Westminster Politics

Frosty

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Paul the Wolf said:
Has BoJo ever told the truth?
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Yes, here:

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article...rica-is-a-mess-but-we-can-t-blame-colonialism

Believe me, you blush, you fat, white chiefs, at that kind of reception. You feel embarrassed, and obscurely ashamed, and it is that feeling of shame I wish to confront. If we were erroneously treated like the Duke of Kent. imagine with what rapture Africa will greet Tony Blair when he descends next week in his big white bird. Last year he told the Labour party conference that Africa was a 'blot on our conscience'. Last week Jack Straw was raging in the Guardian at the iniquities of the colonial legacy.

Heaven knows what the Foreign Office has cooked up for Blair, or quite how this British prime minister will choose to break the winds of change. But we must hope, for the sake of candour and common sense, that he does not blame Britain, or colonialism, or the white man. The continent may be a blot, but it is not a blot upon our conscience. The problem is not that we were once in charge, but that we are not in charge any more.

Consider Uganda, pearl of Africa, as an example of the British record. Are we guilty of slavery? Pshaw. It was one of the first duties of Frederick Lugard, who colonised Buganda in the 1890s, to take on and defeat the Arab slavers. And don't swallow any of that nonsense about how we planted the 'wrong crops'. Uganda teems, sprouts, bursts with vegetation. You will find fruits rare and strange, like the jackfruit, hanging bigger than your head and covered with green tetrahedral nodules. Though delicately perfumed, it is, alas, more or less disgusting, and not even Waitrose is pretentious enough to stock it.

So the British planted coffee and cotton and tobacco, and they were broadly right. It is true that coffee prices are currently low; but that is the fault of the Vietnamese, who are shamelessly undercutting the market, and not of the planters of 100 years ago. If left to their own devices, the natives would rely on nothing but the instant carbohydrate gratification of the plantain. You never saw a place so abounding in bananas: great green barrel-sized bunches, off to be turned into matooke. Though this dish (basically fried banana) was greatly relished by Idi Amin, the colonists correctly saw that the export market was limited.
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Mr Pigeon

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MUW4Eva said:
Errr......the crushing of the Carrie story would say otherwise .....
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not only should that story have been the end of him but the subsequent crushing of the story should have also been a huge story, but these cnuts have the ability to get rid of bad news and control the narrative what story? There was no story.
 

Mr Pigeon

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BBC picking their language VERY carefully...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-61869650

Downing Street has confirmed that it spoke to a newspaper before it dropped a story involving the prime minister's wife, Carrie Johnson.
The Times printed a report on Saturday saying Mrs Johnson had been offered the role of chief-of-staff to Boris Johnson while he was foreign secretary, at a time when they were in a relationship.
But the item was removed from later editions and not published online.
No 10 said it had spoken to the Times before and after the story came out.
The prime minister's spokesman said it had been made clear by his political colleagues in Downing Street - and by Mrs Johnson's spokesperson - that the claim was "not true".
But a government source told the BBC the conversation following publication had not included mention of legal action.

Mr Johnson, who became prime minister in 2019, served as foreign secretary from 2016 to 2018, when he resigned in protest at then Prime Minister Theresa May's Brexit stance.

Two sources told the BBC that Mr Johnson had floated the idea with members of his team that his now-wife could be employed as his chief-of-staff when he was foreign secretary - and said multiple aides had advised him against it.

The Times declined to comment on why it had removed its story regarding Mr and Mrs Johnson during his time at the Foreign Office.

The prime minister's spokesman said Mr Johnson had not spoken personally to deputy editor Tony Gallagher asking for it to be removed.

The journalist who wrote the Times story, Simon Walters, told the New European website that he stood by it "100%".

"I was in lengthy and detailed communication with No 10 at a high level, [Mr Johnson's press secretary] Ben Gascoigne and Mrs Johnson's spokeswoman for up to 48 hours before the [Times] went to press," he said.

"At no point did any of them offer an on-the-record denial of any element of the story."

"Nor have any of these three offered an on-the-record denial to me since," Mr Walters added. "No 10 and Mr Gascoigne did not deny it off-the-record [meaning to be reported but not directly attributed to an individual] either."

Mr Johnson married Carrie Johnson - née Carrie Symonds - in May last year and they have two children together.

Mrs Johnson is a former head of communications for the Conservative Party.
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No mention that it was during an affair. No mention of it not happening after another MP caught Carrie on Boris' johnson. Should go without saying that it's not got top billing even on their Politics page at the moment (that honour goes to the story about Boris having a sinus operation followed by two separate rail strike articles) even though the story is the entire site's most read article.
 

Frosty

Logical and sensible but turns women gay
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Mr Pigeon said:
BBC picking their language VERY carefully...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-61869650



No mention that it was during an affair. No mention of it not happening after another MP caught Carrie on Boris' johnson. Should go without saying that it's not got top billing even on their Politics page at the moment (that honour goes to the story about Boris having a sinus operation followed by two separate rail strike articles) even though the story is the entire site's most read article.
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Honestly I think the by-elections this week are playing into this too. The BBC is worried about the blowback.
 

Fluctuation0161

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Mr Pigeon said:
BBC picking their language VERY carefully...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-61869650



No mention that it was during an affair. No mention of it not happening after another MP caught Carrie on Boris' johnson. Should go without saying that it's not got top billing even on their Politics page at the moment (that honour goes to the story about Boris having a sinus operation followed by two separate rail strike articles) even though the story is the entire site's most read article.
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BBC news is simply a Tory mouth piece these days. Very little value in following it.
 

Buster15

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Fluctuation0161 said:
BBC news is simply a Tory mouth piece these days. Very little value in following it.
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Exactly.
They always claim to be unbiased.
But anyone who watches or listens to it knows full well that they are just like the rest and tow the government line.

The only news programme I watch is Channel 4 at 7pm.
 

Pexbo

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Jericholyte2 said:

This is Tory Britain now!
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The irony is off the scale. It doesn’t need reiterating but I can’t help myself. It’s literally been a Tory government for 12 years now.
 

Jericholyte2

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In the same news cycle where rail workers, calling for better working conditions and a below-inflation pay rise, are vilified, we get this...
 

Berbasbullet

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Why exactly do Labour seem to be under fire for these protests? Im confused
 

cafecillos

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Pexbo said:
The irony is off the scale. It doesn’t need reiterating but I can’t help myself. It’s literally been a Tory government for 12 years now.
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So, in the middle of a Tory government, and with uninterrupted Tory governments since 2010, what is actually happening right now is a "vision" of Labour's Britain. Hate doesn't begin to describe what I feel for this fecking scum. All of them are either incredibly dumb or incredibly abhorrent. Or both, of course.
 

Fluctuation0161

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Buster15 said:
Exactly.
They always claim to be unbiased.
But anyone who watches or listens to it knows full well that they are just like the rest and tow the government line.

The only news programme I watch is Channel 4 at 7pm.
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Cameron ruined BBC impartiality. Boris drove a stake through it.

Channel 4 news, although it has its flaws, is the only TV news which doesn't serve the Tories purpose. That's why they want to get rid of it.
 

TwoSheds

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Fluctuation0161 said:
What a serious and vital life event. Much more important than rail workers safety.
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Yeah I was particularly worried about the guy who wouldn't be able to have his stag do as planned, seemed really important.
 
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