Nearing the end of January (not my favourite month) the sky was overcast but it was dry and not raining so I took myself up my hill for an early walk. At the top of the hill I found myself looking out over a wet and soggy land enshrouded in mist.
I came home and set about editing my Beefheart book while listening to the Kills.
Meanwhile, out in Coronaland, Johnson is hovering on the brink. Just as he’s trying to come to terms with Partygate and prepare himself for the onslaught of Sue Gray there suddenly comes Muslimgate out of left-wing. We haven’t got over Bullygate either and still have Covidgate, Sleazegate, Wallpapergate and Brexitgate to come.
The common feature in them all is Johnson’s cavalier attitude, entitlement, lack of detail, lies and laziness. It all sends a clear message. You can break rules, even laws. It’s always party time. You don’t have to work hard. You just make things up. You can get away with anything.
Partygate – the cavalier breaking of rules, lying and love of partying. Wine, women and wallpaper. Arrogant superiority and disdain for the little people. We make the rules. You do as you’re told. We do as we want. It’s party time.
Muslimgate – we can be racist, rude and offensive. We pretend to be inclusive but we aren’t. We have token ethnic minorities but we don’t like them. Why do you think we wanted Brexit? We don’t like foreigners. We’re the party of xenophobia – letter boxes and sacks says it all.
Bullygate – it’s black and white. We tell you what to do and if you don’t do it you will pay. Rules and laws mean nothing. We don’t have to follow them. Blackmail, threats and nastiness are the tools of the trade.
Covidgate – we alternated panicking with complacency, did everything too late or two early, dumped the old, dumped the care homes, used it as an excuse to give billions to ourselves and our chums and killed more people than nearly everyone else. We did not have our eye on the ball, did not know what we were doing, ignored advice and cocked up. No attention to detail, coupled with arrogance and incompetence made everything much worse than it needed to be. Confusing messaging, invisibility and breaking the rules that were made coupled with failure to set examples – a disaster. Silly sound bites and exaggerated claims of world-beating this that and the other, magic moonshots and then lie about it, tell everyone it was a great success and that Johnson introduced vaccination and saved the world. In reality it has been a complete mess up and a lot of Tories made a lot of money.
Sleazegate – second jobs, revolving doors, lobbying rules broken, Cameron and Patterson, government ministers earning millions while working in the Caribbean, backhanders, illegal donations, cash for peerages, cash for meetings, cash for everything. The Cayman Isles must be groaning under the money being stashed away from all the dodgy deals we don’t know about. The Tory Party has been profiteering.
Wallpapergate – the tip of an iceberg – illegal donations from promises and deals. We’re expected to believe that these people do it for nothing. They do it because they expect stuff in return. Meals, expensive wine, refurbishment, expensive holidays. Heaven knows what else goes on in private.
Brexitgate – based on lies, unfounded promises of sunny uplands, xenophobia, racism, nostalgia for an age that never was, nationalism and fear. 5 Million Turks, Muslims taking over, Eastern Europeans taking over, unimpeded immigration. Stark horror out of the minds of racists who despise foreigners and still think Britain is not only superior but should have its empire back. So badly negotiated that it has landed us in the shit, ruined trade, loaded us with red-tape and delays, left food rotting, put costs up, created HGV shortages, nursing and caring shortages and stopped our youngsters having access to Europe for work and study. Obstacles, impediments and competition replace free trade, cooperation and friendliness. But a lot of Tories made a lot of money out of it – how many million did Rees-Mogg make??
It’s a nasty long list of malaise that all stems from one man – a self-serving clown whose character flaws, greed and gluttony have created a government of self-serving, lazy fools who think they too can get away with murder.
It all comes from the top!
So, yesterday there were another 74,800 new cases. Not exactly tumbling down is it? There were only 75 deaths though. That’s something. Though they’ll probably tell us that they forgot to count them over the weekend or that it doesn’t count people with nasty coughs.
The ONS is insistent that there have been 177,000 deaths which mention covid. But what’s 20,000 deaths to a Tory?? Let the bodies pile up!!
We’re fine. There may be a new variant on the horizon and we may lose half of our NHS staff soon who are being kicked out because they’re un, and we’ve lost 2 million days of NHS staff due to long covid, so they’ll be nobody to care for us, but we are trialling the antiviral drug from Merck!! Maybe it’ll work. The hospitals will be closed but they can pop it in the post to us.
Lord Agnew resigned. He’s been in charge of fraud. Well I bet a number of Tories have really been in charge of fraud. But he’s getting out before Fraudgate becomes investigated. It seems that he has mislaid £4.3 billion. It’ll probably turn up in some MPs account on the Cayman Islands.
Johnson will need a lot of money to maintain his lifestyle, childcare and alimony.
Stay safe – this looks like being an interesting week!! We could have a leadership contest for who’s taking over the crime syndicate!
Opher – £4,3 billion given to crooks and thieves, money that’d build hospitals, schools, improve public services, help alleviate surging energy costs, and rising prices. But yet, our grubby, grimy, gratuitous government writes it all off! It is all very despairing and wholly unacceptable!
