The PM had willing stooges as he pushed standards in public life to a shameful new low
were more than victims of a dependency culture. With occasional honourable exceptions, they were an active and willing arm of the Johnsonian state. They gave the prime minister a privatised propaganda service complete with cheerleaders, excuse-makers, bullies and spies. Johnson was one of their own. They loved him for it.
To understand what Johnson did to the UK, and why his legacy will poison public life, see him as a hack following the playbook of the worst type of journalist. Showboat with a dramatic pose that strokes the prejudices of your readers. Don’t worry if your big idea is impractical or your propositions are false. Ignore facts that spoil the argument and lie without shame if you must.
When the lies wouldn’t wash, he tore up a solemn treaty and blamed the EU for the consequences of his own double dealingof the 1930s for exercising “power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages”. Baldwin’s words now precisely describe his Conservative successor in Downing Street.done” – that certainly grabbed attention – and then did what Theresa May said no British prime minister would ever do, put a border in the Irish Sea.
Like all cheap columnists, he insisted he was the voice of the people, while collapsing the people’s trust in politics. Whenever his fantasies crashed into reality, there was always someone else to blame: the BBC, the judges, the civil service, “the blob”, the “saboteurs”, the liberal elite, the unions, the enemy within. Never before has irresponsibility had such power. Never before has harlotry become a guiding governing principle.
It feels futile to say it after the boosterism of the last three years, but Johnson was never a beloved leader. He was less popular in the 2019 election than May had been in 2017. He won so well because by that stage Jeremy Corbyn was
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