As Johnson Draws a Happy Face, Britons Confront a Run of Bad News

[Zorro]

There’s a cognitive dissonance between Mr. Johnson’s upbeat appraisal of British life and the ills facing its citizens, including gas and food shortages and fears of rising energy prices.

LONDON — Britons are lining up for gas, staring at empty grocery shelves, paying higher taxes and worrying about spiraling prices as a grim winter approaches.

But to visit the Conservative Party conference in Manchester this past week was to enter a kind of happy valley, where cabinet ministers danced, sang karaoke and drained flutes of champagne — Pol Roger, Winston Churchill’s favorite brand, naturally.

Nobody captured the bonhomie better than Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who told a whooping crowd of party faithful, “You all represent the most jiving, hip, happening, and generally funkapolitan party in the world.”

The cognitive dissonance extended beyond the Mardi Gras atmosphere. In his upbeat keynote speech, Mr. Johnson characterized the multiple ills afflicting Britain as a “function of growth and economic revival” — challenging but necessary post-Brexit adjustments on the way to a more prosperous future.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/09/world/europe/boris-johnson-britain-brexit.html

[Skittles]

1. are they like our GOP

where they can fix shit so they will "win" regardless of what the majority wants?

[tanyev]

2. Many times in history where that type of situation did not end well.

[Thomas Hurt]

3. just how bad does it have to be before the UK gets rid of this is idiot?

[Aussie105]

4. Not this idiot who is the problem.

More, consequences of Brexit.
The lowly paid working classes - mainly foreigners - all went home.

Now, a little bit of thinking and forward projection might have helped here.

But the stiff upper lipped British, led by I-am-all-mouth Boris, never expected this!

Oh well, back to post World War 2 shortages for them, I guess.

Same thing could happen in the USA seeing you have your own slave classes so don't get too complacent, you hear?

But Australia is no different, thinking there are untapped supplies of people to fill labor shortages.

Our leader wants to import 100s of foreign nurses to fill gaps revealed in the system by COVID cases.
You know, stresses on the hospital system caused by a pandemic, some nurses burning out and resigning, some not wanting to get vaccinated - easy solution, just import the workers.

I'm thinking . . . most nurses overseas are busy, surely? For the same reasons Australian nurses are busy.

[milestogo]

5. Most Covid nurses everywhere are totally burned out.

I can't imagine why someone would want to go to another country and experience the same hellish situation.