Where is Boris?!

[SleepymummyZzz]

Why is Boris no longer doing the daily press conference? I get that he doesn’t need to do it every day but it would be nice if he showed his face once a week!

Conservative voter here, really disappointed with Boris.
Day after day he sends his cabinet out like lambs to the slaughter to answer the difficult press questions.
Bad leadership. My faith in him is gone.
Scottish FM up there every single day taking the difficult questions and leading the country.
He needs to go after this.

He could be trying to see Brexit through I suppose, but he's not someone who was ever ideologically committed to Brexit and chose his side for reasons of political expediency. I don't think he's ever actually been imbecile enough to believe the cliff edge is a good idea, but the shit or get off the pot moment is upon us. It will depend whether he still thinks taking risks is going to optimise his legacy or not, I think.

Is it possible he is hanging on to see Brexit "through"? He was elected on that premise?

He's probably banking on using Brexit to revive his popularity but the whole landscape has changed now, people have different priorities and even before Covid he looked like making a right mess of the negotiations, so I doubt his strategy will work at all.

Peregrina, I can see the argument but when I look at Cameron (everything up to the referendum then jumping having created the Brexit singularity which for all anyone knows could lead to enormous economic costs), May (the evil (to me) of the hostile environment leading to deporting British Citizens to die in another country and handling Brexit by repeatedly doing what looked like substantially the same thing again and again and again with pretty much the same failed result) then Johnson's management of COVID which might still lead to his political demise, they all feel of a piece but it doesn't look to me like she's held to a higher standard. Might be my unconscious prejudice and poor judgement, I suppose.

He's been for a secret jog today, which the DM managed to get photos of. Let's not pretend that he's too ill with post-Covid to stand up and do his job in front of the press.

@Zilla1

I am not sure, maybe, I'd have to think about that. What I was actually agreeing with was that a double standard applies to the particular qualities mentioned like chaotic love/family life, and especially the bumbling talking nonsense aspect.

When I look at the replacements and the previous PMs, I wonder what's worse, the inflexible ideologue willing to do anything to achieve something like Brexit or the pragmatist who believes in nothing beyond their own interests and willing to do anything for personal advancement after having written a list of arguments for and against before decking which way to campaign.

Equally, journalist, lawyer, politician. They aren't exclusive but which is worst?

I think it's at least possible for a person to be well enough to do some exercise but not fulfil the entire role of Prime Minister during a pandemic. That's not to say it wouldn't be totally in character for the cowardly, amoral fuck to be using it as an excuse to avoid scrutiny, but I don't see that we can rule out him not actually being healthy enough to do the job at the moment. Which isn't to defend him either, because if he isn't up to it he has a duty to say so.

I think in general a pragmatist Is better than an ideologue, but ideally not one whose pragmatism is focused purely on their own advancement.

@TeeBee oh please! I think a global pandemic has to come before his 6th paternity leave!

Boris wasn't interested in ' getting brexit done properly' he was more the poster boy for getting something through cobbled together on the back of a fag packet then put on the back burner. All done ✅ ( by Cummings)
The virus has thrown all the plans out the window and putting the government centre stage a lot more than was hoped for back in January.
I don't doubt that labour would have messed up as well but I bet the Tories are cursing this virus for causing such damage at a time when it should have been about the EU and getting us out in one piece.
The best laid plans .. etc etc.
You never know what's round the corner! It's so true.

Inkpaper, Peregrina, I've thought about what you've said and I think you're right (not that my agreeing means anything). The family angle would mean the female politician wouldn't have even been at the races and the buffoonery wouldn't have been tolerated either. I was focusing on what they did and perhaps I've put too much attention on May's hostile environment and repetition.

I wonder when a male politician with public divorces and publicly known children outside marriage and general buffoonery became electable as PM? Could Johnson have been elected before, say, 2000?

Does anyone seriously think Boris is losing sleep with the baby? Do you really think that there isnt a night nurse/nanny

No of course he's not up with the baby. 😂

Hiding in a fridge

@starksforthewin
I’m not naive, disingenuous or ill informed. I do not think there is a chance of it happening but that doesn’t mean it should’t.
I’m not defending Boris and the Torys, I’m saying there are times when politics should not be the main agenda, it’s too serious for that; getting through this is above all that.
You just prove my point “Keir Starmer will “put the politics aside” when this government does. Let’s fight in the playground instead of rolling our sleeves up and start working together.
Thanks for throwing a few insults at me though, politician are you?

He's probably banking on using Brexit to revive his popularity

A no deal Brexit will see imported food (and other goods) go up in price, i doubt that will help his popularity, especially as we go into the worst recession for a century.

I’m saying there are times when politics should not be the main agenda, it’s too serious for that

Even if you were right there is no way this current government is going to put aside politics and work together. Politicking is all they know - fighting for position, shirking responsibility, briefing against others, lying and conniving.

Starmer is very wise not to want to touch them with a bargepole, he'd only get dragged down and made a scapegoat.

Arguing for politics to be put aside due to the situation is itself a political stance.

He working up the courage to tell us that Brexit is not such a great idea after all

I bet he isn't.

@The80sweregreat

Actually I think you are wrong, if you think about all the bad things people were saying that were going to happen with Brexit, have more or less started to happen now.

Now when prices rise and shit hits the wall, it won't be because of Brexit it will be because of Coronavirus and the government's main concern was to keep people safe

He did look really tired when he did his last speech.

A no deal Brexit will see imported food (and other goods) go up in price, i doubt that will help his popularity, especially as we go into the worst recession for a century.

I agree with you about what may happen but I've heard quite a lot about Boris wanting to be like Churchill and he could spin Brexit as a patriotic and democratic act ("will of the people") because he wants his place in the history books.

I love a pragmatist

Boris isn’t one.