Liz Truss has resigned. Part 3: The Return of the King?

[sunnydaytoday0]

Continuation from last thread.

By Monday we could have a new prime minister, and by next Friday at the latest.

Will Sunak win this time, or could Johnson get his old job back? Would the Tory members once again go against the wishes of the MPs?

And yes I think Johnson sees himself as some sort of world king..

Charles Moore, Andrew Neil, Max Hastings and now David Frost. There's a long record of former employers and close colleagues of Boris Johnson advising others to stay well clear.

will hunt lose his postion to rishi?

So far Hunt has made the right noises which had the effect of stabilising the market. His track record for actually doing things which yield positive outcomes is not good. He has demonstrated that he does not have what it takes to win a leadership contest either. Rishi was ideal as Chancellor and still would be. He does not have party leadership potential either but he knows his economics. Bringing the right people into the right roles is going to be the biggest challenge for the eventual winner because it is a broad church irreversibly divided.

Johnson only has 48.

Rishi has comfortably gone to 101.

Even on Guido's spreadsheet Johnson only has 71. What's more, since the markets moved around 24 hrs ago, he has only gathered 10.

It could get interesting yet.

Smarkets latest -

Rishi - 1.28
Boris - 6.0

That’s a huge drift for Boris.

Betting odds as a graph - Boris in red, Rishi in green.

Guido's spreadsheet has 59% declared.

Assuming there's still as many Johnson backers left to declare as a % that would put him on 121.

If you assume that supporters came out early for him, it could be a lot tighter on the magic 100 than you might think.

That certainly would tend to echo with the tone of the newspapers last night and him ringing around everyone.

And only 55 of those are named nominators for Johnson. Sunak has far fewer anonymous supporters and has comfortably passed the threshold without them.

Adam Bienkov at adambienkov
Sunak looks on course to win a majority of Conservative MPs. Even if Johnson gets over 100 (which looks likely, but not certain) the party would surely be ungovernable if he was then installed by the membership against the clear wish of MPs.

More on the online voting process and the security concerns around it: www.bbc.co.uk/news/63344131

Barclay supporting Sunak

smarmy reece mogg trying to persuade telegraph readers that the tory members should get a choice.

It must be said that there is a fair amount of potential for smash-and-grab corruption/interference this time around given the unusual conditions and timeframe. I'm not sure it is possible to watch out for it either.

Even if Johnson gets it that’s a lot of MPs who didn’t choose him.

Cos he's got such a zany hairdo. I thought everyone knew that was the most important thing?

Robert Peston at peston
Swayne, who endorsed Braverman and Badenoch last time, is backing Sunak and not Johnson. Which may be significant

To explain. Desmond Swayne is a key member of the ERG.

With the most right wing of the party lacking a Braverman or Badenoch as candidate, the expectation might have been they would come out for Johnson. Clearly that's not a certainty now and it will be interesting to see which way other ERG members jump. This one is a blow for Johnson's hopes for sure.

Mogg is out of the Cabinet if Sunak gets in, along with his deregulation fantasies. No wonder he backs Johnson, he couldn't do it fast enough.

In terms of sources for numbers so far: can people please remember that Guido is utterly full of shit. I wouldn't trust it if it said the sun was going to rise tomorrow.

Swayne is the one who looks like a 1950s car dealer? Surprised he didn't plump for Boris Johnson.

Nick Robinson at bbcnickrobinson
To run or not to run. That is the question facing Boris Johnson. I suspect he may only finally decide at the last minute after writing down the case for & against as he did with Brexit …

Running could allow Johnson to make a Churchillian comeback, claim vindication & make it easier to block, overturn or water down the findings of the Privileges Committee on the grounds that it would spook the markets to destabilise a sitting PM but …

He can’t be sure he’ll win. The Tory press did not call for him to be crowned again & his first month back would be dominated by the need to choose whether to make cuts or raise taxes or both (markets don’t do cake-ism) & by televised hearings about whether he lied about parties

Not running preserves the Johnson story Boris fans tells themselves - “Popular undefeated PM who delivered on Brexit, Vaccines & Ukraine brought low by coup about cake” - and allows him to keep earning £150k/speech. Tricky choice

Remember that he pulled out of running to be leader in 2016 just 9 minutes before the news conference launches his leadership bid leaving his backers in tears. He may not yet know the answer himself

Is Johnson going to make Nadine cry again?

Full of shit and his real name is P. Staines which always gives me a smirk. Staine by name stain by nature. Can't believe how much legitimacy he's given. And he doesn't even live in the UK.

Guido also supplies a probable best case scenario for Johnson. Which at this point is useful to a point.

See my last post about the numbers and calculations over whether he will run.

Boris is not looking to outdo Rishi. He is looking for the magic hundred. The rest will take care of itself. Well, in the short run anyway.

It would make sense for the ERG (outside of Rees-Mogg as he just wants to retain a cabinet position) to support Sunak. Don’t forget how he got his start, Cummings installed him. Cummings is the architect of Vote Leave and Sunak is his guy. Gove also wants Sunak for the same reasons. Expect ERG are concerned Johnson will push ahead with the green agenda which they hate also.