Defending the indefensible: A beginner’s guide
Let us all take a deep breath and calm ourselves, shall we? It’s time for fair-minded folk to take a stand when they see a fair-headed man being wrongly condemned by every socialist spud and their grandmother. You see, what critics of this Prime Minister seem to forget is that the conventional rules do not apply to him…
I know. I know… It’s an easy thing to have missed amid the chaos. It rarely comes up in conversation and the actual legislation that excludes him from the ordinary rules of politics is written in very small letters on the back of Erskine May, somewhere below the bit about the Speaker’s right to drive sheep through the Commons (in crisp cotton knickerbockers no less). But the simple fact is that Boris Johnson is no ordinary politician in the ways that Tony Blair or Gordon Brown were very ordinary politicians.
Nobody fined them when Blair LIED about WMDs or Brown LIED about being electable. There were no fixed penalty notices. Not even a sternly written rebuke from the Met police chief. And why was that? Well, frankly, it was because the police were far too busy coping with ENORMOUS CRIME WAVES under Labour. It’s a sign of CONSERVATIVE SUCCESS that the police now have the time to decide when a couple of glasses of champers and cake constitute a birthday party.
The same goes for the media. I understand the argument that certain newspapers cruelly attacked Gordon Brown when his penmanship wasn’t good enough on a letter to a GRIEVING MOTHER. Today those same newspapers are defending this Prime Minister. “Hypocrisy!” cry some, to which I reply: “have you seen this Prime Minister’s handwriting?” Isn’t it to his credit that he doesn’t subject grieving families to his haystack scribble?
No, this Prime Minister knows exactly what he’s doing and is in full command of the facts. When the opposition says that he lied to parliament they have it completely the wrong way round. Rather than not tell the truth, he showed profound strategic acumen towards the truth. And rightly so. Don’t you think Vladimir Putin would have been very happy to see another Western democracy undermining itself with its blind adherence to the truth about a few crates of Prosecco? The Prime Minister did not lie. He took a reasoned geopolitical stance in the name of FREEDOM. If there was any blame here, it lies with facts working against the national interest. It’s they that should be investigated… FOR TREASON!
And that’s what we should all remember. Nothing comes before the DEFENCE OF THE REALM. It’s a bit like saying there are no British forces in Ukraine (wink wink) teaching those brave men and women how to use our British made TANK-BUSTERS sent by this Prime Minister to kick some Russki rump. Is he going to get a fixed penalty notice about that as well? I should hope not!
So, no. Let’s hear no more of this nonsense because it is the lowest form of politics when the opposition uses a Prime Minister’s own words against him. Just because he said certain things didn’t mean that he meant certain things. Does anybody send the Old Bill around whenever Sir Keir claims to be a socialist and a true man of the people?
You see there’s “the truth” and the “political truth” and people are deliberately confusing the two. It’s like when a Prime Minister says that Britain is the best country in the world. It would look jolly odd for them to sing the praises of Canada, Denmark, or Sweden, but I suppose some would rather we talk down this nation in the name of the greater truth.
And, lastly, when he said he didn’t believe there were parties, who are we to say what he did or did not believe? Who can look into a man’s soul and discern the truth? As Jesus says in the Good Book: “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup which the Father has given me?” St Thomas Aquinas described this as the “the zeal of the disciple” and I think it’s important to remember that zeal, that cup, that sword, and, indeed the bit about the fig tree and the three virgins from Jabbock…
Look, the point is: let’s admit that this whole saga has been one great big understanding and let’s do what Jesus and the good saint would both do. To paraphrase SHAKESPEARE: let’s move on to praise this Prime Minister rather than bury him.
We are, after all, at war…