Ch 4 10 pm. Boris Johnson and Lebedev…

There's not only Trump about to get his just desserts.
In 2007 the then President Sarkozy received Gaddafi on a visit
He was allowed to pitch his tent (s) and hold court in a
park near to the Elysee Palace . It was quite a shocking sight at the time . Fast forward 10 years and we find
Sarkozy is constantly under investigation for illegal funding
and facing jail time.
The judiciary may be slow but they get there.

So frustrating, it doesn’t seem to be available. I’ll keep looking.

It was mentioned at OMQT today. I missed it, though. I don’t think there was an answer ( there never is).

A long and excellent twitter thread by Andrew Levi on how this happened and why nothing could be done about it:

twitter.com/AndrewPRLevi/status/1673997876098215938

Basically it's because the PM is the ultimate arbiter and cannot be overruled by anyone at all, not even the monarch. We depend on the PM behaving with integrity and honesty, Johnson has neither of these qualities. So we were f*cked. And will be again if another politician equally lacking in those qualities becomes PM. And, as I said earlier, if they were better organised and focussed there would be no saving us.

We were only rescued because his Cabinet revolted against him and forced him to resign.

You can read the substance of Andrew's thread in the article he wrote for West country Voices. It might be easier to access than the twitter thread.

westcountryvoices.co.uk/why-did-they-let-it-happen-putins-agents-and-our-guardians/

Whitewavemark2

So frustrating, it doesn’t seem to be available. I’ll keep looking.

I found it on freeview via a rather tortuous route (which I still don't understand.)

See if this works:

www.freeview.co.uk/tv-guide?userNid=64257

Got it! Cheers.

Cousins just said to watch “Traumazone” he said excellent. It is a series about Russia and the lead up to 1999.

It seems to me that politicians are not careful enough about who they socialise with.

“Newspaper set the political agenda”

I’ve recently read an autobiography by an ex- Russian KGB member, now living in the U.K. And he stated that you remain KGB the whole of your life.

is that oleg gordievsky ?
fascinating man and life story.
esp his exfiltration where a baby saved his skin, just.

and then they played finlandia to let him know they had crossed the border, the car being bugged, while he was squashed in under the boot.

The rest is politics podcast covered it. It's about bl..dy time that this was properly investigated, BJ has been a total loose cannon and I can't help but think there's money involved somewhere!

Great. As the most listened to podcast in the country that will get it out to a wider audience.

Johnson waiting in Perugia airport. Apparently entirely on his own with no luggage, according to fellow passages So where are the documents he arrived with?

MaizieD

A long and excellent twitter thread by Andrew Levi on how this happened and why nothing could be done about it:

twitter.com/AndrewPRLevi/status/1673997876098215938

Basically it's because the PM is the ultimate arbiter and cannot be overruled by anyone at all, not even the monarch. We depend on the PM behaving with integrity and honesty, Johnson has neither of these qualities. So we were f*cked. And will be again if another politician equally lacking in those qualities becomes PM. And, as I said earlier, if they were better organised and focussed there would be no saving us.

We were only rescued because his Cabinet revolted against him and forced him to resign.

You can read the substance of Andrew's thread in the article he wrote for West country Voices. It might be easier to access than the twitter thread.

westcountryvoices.co.uk/why-did-they-let-it-happen-putins-agents-and-our-guardians/

Thanks for the link.

Basically it's because the PM is the ultimate arbiter and cannot be overruled by anyone at all, not even the monarch. We depend on the PM behaving with integrity and honesty, Johnson has neither of these qualities. So we were f*cked. And will be again if another politician equally lacking in those qualities becomes PM. And, as I said earlier, if they were better organised and focussed there would be no saving us.

This is really quite frightening isn't it? The more so because there are still those who would happily see Johnson re-instated.

