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The whole thing is political (the two party system is a disaster). I don't think Boris wanted lock down or any other curbs on freedom - that's not in his chara
by rezeroed 6y ago
The whole thing is political (the two party system is a disaster). I don't think Boris wanted lock down or any other curbs on freedom - that's not in his character. I expect he would have preferred the Swedish approach, but he's trying to win over the left, which is fairly futile because they'll always find something to shout at him about.
- toyg 6y ago> he's trying to win over the left That's... new. He got in power by courting the hard right. He nominated hardcore right-wingers to all key positions, and pre-covid was busy implementing a hard-right "no prisoners" approach to Brexit. And now he'd supposedly be leaning left...? I agree that he wanted to follow Trump in not locking down anything - but he had to change course after meeting resistance from scientists in the civil service, as widely reported, not from "the left". "The left" didn't even have an actual leader for most of the crisis.
- rezeroed 6y agoThe left includes Adam Boulton, Beth Rigby, Piers Morgan, the Guardian, the BBC, the people banging pots and pans on their balconies on Thursday evenings. Getting in to power and retaining power don't require the same strategy. Example, school lunches.
- toyg 6y agoThe left includes Piers Morgan...?
- ben_w 6y agoHe has an 80 seat majority, and is quite willing to ignore (or attack) his political opponents rather than to compromise with them — Brexit in general, the WA which he opposed then fired his own MPs for opposing and now himself opposes again, and of course Cummings’ eye test. I agree he did not want a lockdown, but I think that happened because France said something like “either you lock down the UK or we ban everyone from the UK from entering our country”.
- rezeroed 6y agoI don't mean he's trying to win over the left politicians, but the left voters.
- ben_w 6y agoHmm. I can see that he is still in “campaign” mode, but I don’t see how his actions are supposed to win over the left so much as to rally his core supporters. Then again, if your argument is that he can’t tell the difference, I would agree.
- jen20 6y agoThe mistake you are making in this comment is assuming Boris Johnson has _any principles at all_ despite every piece of evidence being to the contrary, and every action he has ever taken in his career (and apparently also in his personal life) indicating that the only constant is doing whatever is necessary to maintain or increase power regardless of consequence. (Yes, I’m British, though I don’t live there any more).
- rezeroed 6y agoI didn't call them principles. I'd call them preferences, tendencies, or character
- jen20 6y agoIn that case, I'd assume his preference would have been to do absolutely nothing, and let millions die as a way to reduce the costs of the welfare state. His tendencies and character do a good job of enlightening us as to his lack of principles. If you think that "lockdown" was to appease the left (who tend to be younger and healthier) rather than the core Conservative vote (the overwhelmingly older, less healthy, more-at-risk-from-COVID group), I don't know what to tell you.