Didn’t that narcissistic bloody fool Johnson see what was coming? Didn’t that great strategic brain of Dominic Cummings see it too? Didn’t anyone at CCHQ? Apparently not. Let me spell it out. The old fashioned Labour heartlands whose mines were closed, whose factories were left idle, who felt betrayed and abandoned by the two main parties are unlikely to vote Labour and would rather die in a ditch than vote Conservative. As politics abhors a vacuum in gushes the same fetid racism, false promises and general nastiness of UKIP in the fraudulent form of a new shiny limousine that is the Brexit party. The Tories don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell in winning these seats but they have convinced themselves not only that they can but that they will. Worse, they are prepared to sacrifice Remainer Tory seats in the process. And then, shock horror, Farage announces that unless the Tories unconditionally accept a No Deal Brexit he will fight them to the political death, which would split the vote and lead either to a hung parliament or a Corbyn government.
But Farage would always have found some way to to achieve the same end. No form of deal would ever be good enough. He has a well funded party and a simple message. And it will be catnip to the ERGS.
So please will someone tell me what is the point of calling this foolhardy and dangerous election? It is blindingly obvious that to call an election without even the fig leaf of a done deal is meat and drink to the Brexit party. Johnson could have got his deal through which would exploded the need for them. He could have had a glorious Spring election and wiped the floor with them. Now he will ensure that Farage will be elected to the Commons and will be a rallying point for the nutters.
The slogan ‘let’s get Brexit done’ is just bloody stupid. He could have done it and he hasn’t. It’s his own damn fault. So we are having an election because Parliament had the audacity to ask for a little more time to scrutinise it.
Now it seems that Johnson is ruling out a no deal Brexit. For the likes of most sentient beings this is an overdue and sensible move. But for the Spartans this will be seen as a betrayal. They view it as the not so secret weapon that will terrify Brussels. The shaky coalition between Johnson and the carpet biters could be at an end. The moderate wing of the party has been ethnically cleansed so all One Nation promises will ring hollow. The Sunday Times will make an interesting read tomorrow.
This is going to be a nasty, divisive bad humoured election which will descend into the People versus Parliament, (and don’t for get those traitor judges), the elite against the innate good sense of the common man. There will be panic policies which cannot be afforded, wild promises that cannot be kept, U turns, crash landings and probably violence on the streets.
Johnson hasn’t yet destroyed the Conservative party, merely hastened it’s demise. This election is about the egos of two totally unprincipled men who will do anything and promise anything to get elected. They have written off the Union. They would sell out Northern Ireland and have effectively ceded Scotland to the SNP. And then there is Corbyn the Marxist, the friend of the terrorists who will not lift a finger to stop the antisemites who are taking over his party. He will have a terrible election. He did well in 2017 simply because commentators thought he would be a disaster. Now expectations, which he can’t possibly meet, will be higher.
It goes without saying that ITV have lost all sense of judgement in just having a head to head with with Johnson and Corbyn. Jo Swinson is wrong to claim sexism and would be wiser to argue that the LibDems are serious players who once again could hold the balance of power or form a government. But she has an advantage. The public will see two badly briefed, bad tempered white males who won’t answer a straight question behaving appallingly on live television. They will be rightly disgusted. When her time comes she will wipe the floor with both of them. Her challenge will be to keep her policies moderate and be the only true champion of Remain. Panic will begin to set in when her polls start moving north.
There will be a lot of tactical voting in this election. Most of my friends who have been Conservative all their lives will be voting for Libdem. This could be Jo Swinson’s moment. She must be unafraid, call out the liars, and and keep it simple. I wish her well.