Tuesday 19 April 2022

Might Starmer gets his Man after all?

 So last week I wrote about how Boris would survive, undeservedly, due to Ukraine and Labour being so weak. However, today he came to Parliament to apologise and was defenestrated by Keir Starmer. 

Not that in the long term this should matter, but the way the whole partygate story is unfolding may well end up doing for Boris. Firstly, on his own terms, he has lied and been fined. For me this is a very confected story for now, but still. he was guilty as charged. 

The bigger issue is that Priti Patel was also woeful before in defending the Rwanda policy; a policy which needed much better communications than it has had. it would always be controversial but the way it was announced does seem like a dead cat to distract from partygate. Which is a shame, as doing something about illegal immigration should be very popular and is needed after generations of politicians ignoring it as too difficult. 

The real mess will be if Boris gets more fines. Keir has laid the marker now that he is a convicted liar. Apparently Boris is under investigation by the Met Police for six more potential breaches. I can see him hanging on for one more, but after that the litany of abuse will be to  much and he will resign or be forced to face an internal election at best. 

So the odds on the Survivor appear to have come in shorter during the week!

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

It is painful to watch the Mother TheresaMay acting as if she never told a porkie.

She stood up in Parliament saying the UK was leaving the EU, without a deal. She said that over and over. Despite everyone knowing she would never do that. Couldn’t do that, even if she wished. Which she didn’t. Yet even one week before leaving day, with zero preparations being made, she was saying we exit the eu, in 7 days, without a deal.

And when the eu ignored her and business disbelieved her and the opposition made huge gains by rallying the Remainers against her, she still insisted it was happening, and then, at zero hour, said we weren’t leaving without a deal.

Anonymous said...

Is anyone (Nick D?) interested in the fact that while the UK government is impoverishing its own population by refusing to import Russian gas/oil/coal, Russian gas is still flowing to Germany via - guess where? Ukraine!

And the Ukrainians are pulling out all the stops to keep it flowing!

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/missiles-fly-but-ukraine-s-pipeline-network-keeps-russian-gas-flowing-to-europe/ar-AAW8zLY

Nick Drew said...

No mystery, anon: this aspect of the status quo is Officially Sacrosanct. Think about it.

That said, I'm still waiting for a rogue actor to upset the applecart in the fog of war with a couple of well-placed bundles of semtex. And, gas prices ...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2022/02/mr-putins-gas.html

PS, the UK govt is NOT impoverishing us in the way you suggest. It has quite enough other ways, thanks

visc said...

How well do you think Supply Teacher Truss would fair against Starmer?
Both are vile creatures, devoid of morals, charisma or usefulness. I fear Starmer's unctuousness would shade it for some.

I will happily say I know less about Ben Wallace pushed as the other current "front runner". That is no positive recommendation though.

As for Boris, (from elsewhere ...)
https://image.vuukle.com/7be2fc3b-e0e9-40d3-9ac0-27c21ba272b2-b79ab7f0-e3de-4c16-894d-98ebf1092d44

E-K said...

Boris has painted a target on all our backs to save his own skin.

He must go. A vile man.

As of Rawanda. The deal with that country is that we exchange our refugees for theirs, except theirs will be the ones they can't cope with because they're ill.

Way to go Boris !

The worst Government and Prime Minister in our history. There will be worse, unfortunately.

Anonymous said...

ND - "the UK govt is NOT impoverishing us in the way you suggest"

Are not imports of Russian oil/gas/coal forbidden - de facto if not de jure?

In Australia, which does't have much oil of its own, unleaded is 90p a litre, and AFAIK tax rates are about the same. Not only that, but it gets you a greater distance as it doesn't have 10% of water-attracting, plastic/rubber seal-destroying, low-energy ethanol in it, which our E10 has.

(Most UK lawnmower/classic car users will have to find E5 btw at 20p more)

Britain is going to supply the arms to enable Zelensky to fight to the last Ukrainian, after which, like most wealthy rulers (eg Boris and our chancellor) he'll jump ship to some other country. Pity about the poor buggers, whether here or in Ukraine, who only have one country.

Bill Quango MP said...

The Ukrainians are fighting to the last Ukrainian.
THEY are asking for the weapons.
Actually begging for them.

If they don’t want them they could leave them at the border. But they do. It’s just absurd to paint the conflict as an engineered proxy war by Boris to get him out of his birthday party woes.

