The dwarf has played his little trick

He can only play it once

Something striking about Burnham’s supposed popularity is that it is always assumed that he is appealing to somebody else. Somebody off-screen. That there exists a constituency of northerners who are lapping up the ‘barm, bap, cob’ videos like bleating mutton for the slaughter.

I have taken the time now to speak to maybe fifteen to twenty people who are not particularly interested in politics, a few of them ‘red-wallers’, and on each occasion I have heard something to the effect of: ‘I find his social media a bit patronising but I can imagine it would work with some people’.

But what if, contrary to the Brenda from Bristol sociological narrative, the average voter is able to see through the Burnham’s Savile Panto routine? Just as they were able to see through Project Fear, the Euro and devolution in the North East?

This more optimistic perspective on the intelligence of the average voter would seem to bear out in the polling ratings. Reform have already drawn level again with Labour. Instead of Burnham inspiring ‘hope’ amongst millions of people his principle achievement appears to have been knocking down the Green Party, who still poll over 10%. This probably would have happened anyway in 2029 with Starmer in as the general election would have forced Green voters to back the anti-Farage candidate (overwhelmingly Labour where they live).

But the insurmountable challenges which caused Starmer to open up a flank on the left still exist. Burnham will have to pass a budget at the end of October which will have to deal with the inflation/cost of living pressures accruing as traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains at a dribble. Israel is also refusing to down tools in Gaza against Hamas, implying that there may be another flareup of fighting in the region; and so Burnham will find himself caught between pro-Palestine activists and pro-Israel institutions/donors within the Labour movement.

‘Hope’ cannot paper over these cracks. Nor can gormless grinning. You are either for another round of energy subsidies a la Truss (which his backbenchers will demand) or you are obedient to the Bond markets. You are either in favour of Israel’s right to defend itself or you shall not rest until every grain of Palestinian sand has been seized back from the Zionists.

Burnham’s Royle Family routine is already falling apart as he has to explain to victims families why he is releasing violent criminals and rapists. Mobs are storming asylum hotels in Norfolk. Burnham will eventually be forced to give up on the carrot and start using the stick. Every city east of Przemysl is being turned to rubble by autonomous murder drones. The land is burning and the skies are full of DEATH. So it is that Burnham’s happiness rings hollow.

Here is the heartening thing – pushing Burnham forward is the last idea that these people have to prevent an upturning of the system. Yes there is still the constitutional outrages which Sue Gray will attempt, there are factional disputes on the right which will make it hard for any one party to form a majority government outright. But the Burnham cat is out of the bag and it looks be dead on arrival. Labour are not soaring to forty per cent in the polls, as some commentators breathlessly predicted.

Farage seems to have weathered the corruption charges intact if slightly cowed. This is not a ringing endorsement of Reform’s conduct over the past six months and serious changes are needed if Reform want to win an outright majority in 2029. Farage must learn a new media strategy for dealing with corruption/impropriety allegations in interviews to avoid visible cortisol spiking. Reform must red team policy announcements such the recent channel Royal Navy announcement so they do not get caught out on basic details like which ships are being decommissioned in the next three years.

Most importantly they must start driving the news agenda instead of reacting to whatever they see on the Telegraph this morning. As J’accuse wrote yesterday the Arday affair was an open goal for driving forward an anti-EDI in higher education agenda which should have taken priority over the illegal immigration announcement once it became clear that Cambridge would have to u-turn. More to the point – will nobody except a few anon accounts point out that the incumbent Tory leader Kemi Badenoch is as much of a fabulist?

It is apparently forgotten now that Badenoch made up an offer in Medicine from Stanford. That is just the tip of the iceberg. Ashcroft’s fawning biography of Kemi says that she invented being slapped by a White woman for being anti-woke. Kemi went to one of the most expensive private schools in Lagos and has been telling the press that she used to have to bring in chairs to sit on and machetes to cut the grass. She has claimed that she went without water and electricity despite being related to the former Vice-President of Nigeria. Just look through Kemi’s Wikipedia page and see how many times you see the term ‘claimed’ is used in her early life biography.

Here is another free suggestion – Every time a Tory MP or journalists tweets something about Arday, he/she should qt’d by Zia/Farage with screenshots of the Stanford story. These people want to make a known mountebank Prime Minister. They think a compulsive liar who was half an hour late to their first cabinet meeting should be given the nuclear codes. That is much, much more important than Cambridge giving the role of Professor to an asinine DEI grifter.

By your fruits, ye shall know them….