Our FPTP electoral system encourages the Right v Left mindset which, I believe, is a danger to democracy. The voice in the middle which says "but hang on a minute there" - that wants to put a brake on the helter-skelter of Right / Left extremism is ignored... any coalition is seen as unfavourable because it slows down the decision-making process. When in fact it's the very 'slowing-down' that could save us from ending up with a dictatorship - or the nearest damned equivalent.

We were, under Johnson's premiership, at a time, at that point in a documentary about a nation's slide into dictatorship where the viewers say, "why didn't someone do something?" Fortunately enough numbers in the Tory party did do something - maybe not for the right reasons, nevertheless we were 'saved'. By a bunch of back-stabbing, incompetent, self-interested MPs... phew!

What I find scary, Dickens is that the public at large don't really care about our slide into a dictatorship, or corruption in high office.

Look at how much interest this thread isn't getting.

It appears to be a thread for ‘fun sponges’….(we should be getting our news from GB News it seems)

MayBee70

It appears to be a thread for ‘fun sponges’….(we should be getting our news from GB News it seems)

Eh?

It’s on the I love GB News thread. People like me who don’t watch GB News are now known as fun sponges. It seems we’re not supposed to take the news seriously but find it amusing….

Is anyone truly surprised by this latest in a series of revelations about Johnson's bizarre behaviour? The fact that he clearly has no functioning moral compass means that he is entirely ruled by his own, self-obsessed, narcissistic agenda, so it's a case of "anything goes". He's also so self-deluding that he constantly thinks that he can get away with it, and even when found to be as guilty as sin, he retreats into his own fantasy world in which it's all a plot against him, and where he constantly protests his innocence. Trump is out of the same stable. Finally, I don't think we've seen the half of it yet...

GB News is not watched over by OFCOM because it is not deemed a news channel. It is purely entertainment, so truth/lies all get treated the same.

MayBee70

It’s on the I love GB News thread. People like me who don’t watch GB News are now known as fun sponges. It seems we’re not supposed to take the news seriously but find it amusing….

SpongeBob is my role model! I doubt he watches GB News either…

MayBee70

It’s on the I love GB News thread. People like me who don’t watch GB News are now known as fun sponges. It seems we’re not supposed to take the news seriously but find it amusing….

So how does this work? Are we 'fun sponges' because we suck 'fun' out of life by actually caring about subversion of democracy, PMs who turn out to be Russian assets, lies told in a referendum campaign, Parliament being stripped of its power etc? ?

Is this a term of contempt, like 'woke'?

MaizieD

What I find scary, Dickens is that the public at large don't really care about our slide into a dictatorship, or corruption in high office.

Look at how much interest this thread isn't getting.

I truly believe that an awful lot of the general public do not understand how easy it would be for us to end up with an authoritarian / totalitarian / autocratic (call it what you will) government. Nor how such a government would affect their everyday lives.

I don't quite know how to put this without being labelled a conspiracy theorist... however - those that are 'under the spell' of a government that wants to crack-down on "illegal" immigrants" and - on the domestic front - 'unemployed benefit recipients / shirkers' - don't realise that, as a group, they too would be targeted as the undesirables should they step out of line.

If anyone wants any proof of this, just look at how one minute the 'grey' vote - pensioners - are being courted with a 10% increase; then, when the younger working generation start to lose faith with government and mumble and grumble - up pop various politicos with ideas to solve the inter-generational 'unfairness', suggesting that pensioners should be encouraged back into the work force; or, as one individual once suggested - can't remember his name, pensioners should not get interest on their savings... they should spend their money and put it back into the economy. Then the "triple-lock" is touted as "unaffordable"... and a general demonisation of pensioners follows, picked up by the media - all because government sees a backlash and wants to court the younger vote when it looks like it might be in danger of alienating them. It's the old-as-the-hills Divide and Rule, and government cares not one jot for any demographic, it will court them one day and abandon them the next, if it suits.

Why can’t Johnson be investigated for his activities as Foreign Secretary? Particularly as most of his potentially traitorous activities happened during that period.