Carrie Johnson - time to resign

[PersonaNonGarter]

I realise she isn’t an elected politician, but Carrie Johnson gives me red mist. It’s a combination of her smug OW-ness and the flat refurbishment and general influence on the staff hires at Number 10. And the fact that she is so unaccountable.

YABU - it’s misfired anger, Boris is ultimately responsible for everything including his wife

YANBU - she has agency and influence and hiring an £££ interior designer was hardly Boris’s idea was it

@HeadPain

What was she before? Head of Tory communications? What is she now? Anything?

Head of Tory communications who claimed expenses she shouldn’t have. Treating her friends on CCHQ funds and got found out. Makes me laugh that some posters on here are making her out to be a saint. She’s perfectly well suited to lying, scheming Johnson.

Surely Johnson' ability to have affairs has now been curtailed?

Surely being Prime Minister he has security around him all the time and has to coordinate movements? Or maybe thats what he was doing for much of the pandemic causing him to miss those Cobra meetings?

I feel sorry for Marina, his second ex-wife who was recovering from cancer when Boris and Carrie had that ridiculous boho woodland wedding like a pair of teenagers in love.

I wouldn't feel too sorry for Marina - she was also an OW and iirc Boris just about managed to extricate himself from his first marriage and marry Marina before she gave birth.

Like attracts like - Boris and Carrie both seem to exist in a moral vacuum

@Knickynackynoo

I think people seem to forget what she did before rebranded herself as animal rights activist, barefoot bride......sharpest elbows and most forked tongue of the lot of em!

What did she do?

Should she be a good little wifey then and just gaze lovingly at her husband in photo shoots and then go home and bake cookies?

Straw man much? No one said that. No, she should stick to her own career and / or interests, at least in public, much like Dennis Thatcher, Samantha Cameron, Philip May, Norma Major et al. Of course she might want to be a SAHM and that’s between them, but there’s no requirement on her to bake cookies. She just doesn’t belong in political meetings or arguing with advisors. But as I said, it’s on him to make sure that doesn’t happen.

They are both ghastly amoral freeloaders and she does appear to have some influence on appointments, but yes the current shitshow is all on him as PM.

I want him gone and she will go with him so no need to worry about her, let's get him out.

Surely Johnson' ability to have affairs has now been curtailed?
HAHAHA

Makes me laugh that some posters on here are making her out to be a saint

Not a single person has done that as far as I can see. She is most definitely not a saint, quite the opposite. What people are pointing out is that by casting her as a lady macbeth type figure responsible for his decisions, the blame is shifted from Boris Johnson and allows him to get away with the current shit show. It's part of his schtick, the harmless bumbling buffoon who means well but just somehow keeps making poor decisions that most definitely aren't his fault.

I’m always really pro women and never blame them for men’s choices but I cannot bear CJ. The sight of her smug face gives me rage.

Obviously I also loathe Boris. Absolutely disgusting human being. I met him when he was Mayor of London and he was equally as odious in person. Rolled up completely unprepared and like he’d fallen out of bed. I couldn’t believe the general amount of fawning around him.

Another poster said it - did critics of Theresa May blame Philip, or of Margaret Thatcher, Denis?

Private Eye parodied Denis in their Dear Bill pages as a gin-soaked buffoon under the thumb of his wife. You could see that they were really getting at Mrs T herself. Now when Blair came along, they parodied Blair himself as a trendy vicar.

Bet Marina is sniggering over her cornflakes think I would be in her shoes. Well out!

Bah, she's a pain, but if you really think she's the problem, not the sentient haystack she married, then YAdefinitelyBU

(BTW - anytime Boris says anything decent about environmental policy (remember COP26 all those years ago?) - that's Carrie's doing...)

@PersonaNonGarter

In the ‘Cheese and Wine’ garden photograph, Carrie is sitting with Boris, Dominic Cummings and Martin Reynolds. We are explicitly told by Downing St that this was ‘work’.

Why is it ok to have views on the three individual men (and I do) but not hold views on Carrie? Or discuss her influence? Clearly, she has a lot.

This isn’t a thread asking who has ultimate responsibility.

There's a huge difference between holding a person doing a job responsible and blaming family members for their influence. Like, if my mum gives me some advice about my job, I can take or leave the advice but if I do follow her advice and it goes wrong, then I'm the one to blame not my mum.

She shouldn't have anything to resign from but it is so obvious she wants in on the power. Constantly hovering and giving speeches on things which have bugger all to do with her.

Sometimes I wonder who the real PM is with her hanging around all these "work meetings" with the government.

There's a huge difference between holding a person doing a job responsible and blaming family members for their influence. Like, if my mum gives me some advice about my job, I can take or leave the advice but if I do follow her advice and it goes wrong, then I'm the one to blame not my mum.

@StrangerThanSpring but then again your Mum (or spouse and child) wouldn't be attending "work meetings" with you, as it has nothing to do with them and they shouldn't have been there (but then again we all know it wasn't a work meeting ).

I have the feeling- might be wrong- that he's under her thumb, like many older men who have 'bagged' a younger model, and can't quite believe that someone her age wants to be with him. I suspect it will be all 'Yes dear, no dear, three bags full, dear'.

As an aside, they weren't married at the time of the party. They were not even engaged. She was his girlfriend at the time.
The constant reference to her being his 'wife' is in present time, not May 2020.

@EarringsandLipstick

This is a horrible thread. As well as stupid.

I don't have any great opinion of Carrie Johnson. But she's Boris' wife. That's it. She is not an elected political figure with a position to resign from. Save your ire for those who deserve it.

And absolutely there's misogynism seeping through post after post. Another poster said it - did critics of Theresa May blame Philip, or of Margaret Thatcher, Denis?

Totally this.

To turn it on its head, I suppose by this yardstick Clementine Churchill was responsible for any successes her husband had during WW2 or that Violet Attlee is remembered for the foundation of the NHS?

I'm not impressed with what I've seen of CJ, but this is not on her. If Boris has allowed her undue influence, it is still on him.

She clearly has alot of influence.

She has a 'appointed' her own circle of friends to roles in the government, without them going through the normal channels of appointment.

Other PM's spouses have had their own jobs, completely away from government. She was even given a platform at the last Tory conference to speak. Bizarre.
If she wasn't married to B this would not have happened, I'm sure.

I see the article from Prospect says she championed Allegra Stratton.

@CPL593H The women you mention did not have a former career working for their parties, and didn't need to use their spouse as a leg-up to further their own political ambitions.

You are making comparisons that don't exist.

@GreenLunchBox
"Anytime a woman is criticised it's framed as misogyny here....."

I agree with you.

Apropos of Carrie - I don't like when women have affairs with other women's husbands. Particularly when children are involved.
Was Marina the OW when Boris was married to Allegra ?
As for Boris 🙄

@Blossomtoes

She is not an elected political figure with a position to resign from

That’s the entire point of the thread. Unelected, in Downing Street through marriage, yet apparently exerting political influence.

Evidence of this?

And then where does she 'resign' from?

If as a spouse she's engaged in discussions and activities with her husband, then she's doing exactly as many spouses have done before her, including the male spouses mentioned in my last post, who are never assessed in this way while the (female) office holders are derided.

I see the article from Prospect says she championed Allegra Stratton.

That went well then!

We are explicitly told by Downing St that this was ‘work’.

And it's crystal clear that they are lying!

Even so, you would absolutely be able to find a photo of eg Blair plus advisors plus Cherie.

It can't be taken as proof of anything.

I do think you've a valid point overall, but you are making it poorly and without evidence.