Boris is giving Ukraine what UKRAINE asked for? He is being praised for doing so in Ukraine. The German laggards, who are potentially offering a far greater amount of arms than us, is being uninvited.

look at congress. They have approved a lend lease bill. Similar to the ww2 one. But the new bill, unlike the Roosevelt one, lists the enemy. That is Russia.
And the bill allows the US President to send any military aid, except the very top tier of weapons, to ANY country that borders the Russian Federation, in East Europe.
The US has agreed the bill. It has passed. That’s why their heavy artillery is currently being sent. The US can send almost what it likes, to any neighbour of Russia.

Or,

The Germans are talking, quite seriously, about selling Ukraine their obsolete Leopard I tanks. Selling a tank, designed in 1965. It was a good tank. But it probably is no longer even as capable as the poor Russian T72s. The price for these mothballs won’t be very high. But they are the strategic, and conscript reserve for Germany. If they do mobilise or get serious about nato, they would need them for training and local defence. Yet, expect to see the deal go through, quite soon.

Anonymous said...

BQ - I know it's not Boris who engineered this war, it's the US State Department.

It must be said their policy of detaching Europe from Russia and killing NS2 has been tremendously successful. Victoria Nuland is worth a dozen divisions.

Ukraine in NATO is an existential threat to Russia, just as US missiles in Turkey were in 1960s (Cuba crisis). Improved US targeting techniques make a first strike attack potentially feasible if you are close enough to the target.

https://thebulletin.org/2017/03/how-us-nuclear-force-modernization-is-undermining-strategic-stability-the-burst-height-compensating-super-fuze/


"he is being praised in Ukraine".

Given that war sceptics are being "disappeared" in Ukraine just as occasionally happens in Russia, I am sure we should believe everything we get via the Ukraine government, just as we should believe our government!

Anonymous said...

Note btw that while 1 person killed in Ukraine can make the front page of the Guardian, we are happy to ask the Saudis, bombing Yemen for 7 years now, to pump more oil for us.

I do wonder what happened to the Guardian after MI5/police raided their offices and took all their computers away post-Snowden. Ever since then they've been slavish adherents of American foreign policy, while continuing to tar American domestic policy as racist "white supremacy".

James Higham said...

People need to be careful what they wish for. I mean ... Starmer? Nightmare.

Don Cox said...

Starmer and his band of ignoramuses -- I agree, nightmare.

It would certainly be good if we had an opposition full of able well-informed people, with strong policies that one could consider voting for. It's bad to have the same party in power for decades. But we don't have such an opposition.

Perhaps one might arise from within the Tory party.

Don

Anonymous said...

Coming back to this trans-Ukrainian pipeline? There is a transit payment from who to whom? Do the Russians pay (using German money) or do the recipients pay UKR directly.

All very odd with NS2 not operating (yet)

Wasn't a certain Mr Biden in the UKR not so long ago looking at energy assets?

visc said...

I really can't see that Starmer and Labour are more a "nightmare" that the Tories both are destructive and do not exercise power in my name or with my interests at heart. The sooner this tribalist bullshit stops the sooner we might have an actually representative govt (yes I know it's not the only condition before some smart alec points it out.)

But seriously it's like saying you prefer one eating one flavour of shit over another - "Mmmm No 3. on the Bristol stool chart for me, I simply couldn't consider any of the others"

iOpener said...

All of you people expecting politicians to be even human, much less honest or kind, make me laugh. You apparently know nothing about humanity or history.

E-K said...

Who said it was a proxy war for Boris ?

He's just making hay out of it.

The worst thing for Ukrainians is to prolong the war and Boris is doing it because it's popular here. "Plucky Ukrainian fighting to the last" has rung a bell with the average dimwit and Boris knows it. Saved by that bell.

I'm watching the sleazy local Swinger About Town grinding his crotch against the leg of the crazy ex girlfriend of the psycho across the road and I'm incredulous because so few can see what we're getting dragged into here.

The US (this time in the guise of NATO) can start a fight in an empty pub and has done it at least twice that I can point to. This third guy, Putin has had enough of it and has made a stand.

Here's a clue. The USSR disbanded some 30 years ago. NATO still exists. We are on the brink of nuclear war.

So who's been the problem here ????

(I am not a Putin supporter, I must reiterate yet again.)

dearieme said...

"It must be said their policy of detaching Europe from Russia and killing NS2 ..."

In contrast my own policy of detaching Britain from the EU and killing HS2 is so far only partly successful.

Patience is a virtue though.

E-K said...

Didn't shale rich America want the EU to have cheap Russian gas, Dearieme ????

Is this what Victoria Nuland meant when she said "Fuck the EU !" in that leaked telephone transcript where two US diplomats decided upon Ukrainian candidates after the 2014 coup in Kyiv ?