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The worst political bet on the market today? – politicalbetting.com

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  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    kinabalu said:

    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    "My hand picked advisors are shit and I had no control over them" is not the defence some people want it to be...
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763
    kinabalu said:

    IanB2 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    He is still there. He has the cabinet out in support. So I guess the answer, within the Tory party, is yes. At least for now.

    The bottom line is Big Dog is a big beast and a unique political operator. Malign IMO, but undeniably different. Whoever succeeds him will have far less room for manoeuvre. It might well feel much like May or Major. They could be in for a very rough ride.
    He is toast

    I said this around the New Year when others were detecting green shoots of recovery in the polls. He can't reset. He is what he is. Even if he could, there is so much more already there but not yet come out. Trust me on this.
    I will be v surprised if there isn't a load more revelations to come in tomorrow's Sunday papers.
    There are already rumours about parties actually in Johnson’s flat, rather than in the office or in the garden.

    So much for “I wandered out and found, to my surprise, all my staff having a work gathering”

    It is noticeable that the Tories are desperately trying to keep the focus on the parties - where Gray might or might not give them a way out - rather than on the quite obvious string of lies that we, and Parliament, have been told by the PM - which is inarguably a resigning matter, period.
    Yep, the proliferation of 'parties' might help him. It risks things sliding into "they're all at it" territory. The lying is imo where it's at, plus the cowardice, these 2 things demonstrated together and perfectly with the nausea-inducing "I was so angry when I found out about it" from him following the Stratton video leak.
    Ruminations by Boris

    As I was going up the stairs,
    I met a drink that wasn't there,
    It wasn't there again today,
    I wish, I wish it would go away.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,081
    We all really should rush out to the nearest pillarbox and post a letter addressed to “The Liar, London, SW1”.

    It doesn’t really matter what you put inside. Send him the latest direct mail you’ve just received. Whatever.

    The fact is that it will arrive, and you’ll be gifting our postmen and women the pleasure of sorting and delivering it.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 75,842
    ping said:

    Estimates for winter ‘22 energy price cap are now £2400-£2600;

    https://www.google.com/search?q=https://www.ft.com/content/d246f8b4-80ef-498f-b9f1-7779acc5efd7

    Sweet jesus
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    See Emily Sheffield’s comments in the Standard last night. The ERG is already teeming up with newly elected MPs worried about their seats and others. They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?
  • StockyStocky Posts: 9,653
    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    BF rules state that if Johnson lost a confidence vote or jacked it but agreed to stay on until a successor is found the market settles at the end of this interim period. So no way he goes for the purposes of this market prior to 1 April, as replacement process will drag on longer than this, unless he literally ups sticks and walks.

    A Lay of first quarter exit at around 4 with BF is a great bet.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763
    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    Only the Republican party could come up with a run off where Trump was the rational choice.

    And thank the Lord for that.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772
    edited January 2022
    kle 4 said:

    Jonathan said:

    My impression of Mogg, like many (but not all) of those Eton types are quite rough under the veneer. Get them riled and it all comes out.

    He used to seem polite, but there's been too many instances where he might well be civilbut very disrespectful and rude for it to be correct to call him polite. Now he just puts me in mind of Lady Catherine de Bourgh - unthinkingly and egregiously rude, but imagining herself to be very classy and civilised.
    That's a great comparison.

    Both of them expect others to agree with them, and do as they direct, by right. Having anyone disagree with them seriously disturbs their sense of the natural order of things and they lash out - keeping things superficially polite by avoiding vulgar words.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,145
    kle4 said:

    I don't quite follow the official explaination for why this is returning, but temporarily.

    MPs will be able to be elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly but keep their Westminster seats, BBC News NI has learned

    But the return of the dual mandate will only last until the next Westminster election due in 2024.

    It will bring Northern Ireland into line with the rest of the UK.

    The move will allow DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson to stand for election to the assembly in May while retaining his seat at Westminster


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-60000812

    It's a fiddle for the benefit of the DUP? Or am I missing something?
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763
    Carnyx said:

    kle4 said:

    I don't quite follow the official explaination for why this is returning, but temporarily.

    MPs will be able to be elected to the Northern Ireland Assembly but keep their Westminster seats, BBC News NI has learned

    But the return of the dual mandate will only last until the next Westminster election due in 2024.

    It will bring Northern Ireland into line with the rest of the UK.

    The move will allow DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson to stand for election to the assembly in May while retaining his seat at Westminster


    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-60000812

    It's a fiddle for the benefit of the DUP? Or am I missing something?
    Probably several things. All of which are deep, dark, mysterious and utterly tedious to those lucky enough to live outwith the ambit of NI politics.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    MrEd said:

    They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?

    Because they need to pick someone the members will vote for.

    Truss, yes.

