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Boris the Blogger Well, miracles do happen. For a while, I was labouring (scuse pun) under the view that no British Conservative MP would ever set foot (or fingers) in the blogosphere.
I was wrong. The Conservative MP for Henley and all-round media superstar, Boris Johnson, now has a blog.
I only hope he has some inkling of what he has let himself in for.
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Another mug MP aligns himself with the socialist moonbat Tim Ireland…Oh dear. If evidence of politicians’ lack of judgement were ever needed, this would surely suffice.
I’m sure Boris was appalled to find there was a medium in which he wasn’t front and centre.
Am I the only one who finds him a sanctimonious, foolish, preachy bore masquerading as a hopelessly charming chap?
Verity is not alone.
I looked at the photos on his site, and he’ll never make it- he always wears suits not pj’s.
Whether you like Boris and his policies or not – or indeed Tim Ireland and his policies – they both should be applauded for trying to get more honesty and openness into politics.
Actually, Shane, I disagree. Their aim is not to get more honesty and openness into politics – as someone who has spent a fair amount of time in the Palace of Westminster, I can assure you that if politicians were honest about what goes on there and about what they really think, their careers would not last long. It is about self-preservation and self-promotion. And this ain’t cynicism: it’s the truth plain to see for anyone who cares to open their eyes.
I see no blog. Only a syndication of parts of articles published in the Torygraph.
Most blogs are about ego boosting and self promotion, so I’ve no problem with Boris joining in. I just wish it was an actual blog.
J
The good thing about a Tory MP blogging, is that when he gets involved in an enormous scandal (I’m just an American, but I understand that the Reform Act of 1881 makes this compulsory for rising Tory stars), he’ll be able to break the story on the blogosphere, and bring himself down.
Self-congratulatory bloggers everywhere will then take credit for having made it happen, while old media pundits, hoping to make themselves feel up to date, will prattle on about how the blog-o-sphere is this new place where people can write their thoughts on a computer, yet it’s infinitely inferior to newspapers or the Beeb.
A politician’s blog is something like improvisational calculus – the idea that these most image conscious of primates could do anything that is both spontaneous and interesting (the supposed reason to live of the blogosphere) is simply impossible. The two notions are mutually incompatible, and if somebody so much as suggested they were, a black hole would open and the universe would be destroyed. Thus, I think Boris’ Blog ought to be renamed Boris’ Bulletin Board. The Truth in Advertiseing rule of the EU may be relevant here…
Al Maviva – Very well said.
I think I lost interest in Johnson when he talked about banning cars in favor of bicycles.
Or was that Blunkett?
I lost interest in him when he wrote a self-serving piece about riding his bicyle through London traffic and talking on his mobile phone. He almost crashed into a woman’s car, causing her to slam on her brakes. She reprimanded him for almost causing an accident and he shouted back a few choice words of sanctimonious outrage, as people riding bicycles are wont to do. He foolishly reported this in his column.
That alone was enough to put me off Johnson. But the following day, the woman in the car wrote in to The Telegraph and revealed what the few choice words he had shouted at her had been. End of Johnson as universal charmer. Hello, Johnson, self-regarding bully.
And then, of course, he’s wrecked The Speccie, although his family is well-employed with weekly assignments.
Don’t know the man and his background, but judging by the comments here, I can see why David put up such a nifty movie reference in the title of this post.
Boris the Blogger? As in Boris the Bullet Dodger?
My goodness you lot are harsh. As MP’s go, Boris is definitely one of the better ones. He is at least vaguely likeable, far from stupid, and more libertarian than the vast majority of his colleagues. As for the Speccie, what’s all this about having ruined it? He’s increased circulation and there is plenty of decent stuff in there most weeks; including a good chunk of libertarian-inclined material. Leave the man alone!
Citizen,
I don’t doubt your comments about MPs not wanting to be open and honest for fearing of saying what they think and therefore fore-shortening their careers. However if you think that it is a satisfactory situation that our elected representatives cannot be open and honest then you have very low ambitions for our democracy (of sorts). Instead of criticising Boris (and the jury is definitely out on his blog – one post and a couple of comments don’t make a blog as other’s have pointed out) we shoud be encouraging him as it may prove to be an outlet to encourage honesty and openness. As another post points out – he’s been honest enough to write about his bicycle escapades even when it doesn’t show him in a good light (not that he probably realised that at the time) why not encourage the same of his political life.
Boris is a bit of a Tory wet, in my opinion. He just works very hard on cultivating his lovable buffoon image.
Shane McC – Johnson wrote about his incident of almost causing an accident at a red light because he was wobbling around on his bicycle while talking on his mobile phone as though he’d just won the Battle of Waterloo. Even while I was reading it, I was marvelling at the disconnect between the reality and how he was reporting it.
Johnson is not only NuLab in his soul, but he has stated that he likes Tony Blair personally. Anyone who could harbour one grain of respect for this disgraceful, opportunistic sleaze is not a Conservative. At least IDS had the merit of going on record with how much he loathes Blair. I suspect the same goes for Michael Howard.
I only see a website that says: Hello and welcome to the website. The theory is that it should be able to provide you with all the articles and press releases by Boris Johnson MP. It doesn’t claim to be exhaustive, but we hope it is useful.
That’s not a blog, IMO. There is no Boris, the Blogger, only Melissa & co, posting his prolific output for other media on a website with full weblog facilities – wtf does that mean?
Bandwagon, jump (badly), fall off. Whatever.
No, Adriana, it’s not a blog. It’s a windy self-advertisement.
“The theory is that it should be able to provide you with all the articles and press releases …”
Why is it a theory? The sainted Steyn and Melanie Phillips have been doing this for yonks. Why are they trying to make it sound like an amiable, amateurish, good-naturedly confused effort by Boris?
They close with the hope “that it is useful”. In what way would the ability to access an MPs press releases and gaseous articles serve the human race? “Useful”?
If anyone’s still reading this thread, I just read on Melanie Phillips that Boris invited her to write a piece on the Turkish plan (since dumped in response to the outrage of EU countries) to make adultery illegal. As a demonstration of both his tin ear for the writings of other journalists, and his self-absorption, he actually thought that Phillips would approve of the law and write a piece supporting it.
She declined.