You might say it’s a long-standing tradition of conservatives ignoring reality during leadership elections. Only the Tories have struggled with reality for years. Just think. Ukrainians voted for a comedian and got a serious leader. Three years ago the UK voted for a comedian and got a sociopathic quayside clown. Someone who has visibly turned away from the truth. As a result, the entire country has an urgent need for PTSD treatment.
However, we are now officially in game show territory. Also known as the Tory party having a collective orgasm as it reveals its deep dysfunction with countless deluded fools who decide they want to be Prime Minister while making promises they have no hope of keeping. I mean, Reman Chishti. Even his family doesn’t know who he is. Why waste everyone’s time? It’s not like someone pushed him a post in the office.
And Grant Shapps. You know the party is really screwed when Grant Baby is one of the more serious contenders. And his only promise – other than mandatory unfunded tax cuts – was that he could help re-elect a few lawmakers. Because that’s the big picture. The way to move the country forward is to make sure Chris Pincher’s constituents vote for him next time. That will do it. Things are so bad that Rishi Sunak’s commitment to bankrupting the country a little slower than any of his colleagues seems quite attractive.
We are still where we are. So we can sit back and enjoy the shitshow. Watching a collection of ragtag Tories crash and burn as they compete with each other to look the least competent. Heck, Wimbledon’s over, the World Cup is postponed until November, so we can tuck into the popcorn and look at the leadership race as the next entertainment this summer. Kind of like a third-rate reality show. Only with more laughter. And lies.
The fun began in the Churchill War Rooms in Westminster, where Steve Baker launched his latest pet project, Conservative Way Forward. The perfect bunker for the bunker mentality. They’ll never catch Steve alive. The CWF isn’t really a think tank, as no thinking is ever associated with anyone joining Baker’s upsets: it’s more of a nostalgic trip back to pure Thatcherism, where the market and low taxes decided everything. The opening video, which somehow left Boris Johnson off the list of recent Conservative prime ministers, was pure Little Britain.
Baker’s slogan was “happiness through freedom.” Or something. It made the Bruges Group look like an intellectual heavyweight. He was supported by the irredeemably dark Lord Frost, whose attempts to combat the mind-body divide led him to attempt a full frontal lobotomy on himself. Now he has no idea he is the man who negotiated the Brexit deal. He mumbled in a monotone while gradually losing his audience, who were suffocating in the heat. “I’m excited,” he said. As you level.
Then came the first challenger. The Minister of Finance for the next 10 minutes, Nadhim Zahawi. It was painful. Nadhim apparently has no idea that the only reason he got the job was because the Condemned was completely desperate, and anyone with any self-respect would say no. He was also almost unattached. Sentences were disfigured and died without meaning. Whoever had told him he would make a good leader could never hear him speak. Being a bit more familiar with word formation than Liz Truss isn’t the vote winner he might have hoped for.
Zahawi first committed to immediately repealing the planned tax increases, unaware that he was part of a lame duck administration that was prohibited from doing so. Like I said, it’s not the sharpest. Then he promised to cut even more taxes and cut department budgets by 20%. Nothing like taking a wrecking ball to the NHS and schools.
As the word salad continued, a young woman passed out in the heat. It was the smartest response of the day, although Tobias Ellwood, one of Zahawi’s surprise supporters, pushed a few people out of the way to offer his help. Not that he wanted anyone to notice, of course. Meanwhile, Nadhim just kept spitting. Ignoring the drama. Indifferent to everything. Except to get to the end. It was effectively the shortest leadership campaign of the season. Even if he didn’t know it was game over, everyone else did.
Suella Braverman was among her people—her tribe—and her appearance in the pulpit was greeted with cheers and cheers. She began by saying she was completely on board with the tax cuts – she didn’t mention how she intended to fund them, but we can all play fantasy economics these days – before insisting she wanted to keep the Good Friday Agreement. by leaving the Northern Ireland Protocol and the European Convention on Human Rights. Her understanding of the law is poor. Even for Attorney General.
It was fitting, she said, that we were in Churchill’s War Rooms because it was thanks to Churchill that we had these leadership elections. You could have fooled me. I could have sworn it was because the Tories were in the doldrums and the party finally realized its country had had enough of Johnson’s lies. She said she hoped older people would do the right thing and not overuse NHS services. “I have a clear vision,” she said. There again…
The final performance of the day took place in the Cinnamon Club’s private dining room, where Sajid Javid gave his address to the party. He wasn’t going to talk about being the son of a bus driver, he said as he continued to talk about being the son of a bus driver. Because being the son of a bus driver didn’t sit well with him when he ran for the leadership three years ago. And he had no flash clips or promo material. Although there was a glossy manifesto that didn’t look like it came out in the last five days.
We need a leader in the national interest, he continued. Although he couldn’t explain why it had taken him so long to realize that the Doomed One was the wrong person. Nor was he happy to support the tax hike he was now determined to reverse. “The best prime ministers surround themselves with people smarter than them,” he said. However, Javid seemed to surround himself with completely lightweight players. Sitting in the front row were Chris Philp, Rachel McLean and Robin Walker. None of which can boast a neuron between them.
“Only two candidates are really suitable for this contest,” he concluded. Without telling us who those two might be. Although probably not him, Braverman and Zahawi. Who seem to have done their best to disqualify themselves. But the rest of the week would almost certainly reveal some fresh idiocy. Keep it colorful.
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