11th January 2021
Individuals were arrested, prosecuted and convicted for doing just what the Prime Minister and his circle did at his garden party.
Individuals made unimaginable sacrifices not to see loved ones at critical moments because they did not do what the Prime Minister and his circle did at his garden party.
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And last week, government supporters insisted that the Colston Four clearly broke the law and should be punished, regardless of what any jury said.
But this week, government supporters say that things are not clear and so we really should wait for Sue Gray’s report to tell us if there was any wrongdoing with is garden party.
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These tensions – contradictions – cannot hold in any sensible polity.
I’m just gonna keep posting this Frank Wilhoit observation given it so perfectly explains all these events.
“There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.”
— Colin Elves (@colinelves) January 11, 2022
What's that old quote…?
"For my friends everything, for my enemies the law"
— Alex McLaughlan (@alexmclaughlan) January 11, 2022
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Or, at least these things should not hold in any polity.
The concern must be, in this horrid period of hyper-partisanship that such utter inconsistencies are not only permissible, but routine.
That like some say of Covid – one now has to get used to living with this anti-politics.
The only hope for sensible politics is that the Prime Minister will be undone by his hubris and is not replaced by another hyper-partisan leader.
Otherwise there is no point replacing one Johnson with another proto-Johnson, for the same problems will continue.
For the real problem is not so much Johnson – but the political context that enabled him to become Prime Minister and keeps him as Prime Minister, notwithstanding the obvious faults and dishonesty.
And until and unless that permissive context is addressed, then we may just end up with more of the same.
There is something rotten in our polity – and Johnson is as much an effect of that as a cause.
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You need to add: Brace, brace. at the end.
The positive is that a lot of Conservatives have come out strongly against the Johnson. The leader of the Scottish Conservatives had been clear that he needs to go if the allegations are true.
I don’t think that overall the Conservative party is corrupt. Theresa May had many faults but she was not personally corrupt. It’s unlikely the next leader will be as dishonest as Johnson.
The problem may not be that they are all corrupt, rather many are vorrupt and virtually all of the rest ( of the pcurrent parliamentary party) are complicit.
As MPs they should expect to be held to a higher standard, of which (virtually) all are falling far, far short.
It is hard not to be incandescent with rage , but also exasperated with Johnson and his government’s ability to ride this out and the British public’s acquiescence in it. He will survive short term. We are told we get the government we deserve. What did we do to be so punished? Corruption is now just so egregious and blatant. But according to the law even if he is defenestrated something like 60,000 Tory association members, average age 75, predominantly Telegraph readers, will determine the UK’s next Prime Minister. Welcome to UK democracy.
“We are told we get the government we deserve. What did we do to be so punished?”
You elected him.
I think the full Wilhoit quote merits a read by the way for those not familiar with Greshams law it states that “bad money drives out good”
“There is no such thing as liberalism — or progressivism, etc.
There is only conservatism. No other political philosophy actually exists; by the political analogue of Gresham’s Law, conservatism has driven every other idea out of circulation.
There might be, and should be, anti-conservatism; but it does not yet exist. What would it be? In order to answer that question, it is necessary and sufficient to characterize conservatism. Fortunately, this can be done very concisely.
Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit:
There must be in-groups whom the law protectes but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.
There is nothing more or else to it, and there never has been, in any place or time.
For millenia, conservatism had no name, because no other model of polity had ever been proposed. “The king can do no wrong.” In practice, this immunity was always extended to the king’s friends, however fungible a group they might have been. Today, we still have the king’s friends even where there is no king (dictator, etc.). Another way to look at this is that the king is a faction, rather than an individual.
As the core proposition of conservatism is indefensible if stated baldly, it has always been surrounded by an elaborate backwash of pseudophilosophy, amounting over time to millions of pages. All such is axiomatically dishonest and undeserving of serious scrutiny. Today, the accelerating de-education of humanity has reached a point where the market for pseudophilosophy is vanishing; it is, as The Kids Say These Days, tl;dr . All that is left is the core proposition itself — backed up, no longer by misdirection and sophistry, but by violence.
