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Boris as Foreign Secretary… it is the gift that will just keep on giving In truth, the appointment of Boris as Foreign Secretary is just about the most awesome thing ever.
In another Telegraph column, in November 2007, Mr Johnson described Hillary Clinton as having “a steely blue stare, like a sadistic nurse in a mental hospital”.
How perfect is that? Words can scarcely describe how much I am looking forward to seeing this unfold 😀
Of course the appointment that really matters is David Davis to head up Brexit. I simply cannot imagine a better choice for he is staunchly free market and was known in EU circles as the “charming bastard“.
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I think it is important that BRExiteers are in the key jobs required for BRExit, on the basis that “You caused this problem, you bloody fix it!“.
As a hard-line BRExiteer, I thoroughly approve of all of the appointments made, indeed I would go further and say it is pretty much a dream-team of who I would want in those positions.
I might have exchanged Liam Fox for Michael Gove, but given the shenanigans with Boris over the leadership challenge I can understand why not. I certainly hope that the new PM can find somewhere for Michael Gove as his talent is too great to be wasted on the back benches.
All-in-all, I am quite happy with the line-up so far.
ITV News Deputy Political Editor Chris Ship tweeted:
Asked by @LibbyWienerITV if he’ll apologise to President Obama, @BorisJohnson said USA ‘in the front of the queue’
Well as you may or may not know I’m a Yank (no wisecracks please) and I must say I’m amazed.
Just look at what we are about to get stuck with. And it looks like we are about to handle an insurrection in our usual fashion.
http://classicalvalues.com/2016/07/i-have-been-saying-this-for-a-while/
Boris at the F.O. – we will see how it turns out, it could be bad or it could be good (I do not know).
David Davis to handle British Independence – good.
“But he is old Paul”.
So am I.
Indeed whatever its says on our birth certificates, I suspect I am a lot older than David Davis is. One is as old as one feels.
And I could do this job – and so can he.
Gove is out. I feel slightly sorry for him, both because he is one of the few people who has ever done so much as land a punch on the Blob and also because he is a man who honed himself for high office by spending his youth playing Dungeons and Dragons.
Ah well, never mind. He’ll be nice and rested when Boris is fired.
Indeed, I very much doubt we have seen the last of Gove.
Like all leftists/semi-leftists, May talks about caring and sharing, but really she’s ruthless operator. She has purged the Cameroons, not just Osborne, Letwin and Hunt, but also semi-Cameroons like Gove and Morgan. Be interesting to see what happens to Javid, Leadsom and Soubry. Soubry is a disgrace, but she’s female, and apparently that counts all by itself as a virtue.
“he is a man who honed himself for high office by spending his youth playing Dungeons and Dragons.”
The idea that Gove is just this cunning operator is laughable. If he really was he wouldn’t have abandonded Boris at the last minute in such a visible, cack-handed way. He would have had other people do the dirty work for him, in an operation which would have been prepared long in advance, while his hands stayed clean. Rather like Tom Watson is trying to do to Corbyn.
Appointment of David Davis is highly significant; the others less so. Both Boris and Liam Fox could be moved in future without much ado. Not so for Davis. If he was removed, or kept on too tight a leash, in future, that would be highly damaging to May’s reputation with her party members. If she made this appointment knowing this, and knowing that others know it, then that is quite an impressive move.
Very sorry to see Gove go. You just know that anybody that can annoy the teachers’ union as much as he did must be a very good chap indeed.
I am also sorry to see Gove go, for the same reason PeterT gives. He was making a real difference at Education, until Cameron moved him – out of cowardice, or perhaps at the behest of his (Cameron’s) EU masters (Ha! THAT phrase will soon be redundant, God willing!).
But he had proved himself unworthy of high office by his behaviour during the leadership struggle; I really think that just now he would be too divisive a figure.
Fixed that for you Natalie.
Last time he was fired for lying about personal indiscretions. I wonder what it will be next time. No doubt some spectacular Alan Clark type gaff. 🙂
Smart move of May putting him at the Foreign Office, I can just hear her now “It’s not me Boris, it’s the Americans. The US Ambassador is furious and his wife is still in the hospital”.
Carry On Up the Foreign Office!