    Francois, no.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    A new political category - the "low conscientiousness conservative".
    https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/01/14/we-found-the-one-group-of-americans-who-are-most-likely-to-spread-fake-news-526973
    ...we found that the only reliable explanation was a general desire for chaos — that is, a motivation to disregard, disrupt, and take down existing social and political institutions as a means of asserting the dominance and superiority of one’s own group. Participants indicated their appetite for chaos by using a scale to express how much they agreed with statements like, “I think society should be burned to the ground.” For LCCs, we concluded, sharing false information is a vehicle for propagating chaos...
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    Yes, I agree that's how he stays. They hold off now with a view to ditching him after a disaster in the locals. Then it isn't a disaster or enough of one.

    I like your clear & consistent confidence that he's out this year but I don't quite share it. I have it as a 50/50. Hope your reading of things is better than mine in this case.
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,623
    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    That reminds me - I've not played "Lemmings" for a few years.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,145
    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?

    Because they need to pick someone the members will vote for.

    Truss, yes.

    Francois, no.
    She can fit inside a tank cupola for the photo-ops?

    [Not that I could do any better.]
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    This has been going on for a while now. DeSsntis has particularly been gaining support amongst the anti-lockdown crowd. Personally, I still think he ends up as Trump’s running mate.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,081
    Freedland:

    What, for example, would it say about our perennial brag that we are a society subject to the rule of law that the man who sets the rules is allowed to break them and break them so egregiously?

    What will it say about the supposedly unbreakable convention that a minister who lies to or misleads the House of Commons has to resign? Johnson was guilty of that on Wednesday with that “work event” nonsense, but it was hardly the first time.

    Johnson’s fate will be decided not by [Gray] but by politics: initially by MPs and, if necessary, by the people. Johnson’s former editor at the Telegraph, Max Hastings, once wrote that if Johnson, a man he believed “would not recognise truth if confronted by it in an identity parade” became prime minister, it would demonstrate that Britain was no longer “a serious country”. If we allow Johnson to stay as prime minister, given all that he’s done and all that we’ve seen, it would say something far, far worse.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 9,653
    kinabalu said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    Yes, I agree that's how he stays. They hold off now with a view to ditching him after a disaster in the locals. Then it isn't a disaster or enough of one.

    I like your clear & consistent confidence that he's out this year but I don't quite share it. I have it as a 50/50. Hope your reading of things is better than mine in this case.
    He only goes if 1) 54 letters go in and he loses a VONC or 2) he resigns.

    I think IF he gets past this weekend it is 50/50.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?

    Because they need to pick someone the members will vote for.

    Truss, yes.

    Francois, no.
    There are other options than Francois you know.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    MrEd said:

    There are other options than Francois you know.

    OK, name the ERG candidate that has a batter chance of winning the membership vote than Truss?
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    MrEd said:

    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    This has been going on for a while now. DeSsntis has particularly been gaining support amongst the anti-lockdown crowd. Personally, I still think he ends up as Trump’s running mate.
    He's been a lot cagier about it until now.
    I think your latter scenario possible, but unlikely; if he runs against Trump, it's not going to happen.
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,623
    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Is that "people around Boris" or really "people who ARE Boris" ?
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    There are other options than Francois you know.

    OK, name the ERG candidate that has a batter chance of winning the membership vote than Truss?
    I mentioned McVey the other day as a good outside bet because she combines both the ERG and Red Wall Tories wings (and has been consistently anti-restrictions). Harper probably could be considered a candidate (less chance I think because I’m not sure new Tory MPs consider him attractive to the RW).

    But, just to check, you think everyone on the ERG are essentially Mark Francois?
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772
    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    You also lose if the plan to dispose of him until May is merely an example of procrastination, and becomes a plan to dispose of him by September, or November, then after next winter.

    If they really wanted rid of him he would have now gone. They didn't wait until after the Gulf War to push out Thatcher.

    I'm a procrastinator. I know it when I see it. They're procrastinating. There's no way of knowing when they will eventually act - but it will be certain that by the time they do they will regret not having acted earlier.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 9,653
    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    There are other options than Francois you know.

    OK, name the ERG candidate that has a batter chance of winning the membership vote than Truss?
    Baker has best chance from ERG
  • kinabalu said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    Yes, I agree that's how he stays. They hold off now with a view to ditching him after a disaster in the locals. Then it isn't a disaster or enough of one.

    I like your clear & consistent confidence that he's out this year but I don't quite share it. I have it as a 50/50. Hope your reading of things is better than mine in this case.
    Besides, by then, Rishi will seriously be in the doghouse. So Liz would have an open goal in front of her. That being the case, there will be a significant temptation to squint at the results, say "not as bad as 1993/4/5" and totter on.

    Boris clearly ought to go before he destroys them all, but... after you, Claude.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Stocky said:



    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    There are other options than Francois you know.

    OK, name the ERG candidate that has a batter chance of winning the membership vote than Truss?
    Baker has best chance from ERG
    I’ve put some money on him but my issue there is I don’t think he wants the job. He likes to be the power behind the throne.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    MrEd said:

    But, just to check, you think everyone on the ERG are essentially Mark Francois?

    I think the ERG think Truss can win and they can control her.

    I think the ERG think they don't have a better alternative candidate.

    Not long till we find out perhaps :)
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772
    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    That's a rumour designed to scare Hunt supporters into holding their fire for fear of making the situation worse. Never going to happen.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,585
    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    Not so fast with your nightmares... only two years to a Conservative wipeout!