So this tells us what anti-conservatism must be: the proposition that the law cannot protect anyone unless it binds everyone, and cannot bind anyone unless it protects everyone.
Then the appearance arises that the task is to map “liberalism”, or “progressivism”, or “socialism”, or whateverthefuckkindofstupidnoise-ism, onto the core proposition of anti-conservatism.
No, it a’n’t. The task is to throw all those things on the exact same burn pile as the collected works of all the apologists for conservatism, and start fresh. The core proposition of anti-conservatism requires no supplementation and no exegesis. It is as sufficient as it is necessary. What you see is what you get:
The law cannot protect anyone unless it binds everyone; and it cannot bind anyone unless it protects everyone.”
― Frank Wilhoit
I’ll say again that the answer is straightforward: simply prosecute him (and most of his cabinet) for misconduct in public office.
That will not only remove Johnson and the Johnsonites, but it should remove the spurious idea that crime should not be prosecuted just because it stinks of politics.
Some police areas actually have it as their official policy: South Yorkshire police have actually said: “Prosecution of this offence is not appropriate where there is disagreement over policy or direction.”
The voters are unlikely have their say until 2024. In the meantime Mr. Johnson may be ousted by his own party. Every day 15% of conservative MP’s delay sending their letters to the chair of the 1922 committee is likely to adversely affect the party’s (political one this time) standing with the electorate.
Would it be too much to ask candidates wishing to be Mr. Johnsons replacement to pledge to live with the wallpaper in the Downing Street flat to assist in reducing the level of public expenditure?
As a (fairly) unreconciled Remainer, the schadenfreude of watching Johnson get his comeuppance should be fairly satisfying.
Unfortunately, I have a nagging 1970s political conspiracy movie type feeling that the leaks against Johnson are being orchestrated as part of a campaign to replace him with Truss (or worse) in good time before the next election.
Like a neutron bomb, this could wipe out Johnson and his coterie while leaving the rest of the parliamentary Conservative party untouched. Contrast that with potential questions about how PPE contracts were allocated – which could usher in Labour if it were the trigger for his departure.
I’m not sure that Dominic Cummings (or whoever it is who has drip fed details of the events to the media) should be able to choose our country’s leadership.
It is understandable that workers in Number 10 during the pandemic needed to blow off steam – they were doubtless working 90 hour weeks beforehand. And during the lockdown, alternative venues were unavailable.
So – I doubt whether attending a garden party should be a resigning matter. The whole moral panic about this affair has a sordid 1980s hypocritical News of the World feel to it. Particularly as many of us know people who honoured the rules in the breach at the time, working under considerably less pressure.
Are you assuming here that most MPs would know what the word ‘polity’ means?
I believe much of this goes back to Trump. It was from his success that Johnson learned the crucial lesson that if you don’t volunteer to be held to account, no-one can make you. Before 2016, it simply didn’t occur to British politicians that this was an option: that when caught in a lie, you can just shrug and move on.
Forgive me if I misquote you, David, but my impression has been that, in the past, you have defended our lack of written constitution – a position that you’ve explained to my satisfaction. Is it perhaps not now time to have a few basic, but inalienable, tenets enshrined in a constitution-of-a-kind, the first being that all people are equal under the law and that the law applies equally to all people, whoever they may be? Because it appears currently that this is not the case, in this, democratically advanced, country.
[I hope I’m not coming across as a modern-day Tony Hancock]
But there are only proto-Johnsons left in the so-called government. Change to stablity is surely more likely if Bojo judders in place until 2024, stacking up the contempt against him till then.
The Economist reckons that the importance of Brexit as the prime source of partisanship in the UK is fading. Though the ERG keep blowing on the embers- Brexit is their raison d’être and they fear a U-turn- may not prevent the dulling down of Brexit as a National Idea and as time passes, more eyes will open to see the project for what it is.
The perceived lack of inspiration from SKS betrays his care and efforts to take back the middle ground. Again, we are better waiting another two years before the electorate must choose.
The British press & electorate made this bed, the ERG wet it; you will all have to lie in it a wee while yet if you want to walk again.
