Published September 26, 2019
© Georg Boomgaarden
Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s extraordinary performance in the House of Commons on 25th of September 2019 will be remembered. He was furious that the day before the Supreme Court had declared his prorogation of Parliament null and void and with no effect. He was furious that he had to stand in the House again instead of having Parliament, Courts „and all that stuff“ silenced. His inflammatory tone was disgraceful.
The Speaker asked both sides to use a more civilized tone, but it was the Prime Minister who set the tone from the start. He did not hide his deep contempt of Parliament and the Supreme Court – a position more typical for outright fascists than a democratic head of government. He called a law that has the Royal assent a „surrender-bill“.
His speech was preparing an electoral campaign under the heading of „Parliament against the People“ – also a characteristic topic for fascist ideology. Playing out referenda against parliamentary sovereignty is also typical for demagogues and dictators – as Margaret Thatcher once remarked. Boris Johnson is not only playing a blame game against the EU, he also prepares in a very aggressive way a stab-in-the-back legend to blame Parliament and the EU for not getting his no-deal-Brexit done.
The stab-in-the-back legend was notorious for right extremists in the first German Republic – the Weimar Republic from 1919-1933 – who blamed Social Democrats for losing the Great War by stabbing-in-the-back of the army forcing it to surrender and signing the humiliating Treaty of Versailles. With that they deflected attention from the fact that the generals and the Kaiser were asking Social Democrats to step in at the very moment when they knew that they lost the war and revolution threatened. The legend of the stab-in-the-back was an important element of Nazi propaganda before coming to power and when in power.
I do not say that Boris Johnson is a fascist. He is a populist using typical fascist rhetoric. To blame others for own failures is nothing unusual in politics, but it is quite shameless how Boris Johnson continues to defy logic by pretending to negotiate and at the same time not putting any viable proposal on the table, pretending he could eat the cake and still have the same cake, pretending he would not write to the EU for a further extension and still obey the law that excludes a no-deal-scenario. He puts up a kind of virtual world that pretends to be real – and I wonder why there are still some of the few more decent Tories, who were not yet taken away their whip, following him.
Boris Johnson may certainly hold the opinion that the Supreme Court was not right when it called his advice to the Queen unlawful. But his opinion on any judiciary decision is utterly unimportant because it is a done cause and he has to comply – fully and not reluctantly, and he has to stand for the rule of law.
Some weeks ago the Prime Minister said that he did not want elections and that it is the Opposition that forces elections on him. Boris Johnson is very unhappy that the fixed-term Parliament does not allow him just to dissolve the House and have new elections when he thinks it most favourable to himself. He believed that he could rely on Jeremy Corbyn to run into the trap of an election at a time, that is convenient for the Brexiteers. His idea seems to have been that after a decision with a two thirds majority to have an election, Parliament has no more power over the election date. This leaves the fixing of the date to the government.
Since a notorious liar like Johnson is not trusted – and he did not even try to win trust – the Labour Party and all other opposition parties smelled the rat. The rat is so smelly that even outside of Britain Johnson’s tactic is very transparent: he wants to have elections that allow him to stealthyly get over the date of Halloween to get an automatic no-deal-Brexit without the need to go back to Parliament any more. The same would be true if a vote of no-confidence would be tabled and won. I believe his provocative behaviour on 25th of September was an intent to make the opposition angry and have them make the mistake of helping him by the time-consuming procedure to get over the Halloween date – and at the same time allowing him to avoid to ask the EU for more time.
Boris Johnson’s tactic is that of a Stealth Bomber: but the radar of the members of Parliament has detected the attack and Parliament will hopefully vigorously defend democracy.
© Georg Boomgaarden