A cold, calculated career decision
According to Andrew Grice in the Independent (and he’s not the only one), Brexit is all about Boris Johnson’s personal ambition. It’s amazing how just one person can fuck up everything in sight.
In killing Boris’s bid, the Justice Secretary has delivered the justice that Boris deserved. Johnson’s personal ambition got the better of him. He used to tell friends that he wanted to not just run Britain but “the world”; he was only half-joking.
But what a price the whole country has paid for that ambition; our EU membership has probably been sacrificed for it. The Leave camp would probably not have won without Boris as their front man.
“I am not an Outer,” he told some fellow Tory MPs shortly before coming out for Brexit. Many Tories – David Cameron included – are convinced it was a cold, calculated career decision. That he didn’t really believe in Brexit, he just believed in Boris. Now, incredibly, Boris has walked away from the scene of his unforgivable crime and left others to clear up the mess.
Oh well. No biggy.
Well, yes, the more polished, more English version of our Dumpsterfire is a bad piece of work. But let’s face it. Cameron did do the essential bits in a cold calculated career move. Boris just thought he could take advantage of them in a likewise move.
Yeah, Andrew Grice, sure the debacle is due to the ambitions of the villainous Boris. The Brexir ‘referendum’ exposed the deep class divisions and racism in the UK, blame the 52% who voted to leave. For the umpteenth time, Britain will probably not leave the EU, some compromise will be cobbled together.
I don’t know why you say “for the umpteenth time” as if we’re being naughty in not taking your word for it. Some people think Article 50 may never be invoked and others don’t – I don’t see why we should assume you have infallible knowledge on what Parliament will do.
Ophelia,
Where did I claim infallible knowledge? I used the term “probably”. I would bet a significant sum that Britain would stay in the EU, one way or the other. It would take about 3 or 4 years to be sure–too long for me. Nobody needed to take my word, few people bothered to examine the details of the ‘referendum’, it was never intended to be legally binding, I doubt that it could be under the British psrliamentary system. I’m not sure whether the misleading term was chosen deliberately or the British political elite can’t tell the difference between a referendum and a plebiscite. The country doesn’t have a tradition of direct democracy.
It’s now obvious that close to half the population consider themselves losers under the present regime, whether or not it’s the result of EU policies or the legacy of Thatcher’s scorched earth neoliberal ‘reforms’ is a different question.
It’s all gone horribly wrong for Boris. His dream scenario would have been the Remain campaign winning with a tiny margin, small enough to discredit Cameron but large enough for him to say that he would bow to the wishes of the British people. The next best would be Brexit winning and Cameron pushing the button, as, indeed he had said he would. Any bad consequences could then be blamed on Cameron’s undue haste. But Cameron stuck it to his nemesis by leaving the decision up to him. After his Pyrrhic victory Boris had three choices:
1) Stay and push the button
2) Stay and find some way of not pushing the button
3) Leave now.
The only question which was least damaging in the long term. (1) Seems totally out of the question because when everything turned pear shaped, he would be blamed not only for pushing the button but for getting the country in a god-awful mess in the first place. He seems to have been sounding out if he would have any support for (2). He could delay the act with informal negotiations, come back with an agreement that was the same as before, but with a few fig leaves in appropriate places, and have a second referendum on, which he would in all likelihood win. Could that have ever been pulled off? Well he certainly has the skills to pull this off as far as the British are concerned, but it is unlikely Angela Merkel would go for it.
But making it so obvious he was going down route (2) set wee Boris up for Gove, or Gove’s alter ego Mr. Vine, to shop him in a move that some, perhaps not Gove himself, suspect was planned all along.[1] Oh the indignity of being told by one who had claimed that he himself does not have the requisite skills for leadership that you are so much worse! Boris has not so much chosen option (3) as had it unceremoniously thrust upon him. Yet this had always been his best option if not one he could easily avail himself of. In the long term, remembering that a week is a long time in politics, this might not work out too bad for him. After a few years of utter chaos he might make a surprising come back, things might not have been so bad had other people not botched everything up – He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day.
The field is left wide open for Theresa May, and who could not have been completely unaware all along of the possibility of this outcome. She has played a wily game. She was a known Euroskeptic, but, after one of those road-to-Damascus conversions that politicians have when it suits their purpose, backed the Remain campaign. She would never have been expected to take a prominent part, so there was no danger of her being accused of halfheartedness. She could credibly be part of a Boris Remain cabinet because of her reputation for accepting no nonsense from anyone including the rest of the EU. After a few years it would be clear to everyone that Boris does not just pretend to be a bumbling idiot, and she could go for the leadership. As it happens fortune has favoured her wildest dreams.
She, as prime minister, could press the button but leave her political carrier intact. She would do it, after all, not out of personal preference, but out of respect for the democratic will of the people. If chaos ensued, she could not be held responsible for it. If things got out of hand she could credibly ask the EU to abandon the Article 50 process.[2] If the EU refused to play along then, again, she is not to blame. If she is blocked either by parliament or, as some have suggested is possible, by legal action, then again she is not to blame. Finally, if, by some miracle, life turns out to be a bed of roses, she can take all the credit. What more could she possibly want? Of course, she’s not leader yet and never forget that a week is a long time in politics.
We hear a lot from conspiracy theorists about how political elites conspire against the people, which on occasion they no doubt do. The truth, however, is that political elites spend much more time and energy conspiring against one another. The people are just spectators. In the UK one of the main political parties has a reputation for Machiavellian leadership plots and the other has a reputation for washing its dirty linen in public, and they are both indulging with no little gusto in their favourite occupation. In normal times this would be some annoyance, but these are not normal times. In the aftermath of a group of pampered millionaires playing a game of Russian roulette with the country, the UK faces its greatest existential crisis since world war two. If ever there were a time for politicians of every stripe to unite and actually do what they are paid for, actually do something about the state of the nation it is now. But do they? Not on your Nelly! It’s far more fun to run about like headless chickens fussing about who the next leader might be. Only the unelected Bank of England seems to be doing anything constructive by intervening in the bond markets and the overnight repo market with sums that dwarf decades of EU contributions.
The real political winner is Angela Merkel. Having cut her political teeth in Stasi East Germany, she is well aware of the value of making sure the consequences of a particular political choice are so unattractive that no one else will consider making it ever again. Is this case, like the Great Sage of the Dao De Jing, she has achieved her purpose by doing precisely nothing.
Indeed we live in interesting times.
Footnotes:
[1] One Borisnik tweeted “Gove is a —- who has set this up from the start” others have detected the hand of Osborne.
[2] There is some dispute among lawyers about whether the process described in Article 50 could be abandoned. I have seen an opinion to the effect that since there is no provision for abandoning it, this could be done. I have seen another to the effect that since abandonment is not mentioned at all, the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties implies that this is a possibility. In any case she could, as a Remain supporter, credibly go to the European Court for a ruling without wreaking her career.
It came from the apparent exasperation of “for the umpteenth time.”
@Bernard Hurley: Great comment, thank you. One thing: “political elites spend much more time and energy conspiring against one another. The people are just spectators.” Personally, I think that should read “The people are just caught in the crossfire.”
Also, even if there’s a possibility that the EU could halt the progress of an Article 50 exit, I get the feeling that they won’t want to. It would send a signal to other EU countries that they could start the process, try to negotiate some kind of special status deal, and then just back out of the whole thing if they didn’t get the special status they were hoping for – which is a signal I’m pretty sure the EU doesn’t want out there.