    Although, if there will be anything left for a non- Conservative Government to govern is the conumdrum.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    Stocky said:

    Baker has best chance from ERG

    I don't think he beats Truss.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    MrEd said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    For a start, that tweet risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The replies below it are pretty damning not just of the nurse but Labour’s attitudes to lockdown. All it has gone and done is reminded people that, under Labour, the restrictions would have been more severe and there would have been far more “Jenny’s”.

    Secondly, and this I think shows more of a fundamental issue for Labour, who thought it would be good politics to send that tweet? It should a complete lack of understanding of how people are likely to react. It was like the Labour leaders who thought that comparing David Cameron to Gene Hunt was a fantastic idea.
    A cautionary reminder that it is all relative and that SKS is still shit except by comparison with bj
  • IshmaelZ said:

    MrEd said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    For a start, that tweet risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The replies below it are pretty damning not just of the nurse but Labour’s attitudes to lockdown. All it has gone and done is reminded people that, under Labour, the restrictions would have been more severe and there would have been far more “Jenny’s”.

    Secondly, and this I think shows more of a fundamental issue for Labour, who thought it would be good politics to send that tweet? It should a complete lack of understanding of how people are likely to react. It was like the Labour leaders who thought that comparing David Cameron to Gene Hunt was a fantastic idea.
    A cautionary reminder that it is all relative and that SKS is still shit except by comparison with bj
    Britain Biden v Britain Trump
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Nigelb said:

    MrEd said:

    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    This has been going on for a while now. DeSsntis has particularly been gaining support amongst the anti-lockdown crowd. Personally, I still think he ends up as Trump’s running mate.
    He's been a lot cagier about it until now.
    I think your latter scenario possible, but unlikely; if he runs against Trump, it's not going to happen.
    Oh no, if he runs against Trump, no way. My guess is he would go for Scott.

    My thinking is that other candidates also won’t want DeSantis because he will aim for 8 years whereas you know Trump will only be there for 4.

    Bizarrely, if it’s between the two, Trump will run as the moderate.
  • Gary_BurtonGary_Burton Posts: 737
    edited January 2022
    kinabalu said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    Yes, I agree that's how he stays. They hold off now with a view to ditching him after a disaster in the locals. Then it isn't a disaster or enough of one.

    I like your clear & consistent confidence that he's out this year but I don't quite share it. I have it as a 50/50. Hope your reading of things is better than mine in this case.
    I can't see how the Tories lose enough seats to label it a disaster (as opposed to 1000 losses in 2019) and if they somehow hold all their London councils or even just lose one which is still plausible or even likely, Johnson can spin it as a good result.
  • Just say what you see.

  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763
    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    IshmaelZ said:

    MrEd said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    For a start, that tweet risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The replies below it are pretty damning not just of the nurse but Labour’s attitudes to lockdown. All it has gone and done is reminded people that, under Labour, the restrictions would have been more severe and there would have been far more “Jenny’s”.

    Secondly, and this I think shows more of a fundamental issue for Labour, who thought it would be good politics to send that tweet? It should a complete lack of understanding of how people are likely to react. It was like the Labour leaders who thought that comparing David Cameron to Gene Hunt was a fantastic idea.
    A cautionary reminder that it is all relative and that SKS is still shit except by comparison with bj
    And that Labour is still a party of the North London, Guardian-reading masses and public sector professionals. You can’t win an election that way.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,585
    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
    Wow!
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    But, just to check, you think everyone on the ERG are essentially Mark Francois?

    I think the ERG think Truss can win and they can control her.

    I think the ERG think they don't have a better alternative candidate.

    Not long till we find out perhaps :)
    They thought that with May. And to a degree with BoJo.

    The other part are the RW MPs. I don’t many of them think Truss will carry their constituencies
  • StockyStocky Posts: 9,653
    Scott_xP said:

    Stocky said:

    Baker has best chance from ERG

    I don't think he beats Truss.
    No probably not - but he's best chance from ERG.

    Of course there is a cross over (imperfect) between the old ERG and the new Covid Recovery Group. If you include those guys then Harper come into the picture.

    But before the membership comes the MP hurdle. Matters not how popular Truss is in the member surveys. If Sunak, Hunt, Truss and Harper/or Baker are the candidates then I rate Truss's chances of making it through to the member vote as minimal.
  • CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 59,540
    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    MrEd said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    See Emily Sheffield’s comments in the Standard last night. The ERG is already teeming up with newly elected MPs worried about their seats and others. They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?
    Truss isn't a Mrs May type of politician. She has far more ideology.
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    *update 🐎

    By my sums Malc, Stodge, MoonRabbit 1 win each so far
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    MrEd said:

    Scott_xP said:

    MrEd said:

    There are other options than Francois you know.

    OK, name the ERG candidate that has a batter chance of winning the membership vote than Truss?
    I mentioned McVey the other day as a good outside bet because she combines both the ERG and Red Wall Tories wings (and has been consistently anti-restrictions). Harper probably could be considered a candidate (less chance I think because I’m not sure new Tory MPs consider him attractive to the RW).