Agnew…whether involved or not…feels it safer to go out of alleged protest than stand tall and try to recover public-money. Make no mistake Sunak must take full responsibility for allowing fraud on his watch. He must now put his head above the parapet to explain to the public what went wrong, how he’s going to amend this disaster, and what mechanisms will be put in place to ensure fraud on this scale doesn’t happen. Another Inquiry is imminent! It should be said, according to certain parties, Agnew is close with Truss and Gove. Is Agnew’s very public resignation an attempt at shoring up contenders for a potential leadership challenge by highlighting further government failures under Johnson’s incompetent, wrecking-ball lead?
Cummings gave evidence in writing to Gray today. His reason for not being interviewed, and his statement recorded, was that he felt the clown would lie, spin, and diminish his spoken testimony if it were not stated in full, in writing, where it could not be tampered with. It is a measure of the depth of distrust Cummings has in the clown, in the ‘impartial’ inquiry process, and in an inquiry system that permits BoJo to preside over the outcome of the report. I’m not a fan of Cummings – he obviously has his own agenda, and possible desire to return to government under a different leader – but he has revealed key information that the public might otherwise never have known. However damaging his submission is, it is becoming increasingly obvious that detailed evidence appertaining to the Gray Inquiry will not be made public. This will do nothing whatsoever to restore any semblance of trust in holding the government to account.
And now Muslimgate to add to the growing list of charges engulfing the U.K government. The list appears never-ending! Of course, we remember only to well BoJo’s openly-racist turn of phrase when writing for the Torygraph, but what I don’t remember is him being sanctioned for it. Perhaps now, with an inquiry due to start into these abhorrent allegations, BoJo will be scrutinized far further. It is also a strong possibility that his testimony will be sought during the investigation as he did not act upon the complaint when it was first made. Seems another chicken is coming home to roost.
I think you’ve summed BoJo up very well Opher. There”s nothing more I could add to the character profile you’ve discussed above. He is a grubby, hollow, duplicitous little man of ignoble character and compromised values. In no way a leader or statesman, is it little wonder the Tory government is in complete disarray!
Roll-on day 702!
DN
I am beginning to think that he won’t survive the week. There is too much garbage building up around his door. He’s got away with murder for two years and now it’s all coming together.
Although the man is a clown, a chancer and a devious scumbag he is only the tip of the iceberg. Behind him, lurking in the shadows, are an even worse batch of very nasty people. They are profiteering nationalists with entitled arrogance who feel they have a right to control us. They don’t serve they manipulate. They’ve been pulling the strings on our chancer of a puppet. We’ll see who they select to continue their gravy train.
I see the MET are now involved…could court cases follow?? It’s about damn time too if you ask me! Senior officials should be named and shamed, and dismissed. Characters who have ‘moved-on’ from senior roles to new jobs in the private sector should not be exempt from disciplinary action either. BoJo should just go…he will never regain the public’s trust. His constant lies, his lack of delivery on promises, his dysfunctional leadership caused by incompetence, his contempt for rules and democratic process, his sleaze, corruption, obfuscation and deceit (the list could go on and on) is all there is to this miserable mishap of a man. 62% of the public want him gone.
The papers suggest Gray’s report may be paused whilst the police investigate potential serious rule-breaking, and criminal activity, at certain party’s. I’d like to see the MET extend its investigation to at least cover the unlawful issuing of PPE contracts via the VIP Lane as well. Their net should be cast far and wide. Destruction of evidence – WhatsApp messages particularly – appertaining to this shit-show must also be taken into consideration. Delaying the Gray report – with no indication how long that will be, or indeed, how long the MET will investigate for either – will not diminish public anger, nor persuade potential swing voters to vote Tory. People want to have faith in who their vote supports. I think BoJo is delaying the investigative reports so that its conclusions won’t further impact on local elections in May. The idiot just doesn’t get the fact that voters feel the urge to defecate, or vomit, whenever his name is mentioned. The upside to delaying the report for those not Tory voters, is that allegations without conclusion will continue to damage the reputation of the nasty Tory Party still further. I want them to become insignificant, unelectable, obselete, and ultimately ruined.
Quite how the civil service will address the findings that might implicate members remains to be seen. If they want to restore public trust, disciplinary action must be taken against those guilty of rule-breaking.
The options for who might be replace the Clown are slim to say the least. There is certainly no pool of talent to choose from in the current cabinet! God help us!
DN
From what I gather these will not be court appearances but fines meted out for illegal gatherings. It’s more the aspect of lying to Parliament that will be the serious issue. That should be a resignation matter but we’ve seen him break law after law; I suspect he’ll brush it off.
They’ve moved from saying there were none, to saying he wasn’t there, to saying it was only for a short while and they’re trivial and not really parties. Their defence is now moving to – we need to leave this behind, we’ve got big issues to deal with – the Ukraine, cost of living etc. But what could be more important than the integrity of our leader?? Nothing!! He has no integrity left! He can’t lead!
It’ll be Rishi the slimeball!!