An Englishman Wonders Who Will Lead His Country
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Prime Minister Theresa May made a tearful resignation speech the other day. She will no longer be Prime Minister in June. I admit to not having been a great fan of hers and, to be honest, she may have brought this on herself in many ways. However, being an old fashioned sort of chap, it is hard not to feel sympathetic when a lady cries, and I found that I did.
Arguably, her resignation speech was, possibly, the best she ever made, which is a little ironic.
Anyway, she has gone to all intents and purposes so, who is next in line to lead us?
Lots of Conservatives are throwing their ‘hats into the ring’ at the moment, so it could be any of them.
Boris Johnson and Dominic Raab are the front runners at the start, but with ten, at the moment, putting themselves forward – and that number might well increase – who knows who the final two will be?
Both Raab and Johnson are quite happy to lead us towards a so called ‘hard Brexit’, while many of the other contenders are more inclined towards a deal with The EU.
The problem they would immediately face is that, at the moment, The EU are saying ‘You have your deal, you’ve rejected it, but there will be no other deal offered’.
Of course, what The EU say and what The EU eventually do has often proven to be a completely different matter, but, if The EU did stick to their guns where could a new Prime Minister go?
The likelihood of leaving without any kind of deal now looms ever larger on the horizon.
Boris Johnson, more regularly known as simply ‘Boris’ or ‘BoJo’ is certainly the main front runner. Historically though, the ‘front runner’ in a Conservative party leadership election has rarely won.
I must admit, I am amazed that so many of them seem prepared to take on the job at the moment. I suspect even Solomon himself would struggle, given the divisions within the country and all the mainstream parties.
If, as is expected at the time of writing, Nigel Farage and his ‘Brexit Party’ actually do ‘wipe the floor’ with the opposition in the EU elections – the outcome of which is tomorrow as I’m writing this on a Saturday – then it is not inconceivable that The Brexit Party might well stand, as and when a British General Election is called.
At the moment they have no manifesto, although in fairness, they have only existed for a matter of weeks.
Assuming they have trounced everybody in The EU elections, I strongly suspect a manifesto will be forthcoming. Combined with Farages popularity with so many people – at least those not carrying milkshakes – is it too far a stretch of the imagination to envisage Farage himself as Prime Minister?
A recent poll – albeit I have little trust in polls – actually put Farage and his party only a couple of points behind Labour nationally – and they aren’t, as yet, a political party in purely national terms.
You know how I have often said ‘history repeats itself’? – Given that there are variations on the theme – I am beginning to wonder whether some events of the past are returning, albeit with some aforementioned variations.
Perhaps it’s getting dangerously close to ‘conspiracy theory’ type stuff, but I do wonder.
In 1930’s Germany, primarily due to a dreadful recession, the German people had lost faith in their mainstream political parties. This caused a political void and along came old Adolph to gleefully fill said void.
We all know what happened then don’t we?
No, before you ask, I am not comparing Farage to Hitler. That is just silly. What I am comparing is the political voids.
Britain is not in a recession to begin with, however, the people have lost much faith in the mainstream political parties.
When the dust finally settles, we may have Bojo as Prime Minister, or somebody else. There will be, at some point, a General Election.
The chances are the Conservatives will be ‘punished’ for the shambles created around ‘Brexit’. The chances are, an insufficient number will be prepared to risk a far left Labour government with Jeremy Corbyn as Prime Minister.
The result will, probably, be a ‘hung parliament’ with no outright winning party. Then, depending on how many elected MP’s not from the ‘big two’ are prepared to go into a coalition government, one of them will emerge leading a ‘minority government’. Frankly, this scenario is about the best chance Corbyn has got of ever becoming Prime Minister.
There is, however, a potential ‘dark horse’ in the mix.
Farage has announced that his Brexit Party would field candidates in a General Election.
Given the weight of disillusionment with ‘mainstream’ parties, is there really an outside chance that, in the not too distant future, we could be announcing Nigel Farage as the new Prime Minister?
Far fetched? Possibly. Unrealistic? Probably. Impossible? No.
These interesting times could, quite conceivably, become extraordinary times politically speaking.
The result of them becoming extraordinary times could be extraordinarily good, or they could be history repeating itself.
The former would, of course, be marvelous. The latter would, of course, be, potentially, very alarming indeed.
Only time will tell.
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Nigel Farages Brexit Party have absolutely smashed The EU elections.
A party that didn’t exist several weeks ago has blown all the mainstream parties out of the water.
The Liberal Democrats, who want to stop Brexit, have done very well.
This underscores the division in the country.
However, there’s no other way to view it.
Nigel Farages Brexit Party have smashed it.
Good! It’s what the mainstream deserved 😁
Excellent news!
I’ve been looking at the preliminary maps — the Brexit party looks dominant all over England and Wales.
Let’s hope this is a wake-up call the government, whoever the next PM is, can’t ignore.
Spot on Infedel!
As I said, history repeating with clear variations… The variation being the reason for discontent with the mainstream parties.
You are also 100% right that, in this case, the discontent was so easily avoidable it hurts.
As for Farage as PM. Highly unlikely but, not impossible.
His ability to capture the attention via his communicative skills and well acted ‘everyman’ persona is extraordinary.
A small bet on Farage as PM by 2025 will almost certainly be a small loss… Or a huge profit?
In a coalition government, isn’t it normally the head of the largest party in the coalition that becomes Prime Minister? If so, Farage could only become Prime Minister if the Brexit party won more seats than whichever of the “big two” it was in coalition with. I suppose that’s possible, but it seems awfully unlikely.
There’s one major difference between the disillusionment with mainstream parties in Britain today and that in Germany in the 1930s. Germany was facing problems which no conventional party could really have handled satisfactorily — the Depression, reparations, the humiliation of the post-WWI settlement. In Britain, the issue is that both mainstream parties simply refused to address the public’s objections to immigration and the EU — they just bulldozed on with a consensus politics in favor of those things, and called people names if they objected. People turned to cranks like Farage out of desperation. One or the other of the mainstream parties could easily have listened and made itself a vehicle for the popular discontent on those issues. They simply chose not to.