The car's on fire and there's no driver at the wheel - The Tory leadership elections

proving to be the most prescient UK tv program ever!

Hot take - the most likely candidates don't actually intend to follow through on the promises they're currently making, they just understand the value of pitching to their party before pitching to the country. Unlike, say, Liz Kendall or Yvette Cooper who tried to do the opposite.

what could possibly go wrong

Matt is right that Johnson's tax proposal isn't really a proposal, it's a statement of which wing of Toryism he's aligning himself with. the on the nose-ness of it, plus the current media strategy - don't engage with the media - feels like he's trying to create the same procession that led May to the leadership. I don't see any way he ends up unopposed but he might well hoover up a bunch of the other candidates and shorten the ballot process.

i also think he's reasonably explicitly demonstrating to the faithful that he wants to go full Trump/Bannon and it's just crazy enough to work as long as he can get to the final 2. i don't think any of the potential opponents are seriously going to try to attack him from the left.

But then after already pissing off vast swathes of the electorate he should be trying to win over for the sake of 40 odd thousand head-bangers, he has to do a damaging policy u-turn in a GE cos he didn't really mean it. It doesn't seem a good strategy to me.

obv he isn't thinking that far ahead - but he should be. and they have to let him out of that box at some point as well.

His approach is working so far, but then the great British media allows Boris to get away with shit no other politician would dream of even attempting to get away with. I only hope the infidelities, abortions, illegitimate children, coke, sexual harrassments, racism is going to be flung in his face when he does stick his head above the parapet but I wouldn't bet on it and, a la Trump, I'm not sure anyone really cares.

he has to do a damaging policy u-turn in a GE cos he didn't really mean it

He may calculate he can pivot without much damage, he may even be right. There might not really be that much calculation to it

But also if your trade is in identity and persona then policy isn't even all that relevant, so what if you u-turn

He’s *possibly* toast at the next GE because Labour people in his constituency have been running an unseat Boris campaign for two years.

some of the noise from his camp has been about how he is still the one nation liberal tory who was mayor ...blah blah .. and the only way they can project this nonsense by keeping him out of sight. That is the Boris they'd pitch to the electorate imo .. and maybe Trump style stuff wouldn't be by design and maybe they'd calculate he could get away with some of it .. but going full Trump/Boris would be a complete fail imo. When people say he's popular with members, don't forget that is such a small number these days they daren't even disclose it out of embarrassment and good lot of them are probably dead!

Would be so sweet if Johnson pulled a Balfour and lost his seat while PM

Hot take - the most likely candidates don't actually intend to follow through on the promises they're currently making, they just understand the value of pitching to their party before pitching to the country.

It is probably true that they either already know "renegotiate the backstop or No Deal" is nuts and doesn't make sense, or will find that out just like May did, and similar may apply regarding tax plans etc; but I'm not enjoying watching the press gamble the entire country on this without asking any questions more relevant than "what posters did you have on your wall when you were 14" while we helpless onlookers try to uncover traces of the line between "pretending to be recklessly dictatorial and cronyist for votes" and "actually being recklessly dictatorial and cronyist", and I imagine it's not winning us a great deal of goodwill on the EU side, or indeed Scotland.

(Or from any other non-Westminster-and-maybe-DUP govt/institution except Trump, and if anyone thinks his momentary blurtings of apparent goodwill are worth a thing, well...)

Yes, none of this matters because there's nothing I can do about it and we all need to sit through it and not scream ourselves too hoarse to make some kind of futile protestation afterwards that it wasn't actually our fault.

is such a small number these days they daren't even disclose it out of embarrassment and good lot of them are probably dead!

A third of them might be dead, a third of them are pensioners many of whom may not have actually paid any attention to politics since 1981, and a third of them are Brexit Party entryists swelling the ranks to vote for the looniest loon. Yay!

I think there's a good chance he or at least the party is toast at the next election btw but I can't see us getting a GE any time soon because they know that, and even the "never Boris"/"never No Deal" Tory MPs are probably "never willingly giving up a seat by voting no confidence" Tories long before they're never anything else.

CH has been keeping its own list of declared MP supporters: https://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2019/06/leadership-election-candidate-support-numbers-hunt-27-johnson-19-raab-13-gove-12-javid-10.html

the winner of the leadership race gets potentially 3 years as PM before having to win a general election. they've got little reason to be appealing to anybody beyond their membership.

Maria Miller, who is backing Dominic Raab to be Tory leader, says allegations which led to him signing a Non-Disclosure Agreement were brought "vexatiously". Under the terms of the NDA, the other party can't dispute that claim. #r4today

— Kevin Schofield (@PolhomeEditor) June 11, 2019

The NDA refers to sexual harassment claims brought by a woman. The judge who granted it was Tom Tughendhat’s father Justice Michael T, who should have recused himself from ruling on his son’s friend’s case. #RevokeA50 #StopRaab

— Kate Makuen FRSA 🖖🏻 (@VesperUK) June 11, 2019

could this finally derail #tugmentum

SV to thread!

Mark Harper’s leadership launch material is certainly different pic.twitter.com/xJWmP9AXOp

— Jessica Elgot (@jessicaelgot) June 11, 2019

(I said "I think there's a good chance <Boris> or the party is toast at the next election btw" earlier but even that strikes me as too optimistic now - but I have done enough howling at the moon and clutching my tinfoil hat on this thread already so I'll try to shut it with the "we're doomed" for a bit)

Interesting that not-so-keen-on-Brexit types Ed Vaizey and Oliver Letwin are listed as backing Gove. Then again I was already confused by the Cooper-Letwin Bill because iirc Letwin shares the hardcore Brexiteers' desire to see the NHS sold off. Maybe that's just a given for a Tory these days. I guess Gove, Vaizey and Letwin were all "Cameroons".

