A warning to Gove and Johnson - we won’t forget what you did

[BeyondGeography]

Jonathan Freedland

It’s gripping, of course. Game of Thrones meets House of Cards, played out at the tempo of a binge-viewed box-set. Who could resist watching former allies wrestling for the crown, betraying each other, lying, cheating and dissembling, each new twist coming within hours of the last? And this show matters, too. Whoever wins will determine Britain’s relationship with Europe.

And yet it can feel like displacement activity, this story of Michael Gove, Boris Johnson and Theresa May – a distraction diverting us from the betrayal larger than any inflicted by one Tory bigwig on another. Now that the news cycle is measured in seconds, there’s a risk that 23 June might come to feel like history, that we might move on too soon. But there can be no moving on until we have reckoned with what exactly was done to the people of these islands – and by whom.

This week’s antics of Gove and Johnson are a useful reminder. For the way one has treated the other is the way both have treated the country. Some may be tempted to turn Johnson into an object of sympathy – poor Boris, knifed by his pal – but he deserves none. In seven days he has been exposed as an egomaniac whose vanity and ambition was so great he was prepared to lead his country on a path he knew led to disaster, so long as it fed his own appetite for status.

He didn’t believe a word of his own rhetoric, we know that now. His face last Friday morning, ashen with the terror of victory, proved it. That hot mess of a column he served up on Monday confirmed it again: he was trying to back out of the very decision he’d persuaded the country to make. And let’s not be coy: persuade it, he did. Imagine the Leave campaign without him. Gove, Nigel Farage and Gisela Stuart: they couldn’t have done it without the star power of Boris.

He knew it was best for Britain to remain in the EU. But it served his ambition to argue otherwise. We just weren’t meant to fall for it. Once we had, he panicked, vanishing during a weekend of national crisis before hiding from parliament. He lit the spark then ran away – petrified at the blaze he started...

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/01/boris-johnson-and-michael-gove-betrayed-britain-over-brexit#comments

[LeftishBrit]

1. k&r

[TubbersUK]

2. K & R n/t

[Igel]

3. It's not the "leader". Not in a democracy.

If he's a demagogue, call him that and say that the populace was mislead and deluded to vote for him.

If he's not, just say that the electorate screwed up.

You can't say "the people have spoken" and then blame a single person for their speech.

[pkdu]

4. Boris Johnson - Political Arsonist n/t