Boris Johnson, Roman Fascists and whatever is going on in London?

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People not in the UK may not know that the Brits had a swathe of local elections recently of which there are two notable take home points:
  1. Labour did the worse they ever have
  2. Boris Johnson is now the Lord Mayor of London
The first point is irrelevant to nearly everyone outside of the UK and I will leave you to discover the finer details although I now know that Monmouthshire remained Conservative, *sigh*.

The second, Boris Johnson, is something that everyone with a fine sense of humour can take great pleasure in. Ken "Red" Livingstone was ousted on Thursday by the crown prince of British political tom foolery ... just awesome!

A little background from Wikipedia:
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (born 19 June 1964) is a British politician and the incoming Mayor of London. He is also a journalist and author, formerly serving as editor of The Spectator. He was elected as Member of Parliament for Henley in 2001 and was Shadow Minister for Higher Education, until the announcement of his intention to stand in the London mayoral election of 2008, his victory being announced on May 2, 2008.

But that's a bit dry, try a little of his more known escapades, again taken from Wikipedia:
  • Stuart Collier - he is heard agreeing to supply to a former schoolmate, Darius Guppy, the address of the News of the World journalist Stuart Collier.
  • 'Theft' of cigar case - the 'theft', in 2003, of a cigar case belonging to Tariq Aziz, an associate of Saddam Hussein, which Johnson had found in the rubble of Aziz's house in Baghdad.
  • People of Liverpool - On 16 October 2004, The Spectator carried an unsigned editorial comment criticising a perceived trend to mawkish sentimentality by the public.
  • Papua New Guinea - Johnson's journalism and public speaking is much given to overblown metaphor, and a 2006 column likening Tory leadership disputes to "Papua New Guinea-style orgies of cannibalism and chief-killing" was criticised in Papua New Guinea.
  • Jamie Oliver - Johnson was criticised for his comments regarding the campaign for healthier school dinners headed by celebrity TV chef Jamie Oliver.
  • Portsmouth - claimed, in a column for GQ, that the city was "one of the most depressed towns in Southern England, a place that is arguably too full of drugs, obesity, underachievement and Labour MPs".
  • Allegations of racism - Journalist Rod Liddle said that Johnson used the word "piccaninnies" in private to refer to black Africans. Greater London analyst and director of the Greater London Group at the London School of Economics, Dr. Tony Travers, has written that "There is no way to dress up expressions such as "piccaninnies'" and "watermelon smiles" to take them within a million miles of acceptable."

Nothing terribly strange about that for a Conservative MP, no sex scandals ... yet - also piossibly not quite as "bad" as Ken Livingstone's 'controversies'.

I think though it's the manner in which Boris goes about it all that gets up people's noses, much like an English Private School Rugby Captain that's got too much time on his hands and not enough sense of empathy for anyone. Makes for an interesting choice of Mayor for your capital city eh!

[Fascist interval, please make your way to the lobby for popcorn and soft drinks]


Oh, before we move on to what what certain UK bloggers are saying about the whole Boris shebang you'll have heard that the Rome City mayoralty has also changed hands, to Gianni Alemanno a 'former' Fascist and now of the right-wing National Alliance party. The win gave us this:
some of his supporters Tuesday night celebrated on the steps of the Campidoglio city hall with "saluti Romani" — the Mussolini-era stiff-armed salute that was later adopted and made notorious by the Nazis.

Alemanno's win also had Silvio Berlusconi, ex/incoming-Italian Prime Minister and Alemanno financial backer, saying “We are the new Falange.” As the San Francisco Sentinel explains, "The original Falange - the word means “phalanx” - was the Spanish fascist party, founded in the 1930s, which supplied Francisco Franco’s dictatorship with its ideological underpinning."

Well, the same move towards NeoNazism is also happening within London with the election of Richard Barnbrook of the British Nationalist Party (BNP) to the London Assembly:

Can you see what is happening in Rome and what is probably starting to grow in London? I've more hope for London than Rome but still ...

[/interval - welcome back]

And on with Boris - here's a few bloggers comments I've seen about his win:

Well I'm delighted Boris Johnson was voted in as mayor of London.
Because that means no-one from our fair capital CAN EVER BE PATRONIZING ABOUT CORNWALL AGAIN.

Sample conversations:

PRODUCER: You live in Cornwall? Hahahahaha, I bet it's all inbred down there.
ME: Yeah yeah, but at least we didn't vote for BORIS FUCKING JOHNSON, you retarded fuck.
PRODUCER: ....

...


On sticking one's nose into the London mayoral campaign where it's not wanted
Dear the Henley Standard

I note with some fascination Henley MP Boris Johnson's bid to become mayor of the great metropolis of London. Should he succeed in his noble quest, I fear that his days as the town's representative at Westminster will be numbered thussly: zero.

I, for one, will miss the great man careering down Greys Road on his mountain bike screaming "Get out of the way proles!", flailing away at passers-by with an antique cutlass in one hand, autographed copies of his latest fiction in the other. Who says the age of the Great British Eccentric is dead?

...

And I leave you with the link to the BorisWatch blog: Reactions from around the world (and the blogosphere)

“I’m kicking off my diet with cheeseburger - whatever Jamie Oliver says McDonalds are incredibly nutritious and, as far as I can tell, crammed full of vital nutrients and rigid with goodness.”
While campaigning at McDonalds in Botley, Oxford, May 20
[source: Boris Quotes from the BorisWatch blog]

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