Poor Boris

[Namechangervaver]

He looks like he hasn't slept for a week. I never thought the day would come when I'd feel sorry for Boris and think that Trump sounded professional (in his press conference today). Everything is upside down. We're fucked, aren't we?

Even now

Wonder if Michael Gove would stand up and give his anti expert speech now! Doubt it!

I think there is a thread about this phenomenon in Relationships by Reality.

She explicitly said that you should never stay with someone just because they're a bit better than your ex.

I don’t know why some posters are focusing on Jeremy Corbyn. He is not PM.
I am more concerned about the incompetent idiot in charge of our country.

What do people want from a leader? They don't expect them to know everything, solve everything but they do expect clarity, authority and empathy

This. I watched Macron address France and OMG he could not be more different than Boris. People are scared. They want reassurance, someone who acts like they know what they're talking about, someone with gravitas. BoJo could not be further from that. Dishevelled, exhausted looking, red rimmed eyes, and then there's the slogans and blustering and soundbites. I don't WANT THAT.

And the Irish PM. He was ministerial. We just don't have that in Boris. And that worries me greatly.

And Spain's Pedro Sanchez (it helps that he's extremely handsome too, sorry to be shallow!). Seriously, he has won a lot of new fans in Spain for how he has handled this crisis. Because he is decisive, reassuring, he speaks to the nation with some heart, like he really really cares.

And then we have Boris. Scary.

Trump sounded professional !!! He was talking about hospital ships which are apparently " Big white ships with red crosses on them "

Can you imagine how Obama would have handled this? I would have felt so comforted if he was our PM.
He's so reassuring and wonderful

Obama is a planner and his administration reportedly initiated planning for pandemics, so yeah. Much better.

www.businessinsider.com/trump-appointees-trained-pandemic-response-in-2016-2020-3?r=US&IR=T

@potholeparadise

Wow- one of them "fell asleep"? how utterly depressing these idiots are in charge of a country. God help us.

I don't feel sorry for him at all.
He is a liar, a snake oil salesman and a charlatan, who is unfit to water pot plants, never mind lead a country.

Ya'll got what you voted for.
Good luck with that.

AlexisCarringtonColbyDexter

Yup. The situation isn't looking good here, but one thing I will say for Johnson, is he's perfectly willing to delegate to someone else. I personally suspect that in the first weeks, he delegated to Cummings rather than, you know, any epidemiologists, and we will suffer for that.

Trump, on the other hand, is not someone who takes advice. He refuses on principle, and getting Trump to implement a carefully drafted public health policy is probably on par with getting an angry toddler to put his shoes on when he doesn't want to. I am very concerned for American friends.

Trump, on the other hand, is not someone who takes advice. He refuses on principle, and getting Trump to implement a carefully drafted public health policy is probably on par with getting an angry toddler to put his shoes on when he doesn't want to. I am very concerned for American friends

You are absolutely spot on with this. Nailed it. I'm worried for them too.

Absolutely. Trump won't listen to advice. I read an article that said the whole Administration know they only have to say nice things to him, they have to big him up, they have to make sure they tell him he's doing a wonderful job etc. He will never listen to advice and changes his mind on a whim.
So
I blame them for enabling him.

And I do hope BoJo has good advisers behind him because he is only the front man, and hopefully he takes advice from them.

I suspect hes realising that Thatcherism plus austerity from the Tories over the last 30 years is going to contribute to this disaster. Expecting people to behave decently in shops and asking currency speculators and disaster capitalists nicely to think about society before they short the pound is laughable. They wont do it. Plus the chronic underfunding of public services in the name of austerity has left us with no safety net. Hes been left holding the baby his own party's policies have led to now the shit has hit the fan.

Poor fucking Johnson? You are having a laugh. He epitomises hubris and deserves to catch the virus, run out of bog roll, and die alone in a plastic bubble. His self interest, sense of entitlement, arrogance --- utterly irredeemable and I loathe him in case you hadn't noticed.

No sorry, I don't buy Boris needing two experts at his side at all times. The leaders of other countries have a clear plan for their people, Varadkar and Macron exude confidence and the feeling you are in safe hands.

Boris Johnson has taken a slightly more serious demeanour yet still acts like the court jester. He speaks with no conviction or clarity. He has made a turnaround in his approach after five days, a travesty! The approach he was highly criticised for yet chose to proceed with. His ineptitude could have caused untold irreversible damage for this country.

As for Patrick Vallance, he was less than convincing last night. He used a lot of assumptive language about his approach which has already made a drastic u-turn since Friday.

The turnaround in approach was due to new scientific modelling from Imperial College:

ftalphaville.ft.com/2020/03/17/1584439125000/That-Imperial-coronavirus-report--in-detail-/

The new strategy has come following the publication of a government-commissioned report from Imperial College London’s COVID-19 Response Team, which models different strategies and outcomes, focusing in particular on the UK and the US.

Note the words ‘government-commissioned report’.

Just shows that commonsense isn't useless. How many people were saying a week ago that we needed measures to reduce the spread but were told the scientists how modeled it and the controlled spread was what we needed. Controlled my backside with mass gatherings going on.

Still no lockdown in London, in fact “zero chance” of it. Still no plan for kids supposed to be taking exams, still no plan for people who are on zero hours contracts and won’t get paid. Still no plan full stop. They’re making it up as they go along. Arrogant fuckwits.

I do feel as if we are being experimented on

They’re making it up as they go along

Or they're still trying to do something akin to 'herd immunity' with more stealth after the outcry. Same plan, different optics.

Well of course they are making it up as they go along. What part of this is unprecedented in peace time are folks misunderstanding. There ain’t no manual on how to do this.

There are other countries to follow, ffs. China’s almost eradicated it now. They didn’t do that by keeping schools and offices open and allowing people to go round supermarkets like a plague of locusts.

Another speech of BoJo saying a lot about nothing.

allowing people to go round supermarkets like a plague of locusts

Why are they letting this insanity go on day after day? An enclosed space crammed full of people with children, many of whom are probably carrying the virus, spreading it onto other people's shopping and skin.

A perfect example of the lack of serious thinking from Johnson and his advisors.