    But, just to check, you think everyone on the ERG are essentially Mark Francois?
    No, some are less credible...
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763

    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
    Wow!
    Not saying that is my view. Just what I think Boris will be hoping for. I would have forgiven the misjudgements about allowing people to drink after work quite readily. The fact he lied and lied and lied about it is deeply troubling.
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 25,164
    Non-Arsenal fans reacting reasonably on Twitter to the right and proper decision to postpone the NLD. 😆😆😆😆😆
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772
    kinabalu said:

    MrEd said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    See Emily Sheffield’s comments in the Standard last night. The ERG is already teeming up with newly elected MPs worried about their seats and others. They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?
    Truss isn't a Mrs May type of politician. She has far more ideology.
    She also has more energy and chutzpah. II think she has a bright career ahead of her.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 39,748
    edited January 2022
    Nigelb said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    GOATS ?
    (Government of all the sh*ts)
    CUSPers?

    'The United Kingdom is an extended family of a nation, bound together by shared blood and kinship. It has had a marvellous history for many centuries and under Boris Johnson's Liz Truss's leadership is on the cusp of further greatness.'
  • tlg86tlg86 Posts: 25,164

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    Pinch of salt required. How many sexes does he think there are?
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,585
    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
    Wow!
    Not saying that is my view. Just what I think Boris will be hoping for. I would have forgiven the misjudgements about allowing people to drink after work quite readily. The fact he lied and lied and lied about it is deeply troubling.
    My mistake, although even if he survives which is more than a possibility, I believe given the chance, the public will punish him. Unless he can engineer a patriotic war victory he is finished.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709

    kinabalu said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    Yes, I agree that's how he stays. They hold off now with a view to ditching him after a disaster in the locals. Then it isn't a disaster or enough of one.

    I like your clear & consistent confidence that he's out this year but I don't quite share it. I have it as a 50/50. Hope your reading of things is better than mine in this case.
    I can't see how the Tories lose enough seats to label it a disaster (as opposed to 1000 losses in 2019) and if they somehow hold all their London councils or even just lose one which is still plausible or even likely, Johnson can spin it as a good result.
    On last night's poll the Tories could lose control of every London council except Bexley, even Kensington and Chelsea
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Stocky said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    BF rules state that if Johnson lost a confidence vote or jacked it but agreed to stay on until a successor is found the market settles at the end of this interim period. So no way he goes for the purposes of this market prior to 1 April, as replacement process will drag on longer than this, unless he literally ups sticks and walks.

    A Lay of first quarter exit at around 4 with BF is a great bet.
    Q1 end is as far in the future as the Paterson vote is in the past. If more than 25% as much shit happens in the future as has happened since then, he is gone

    Brave call
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    MrEd said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    MrEd said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    For a start, that tweet risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The replies below it are pretty damning not just of the nurse but Labour’s attitudes to lockdown. All it has gone and done is reminded people that, under Labour, the restrictions would have been more severe and there would have been far more “Jenny’s”.

    Secondly, and this I think shows more of a fundamental issue for Labour, who thought it would be good politics to send that tweet? It should a complete lack of understanding of how people are likely to react. It was like the Labour leaders who thought that comparing David Cameron to Gene Hunt was a fantastic idea.
    A cautionary reminder that it is all relative and that SKS is still shit except by comparison with bj
    And that Labour is still a party of the North London, Guardian-reading masses and public sector professionals. You can’t win an election that way.
    No but the Tories probably can't win another election as the party of austerity at the moment either.

    So that means at least a hung parliament unless the Tories repeat the low tax, big spend populism of the last general election and no restrictions on the vaccinated
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Jonathan said:

    Boris is undoubtedly unfit to be PM, but Tories agitating for him to go need to reflect on whether he is still the best leader they have.

    Is there any reason to expect a successor to command as much deference in the party? Major did not have the respect of his peers or rivals.

    Somehow I expect neither Sunak nor Truss will be able to command the party in the same way as Boris. It could be majoresque.

    I would not be surprised if there were not leadership rumours before 2024. Boris should go, but the grass may not be greener.

    What? WTAF?

    That was then. This is now.

    Never mind that the deference was never there, they went along with him because he was electable. You seriously think he commands anyone or anything any more?
    Lynton Crosby is on the case now.

    All restrictions lifted by the end of January. Junior and Senior Civil Servants publicly defesnestrated and Big Dog is saved.
    I predict much use of "he needs better people around him".

    Just laid an exit by 31 March at 3.7.
    Senior Tories are now batting for a May-June exit. Almost everyone else wants him out now.

    Thus the almost free money appears to be on Johnson going in 2022. The only way you lose is if senior Tories keep him on until May and somehow the Tory councillors dodge their already scripted role of going down to electoral slaughter.
    You also lose if the plan to dispose of him until May is merely an example of procrastination, and becomes a plan to dispose of him by September, or November, then after next winter.

    If they really wanted rid of him he would have now gone. They didn't wait until after the Gulf War to push out Thatcher.

