Westminstenders: Magical Thinking

[RedToothBrush]

This week has seen reports of the government editing footage of Johnson to avoid embarrassing questions about the early government response.

We've been asked to accept that the rules were different to what we were told to excuse the law breaking behaviour of a senior government advisor. As Johnson said he was being a responsible father (as if Johnson knows what this is) and it wasn't as if he was visiting a lover (this Johnson would know all about). Let's be honest Johnson is the master of brazening out controversy.

We also have the ERG complaining they were lied to by Gove about the new Withdrawal Agreement and the border in the Irish Sea which surprises precisely no one else.

They appear to be a little upset by the Cummings debarkable too.

@Peregrina

So the Tories want to see their support drain away do they? Well, I admit, that's fine by me. They need to watch it - Major had the same problem with losing support and then Smith/Blair came along who made Labour look electable. We know what happened - a Blair landslide and the Tories in the doldrums for 13 years.

If only!

@RigaBalsam

According to sky they areygking to review the fines people may have had for childcare. After the daily Downing Street coronavirus briefing, Sky's deputy political editor Sam Coates said a government adviser had since stated that there was no "formal review" of lockdown fines.

But it will be dealt with by the Home Office, which is headed by Priti Patel, so that will be a No then.

But think back to the Poll tax - riots, refusals to pay, clogging up the Courts - this finished Mrs Thatcher, and although Major got a surprise win with a working majority, the rot had set in.

Cummings and Johnson, two wealthy, entitled men, brazening it out has angered a lot of people from right across the political spectrum who have suffered real hardship over the past two months.

Maitlis and Goodall did a good job on simplifying things tonight - if Wakefield was ill with Covid then they should have stayed at home, if she wasn’t ill with Covid then they had no reason not to stay home.

I love the new quote thing. Its like 1999 all over again.

Hmm I'm not sure I like the quote thing. Yes it makes it easier but looks messier.

@DrBlackbird

Hmm I'm not sure I like the quote thing. Yes it makes it easier but looks messier.

I think it looks very nice, much easier to see who said what

Aah SabinaThwaite, wish I’d seen that. It is extraordinary that Mr Cummings attempted to both deny travelling with Covid and justify it by the same token. I felt that if the journalists yesterday had remembered the first rule and kept to short questions, the session would have cut through better. Particularly peed off with Robert Peston for failing to use the microphone. I can’t believe the Cummings’ had the gall to write up their Covid experience for the Spectator without mentioning that they went to Durham. I am so angry. Despite seeing that it’s a very bad idea to let their irresponsibility change my behaviour, I found myself arranging to see my infant grandchild this weekend, for the first time since Early March. Somethings gotta change.

Sabrina Thwaite, so sorry, lost your r.

Guess it’s not going away like No 10 hoped it would.

Do my eyes deceive me? Has MN spent lockdown getting adding quote options?

@SabrinaThwaite

Guess it’s not going away like No 10 hoped it would.

As if it was ever going to. I’m loving watching Boris making all the wrong decisions and weakening his position. Long may it continue. Until DC resigns and beyond.

@RedToothBrush

I love the new quote thing. Its like 1999 all over again.

The whole forum is quite 1999 to be fair.

Express and Sun manfully batting for Johnson there.

I would be more than happy to see Johnson carry on until he has wrecked the current Tory party.

Until DC resigns and beyond.

Do you think he will? I can’t see that happening. He really doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong. Classic psychopath / sociopath / narcissist.

“It would be meltdown’: Why Boris Johnson can’t let Dominic Cummings go

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/26/britain-boris-johnson-dominic-cummings-282633

And if Cummings won’t go of his own volition, will (or can) Johnson remove him?
Don’t count on it, said one person who worked with both men at Vote Leave.

“The whole operation is Dom. The whole of No. 10 is staffed by Dom protégés.

Ministers, secretaries of state and special advisers are only in place if he says so …
< a dangerous amount of power >

If he doesn't want to go, it would be meltdown for Boris to try to make him.”

Police officer says people are using Dominic Cummings' behaviour as excuse to breach lockdown rules

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/policeman-dominic-cummings-behaviour-excuse-breach-lockdown-a4451066.html

Serving officer in London says two people caught breaking lockdown rules told him
'well if Dominic Cummings can do what he wants then we should be able to too'

Cummings isn't going anywhere. Let's get that straight now.

The interesting bit is how Johnson squares that with the public and the rest of the party.

And how this works when we get the next (inevitable) Dominic Cummings related scandal, because we will because the man doesn't think the rules apply to him.

Johnson has just lost 20 approval points in a weekend for standing by Cummings.

Johnson is in a lose lose position with the situation as if he sacks him he looks weak and if he keeps him he looks dependent on Cummings (He is. He can't run the country or do Brexit without him)

Here's your bottom line. Sebastian Payne @SebastianEPayne
A Whitehall official says Mr Cummings hasn’t contemplated resigning "because if Dom goes, he’s not going to get back in. Whoever replaces him will marginalise all of the Vote Leave people in Downing Street. There’s a real bunker mentality."

amp.ft.com/content/cfff1b72-9e12-4e7f-a67b-db6eef0443c0?__twitter_impression=true
Johnson struggles to draw a line under Cummings row
PM set to face fresh questions about chief adviser’s actions during UK lockdown

The Mail has some surprising poll results.

65% of people think Cummings’ conduct will make lockdown rules more likely to be broken.
More than half of Tory voters think DC should resign or be sacked.

On reflection I think the blog update may turn out to be significant.
Cummings allegedly positions himself as a super forecaster.

The blog update is unlikely to be a one off. It was done long before the press came knocking so it's only purpose would be to 'bank' a forecast.

Isn't this likely to be a super forecaster modus operandi?

Normally the only reference to this sort of forecast would be in a cv or bid/proposal - which wouldn't get the sort of scrutiny this particular claim did.

So there could be many other examples out there - but only 'customers' would be aware of such claims - one such customer being HMG - not known for exacting due diligence

Dmitry Grozoubinski@DmitryOpines

Somewhere in No. 10 must be a whiteboard with all the explanations they brainstormed for his trip to Barnard Castle,

but ultimately rejected as being MORE insane than
"driving eye test with my children in the car."

I would give anything to see it.
😂

This I found on another thread about Boris...

It’s amazing that anyone thought putting DC on the telly would do any good at all. If he auditioned for the role of unpleasant creepy weirdo in a TV drama he’d get it immediately. I’m no fan at all of the Bodger (thanks another thread for that) but I can see he has a certain presence and charisma that lets him get away with a lot. Gollum, not so much (if at all, Terry Pratchett I think coined the term “charisn’tma”, which seems appropriate here).

Liason Ctee Update:

Ctee Chair and Govt. Toady Bernard Jenkin has ruled that only twenty minutes of 90 min session can be spent on Cummings. With 37 ctee members, he has decided on who will be able to ask questions. They are:

Con: Karen Bradley and Greg Clark.
Lab: Hillary Benn and Sarah Champion
SNP: Pete Wishart