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Well that pretty much nails it. While on paper it still looks like Boris Johnson is in a great position to the vast majority of the public, the next Prime Mini

Well that pretty much nails it. While on paper it still looks like Boris Johnson is in a great position to the vast majority of the public, the next Prime Minister is going to have to follow through with what they know is a terrible idea, negotiate with the EU with remarkably less leverage than the 'Leave' campaign thought they had, try to deal with Scotland wanting to leave, restless regional pressure groups in Wales, Cornwall and other parts of the country, as well as try not to have Northern Ireland fall back into a state of ongoing political violence. So Johnson either has put his hand up to deal with all these issues until the next general election in (or sooner) 2020 and go to an election with a struggling economy (I doubt and the Union slowly falling apart (remember, Scotland's independence would topple the sitting PM almost certainly) or he can wait it out, let another Conservative Prime Minister lose in 2020, and become party leader upon the election loss and hope to win in 2025. I doubt he thought this through very well. On the plus side UKIP's work is mostly done so they mightn't poll as well any more.

bodyfour 10y ago
Arg.. I just spent a half hour writing a long comment on this article, but then Chrome crashed when I hit "submit". I'll try to briefly retype my thoughts here since you've covered some of them. It's quite clear that Boris did not want the referendum to win. While (like all tories) he would occasionally grumble about Brussels nobody considered him anti-EU during his time as mayor. He was, however, obviously after the top job. He would upstage Cameron every chance he got. When he decided to switch back to being an MP, Cameron brought him into his cabinet (without a formal position) He knew he had this referendum campaign to fight and having the popular internationalist by his side would help him command as much party loyalty as possible. Boris then immediately pirouetted (bad mental image, that) and decided to lead the "Leave" campaign instead. The grassroots (largely Euroskeptic) tories who will pick the next party leader would appreciate his help. Cameron already announced that he would leave before the 2020 election, so this would mean PM Boris probably in late 2018/early 2019. So the best result for Boris would be a narrow referendum loss while looking like a great anti-EU warrior. A lot of the rhetoric he employed was to this end -- when he would compare the EU to the Nazis, it would make him look fierce to the hardcore Euroskeptics who controlled his future, while whispering to the electorate-at-large that the whole Leave campaign was nutty. It didn't work. He got what he nominally wanted, and now he has the chance to be PM faster than expected... but he has to deal with the fallout from this disaster. If Cameron had invoked Article 50 immediately then the rest of the party would blame a sloppy exit on him... "we had a great plan to pre-negotiate everything, but Dave messed it up!" He's not giving them that option: if the country is to be destroyed, he wants them to pull the trigger. It's startling watching the "moderate" Leave wing falling over themselves to dial back all of their promises during the campaign.... turns out there isn't more money for the NHS... of course there would still be free movement of workers from EU countries... maybe if Scotland doesn't want to do it we should call it off to preserve the union.... etc etc.. In victory, they're terrified of what they've done. Of course, to the far-right any wavering will be seen as treachery. A fight is brewing there. Meanwhile, Labour is also in full self-destruct mode. Corbyn just sacked the most credible member of his shadow cabinet and many of the rest will probably leave in protest. There have been many times in British political history when the out-of-power party goes through this sort of process, but never when the governing party is also in such disarray. Interesting times, unfortunately. I don't know if UKIP will disappear, though. They could now be the party of northern grievance, locking Labour out of power entirely.
- peteretep 10y ago
  Corbyn has been spectacularly underwhelming. His getting the boot doesn't feel like self-destruction to me.
  - bodyfour 10y ago
    Absolutely, but he's still highly popular with the membership. If the parliamentary party picked the leader, he never would be within sight of the job. Unfortunately Labour is in the all-to-familiar trap of only wanting purity, feeling that the entire country will surely swing to the far-left any second now. You would think being out of power for 18 years last time would have taught them, but apparently not. Had they picked David Milliband to be their leader, he would be PM right now. Instead they decided Ed was more left-wing, and went for him instead. When that didn't work they decided "oh, the country won't elect someone that left... lets see if we can find someone WAY farther out there" Deposing Corbyn would be a start, but unless there is a sudden bust of rationality among the party members it won't mean anything. They'll probably choose Marx's corpse next or something (continuing the recent run of North London leadership, naturally) On a serious note, they'd probably just re-elect Corbyn as leader giving him a fresh mandate within the party. In the last leadership election Liz Kendall was the only candidate that looked to me like she had a chance to win a general election. She didn't even get 5% of the vote. Right now, Labour considers general-election appeal to be toxic.
    - arethuza 10y ago
      "he's still highly popular with the membership." A large proportion of which probably just voted for Brexit - I think Corbyn wasn't that keen on the EU in the first place and knew that a lot of core Labour voters weren't keen on it either.
      - tonyedgecombe 10y ago
        But those aren't the voters he needs to win over to win the next election, it's the middle ground where elections are won and lost. I suspect he thought what was bad for his enemy was good for him, how wrong he was.
YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
All this is just old wives politics. "Did you see the look on BoJo's face?" "OMG why is he so subdued now that he won? Quick, reach for an explanation!". That's all any of these analyses have to go on. A look on BoJo's face. Keep that in mind when you waste your time with all this.
- thomasfoster96 10y ago
  You can analyse faces all you want, but whoever the next Prime Minister is, they have a tough job that will probably end with them being walloped in a general election or being toppled by their own party. Boris Johnson is just in an even worse position because he was seen as the leader-in-waiting and he actively campaigned for the policy that made everything so complicated.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
    And, right now, he has 52% of voters behind him. But, that is somehow making him do a sad face?
    - thomasfoster96 10y ago
      52% of voters from all parties were behind his side. 52% of people voting for a brexit doesn't translate into 52% of the seats in the House of Commons going to a Johnson-led Conservative party. Edit: And it certainly doesn't translate into 52% of people wanting him to win in 2020. If he negotiates a poor deal with the EU and/or 'forgets' about a few central 'Leave' arguments, he'll be in all sorts of trouble.
      - YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
        But that 52% gives him the moral authority to "do his best" to take the country out of the EU. If he screws up a bit, who can blame him? It's a tough situation anyway etc etc. You have to understand how those people operate. They don't give two bits about reason and making sense. All they care about is to stay in power. They optimise for that and that alone. And 52% is power, beyond BoJo's (or Gove's or Farage's) wildest dreams. If Brexit was a big mistake, thinking that Boris will get cold feet now that he has a clear line of sight to his goal (to be PM, duh) is an even bigger one.
TheCondor 10y ago
If this hyper politics game is real, what was the exit plan? There was simply no way it would pass? Or Cameron wants to stay in power so bad that he'd do the dirty work that the people willed and taje the fall for whatever fallout comes?
- arethuza 10y ago
  "There was simply no way it would pass?" Pretty much - even Farage seemed to be positioning himself for a narrow Remain win (in particular his 52%-48% comments about a second referendum).
- tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  Cameron doesn't want to stay in power, he announced he would stand down before the next election at the end of the last parliament.
  - thomasfoster96 10y ago
    But I'm sure he would have liked another three or four years.

