Boris Spells It Out

In the week of the Tory Party Conference, no doubt lots of ink will be wasted speculating that the British people don't like old Etonians (we much prefer Fettes-educated liars or something), that David Cameron is as substantial as the power source for his wind turbine and that the Tories are too young/posh/muddled to seriously challenge Reid/Brown (delete as applicable). All of which may be true, but there's one old Etonian who's still worth listening to. Boris Johnson is a curate's egg of a man - a particularly bad case of politician's 'please love me' syndrome matched with a tendency to think with his dick that would make Jeffrey Archer blush - but there's a sharp intellect there all right and he seems to have, under a veneer of the usual Tory nastiness and his public buffoon image, an instinctive grasp that traditional British fair play and American love of freedom aren't quite what they were (he was born in New York City, of course, and is, or was, a traditional Tory Atlanticist).

He naturally supported the Iraq war originally, but is now charging around declaring that it's a disaster, which is far stronger talk than most in his party's leadership. Quite what he'll make of the USA's recent decision to abolish itself and turn into a totalitarian dictatorship with a side order of show trials and torture I can only imagine. His recent blog post lambasting the farce that is the Saddam Hussein trial is worth reading, forceful, well written and well argued. One sinner that repents, etc. He also quotes Cicero and Ian Hislop, which has to be something of a first.