    I'm a procrastinator. I know it when I see it. They're procrastinating. There's no way of knowing when they will eventually act - but it will be certain that by the time they do they will regret not having acted earlier.
    Agreed.
    If they want to get rid, now is the time. Anything else simply makes them more complicit, and risks him wriggling on the hook for longer and longer.

    And if any of them aspire to lead, then some indication of actual leadership might be a good idea...
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    De Santis has to win re election in November against Charlie Crist for Florida governor first, not a given
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 11,059

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    Ryan's certainly no Labour supported either
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415

    *update 🐎

    By my sums Malc, Stodge, MoonRabbit 1 win each so far

    Wooooooooooooo
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    HYUFD said:

    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    De Santis has to win re election in November against Charlie Crist for Florida governor first, not a given
    Trump has to survive until 2024, also not a given.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,081
    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
    Then again, the Tories trying to double down on the populist nonsense they’ve inflicted on us these past few years, without the clown’s previously deft touch with the audience, raises the chance that once the people get our say they’ll be put out on their ear for a generation.
  • My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    Purlease take the trouble to link to tweets if you are going to post them. What is the point of a twitter handle which you know perfectly well vanilla thinks is a vanilla handle
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    There’s never a good time to suffer a leadership crisis

    This precise moment, tho, is uniquely painful for Tories

    The only people who can remove Boris – by pressure or process – are Tories. Here’s a dispatch on where senior Tory heads are


    https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/15/uk/boris-johnson-parties-scandal-intl-cmd-gbr/index.html
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,709
    Nigelb said:

    HYUFD said:

    Nigelb said:

    Trump v DeSantis look increasingly likely, with the latter using the antivaxxers to outflank the great Florida Orange.

    https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2022/01/14/desantis-uses-conservative-lifeline-as-trump-sours-on-him-1405741

    De Santis has to win re election in November against Charlie Crist for Florida governor first, not a given
    Trump has to survive until 2024, also not a given.
    Biden also back ahead of Trump 43% to 41% in new Redfield poll

    https://twitter.com/RedfieldWilton/status/1481672585096146946?s=20
  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 11,059
    tlg86 said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    Pinch of salt required. How many sexes does he think there are?
    Ryan's posted a lot in support of Johnson. He's an airline pilot who's used his massive furlough time not being a lockdown denier but critiquing much of what he sees as the Covid theatre going on. He was one of the few to post in support of the PM's covid record the other day.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 91,392

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    That's amusing, but kids parrotiing something they have heard is not actually compelling.
    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
    I don't think Hodge's point was so simplistic, given he has talked up Tory chances and talked down Labour chances many many times for years, on the grounds the latter were not 'getting' important things about the public. I read it as that No 10 are treating this like a normal political scandal, where some functionary saying 'Not great, but technically ok' provides enough for MPs and the Tory faithful to defend the position, and enough public to go along with it. But that he would argue on this occasion that normal approach will not work - what people think happened, and what they think of Boris's shitty excuses about it, is already set. So even a whitewash report will not get the members and public on board like they usually would.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
    Then again, the Tories trying to double down on the populist nonsense they’ve inflicted on us these past few years, without the clown’s previously deft touch with the audience, raises the chance that once the people get our say they’ll be put out on their ear for a generation.
    Indeed Truss as PM. With Frost, JRM and, presumably, Patel in the 3 great offices of State, may actually confirm the view that the Conservative Party is simply utterly unrepresentative of the views of Britain in the 2020's.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    Not just Twitter.
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-60003805
    One senior MP described how on Friday, during a standard school visit, he was asked by a group of nine-year-olds whether or not the prime minister was going to resign, and then was catcalled by teenage pupils about Boris Johnson's behaviour...
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    The Man he's got one over with a smirk and an untruth is tens of millions of ordinary citizens.
    That's what's different.
  • FarooqFarooq Posts: 10,775
    kle4 said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    That's amusing, but kids parrotiing something they have heard is not actually compelling.
    You're right, but a distressing number of adults do the same. Even on here.
  • DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
    Wow!
    Not saying that is my view. Just what I think Boris will be hoping for. I would have forgiven the misjudgements about allowing people to drink after work quite readily. The fact he lied and lied and lied about it is deeply troubling.
    What I find unacceptable is the level of stupidity of those involved.

    The Paterson saga was another example.

    Nor does there seem any willingness or ability to learn from their mistakes.

    Making mistakes might be acceptable but not learning from them never is.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    dixiedean said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
    Then again, the Tories trying to double down on the populist nonsense they’ve inflicted on us these past few years, without the clown’s previously deft touch with the audience, raises the chance that once the people get our say they’ll be put out on their ear for a generation.
    Indeed Truss as PM. With Frost, JRM and, presumably, Patel in the 3 great offices of State, may actually confirm the view that the Conservative Party is simply utterly unrepresentative of the views of Britain in the 2020's.
    Has a GOOS holder been in the Lords since ww2? Ww1?
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,081
    Breaking in the Mail:

    Mr Mills, MP for Amber Valley, told The Times: 'These people are meant to be the brightest and the best running the country. It's hard to conceive how so many stupid things could have happened.'