And for those who wish to keep score :
The Cameron Cabinet was 17 Remainers and 5 Leavers (so 77% Remain)
The Cameron other Ministers were 50 Remainers and 12 Leavers (so 81% Remain)
The Cameron backbenchers were 119 Remainers and 127 Leavers (so 48% Remain)
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2016/02/which-tory-mps-back-brexit-who-doesnt-and-who-is-still-on-the-fence/
So far La May has sacked three of the five Cameron Cabinet Leavers.
Lee Moore,
Does it matter if the whole cabinet is signed up to leaving, which they appear to be (especially as one of the two new leavers appointed so far is in charge of leaving)?
Quintessential example of a responsible EU politician agrees to a foreign semi-dictator’s request to prosecute a comedian for writing a satirical poem.
Quintessential example of an irresponsible British politican backs up the satirist with his own poem. And wins £1,000 while doing it. And rhymes “Ankara” with …”thankera”.
I know which example I’d rather my rulers followed.
Well, there’s leaving and there’s leaving. A strongly (ex) Remain Cabinet is much more likely to support a very close and entangled agreement with the EU than a Cabinet reflecting the (ex) Remain and (ex) Leave balance of the Parliamentary party as a whole, never mind Tory voters who are more Leavey than the parliamentary party, and double never mind Tory party members.
Secondly the Remain / Leave border is not exactly but is broadly represetative of the Left / Right border of the Parliamentary party. The traditional approach to Tory party unity is the Left telling the Right to suck it up, which is how we get a 75%-80% (ex) Remain Cabinet out of a roughly 55% (ex) Remain Parliamentary party, and a probably below 25% (ex) Remain party membership. They aren’t called swivel eyed loons for nothing.
We’ll soon see if Auntie Theresa has this traditional idea of party unity in mind. I suspect she does.
The relevance of the sacking of existing Cabinet leavers is that it undermines any argument that it’s just a matter of experience – that there just aren’t enough experienced Leavers. Cos there are.
Of course, it is reasonable for a PM to appoint only ministers with which they feel they can work. If the personal dynamics are such that this means that Gove can’t be in the cabinet, then that is fair enough. Most of us would of course prefer the shoe to be on the other foot, and seeing Gove sending May to the backbenches.
I stand by my comment that pretty much the only good news so far is the appointment of David Davis. Ultimately Boris’s appointment is inconsequential and probably only came about because Prince Phillip was busy.
Leadsom has been appointed to DEFRA (environment food and rural affairs). Small win.
Damian Green to DWP. Less and less room for IDS now.
Hopefully Patterson for Energy
>Leadsom has been appointed to DEFRA (environment food and rural affairs). Small win.
Maybe. Hope so. There were doubts over Leadsom in regards to whether she accepts some Green views.
Priti Patel as Secratary of State for International Development… that’s good news.
Yes, but a non-job really.
Department for Energy and Climate Change abolished. That is good news. But I would have preferred for climate sceptic Owen Patterson to have been appointed. That would have set the cat among the pigeons. Ultimately I suppose we will tell that the global warming battle has been won when it is no longer mentioned in the news – there won’t be a reckoning unfortunately.
Not looking good for IDS. That’s what happens when you quit in a huff I guess.
And big demotion for Savid Javid. He is now ‘communities’ secretary, whatever that is. Serves him right.
In the wake of his appointment, every paper is running some form of “Boris’s Gaffes.”
Reading through them all, I think I could really like this guy.
He’s the anti-PC, and he seems unusually perceptive in his outbursts. I couldn’t find even one which didn’t have at least a germ of truth and a wallop of humor.
This WILL be fun.
“Yes, but a non-job really.”
It is, and probably not what she wanted, but the important thing is that it’s a Cabinet-level appointment, so it puts another Leaver in the Cabinet.
I’m pleased to see Savid Javid still in there. He showed himself to be a bit cowardly, and I think he can now kiss goodbye to any dreams he had of ever being PM, but I still thinks he’s pretty sound, and I’d rather have him around than, say, Anna Soubry.
Many of the papers have dragged out BoJo’s piccaninnies “gaffe”, without contextualising it; he was mocking the behaviour of aid workers who probably think policing language is of vital importance: http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/04/why-i-feel-compelled-to-defend-boris/