“Get Brexit done” is, of course, as utterly meaningless as “Brexit means Brexit” or “Strong and stable”.
As Johnson knows from his undergraduate rudimentary study of Ancient Greek, language in Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War poses a problem. The Athenians, for example, assume a fundamental distinction between erga, “real things,” and logoi, “words,” with the erga constituting reality and logoi a kind of secondary phenomenon.
Occasionally, the mask ‘slips’. The façade of a vivacious charismatic lover of the joie de vivre is suddenly disposed of to reveal a highly unpleasant narcissistic arrogant person who clearly over rates himself. He’s played the system, having been to Eton and Oxford. But that in itself does make him wise or intelligent.
Johnson’s reaction to the news of a boy sleeping on the floor of a hospital was not even faux outrage. It was to stuff a reporter’s smartphone into his pocket. And yet this is a nice parallel to his general approach to evidence. Take for example, the lie exposed about the barriers between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, exposed by DExU, the Treasury, an interview with Sophy Ridge, and the leader of the DUP, for a start. Or the lie about the 60 or so hospitals which turned out to be a handful of allocated ‘seed’ funds. This approach to evidence is sympathetic to his contempt of the law, in the alleged abuse of power getting special favours for his technology partner, or riding roughshod of the law such that the Supreme Court had to interview on behalf of decent patriots including HM The Queen.
Johnson does not understand the NHS or social care. Nor does his Secretary of State, Matt Hancock. Johnson’s immediate oven-ready soundbite in reaction to the latest incarnation of the 1992 war over Jennifer’s Ear was to talk about the ‘record investment’ in the NHS. But we know from all the ‘independent’-ish think tanks that this claim is false. We know there’s no green paper on social care. We know there’ve been savage cuts in social care. We know that integrated care under Jeremy Hunt stalled, whereas Andy Burnham’s ‘whole person care’ was oven-ready back in 2015.
Hancock instead sees staff as a costly nuisance in running the service. He is prepared to do something about NHS pensions such that he can’t be blamed for the disgusting performance over the winter crisis to come. He sees data as black gold, so much so he is willing to get into an unconscionable relationship with multinational corporations such as Amazon and Google, to make data breaches from local hospitals to make your eyes water.
The strangest thing about the record of the Conservatives in 2010-5 is that Johnson has managed to deflect criticism of this period onto his LibDem counterparts. He has managed to do this because Jo Swinson is either deeply fraudulent or idiotic in saying that she did not understand the impacts of the austerity policy on disabled citizens, some of whom lost their benefits and later died prematurely. One of the achievements of Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell, not McDonald, is that austerity has been exposed as a huge con. A con similar in ridiculousness as Labour causing the global economic crash of 2008. The crash, caused by financial products in the US, allowed a ‘scorched earth’ reaction of austerity. The next scorched earth event to happen is of course Brexit.
Jo Swinson has utter hatred for Jeremy Corbyn, and this has detracted away from the genuine offerings of the Labour Party over the NHS, social justice and tackling inequality. This is not something which ‘tribal’ Labour members will be able to forgive in a hurry. Sure, Swinson’s remarks like the Chief Rabbi or Laura Kuenssberg’s fake report of an altercation on Twitter, get more space than Windrush or islamophobia, but not everyone is deceived.
Jo Swinson has not facilitated any meaningful debate on the economy, climate change, or the NHS.
There will be some people who don’t vote Tory. These include Scots who wish to remain in the EU. Some people will vote for Labour, despite Jeremy Corbyn. This is because it is impossible for the Tories to defend their record. There might be some die-hard Brexiteers who want to ‘get Brexit done’, and, if so, even Dennis Skinner will lose his seat.
But Johnson is a pest, and doesn’t deserve to get a majority. If he does, he will find the country unmanageable.