I really don’t care about No 10 partying. Seems just another Yah Boo Sucks yelling match. So, they get rid of Johnson – so what – within a week we will be back to going nowhere, cheap bodged up politics. We have far more serious problems.
We have a huge backlog of chicken coming home to roost – Grenfell, Housing, Healthcare, Social Care, Education, Brexit, Energy etc etc. All brought about by failing to face reality and lying about it. Any excuse to kick any and all these problems into the ‘too difficult’ long grass will be a boon.
Underlying the very long culture of incompetence and lying is the fact that we as a country are not making enough money – as a country we need to go and get a better job. How we do that is the really difficult question.
While people don’t understand money and where it comes from we’ll never solve these problems.
We are not spoiled for choice anyway. Looking back from say Thatcher, we had Major and Haig who have since mellowed into human form, but: then Smith (!) Howard, Cameron & May, then Johnson!! Dear god, I am the only one who finds each of them rather strange? Would you take a drink with any of them? And now Liz Truss =:-{
Despite their regular wins -middle England is staunchly conservative you know- something is badly wrong with the Tory party selection process. You must be strong willed for the post, but imagine if a strong character with a Southgate common touch were in place, the inspiration and the power they would have to get stuff done…. no, wait….
Maybe the real problem here is that, instead of talking about the real challenges that real people are facing (cost of living, inequality, the on-going Covid calamity, Brexit and the damage its doing, housing and of course climate change) we’re instead all debating a garden party and trying to heap the blame onto one particular individual in the mistaken belief that if he goes everything will somehow go back to normal, whatever ‘normal’ is these days.
The crisis in this country is the Conservative party and the media that supports by failing to properly hold it to account. In any other western democracy, a governing party would not survive damaging its own people’s wealth and health to the extent this Conservative government has over the course of the last 11 years with multiple crisis either of its own creation (Brexit, austerity, Hostile Environment) or greatly exacerbated but their malign management (Covid).
What we have instead is a system whereby if a favoured Conservative politician has a blazing argument in the early hours with his pregnant girlfriend the press will investigate his neighbours. Where if a worried parent berates a Conservative PM for his child’s treatment in hospital the massed forces of the media will scrutinize the child’s father. What we have is a system that, if maybe 4 newspaper editors decide enough is enough because even they are too embarrassed by the current PM’s antics, 18 month old story’s they’ve been sitting on suddenly see the light of day.
What can we do about a media that chooses and promotes a complete and proven imbecile as PM then, 2 years later, decides he’s not fit for office after all? Maybe we should be less inclined to pay any attention to that media.
Tl;dr, a pretty good case there, see it daily and what is far more of a concern, see it in the commons more than it should be.
The problem as I see it, is we have Brexit, it has split this nation asunder, it was designed to do this by the Tories who in claiming unchallenged they had a mandate at the referendum when clearly none existed then went on to agitate against a sector of the people who disagreed with the very idea that leaving the EU would be good for them and the nation driving a further wedge into our social structure and at the same time burning down as many bridges as possible in a sort of scorched earth policy between the EU and the UK.
This sort of thing does not happen by accident, nor does it happen because one lunatic is parachuted into #10. it happens after years of careful planning and execution of a policy designed to do just as we see. break our society to the point where not only do people today just want Brexit done so make no tangible objection to it, they make no objection to anything the government does as seen with Covid, the NHS, sleaze and indifference. Every few days there is yet another well-crafted scandal hurled from the walls of #10 into the media pit for the dogs to savage while behind the cover of the screams, Tories quietly get on with the task of dismantling our democracy from its root upwards.
But here’s a thing missed by so many, The EU has made it plain they will not entertain any form of application from a country so afflicted unless a. there is an unchallenged majority. b. There is serious and unchallengeable political reform in the UK so as to prevent any chance of Brexit or anything like it ever happening again. Put simply, if you want in then you had better prove you mean it and why would they waste their time otherwise.
