The Tory leadership election is a sort of X Factor for choosing the antichrist

[Denzil_DC]

This current divide must be especially sad for the Tories. The idea that Europe, the place where they buy their cheese, the place where they took their first five mistresses on minibreaks, the place where they cried at Hitler’s bunker, this collection of potential second homes, this was the place that tore them apart. And so we have a Conservative leadership election, a sort of X Factor for choosing the antichrist. Already, the cast looks like the episode of Come Dine With Me they show in hell before Top Gear comes on.

Stephen Crabb has come under fire for links to a group that claims it can cure homosexuality, and, having had a quick look at him, he’s definitely cured me: his beaming face is like a grim party game where blindfolded children have to try to place the eyes on to an identikit photograph of a murderer.

The frontrunner, Theresa May, communicates something horrifying, not through her appearance, but rather her unique expression of unwavering, furious disgust. It is the expression some nameless, pitiless archon will wear 50 years from now as it signs a contract to rent out our city centres to pharmaceutical companies so they can crop-spray viruses and harvest antibodies from any survivors. It is the expression Lucifer wore when the other angels attempted an intervention. Surely May, of all people, could make a positive case for migration just by saying: “If you can’t see the potential of a free-moving workforce, simply imagine how great it would be if I fucked off somewhere else.” Bizarrely, it looks like she’ll be involved in a runoff against Andrea Leadsom, who was created by Nazi scientists as a response to Dame Vera Lynn.

Michael Gove needs to get 50 signatures, but at the moment he doesn’t look like he could persuade his mother to sign him off a cross-country run after a leukaemia diagnosis. And then there’s Liam Fox. I seem to remember some sort of opprobrium being attached to him. Whatever it was, no doubt there can’t have been much to it (even though he was forced to resign or something) or it wouldn’t be getting comprehensively buried every news cycle by Jeremy Corbyn not indicating when leaving a roundabout or something.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/05/tory-leadership-election-x-factor-choosing-antichrist-brexit-frankie-boyle

I figured what the situation needed right now was a dose of Frankie Boyle.

(Note for US readers: Frankie Boyle is a Scottish comedian, but like Mark Steel, a sharp cookie. He can be provocative and graphic, so maybe NSFW if your work is a wee bit sensitive.)

[T_i_B]

1. Fox has been eliminated

Although that looks less like a headline and more like a description of Tories recreational activities......

[Denzil_DC]

2. LOL. Well played n/t

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Crab(b) is going to be eaten alive next

and this may not bode well for Andrea Salmon (her name before marriage) ...

[T_i_B]

4. Apparently Theresa May has Crabbs!

[Denzil_DC]

6. You've taken that too far.

[LeftishBrit]

5. Indeed!

And as the fox-hunters' song doesn't quite go:


Did you know Boris Johnson who made us all pay?
Did you know Liam Fox who must now go away?
Do you know someone called Theresa May
Who may mess us all up in the morning?


Oh, the sound of their voices does in my head!
I don't want to follow where they have all led!
If Gove could get in, I will go back to bed
And please don't wake me up in the morning!


Yes, I know Boris Johnson, and Nigel too
And that foolish Cameron, who hadn't a clue,
And all of the pundits, whose words weren't true,
And led us off a cliff in the morning.


I would drink to Labour with my heart and soul,
But they're fighting each other, and missing the goal;
While the Right-wing have triumphed through methods most foul
And have messed us all up in the morning.

[Denzil_DC]

7. LOL.

From the Scottish referendum:




Thatcher had 11 years in power before they finally sussed she was barking mad.

May comes out of the traps that way.

[Dworkin]

8. Horrible

Hi,

On a personal note, the sight of this leadership race is so horrible that I've not picked up my newspaper at the supermarket. I can't look at the Tory faces. Unfortunately, Mr Corbyn's face is having a similar effect, but for different reasons. I'd be happier looking at 'fails' on Youtube!

For a while the news will have to come to me via Private Eye and this forum.

D.

[LeftishBrit]

9. Newsthump: Terrible shits deciding who is most terrible shit

A large collection of terrible shits are currently trying to decide who is the most terrible shit of them all.

The process began with five terrible shits; the homophobe with the paedophile beard and the disgraced corrupt one are no longer in the running, leaving the anti-human rights one, the backstabbing liar, and the Thatchery one who bloody loves fracking.

“It’s certainly a tricky one,” said Berkshire stockbroker and terrible shit Simon Williams.

“I am a little concerned that we might rush into something and not pick a genuinely terrible shit....

“
http://newsthump.com/2016/07/06/terrible-shits-deciding-who-is-the-most-terrible-shit/

[Denzil_DC]

10. Not much of a surprise:

Theresa May v Andrea Leadsom to be next prime minister

Theresa May and Andrea Leadsom will battle it out to become the next leader of the Conservative Party after Michael Gove was eliminated from the contest.

After the second MPs' ballot, Home Secretary Mrs May finished with 199 votes, Energy Minister Mrs Leadsom 84 and Mr Gove, the justice secretary, 46.

Conservative members will now decide the winning candidate, with the result due on 9 September.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36737426

We must have been a very, very bad country in our past to deserve this sort of karma.


Still, it's all presumptuous. The way things are going, a tsunami or comet could wipe out Westminster before the vote.

[T_i_B]

11. Andrea Leadsom is truly dreadful

"Fruitcake" would be the nicest adjective I can think of to describe her. Also appears to be from the Jeffrey Archer / Grant Schapps school of Conservatism.

[Denzil_DC]

12. Chatting about it all to Mrs Denzil,

we figured Leadsom is toward the lower end of US Republican/Tea Party-scale conservative looniness, whereas May is conservative in the no less sinister thoroughly British Thatcherite extreme.

Of the two, I think Leadsom might be the easier to beat electorally, despite her current appeal to factions of the UKIP vote. They expect her to trigger Article 50 immediately on taking power.

May should be beatable just on grounds of sheer horrendousness and record, never mind the fact that quite a few of the vocal right think (on good evidence) that she's been an incompetent Home Secretary, also claiming she's spoken favourably about Shariah law, etc., and fearing she's wishy-washy about pulling the trigger any time soon.

OTOH, some in this country, and not least in the party, have been wetting themselves yearning for "another Thatcher" since the old bat's demise, so I won't be placing any bets either way.

[T_i_B]

13. Judging by the Tories local to me....

I would not put it past them to vote for Andrea Leadsom as the "ideological purity" candidate.