The fines were levied and have been paid. None, it seems, have been contested: those who broke the law in Downing Street and elsewhere in Government have effectively admitted their guilt. And as adherence to the law is part of the Ministerial Code, the calls for resignations have come, from all parties bar the Tories, and aimed especially at alleged Prime Minister Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson. But here a problem enters.
My papers will support whichever f***ing Tory Party they want, c***
For our free and fearless press, resignation of one of their own cannot be countenanced. To use the Stateside vernacular, Bozo may be an SOB, but he’s
their SOB. Having a journalist - well, for some value of “
journalist” - in 10 Downing Street, and one who is prepared to allow those who scrabble around the dunghill that is Grubstreet to please themselves when it comes to ethics, or lack of them, will not easily be let go.
So it was that Bozo’s lawbreaking was played down. He was sorry, really sorry. He was honestly so fucking sorry. The Murdoch
Sun summed up the approach, of which we will see more as more fines are levied: “
I’M SORRY … BUT I HAVE WORK TO DO”. He’s sorry, BUT. And this is a big but. He has to “
Tackle Vlad, energy crisis”, as if “
Vlad” gives a flying foxtrot what Bozo thinks. He’ll do sweet Jack about the energy crisis, too.
And they'll do it by lying, if need be
But it is the
Mail that has not merely excused the first Prime Minister to break the law while in office, but let us know just how desperate the next General Election campaign will be. “
Boris was there for nine minutes, Carrie less than five. The birthday cake never left its Tupperware box. And last night the PM rightly apologised. As the left howls for resignations over Met’s £50 Covid fines … DON’T THEY KNOW THERE’S A WAR ON?”
Thus the mark of the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre, once more attempting to bend reality - and his audience - to his iron will. For the UK, there is not “
a war on”, and in any case the excuse is fatuous: Britain changed PM during The Great War, and over the course of World War 2 there were two changes, if you count the endpoint as VJ Day.
He's sorry, BUT Vote Tory, mugs
More recently, Mrs T was removed by the Tories during the build-up to the first Gulf War. The
Mail talks well, but lies badly: Bozo, by all accounts - like that of the cops - spent an hour at that party. Trying to make Downing Street sound like an oasis of frugality by chucking in a “
Tupperware box” is irrelevant deflection. But it does provide an insight.
It brings the kind of insight that the Labour Party would do well to note: when push comes to shove, the right-leaning part of the Fourth Estate can be relied upon not only to shore up the Tories, but to shit all over any and all opposition. Like they did to Neil Kinnock in 1992, to Ed Miliband in 2015, and especially to Jeremy Corbyn in 2019. Like they did to Thames Television over
Death on the Rock - because it questioned Mrs T’s judgment.
The
Sun editorial, added to the
Mail’s lead, shows how Tories will be talked up: “
Boris Johnson has apologised - now he should get on and deliver on his promises … Now let’s deal with real issues … a huge, unwanted distraction … Tory MPs … are in no mood to ditch their wartime leader over a few chocolate mini rolls and a chorus of Happy Birthday”.
Contrast that with the
Mail’s anti-Semitic assault on the memory of the late Ralph Miliband. Paul Dacre and Rebekah Brooks have let slip the firepower they are prepared to unleash come the next election. If Labour think they will escape that,
they’re in cloud cuckoo land.
Enjoy your visit to
Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by becoming a Patron on Patreon at
https://www.patreon.com/Timfenton
This is it isn't it? SKS and his handlers and advisers seem convinced the right wing press will endorse his leadership and the labour party at the next GE if he grovels to them enough. If this isn't a wake up call, if Bozo at al breaking their own rules after lying to parliament that you did nuthin' wrong guv' isn't enough to make them realise the RW press ain't gonna do anything except screw them over and invoke the ghost of the winter of discontent then I don't know what will.
ReplyDeleteIt won't.
I mean, he could of course appeal directly to the electorate with an offer THEY want *(you know, decent wages, well funded NHS, better employment rights etc) but we've already heard from Reeves that that ain't gonna happen either.
Well, Tim, the present Labour Party IS in cloud cuckoo land. Just look at its Quisling "leadership"....and its apologists. All of whom will get worse as a general election approaches.
ReplyDeleteOh sure, there'll be the occasional ritual outrage knowingly - as now - going nowhere. There might even be an odd nod to policy decency. But none of it will add up to more than standard red tory treachery and betrayal by the likes of Nandy, Ashworth and Reeves. Gobshites all.
Corporate media will continue peddling far right lies and propaganda, its dead faced clerks obediently on their treadmill of cowardly malevolence.
Britain has been ruled that way for almost 43 years now. There isn't the slightest indication of any improvement. Quite the opposite in fact. Britain has become a country of wilful ignorance and cultural cowardice, a client of the homicidal maniacs who own the USA.
So no surprise, then, when those who make the law choose to break it with impunity. Except for a derisory fine and a minor faction fight.
It doesn't take much prescience to see where this is all heading if there isn't a complete re-set of social and political culture.
By all means get rid of the current gang of thieving liars. But that's of little use if the only replacement is the Sam Giancana Gang.
Boris Johnson has apologised - now he should get on and deliver on his promises
ReplyDeleteHe never has before.
Funny how so many on the right claim to be tough on 'law and order'. But only when it's for someone not on their side of the fence, of course! Bodger Johnson not only broke the rules. He and his sidekick Sunak broke the law! The very law they crafted and told others to abide by. The very law others were fined for.
ReplyDeleteShould I get arrested, I will do a Daily Mail and claim there are more pressing matters than prosecuting me. I wonder how that'd go down with PC Plod?
Some reports say there are more fines to come.
ReplyDelete@iMatt: you could always claim to be having a mid-life crisis which should at least get Sarah Vine springing to your defence…
ReplyDeleteThe press is populated by Walter Duranty's who shill for the powerful. These people cannot be pandered to or convinced, unless you become their puppet.
ReplyDeleteStarmer needs to remind people what the Brexiters promised at every opportunity, "where's the £350 million? Where's the reduced bureaucracy? You promised lower energy costs?" etc.
Labour needs to take the gloves off, and fight fire with fire.
This country is not at war in Ukraine, there are always several wars in the world, respectable persons do not allude to the war in Yemen, and the Prime Minister changed during the First World War, twice during the Second World War, during the first Gulf War, and four times during the war in Afghanistan. For that matter, the Prime Minister has changed twice during the unmentionable war in Yemen.
ReplyDeleteIf there is a case for keeping Boris Johnson in post, then it is that Rishi Sunak is out of the running, leaving only the trigger-happy Liz Truss, who, moreover, remains a liberal fundamentalist economically as well as internationally. If the Official Opposition were offering an alternative of economic equality and international peace, then that might not be so bad. But it is not.
£50 was how much you had to burn in front of a homeless person if you wanted to be let into the Bullingdon Club. No doubt, it still is. While these parties were going on, then people who were doing the same thing were being fined 10 grand, although even that much would hardly hit Sunak in the wallet, would it? Still, this is all very low level. It is not like being late for an appointment at the Job Centre because the bus was late. You would be docked more than six times as much for that, and rightly so.
How about a class action to reduce everyone's fixed penalty notices for breach of the lockdowns to the same level as those imposed on the Prime Minister and on the Chancellor of the Exchequer? No suggestion that there should never have been any such penalties. Just that everyone's should have been the same.