    Mr Bone said: 'If there were people in Downing Street prior to the Duke of Edinburgh's funeral partying, well they're prats and need to be sacked.'

    Julian Knight, MP for Solihull, said he is 'very open minded' about the idea of Johnson resigning.

    Tobias Ellwood, MP for Bournemouth East, added: 'I say to the prime minister, 'Lead, or get out of the way and step aside'.'

    Danny Kruger, Mr Johnson's former political secretary turned MP for Devizes, accused the PM of a 'callous disregard for the personal sacrifices that families were making'.

    Former cabinet member Karen Bradley said she shares the outrage with her dismayed constituents about the revelations.

    Meanwhile, one MP told the BBC: 'Many colleagues now believe Boris won't be leader at next general election... for many of us this feels terminal.'

    And a former minister added: 'Johnson is toast... if you were the chief whip looking at him you'd say he's not fit to do any other jobs in government, you wouldn't make him a junior minister, he doesn't work hard enough.'

    A Midlands Tory MP simply said: 'The inbox is bad, really bad.'
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    DavidL said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
    I've noted before that the difference is that you can't accept leaders who lie to you, knowing that you know they are blatantly lying.
    As even the school teenagers seem to have worked out.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,747
    edited January 2022
    tlg86 said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    Pinch of salt required. How many sexes does he think there are?
    According to the training I have had, only one. It's called 'pushing a gender.'
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    If we insist on a 'pro' v 'anti' lockdown binary split for people, I'm a pro. I think it was a necessary response to a grave emergency and done for the right reasons. Indeed I am heartened by what it showed - that we are prepared to put the collective good first and foremost in such a situation.

    Still, these were the type of things I could never get my head around, people forbidden to visit other people who were dying, or in care, then if they did die, forbidden to hold proper funerals. I know there were reasons but it just felt wrong to me and it still does.
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 91,392
    DavidL said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
    There are limitations on that even when we expect it aka the 'Don't take the piss' test. The issue is whether there are more people transitioning from going 'He's a liar, but' to just 'He's a liar'.

    Polling would suggest yes. A weaselly equivocation to get off yet another lie may compound that rather than provide an out. Eg why try to wrigggle out rather than brazen it out.

    Boris has proven me wrong many times, and not everything he has done is bad either, but he has been in the public eye a long time, so it may be he uses up his public goodwill soon into his premiership.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    What I find amazing is there are clearly people around Boris who think if Sue Gray says “technically no rules were broken” that will draw a line under all this. It’s not her opinion that matters. It’s the public’s opinion that matters. How can they not see this.
    https://twitter.com/DPJHodges/status/1482344827840827399

    Because they possibly have a more realistic understanding than public opinion and hope for a bit of perspective?

    So, yes of course Boris lied through his teeth and allowed/organised work parties at No 10 whilst telling us we couldn't.

    But he also got Brexit done.
    He got the vaccines right.
    He is quite keen on me going to the pub now, certainly keener than anyone else.
    My wages are rising quite fast.
    I have my choice of jobs right now.
    SKS is a boring, pompous prat.

    So, on balance, its still Boris. Never did believe he told the truth anyway, that wasn't really the point.

    Now they may be being wildly optimistic about all of this. Probably are. But it is not the no brainer Hodges seems to think it is. My guess, FWIW, is that May will not be the disaster some are predicting, not least because the Tories got hammered in the areas voting in 2019. I have not bet on this but if I had I would still be laying 2022 as an exit date.
    Wow!
    Not saying that is my view. Just what I think Boris will be hoping for. I would have forgiven the misjudgements about allowing people to drink after work quite readily. The fact he lied and lied and lied about it is deeply troubling.
    What I find unacceptable is the level of stupidity of those involved.

    The Paterson saga was another example.

    Nor does there seem any willingness or ability to learn from their mistakes.

    Making mistakes might be acceptable but not learning from them never is.
    Yeah, stupidity is always annoying. Hypocrite that I am.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    dixiedean said:

    The Man he's got one over with a smirk and an untruth is tens of millions of ordinary citizens.
    That's what's different.

    The difference is thinking you are in on the joke, and finding out you are the joke.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,145
    IshmaelZ said:

    dixiedean said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
    Then again, the Tories trying to double down on the populist nonsense they’ve inflicted on us these past few years, without the clown’s previously deft touch with the audience, raises the chance that once the people get our say they’ll be put out on their ear for a generation.
    Indeed Truss as PM. With Frost, JRM and, presumably, Patel in the 3 great offices of State, may actually confirm the view that the Conservative Party is simply utterly unrepresentative of the views of Britain in the 2020's.
    Has a GOOS holder been in the Lords since ww2? Ww1?
    Lord Home. Admittedly briefly.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,081
    DavidL said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
    “Not this”, comes the answer.
  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739
    Boris Johnson won by defying the rules – and that is how he has lost. My Sunday article for @Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/boris-johnson-breaking-rules-parties-b1993800.html
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,585
    HYUFD said:

    MrEd said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    MrEd said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    For a start, that tweet risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The replies below it are pretty damning not just of the nurse but Labour’s attitudes to lockdown. All it has gone and done is reminded people that, under Labour, the restrictions would have been more severe and there would have been far more “Jenny’s”.