bodyfour 10y ago

Arg.. I just spent a half hour writing a long comment on this article, but then Chrome crashed when I hit "submit". I'll try to briefly retype my thoughts here since you've covered some of them. It's quite clear that Boris did not want the referendum to win. While (like all tories) he would occasionally grumble about Brussels nobody considered him anti-EU during his time as mayor. He was, however, obviously after the top job. He would upstage Cameron every chance he got. When he decided to switch back to being an MP, Cameron brought him into his cabinet (without a formal position) He knew he had this referendum campaign to fight and having the popular internationalist by his side would help him command as much party loyalty as possible. Boris then immediately pirouetted (bad mental image, that) and decided to lead the "Leave" campaign instead. The grassroots (largely Euroskeptic) tories who will pick the next party leader would appreciate his help. Cameron already announced that he would leave before the 2020 election, so this would mean PM Boris probably in late 2018/early 2019. So the best result for Boris would be a narrow referendum loss while looking like a great anti-EU warrior. A lot of the rhetoric he employed was to this end -- when he would compare the EU to the Nazis, it would make him look fierce to the hardcore Euroskeptics who controlled his future, while whispering to the electorate-at-large that the whole Leave campaign was nutty. It didn't work. He got what he nominally wanted, and now he has the chance to be PM faster than expected... but he has to deal with the fallout from this disaster. If Cameron had invoked Article 50 immediately then the rest of the party would blame a sloppy exit on him... "we had a great plan to pre-negotiate everything, but Dave messed it up!" He's not giving them that option: if the country is to be destroyed, he wants them to pull the trigger. It's startling watching the "moderate" Leave wing falling over themselves to dial back all of their promises during the campaign.... turns out there isn't more money for the NHS... of course there would still be free movement of workers from EU countries... maybe if Scotland doesn't want to do it we should call it off to preserve the union.... etc etc.. In victory, they're terrified of what they've done. Of course, to the far-right any wavering will be seen as treachery. A fight is brewing there. Meanwhile, Labour is also in full self-destruct mode. Corbyn just sacked the most credible member of his shadow cabinet and many of the rest will probably leave in protest. There have been many times in British political history when the out-of-power party goes through this sort of process, but never when the governing party is also in such disarray. Interesting times, unfortunately. I don't know if UKIP will disappear, though. They could now be the party of northern grievance, locking Labour out of power entirely.

