Have you ever attended an amateur debate, in which people have been given things to argue in support of which they don’t really believe themselves? They’ll give it their best shot, but underneath their rhetoric, it’s plain that they don’t really believe in the argument they’re putting across.
Which brings me to today’s newspaper leader columns.
The Times
The Times spends some time highlighting Ken Livingstone’s achievements in office, then bizarrely talks about him offering "more of the same" (which surely doesn’t sound too bad in the light of his achievements?).
They gloss over Brian Paddick as an acceptable alternative, without really explaining why: "He has at no second offered compelling reasons why he should be in the mayor’s chair", a statement which could equally describe the overwhelmingly negative campaign of Boris Johnson.
Then they alight on Boris.
There is plainly an element of risk in backing Mr Johnson. Newspapers have fretted about endorsing him precisely because journalists know Mr Johnson, a fellow journalist, so well and they know he has a history of letting people down.
That a sentence like that can appear in a leader called Boris Johnson for London is extremely revealing about how little their heart is in this recommendation.
They say that "the thrust" of Boris’s "policy suggestions" (it’s true, they aren’t fleshed-out enough to be called policies!) is sensible, and that he is "alive to Londoners’ … concerns about drugs, stabbings and gangs", which is hardly the same thing as being the right person to do anything about them.
Most breathtakingly, their final paragraph even admits that electing him would be an "experiment", and that "if it fails", "London and the country will have learnt something of immense value". Too right: not to trust the Times’s leader column ever again.
In fact, this whole column is so weak in its support for Boris, readers could be forgiven for thinking that an edict was issued from Murdoch Towers that the editor was to print a leader column backing Boris, then left to come up with the arguments himself, despite not believing Boris capable of the job. But surely that would never happen, would it?
Daily Mail
As the Evening Standard’s sister paper, not to mention the bible of the right, it was always inconceivable that they would back anyone but Boris, and so it proves, but as with the Times their support is in extremely measured terms.
Again, a surprising measure of praise for the incumbent is present, given his nemesis status at Daily Mail group HQ:
Ever since he became Labour’s leader in London he has outfoxed opponents, including those in his own party.
In office, he has proved a rather more substantial figure than his critics predicted. Love it or loathe it, his congestion charge is now being studied by cities all over the world.
He was commendably steady after the terrorist attacks on London. And he has proved more friendly to business than you might expect, given his rabidly hard Left past.
Of course they then dwell on some criticisms in the less substantive areas which their Standard cohorts have beaten Londoners around the head with for the past nine months. For instance, apparently the £25 gas guzzler charge is "class spite", which seems strange when there are cars of every size which don’t have to pay it and actually the more wealthy you are, the easier it will be to trade in your luxury car for a less polluting model.
We also learn that Ken’s politics are divisive, which isn’t reflected in the level of racially aggravated crime, which has fallen hugely in London in recent years, while rising outside it; and besides, it’s hard to think of a more divisive politician than Boris Johnson anyway, with his numerous gaffes over the past few years offending everyone from races to cities to entire countries. I suppose at that rate he could soon unite the entire world, against him!
The Mail are keen to point out that Boris "has some highly competent people behind him". It’s interesting that they’re so confident about this, when he has repeatedly refused to name any of them so we have no evidence of this whatsoever.
He "seems genuinely concerned to do something about London’s broken society". Ahh, the old Mail favourite, the "broken society". But if crime is highest and society at its most "broken" in the most deprived areas, which are broadly located in inner London, and Boris is the man to sort this out, why is Boris so unrecoverably far behind Ken in the polls in these areas? Could it be because the people with the biggest fear of a "broken society" are actually those who read the Mail’s baseless ranting but live in the relative safety of the outer boroughs, so can gamble on Boris’s police cutbacks and removal of crime reduction targets without fearing for their own security?
So let’s put our cards on the table. We believe London and Britain would be best served by a vote for Boris - and not simply because the Mail is instinctively conservative.
Yes, I’m sure you gave a great deal of consideration to backing Red Ken!
Indeed, one of the attractive aspects of Mr Johnson’s campaign is his promise to put London first, even if it means disagreeing with national policies.
And this is certainly not something that could be had elsewhere, perhaps from a Mayor who opposed the Iraq war and the abolition of the 10p income tax rate…
We support Boris because he offers change. … Eight years of Ken Livingstone haven’t solved London’s problems. A new, serious Johnson should be given a chance.
"given a chance"? What do they think this is, some sort of game? There’s no such thing as "a chance" in this job: you have to hit the ground running from day one and work flat out for four solid years, showing competence and abilities which are far beyond the reach of even the newest, most serious Johnson imaginable. And don’t forget, this "new, serious Johnson" is an illusion created for the duration of the election campaign only, through a ban on alcohol and minders paid in inverse proportion to the number of gaffes Boris commits.
So with even the Mail’s best arguments for voting in Boris being so weak and couched in expectation-lowering terms, can anyone be left in any doubt as to how little trust there is in his abilities among newspaper journalists?
Daily Telegraph
If you are in any doubt, let Boris’s own colleagues at the Telegraph remove it.
The journalists and editors at the newspaper where Boris has worked for two decades can’t actually bring themselves to back Boris!
Instead, they spent half their column building up London as the most important place in the world, and the other half ruthlessly attacking Ken Livingstone. The only mention of any success whatever is, in full, "the Oyster card, better buses".
Essentially this leading article adopts the Boris campaign tactic of attacking Ken Livingstone while not drawing too any attention to Boris’s own hopeless manifesto of police cuts and impossible promises, but at least Boris has learnt a few short lines about his (to use the Times’s terminology) "policy suggestions". The Telegraph appear to be so nervous of endorsing this buffoon that they can’t even bring themselves to print his name!
In conclusion
With supporters like this mealy-mouthed bunch of leader-writers, who needs opponents? The Guardian have a more sensible line on things, although their endorsement for Ken is not a great deal more ringing than the others’ for Boris, although they are able to point to Ken’s strong record in various areas, which is certainly more than anyone examining Boris’s hopeless record of gaffes, incompetence, lies and sackings could do. Their verdict on Boris is as follows:
The Conservatives have fought a strategic campaign and benefited from Mr Livingstone’s weaknesses. That is not the same as setting out a solid case for office. Mr Johnson has offered celebrity and noise, but nothing very substantial, or even all that brave, his policies in many instances being modified versions of ones pursued by Mr Livingstone. … he has not shown himself equal to the mayor’s strengths. At the end of the campaign Mr Johnson still looks an accidental candidate who has stumbled into his position and is making the best of it, but might not make very much of being mayor. He promises better buses, less crime and a greener city, but cannot explain how he would bring these about.
That sounds about right to us.
What all this highlights is that here in the Stop Boris camp we are certainly up against it. We have the might of Murdoch and the Mail against us, as well as the Evening Standard and Telegraph, although all their support for Boris is half-hearted at best.
What we mustn’t do is become disheartened by this media onslaught. In a democracy, it is we the people who have the final say on polling day. We must not allow sections of the media with vested interests to bully and coerce us into electing another who has no proven abilities at all and would damage London’s reputation around the world as well as managing its huge budget with the incompetence for which he is so well known among everyone he’s ever worked with.
We need a final push this week, Boris-stoppers. E-mail all your friends to warn them about the mendacious campaign Boris has been fighting, and the huge risk this inept clown would pose to the serious business of running London. Get into arguments and discussions about it with anyone you speak to. Convince them to vote tactically to keep Boris out.
We can do this, with all your help. Good luck, everyone.