As for Johnson, I would not waste your own time on him at all, they will hang on to his sorry carcass for grim death because he still serves the purpose he was put there to serve, he entertains the masses and diverts their attention from where they should be looking. should he and his cabinet be arrested and charged, of course they should, the crime was obvious, it took place under the noses of Met police officers ordered to keep quiet, but they won’t be, some political fudge will be constructed and the stench will fade away quickly. The sudden twitch from Dick’s minions made to indicate they are looking into it all bares that out giving Johnson yet another door to hide behind and all he has to do then is bluster his way through a few PMQ’s and he’s home free.
Yes the law should protect all and leave none untouched but it won’t, where is the precedent for dragging a sitting PM out of #10 in chains, never happened and never will.
No Mr Green. Although there are many root causes of why we find ourselves in this mess, one of the main causes is Johnson himself. I don’t think he should be underestimated. He has not arrived at the position of Prime Minister by accident, he has schemed his way through, step by step, taking every opportunity to promote himself, to create and maintain the “Boris” brand while at the same time undermining those unfortunate enough to be above him. I believe he has three photographers on the government payroll so there is always someone on hand to supply a constant stream of images of him as the ‘Action Man’. Of course nothing could be further from the truth – the action he should be taking is in his office and in parliament and in building international relationships, but that is too much like hard work, much more fun to put on the hi-vis and shamble round a hospital or vaccination centre and be the “Hero”.
Likewise he purged the cabinet and party of people of calibre whose challenge he needs and should enjoy, instead surrounding himself with discards and sycophants to try to ensure his security in his position. Unfortunately for him, there is always someone even more scheming, even more ruthless. Cometh the hour, cometh Cummings/Gove/Sunak/whoever else it is drip-feeding the poison to the press about him.
The sooner he goes the better. Yes the processes that have brought this excrescence to power need fixing, but that is tomorrow’s work.
By chance recently I learned of an Australian PM from the 1940s who seems to have been the antithesis of Johnson. Amongst other things he said “We have a great objective – the light on the hill – which we aim to reach by working for the betterment of mankind not only here, but anywhere we may give a helping hand” It is interesting to read this profile of him and contrast him with Johnson they could not be more different https://aph.org.au/2019/02/ben-chifley-internationalist/
Wholly agree!
Sentiments agreed.
I’ve known of the powerful corrupt, for many years, by reference to bent judges in our ‘Great British Justice System’. It is more clearly the ‘Great British Corrupt System’
There is no law that binds these people – they are the law. That is how abusive dictatorships work. It is how the UK works.
And who does one have to go to to try and remedy this corruption? Back into the den of fire, populated by the same.
Of course, there is a desperate need to stop this rotten system from rotting decent lives.
(The Johnson garden party is just one small example as to the disregard of the public, and as to whether or not they see transgressions – they know the public are weak and worthless (same for paying for it all). For the most part, the disregard of rules is hidden and blatant, such I have experienced in the UK civil courts. Masonic affiliations are almost certainly at play in that. The decent and moral have no chance of justice but become the victims of massive injustice, and no-one in the ‘system’ gives a damn.)
Will it change in UK?
I’m not holding my breath. Collective corruption beats justice every time in the UK.
When bad things happen, it’s tempting to blame the people involved. They’re the ones responsible, after all.
But what if the system (allowing for a loose sense of this term) is set up assuming everyone behaves well ?
Then, as you say, ‘the problem is greater’ than any individual.
It certainly sets us up for a lot of complaining for those times when people don’t behave well. And, under our systemless system, with no remedy.
Because although they – the bad behavers, the charlatans, the liars, the corrupt – are responsible, they are not accountable.
And whose fault is that?
” There is something rotten in our polity – and Johnson is as much an effect of that as a cause. ”
Johnson is not a cause of what is wrong, he is a product. No coincidence that Trump and Johnson – both monstrously unfit individuals – slid into the top jobs of leadership at around the same time.
The Wilhoit epigram is useful way to describe conservatism but we seem to have gone well beyond an unwillingness to be bound by law. There is a pathological avoidance of any regulation as being something that is unbearable. The model seems to be that of a Pirate Adventurer with the only code that is recognised is that the polity should be organised around the whims and needs of the Pirate.