Why Boris is worth voting for
In today's Daily Telegraph, Iain Martin has written a very interesting and by no means uncritical article about why people should vote for Boris:"Let Boris be Boris, runs the prevailing media wisdom. The Tories have their candidate for mayor held against his will by armed minders who dictate his every utterance and are ruining his hopes of winning." While such ploys might have worked for a while, with voting approaching and opinion polls so close, should we not see a little more of the Have I got News For You, rugby tackling on the football field, Scouse-abusing Boris we know so well?"After all the headlines, the time's come for Boris to get serious.This is what we journalists say when an actor declines to play his allotted role in a story and our preconceptions are disturbed."In the script, Boris should have had to turn up to Friday prayers and apologise for offending Muslims, or insulted the East End, or run over a pensioner on his bike, all the time saying "cripes" and ruffling his haystack hair-do. There is still time, of course."If he had been un-spun there would, about now, have appeared plenty of articles lamenting the Conservative candidate's lack of seriousness and castigating the Tory high command for its failure to impose some discipline."Instead, the campaign in London is difficult to call and the behaviour of the principals is out of character."In recent television debates, Ken Livingstone has appeared resigned to defeat and lacking fizz. He was caught adjusting Johnson's collar in an almost fatherly way, laughs at Boris's jokes and is declining to be too personal. Is it possible that while observers ask whether the Tory really wants to win, it is Ken who isn't bothered whether he gets in again or not?"Livingstone's activist supporters are making up for his insouciance by shouting hysterically that Johnson is Islamaphobic and a racist."The desperation is understandable as the gravy train of which Livingstone is driver has generated mountains of money, seats on quangos and grants for fake business ventures. For those on the payroll, Ken losing office would be politically correct London's equivalent of the credit crunch."Does it matter who wins? The Tory leadership needs a proper victory and will be very embarrassed if their man loses."Labour thinks it might be able to hold on and recognises, rightly, that defeat would be a staging post on the way to exile."Those are their private nightmares. What of the rest of us who live or work here, visit London, or simply think that the capital should not be run by the mayor in the style of a Latin American dictatorship? After eight years, and more, of sub-Marxist shenanigans and the hugging of hate-preachers, the answer has to be Boris."I was initially sceptical, seeing his candidacy as a temporary stroke of brilliance by Steve Hilton, David Cameron's marketing guru, while suspecting that it would not work."After the positive headlines last year came the difficult part: convincing the candidate to take it seriously. This is what happened after various rockets from the shadow chancellor, George Osborne, and the hiring of Lynton Crosby, the Australian strategist."Crosby clearly understood that a large part of Johnson's "act" involved exaggeration for effect. So strong was his "brand" that the only way to counter its negatives was a sharp swing in the other direction. So serious Boris was born."He is now really up against it. The payola machine Livingstone built for partially reconstructed Marxists at city hall is seamlessly interwoven with his network of activists across the city, giving him real reach in campaigning terms. Livingstone may well be tired, but he still has a very good chance of sneaking back in. Johnson has to hope to persuade Tories in outer London to care enough to vote this time."The bad news for undecided voters is that a flirtation with the Liberals or the Greens is pointless. The electoral system means that the top two candidates' names will first be identified and then only the second votes cast for those two are added to their first vote totals. If a voter wants it to count, their second vote should be cast for either Boris or Ken."Johnson's campaign is showing signs of faltering as the winning post comes into view. The problem has not been that he has avoided playing the clown, rather it is a lack of grasp of detail. He needs to work out a series of coherent answers to questions such as: how much will his new Routemaster buses cost? Who will be in his team if he wins?"Beyond policy specifics - and there is much in his promises on knife crime, policing, open spaces and recycling that is worth commending - ultimately this is a set-piece battle in a culture war."Johnson is the Cavalier fighting Ken's politically-correct Roundhead forces whose grip has been strongest in municipal government. In office his natural inclination would be to do a bit less, "don't just do something, stand there," as Ronald Reagan put it, rather than spraying money at friends and quangos."His most interesting venture would be the building of a bully pulpit with his proposed Mayor's Fund, designed to attract philanthropic donations from the City which would then be forwarded to voluntary organisations engaged in all manner of good and important work."This quaint-sounding initiative carries within it the seeds of a bigger revolution in social policy which has been brewing in think-tanks and the brains of brighter Tories."Livingstone and his kind require a highly bureaucratic, statist model, because it guarantees a lock on patronage and spending, which in turn delivers a client constituency, control and power in perpetuity."Encouraging free institutions to work in concert, convincing them they need not be the creatures of government, is a condition for the overdue regeneration of our civic society."This is not just dead-hand government getting out of the way for the sake of it. The thread runs through Conservative proposals for an explosion in the diversity of school provision, with the power of local education authorities eroded so that new providers more sensitive to parents' and pupils' needs are allowed in. Unleashed properly, this spirit can also liberate areas such as the arts."Johnson's London would not provide a template for a Cameron government as the mayor's powers do not extend that far - and, if he wins, the voters who gambled will want evidence of the basics being mastered."But his election would symbolise the emergence of a wider movement taking on Leftist control freakery and big state social engineering. On its own that makes Boris worth voting for." Yes- let Boris be Boris and let him be Mayor ! Mayor Boris will indeed make it a Greater, Brighter and Happier London.
David Giles ● 6778d13 Comments ● 6759d