(my parents live in Letwin's constituency and their elderly neighbour waited 5 hours for an ambulance while lying on a cold stone floor with a possibly broken back - the neighbour's son drove down to the south coast from Up North quicker than the ambulance got there from 20 miles away - so they were going to write to Letwin, and I sort of felt that they should, but also sort of didn't want this saga to be recited as an example of how the NHS is failing and rip it apart already)

Nah I think your posts were very otm spacecadet and you should post in these threads more!

If anyone remembers, Letwin was the guy photoed dumping confidential papers in St James’s Park(!) so maybe it’s as well ye didn’t contact him
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/oliver-letwin-caught-throwing-away-85337

I think anyone coming in realistically knows they can't be an unelected pm for 3 years and face the prospect of remainers tanking every no-deal brexit/hard-brexit they try and get through parliament, as before. There simply has to be an election much sooner, unless they can compromise even more than May was willing to which would make a joke of all the tough talk. Or as McVey suggested just go full dictatorship and don't allow any more parliamentary votes!

Donald Tusk: “Please do not waste this time.” pic.twitter.com/6rqOXrHbI9

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) June 11, 2019

dear god

more like a scrawny, tb-stricken fox with three legs and lead shot embedded in half its face

or a strigiform with acephaly issues idk

Simplified Brussels view on Tory race:

Johnson - generally regarded as the devil incarnate
Gove - very much on the pantheon of hated Brexiteers
Raab - negotiated a deal and then quit to vote against it

When you get down to Javid and Hancock I doubt many here have heard of them

— Jon Stone (@joncstone) June 11, 2019

What about Cunt?

That's on a previous tweet - basically Amber Rudd thinks he's a respected statesman but no one in Brussels respects him due to his first major intervention being to compare the EU to the USSR.

Wasn't it Hunt that made the Slovenia/Slovakia mixup "Soviet vassal state" booboo? And then said in his pitch video that he was the right man for the job because if people didn't get the details right the EU might not give us the best deal? Arf.

japanese/chinese mixup as well, but was about his wife tbf!

also keeps insisting his surname begins with an 'h' which is clearly untrue

For good or ill, Rory Stewart would absolutely annihilate Jeremy Corbyn in a general election.

— James O'Brien (@mrjamesob) June 11, 2019

only one of them has walked across afghanistan and speaks dari tbf

xp, lol, “for good or ill”

I see we’re back to this narrative

I’m well aware of his voting record. The support for austerity et al stinks. But Corbyn *couldn’t beat Theresa May* & Stewart’s at least a hundred times more impressive than her.

— James O'Brien (@mrjamesob) June 11, 2019

Only one of them has eaten cold Tesco own brand baked beans straight out of a tin.

Given that Rory Stewart is never going to be leader of the Conservative Party it's like one of those pointless, "Would a zombie beat a vampire?" pub conversations.

.@RoryStewartUK electrified this tent. He delivered the most coherent and lyrical launch speech of any candidate. On this showing the Tories have found a proper star. But they will reject him, because his “moderate” views are out of touch with his party. Labour will be relieved

— Robert Peston (@Peston) June 11, 2019

Only one of them can boast this key life experience

He is also a friend of the Prince of Wales and was holiday-tutor to Princes William and Harry when they were schoolboys. He accidentally locked himself in the loo on his very first night at Highgrove - the key snapped and he had to be rescued by Charles's Special Branch bodyguards while Charles himself hovered nearby in his dressing gown, fretting.

These people are paid to comment on UK politics btw.

Mr Jame Sob has been a cunt as long as I’ve been aware of him. Peston just comes across as a bit thick.

LOL seeing as Islington North boasts 100 different languages spoken by his constituents, and he’s reasonably good at other languages, if Corbyn doesn’t know how to ask someone how they are in Dari (which is basically Farsi) I’d be pretty surprised.

If theres anything that recent political history of UK indicates it's that folk are crying out for a moderate Tory PM.

Oh wait no

xp Corbyn speaks Spanish fluently!

He certainly does!

I'm sure mr O'Brien has a very broad criteria for what makes an "impressive" pol, but I'd imagine not being called Jeremy Corbyn or being ever so slightly to the right of centre-left would be a good start with him.

Anyway, here’s the only proof you need:

Is @RoryStewartUK looking for the cat-lovers vote? 🐈🗳️

The Tory leadership hopeful's been spotted outside Number 10 patting Larry the cat ahead of a Cabinet meeting.

Latest on the race here: https://t.co/hlfeB6YEeT pic.twitter.com/G5JyoFT0D7

— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 11, 2019

cats are a bit like tories, ruthless vermin and overrated!

I think most people are currently underestimating how much of a potential menace Stewart is. The more I see of him the more I suspect that he has the same kind of sociopathic, authoritarian, self-righteous, narcissistic traits as Blair. Blair deceived many initially by hiding behind a façade of photogenic reasonableness. Being photogenic is obviously not a tool at the disposal of Stewart, but he is doing much the same thing with his shtick of eccentric, cheeky-chappy approachability.