    Secondly, and this I think shows more of a fundamental issue for Labour, who thought it would be good politics to send that tweet? It should a complete lack of understanding of how people are likely to react. It was like the Labour leaders who thought that comparing David Cameron to Gene Hunt was a fantastic idea.
    A cautionary reminder that it is all relative and that SKS is still shit except by comparison with bj
    And that Labour is still a party of the North London, Guardian-reading masses and public sector professionals. You can’t win an election that way.
    No but the Tories probably can't win another election as the party of austerity at the moment either.

    So that means at least a hung parliament unless the Tories repeat the low tax, big spend populism of the last general election and no restrictions on the vaccinated
    The Conservative Party can easily reinvent itself to quickly remove the vile stench of Big Dog. I'd rather they didn't.

    With the right leader they could elicit a majority. Although, at the moment they do have some rather nasty hurdles to overcome before the next election, but don't forget Johnson would have had these without Partygate, and the pirate known as @BartholomewRoberts was banking on an increased Conservative majority.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    Nigelb said:

    DavidL said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
    I've noted before that the difference is that you can't accept leaders who lie to you, knowing that you know they are blatantly lying.
    As even the school teenagers seem to have worked out.
    Or to put it another way, most voters realise that their individual votes change nothing.
    But when their PM effectively says to their faces 'you are impotent to do anything about my behaviour', they might just change their minds.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    HYUFD said:

    MrEd said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    MrEd said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    For a start, that tweet risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The replies below it are pretty damning not just of the nurse but Labour’s attitudes to lockdown. All it has gone and done is reminded people that, under Labour, the restrictions would have been more severe and there would have been far more “Jenny’s”.

    Secondly, and this I think shows more of a fundamental issue for Labour, who thought it would be good politics to send that tweet? It should a complete lack of understanding of how people are likely to react. It was like the Labour leaders who thought that comparing David Cameron to Gene Hunt was a fantastic idea.
    A cautionary reminder that it is all relative and that SKS is still shit except by comparison with bj
    And that Labour is still a party of the North London, Guardian-reading masses and public sector professionals. You can’t win an election that way.
    No but the Tories probably can't win another election as the party of austerity at the moment either.

    So that means at least a hung parliament unless the Tories repeat the low tax, big spend populism of the last general election and no restrictions on the vaccinated
    You can't do low tax but big spend!
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 49,614
    MrEd said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    See Emily Sheffield’s comments in the Standard last night. The ERG is already teeming up with newly elected MPs worried about their seats and others. They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?
    Despite his wealth and upper-class persona, Rees-Mogg does have something of a knack for understanding the cost of living issues for average people. He’s also a successful money person from his previous life, there could be a lot worse people out there as Chancellor candidates.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    I think dixiedean's explanation for this is spot on - Boris Johnson has offered himself up as a scapegoat for everyone's pain, hurt, grief, loss, annoyance and anger that they have stored up over the 22 months of the pandemic, and now that the pandemic is over (thanks to vaccination and a milder variant), they finally have some time and space to come to terms with what they've suffered. And now it is all Boris Johnson's fault. And by extension the Conservative Party's fault for having such a useless and dishonest leader at a time of national crisis.

    If this is right, then it's an epochal shift in political sentiment to rank alongside the Winter of Discontent, Black Wednesday and "There's No Money Left".

    The next election would also be an opportunity to test how much Tony Blair contributed to the landslide of 1997, or whether John Smith would likely have won a similar scale of victory.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    IshmaelZ said:

    dixiedean said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
    Then again, the Tories trying to double down on the populist nonsense they’ve inflicted on us these past few years, without the clown’s previously deft touch with the audience, raises the chance that once the people get our say they’ll be put out on their ear for a generation.
    Indeed Truss as PM. With Frost, JRM and, presumably, Patel in the 3 great offices of State, may actually confirm the view that the Conservative Party is simply utterly unrepresentative of the views of Britain in the 2020's.
    Has a GOOS holder been in the Lords since ww2? Ww1?
    I mean, don't get me wrong, that line up is so implausible that not even the Conservative Party could seriously contemplate it.
    But it's what was being speculated above.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,763
    IanB2 said:

    DavidL said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
    “Not this”, comes the answer.
    Mainly from those who would never, ever have voted for him anyway though.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 66,747
    edited January 2022
    IshmaelZ said:

    dixiedean said:

    IanB2 said:

    kinabalu said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    A truly chilling sentence from Parris there. I read that in the actual paper and when I put it down my clammy prints were clear to see.
    Then again, the Tories trying to double down on the populist nonsense they’ve inflicted on us these past few years, without the clown’s previously deft touch with the audience, raises the chance that once the people get our say they’ll be put out on their ear for a generation.
    Indeed Truss as PM. With Frost, JRM and, presumably, Patel in the 3 great offices of State, may actually confirm the view that the Conservative Party is simply utterly unrepresentative of the views of Britain in the 2020's.
    Has a GOOS holder been in the Lords since ww2? Ww1?
    Last was Lord Carrington, 1982.

