Meltdown in Lockdown

Last day of the Jackal

Well, that was some week in these dark days of lockdown. In the States, Joe Biden on winning the Presidency with the majority of electoral college votes said that it is "time to heal" and he promised "not to divide but to unify" the US, whilst Kamala Harris eviscerated Trump without even mentioning him. Then the joyous arrival of the Pfizer vaccine and to cap this in a week when things only got better as Dominic Cummings, the puppeteer behind Boris Johnson, left Downing Street for the last time. The oracle that brought us Brexit, levelling up and who presumably persuaded Johnson to contract out PPE and Test and Trace to the chumocracy at a jaw-dropping cost, realised his time was up. The promise of taking back control was exposed as jingoism, and his refrain that 'ministers are following the science' was finally exposed as a mantra as dishonest as his trip to Durham. 

The UK is in a mess and someone had to take the blame. The problem for Boris Johnson is that things will get worse and he will need to dispose of other hostages to fortune. His cabinet is full of well-deserved victims who were prepared to hitch their ambitions to the wonder of Boris as he zip-wired to power on the unpopularity of Theresa May and then the forlorn Jeremy Corbyn. Those look like halcyon days or Johnson as he seeks to find more emollient tones.

There is much speculation about the PM recalibrating his policies to recognise the landslide of lost respect in the devolved nations and the north of England. He will have to embrace those parts of his party less hostile to striking a trade deal with the EU. This will prompt a standoff with the European Research Group (ERG) of Conservative MPs led by the incorrigible Steve Baker and ever duplicitous Michael Gove. If the ERG manage to extract a no-deal from the constantly postponed final negotiations with the EU, they will soon become a busted flush as the true damage of Brexit becomes apparent. 

So this week has provided some light in this winter of despair as the dark days shorten in an ever-tightening lockdown. But for far too many people, it is the loss of family and friends, jobs and income, loneliness and diminished hopes that they will have to endure over Christmas that will be the abiding outcomes of 2020.