Be careful what you want. Just a week ago, televised leadership debates had been a no-brainer for the Conservative party. An opportunity to introduce their candidates to an audience that would otherwise have known little about MPs looking at the Downing Street wallpaper. A showcase for the reach and depth of conservative talent. Or maybe not. Because what the debates have revealed is not gravity but pure Levites. A group of contenders with selective memories, fighting like rats in a sack and barely agreeing on anything. If you know little, the country knows too much. The rotten entrails have been exposed.
The third televised debate was initially scheduled for Monday evening. Until someone realized that this would clash with the third round of voting. Although this could have animated the procedures for the rest of us. Instead of hearing the same five candidates reheat their tired lines and animosity for the third time in four days, we could have eliminated someone on live TV. The right danger. “You’re the weakest link. Goodbye.”
So the debate moved to Tuesday for Ready4Rish only! and Liz Truss will retire a few minutes apart on Monday morning. Almost as if it had been coordinated by Tory HQ. God forbid. Rish! He seemed tired of making fun of how hopeless Truss was; why was he so horrible with Liz in public, he had asked. Because it’s easy and the robotic truss that failed was so useless. Obs. On many occasions, his face had been the rotating circle of computer death, and he was not going to participate again until the final stages of the contest. Although if Liz got to the last two, she would gladly restart the garbage conversation.
Truss was adamant that he would not participate in any debate unless the five on Friday and Sunday were included. Which suggested that he had not understood the format of the leadership contest. Have someone explain this to you, please.
Penny Mordaunt had been happy to move on and blamed Rish for the cancellation! and Truss cannot be civil between them. Before she remembered that this was not Tory HQ’s favorite message and she contradicted herself. Rish! and Truss had gotten along too well with each other. This was! That is why the debates disappeared. Kemi Badenoch and Tom Tugendhat said nothing. Presumably because they had seen the numbers and realized they would not have been likely to participate on Tuesday. So the Conservatives pushed out a more democratic board in the interest of self-preservation.
Meanwhile, in the Commons, Boris Johnson took time out of his fantasies of being a Typhoon pilot to take on the role of prime minister for what could be the last chance. He is still likely to find an excuse to fly to Kyiv to say goodbye to Volodymyr Zelenskiy instead of running for PMQ on Wednesday. These days, the convict can choose what he likes. Obviously, chairing Cobra meetings on extreme temperatures was too boring. Especially when there were parties at Checkers.
But if this was to be Johnson’s last position, it was somehow appropriate for it to be in a debate with no consequences. A prime minister who degraded the post with lies and incompetence should end up in the futility of a meaningless censorship vote. And with its own internal contradictions. Just because the Conservative party had chosen to remove the convict as leader, it somehow did not follow that it was not able to remain prime minister and lead the government. Imagine.
There were many gaps in the back benches of the Tories for Johnson’s last hurricane, though the ever-loyal Nadine Dorries and Jacob Rees-Mogg approached to keep the flame burning for a while longer. Along with the vacant truss. Sell to the party as Boris’s candidate for continuity while happily destroying his economic history in government. Then, nothing makes sense in the modern Conservative party. No less important were the cheers that greeted his arrival from the same MPs who had spent much of the last few weeks trying to get rid of him.
The convict opened by saying he did not understand why Labor had submitted the confidence debate. The president had to gently point out to him that it was a government proposal. Johnson shook his hand (details have never been his strong point and was not about to change now) and continued to utter what was, even by his own standards, one of his strangest speeches. . Up there with Peppa Pig in her chaotic delirium. Almost as if he was still hanging from the previous day’s Checkers party as he entered an expanded metaphor for the Biggles Air Force.
Vain fantasies. Leaning on windmills like the Don Quixote of the last days. Only one totally without honor. Unaware that he was building his own monument to arrogance, he spoke of his time in office as a series of ever-increasing triumphs. A showreel of great successes rethought by narcissistic denial. By achieving far less than other governments he had demonstrated his dynamism. He had hit all the big calls right. Even before the final judgment, he could not tell the truth. There was nothing about food banks, inflation, energy prices, poverty or the collapse of public services. All we had were past glories. His 2019 election success and a Brexit that is still a long way off.
“I am proud of my leadership,” he concluded. Really? Lies, parties, cover-ups? Keir Starmer tried to gently indicate to Johnson that he was leaving in disgrace. Most of his ministers and countless deputies had refused to serve under him. It was just too corrupt. It was not Labor that had brought him out, but his own party. Eventually, he had surpassed the mark among MPs with a high threshold for the villa. Instead of bragging, waiting for such a high and wild letter that he will never have to hand out another, he should have apologized. Not just in the Tories but in the country.
But the convict did not listen. He sat with his face bitter, arms crossed in front of him as Nad shouted insults at Starmer. She is also allergic to the truth. As soon as possible, Johnson rushed to the exit. We hope to never see him again.