peteretep 10y ago
Corbyn has been spectacularly underwhelming. His getting the boot doesn't feel like self-destruction to me.
- bodyfour 10y ago
  Absolutely, but he's still highly popular with the membership. If the parliamentary party picked the leader, he never would be within sight of the job. Unfortunately Labour is in the all-to-familiar trap of only wanting purity, feeling that the entire country will surely swing to the far-left any second now. You would think being out of power for 18 years last time would have taught them, but apparently not. Had they picked David Milliband to be their leader, he would be PM right now. Instead they decided Ed was more left-wing, and went for him instead. When that didn't work they decided "oh, the country won't elect someone that left... lets see if we can find someone WAY farther out there" Deposing Corbyn would be a start, but unless there is a sudden bust of rationality among the party members it won't mean anything. They'll probably choose Marx's corpse next or something (continuing the recent run of North London leadership, naturally) On a serious note, they'd probably just re-elect Corbyn as leader giving him a fresh mandate within the party. In the last leadership election Liz Kendall was the only candidate that looked to me like she had a chance to win a general election. She didn't even get 5% of the vote. Right now, Labour considers general-election appeal to be toxic.
  - arethuza 10y ago
    "he's still highly popular with the membership." A large proportion of which probably just voted for Brexit - I think Corbyn wasn't that keen on the EU in the first place and knew that a lot of core Labour voters weren't keen on it either.
    - tonyedgecombe 10y ago
      But those aren't the voters he needs to win over to win the next election, it's the middle ground where elections are won and lost. I suspect he thought what was bad for his enemy was good for him, how wrong he was.

YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago

All this is just old wives politics. "Did you see the look on BoJo's face?" "OMG why is he so subdued now that he won? Quick, reach for an explanation!". That's all any of these analyses have to go on. A look on BoJo's face. Keep that in mind when you waste your time with all this.

thomasfoster96 10y ago
You can analyse faces all you want, but whoever the next Prime Minister is, they have a tough job that will probably end with them being walloped in a general election or being toppled by their own party. Boris Johnson is just in an even worse position because he was seen as the leader-in-waiting and he actively campaigned for the policy that made everything so complicated.
- YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
  And, right now, he has 52% of voters behind him. But, that is somehow making him do a sad face?
  - thomasfoster96 10y ago
    52% of voters from all parties were behind his side. 52% of people voting for a brexit doesn't translate into 52% of the seats in the House of Commons going to a Johnson-led Conservative party. Edit: And it certainly doesn't translate into 52% of people wanting him to win in 2020. If he negotiates a poor deal with the EU and/or 'forgets' about a few central 'Leave' arguments, he'll be in all sorts of trouble.
    - YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
      But that 52% gives him the moral authority to "do his best" to take the country out of the EU. If he screws up a bit, who can blame him? It's a tough situation anyway etc etc. You have to understand how those people operate. They don't give two bits about reason and making sense. All they care about is to stay in power. They optimise for that and that alone. And 52% is power, beyond BoJo's (or Gove's or Farage's) wildest dreams. If Brexit was a big mistake, thinking that Boris will get cold feet now that he has a clear line of sight to his goal (to be PM, duh) is an even bigger one.

TheCondor 10y ago

If this hyper politics game is real, what was the exit plan? There was simply no way it would pass? Or Cameron wants to stay in power so bad that he'd do the dirty work that the people willed and taje the fall for whatever fallout comes?

arethuza 10y ago
"There was simply no way it would pass?" Pretty much - even Farage seemed to be positioning himself for a narrow Remain win (in particular his 52%-48% comments about a second referendum).
tonyedgecombe 10y ago
Cameron doesn't want to stay in power, he announced he would stand down before the next election at the end of the last parliament.
- thomasfoster96 10y ago
  But I'm sure he would have liked another three or four years.