vaccinated "right away" when their turn for COVID-19 vaccine shots comes.
Another 45.7 percent responded they will delay their vaccinations to "watch the situation" regarding the vaccines' effects, while 5.1 percent said they will refuse vaccine shots entirely, according to the poll result. The remaining 3.4 percent said they are not sure.
The survey also showed that 55.8 percent of the respondents have confidence in the government's handling of the national vaccination program, while 41.1 percent have distrust....
A (far) lower death rate clearly makes people more picky or cautious about vaccines.
Can't imagine it would be anywhere near as low if they'd had out experience.
I can envisage a scenario where he maps out a slow pained emergence from our current restrictions, which will have to be torn up (again!) when the combination of vaccination and summer weather ends the wave of new cases and so the pressure to open up quickly becomes impossible to resist.
The world is in a pandemic which is far from over and neither sadly is a rising worldwide death toll
I'd be astonished if Boris Johnson and others weren't asking her for advice, she's not just the Prime Minister's inamorata.
What must worry her and the PM is that she's managed to eventually piss off the two guys who got the PM where he is today, Dominic Cummings and Sir Lynton Crosby.
That said someone I do like, and has no dog in this particular fight, has started calling her 'Edith', after Edith Wilson.
Edit - After he first called her Edith I thought he meant Edith from 'Allo 'Allo.
The priority now is the economy. We will see that today and in the budget. We need to recover lost GDP and tax revenues as fast as we safely can. We face an immense challenge, this is 2010 all over again so far as the deficit is concerned with more steroids than those Olympic potentials are currently gulping given that out of season testing is now almost non existent.
It's good for democracy.
Just sayin'.....