MAY all the gods help us, British politics is becoming increasingly like the movies in the Friday the 13th franchise. Just when you think that the evil villain has been killed off, up they pop again in the latest iteration of their increasingly tiresome bids to keep themselves in the spotlight. The only thing that ever gets killed off in British politics is a sense of shame and a willingness to accept responsibility.
The latest cartoon villain to come back from the political grave, not that he'd ever really gone, is Boris Johnson, a vain and self-regarding man who was only saved from going down in history as the UK's worst prime minister because he was followed by the equally vain and self-regarding Liz Truss, a woman who took Johnson's worst qualities and added a large dose of bonkers on top.
Johnson, or rather, according to the Times newspaper “sources close to Johnson” – so Jacob Rees-Mogg and Nadine Dorris then – has decided to return to frontline politics in order to save the Conservative party from the mess he created for it.
The report said that Johnson intends to campaign for the Tories to "take the fight to Keir Starmer”.
Of course what Johnson says and what he's really up to are two different things. As always with Johnson, the only person he wants to help is Boris Johnson.
Suggesting Johnson is "a complex character" is risible. He's very simple and easy to read. He's a corrupt, lying, entitled, man-child. Deceitful and disloyal, his lies have cost him every job he has ever held. His unethical behavior defines him, he shows no respect or loyalty except to himself. The fact that a large part of the Tory party still worships this man merely tells us how unfit and dangerous the Conservatives are as a political party in a democracy.
Johnson has no wish to see Rishi Sunak pull a rabbit out of the hat and secure a victory for the Tories at the next election. That would merely cement Sunak's leadership of the Conservative party for at least a few more years. What Johnson really wants, although he'd never say so, is a Tory defeat which is not too catastrophic.
READ MORE: Keir Starmer will NOT face Commons investigation over Lindsay Hoyle allegations
Sunak would then be driven out as party leader, Johnson could lean on a no-mark Tory backbencher to resign and force a by-election in a seat with a decent Conservative majority. Johnson could then be back in the Commons and in prime position to take the Tory leadership again, just like his hero Winston Churchill.
He'd then spend a couple of years as leader of the opposition where he'd remain in the public spotlight and be able to make outrageously grandiloquent promises safe in the knowledge that they'd never be tested by the harsh truths of reality.
In the process, he would pander to the extreme right represented by the ludicrously misnamed Reform party and take British politics into the same dark and dangerous territory inhabited by the Trumpian US Republican party.
In January, Johnson penned an opinion piece for the Daily Mail about how a Trump presidency was just what the world needs. One dangerous, unprincipled, habitually lying, narcissist who doesn't believe he should ever be held to account supporting another.
When I was young the National Front was unelectable because those thugs never hid what they were – fascists and racists. But the new far-right has been far more clever and insidious. They have infiltrated the Conservative Party and hide in plain sight, posing as the voice of “common sense”. Now they are in power and they have wrested the Labour party a considerable way along the same dark, dangerous and dismal route that they have trodden.
Today, the Conservatives are lining up to defend one of their largest donors after he was found to have made deeply offensive, racist and misogynist comments about MP Diane Abbott. Donate £10 million to the Tory party and UK Government ministers will defend you even after you have called for a woman MP to “be shot”.
Fundraising for aid in Gaza
The National's fundraiser for Medical Aid for Palestinians continues to smash all expectations, a testament to the widespread sympathy in Scotland for the plight of innocent Palestinians, trapped in a tiny territory and suffering the full onslaught of a heavily armed army, the misnamed Israeli “Defence” Forces.
The fundraiser smashed through its initial target of £15,000, its second target of £30,000, and has now easily broken through its third target of £50,000. The total raised is now well in excess of £63,000, over four times its initial target. Donations are still coming in and the fundraiser is on course to reach £75,000 by the weekend.
The money will be used to buy much needed medical aid and shelter for the suffering Palestinians of Gaza, who are cowering in the rubble of a devastated territory without adequate food, shelter, or medical care.
You can donate to the fundraiser here: https://www.map.org.uk/donate/donation-details/516
This piece is an extract from today’s REAL Scottish Politics newsletter, which is emailed out at 7pm every weekday with a round-up of the day's top stories and exclusive analysis from the Wee Ginger Dug.
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