Boris Johnson

....except that French roads are no longer lined with trees.

they have all been cut down.

I believe it is lazy thinking to compare Boris and Trump because they are similar in looks.

Boris,Johnson is bright and I have heard he's done a good job in London. He is not bigotted and xenophobic. Trump is. I just hope the Americans backing him can see a bigger World picture.

Boris does seem to have an eye on number 10 but he isn't the only one. A decision on Europe is indeed a complex one not to be taken lightly.

I think Boris is getting ever nearer to the windswept door of Number 10( oh!My hair!)?

"Heard he has done a good job in London" well I suppose it depends what you call a good job. He has presided over the biggest social cleansing operation in the city's history- no poor or deprived in Boris's London, no social housing, no affordable properties. As for the London underground- no staff whatsoever. Last time I had to get an oyster card linked to my railcard there was one woman trying to deal with 3 windows 2 of which had queues of people (most of them visitors). Of course he isn't bigoted or xenophobic he'll deal with anyone who has enough money.

ALL of them, M0? ALL the trees lining the streets?

No, but they have cut down all the poplars that used to line the main roads in pre-car days. Their purpose being, as suggested to provide shade for travellers and their steeds.

Once cars became more numerous, the drivers had a habit of hitting them and doing themselves terminal injuries, so over the years almost all have been cut down.

Very sad, especially as they help deal with pollutants from motor vehicles, as well as keeping streets a touch cooler than without them.

The problem with modern politicians, and I include the leaders of new labour and the conservative party since Mrs Thatcher, is that they are clever but not intelligent, which to me encompasses a far wider understanding than mere cleverness, a high EQ as well as IQ plus that extra something, usually defined as the X factor.

BJ is certainly clever. I am pretty sure he has a First class degree - as has David Cameron, but neither are what I would define as intelligent. William Hague is the most recent politician to be both clever and intelligent and he frightened all the clever nerds of the modern conservative party and never really fitted in.

Re Boris's alleged volte-face, he's not the only one. Jeremy Corbyn has been a eurosceptic throughout his career; now he isn't apparently.

I like that description of cleverness and intelligence, M0. I agree that there is a great deal of joined up thinking lacking in our politicians.

Nick Cohen ripping into Boz with his usual eviscerating gusto.

It's probably wicked of me but I am finding the whole thing very entertaining.

Corbyn's reasoning is right.

"That’s why the Brussels deal is incidental to the real issues facing people in the referendum in June. The prime minister has been negotiating for the wrong goals in the wrong way for the wrong reasons.

He should have been talking to other European leaders about action to save our steel industry; about how to stop the spread of low pay and insecure jobs, and end the undercutting of wage rates and industry-wide agreements through the exploitation of migrant workers. He should have been focused on the scandal of the refugee camps in Calais and Dunkirk and how to deal with Europe’s migration crisis in an equitable way.

He could have been using Britain’s leverage to stop the threat to our services and rights in the secretive Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiations; to build human rights and environmental protection into future trade treaties; and halt the pressure from Brussels to deregulate and privatise public services. He could have been arguing for an end to self-defeating austerity and for the strengthening of workers’ rights across Europe.

But of course he did none of these things. Instead his main concern in the talks over the rights of non-eurozone states has been to protect his friends in the City of London from financial regulation, including of bankers’ bonuses. Cameron’s Tories want a free-market corporate Europe. We want a social Europe of decent jobs and equality for all."

Those are decent reasons to change his mind.

He speaks sense Jen but the media want performers

Boris on a bike is more laughable than Jeremy.

Why?

Corbyn really wants to leave the EU but he and his team have been keeping very quiet lately, so instead of being truthful, he just uses distraction techniques ie. Saying what Cameron should have been asking the EU for ( as if he, Corbyn, has a clue!)

He just is, Ana.

Actually, am quite impressed that someone of Boris's size does so well on a bike.
Djen all the things you are saying lately smack of the playground, shall we all try and be grown up?

I would not like Boris to ever be PM, but if it ever came to a toss up between him and Corbyn, it would be the blonde I would choose.Preferably neither though.

'He just is' is not an answer, durhamjen.

Although it might suffice in the playground, as roses says...

I expect jen means he just is, in her opinion. One's sense of humour is not a matter of facts and can't always be explained.

Yet if anyone had said that Jeremy Corbyn was 'laughable' on a bike, I doubt whether dj would have let it pass without question...

I think people did say uncomplimentary things about JC. Did jen comment every time?