    Previously Home (Foreign Secretary 1961-63).

    Several in the 1920s - Curzon, Halifax both spring to mind. (Edit - also the Marquess of Reading.)

    Can't think of anyone other than a Foreign Secretary who has been in the Lords since 1902, however, with the 48 hour exception of Home.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,065
    DavidL said:

    Stocky said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    tlg86 said:


    Julia Hartley-Brewer
    @JuliaHB1
    ·
    3h
    It's not about the parties...

    If No10 thought it was vital for us all to be locked down, businesses closed, schools shut & unable to see our families, WHY DID THEY THINK IT WAS SAFE FOR THEM TO HAVE PARTIES?

    Because they knew it WAS safe.

    Yet they locked all of US down anyway.

    As has been pointed out before, this annoys both extremes. Some like JHB think that it proves the measures were too severe, and those who think the government endangered lives/the NHS.
    Yes. Look at this simply appalling tweet

    https://twitter.com/UKLabour/status/1481679941456515079

    Sorry it is a photo of text so you'll have to click it. Meant to be a story of heroic virtue (NHS nurse refuses pleading husband access to dying wife on No 10 party day) instead reads like the Milgram experiment and leaves you thinking how the fck did we do that to ourselves? And we did it with SKS cheering to the rafters.
    Chilling isn't it, "For the greater good of everyone else". And the nurse thinks she has the moral high ground by the overly officious applications of "laws" which were only meant to be guidelines and therefore leaving no room for common sense.
    I am also amazed that we did not pick up on the staggering spike in deaths in May 2020 at the time. It seems like half the country snuffed it and we didn't even notice.
    A bit later in December 2020 this death happened in Nottingham, as a student party was policed.

    BBC News - Tom Miller: Hiding student fell to death at illegal lockdown party
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-58070838

  • Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,739

    If this is right, then it's an epochal shift in political sentiment to rank alongside the Winter of Discontent, Black Wednesday and "There's No Money Left".

    As was noted the other night, this is the values equivalent of Black Wednesday.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    DavidL said:

    IanB2 said:

    DavidL said:

    My son just said, “Boris Johnson is a liar”

    So party gate is now at year 1 primary school level of cut through.

    @ThatRyanChap

    But everyone (Primary aged children excepted) has known that BoJo is a liar, basically forever.

    It's just that the standard response was to either ignore it, or even celebrate it as part of getting one over on The Man.

    So what's different now?
    That was kind of my point. SKS and many others say Boris lied. And the public reply, of course, he's a politician. What did you expect?
    “Not this”, comes the answer.
    Mainly from those who would never, ever have voted for him anyway though.
    The polls - and the reports from constituency parties - indicate otherwise.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,081
    CNN: The Conservative Party is being forced to ask itself some very difficult questions at an incredibly hard time. Johnson is not a normal politician. It is simply impossible to say whether or not these scandals have cost him his ninth life, or if one year from now he will still be in charge.

    Either way, Johnson, his government and his party face a horrible few months of pain that will likely get worse before it gets better. The harsh reality is that whatever the party decides to do, it will be an uphill struggle from now until the next general election -- which they could well lose.

    Between now and then, the party somehow needs to find the enthusiasm, energy and drive to gear up for a number of political fights. If it doesn't, then it's likely a new era of politics awaits the UK, as the party that oversaw austerity, delivered Brexit and tried to change the image of an entire nation, is swept from office and replaced with something very different.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 61,574
    Sandpit said:

    MrEd said:

    Scott_xP said:

    I don't want to give anyone nightmares, but...

    David (Lord) Frost’s resignation as Johnson’s Brexit minister is a highly significant telltale of the way the wind is blowing among the Brexiteers and former members of the ERG (the so-called European Research Group) . Liz Truss has been wooing them assiduously and it’s rumoured that should she become prime minister Frost wants to serve as her foreign secretary. I suspect Jacob Rees-Mogg would develop an ambition to be her chancellor.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tory-right-will-decide-when-johnsons-time-is-up-zwfv02njr

    See Emily Sheffield’s comments in the Standard last night. The ERG is already teeming up with newly elected MPs worried about their seats and others. They have the numbers so why would they support something like Truss who, to many, backed Remain and has May v 2.0 stamped all over her? Why not put in your own person?
    Despite his wealth and upper-class persona, Rees-Mogg does have something of a knack for understanding the cost of living issues for average people. He’s also a successful money person from his previous life, there could be a lot worse people out there as Chancellor candidates.
    Rees-Mogg the populist.
    LOL
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    Scott_xP said:

    Boris Johnson won by defying the rules – and that is how he has lost. My Sunday article for @Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/boris-johnson-breaking-rules-parties-b1993800.html

    That is really interesting. He thinks Dom has only recently realised that partygate is the way to slay the dragon - ie by implication that it isn't what Dom had over him at eye test time

    Mind you there's the illegal commuting DSt to Chequers which came out yesterday, perhaps it was that
This discussion has been closed.