What Exactly Is Boris Johnson Doing?
Whether he’s pursuing negotiating leverage or electoral advantage, the prime minister is headed for disaster.
Confidence man.
Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg
Generally speaking, when a government is making emergency plans to safeguard water supplies, stockpile vital medicines, manage food shortages, prepare for civil unrest, suspend the legislature, and exploit arcane procedural devices to stay in power, things are not going great. For British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, it’s evidently all part of the plan.
Johnson came into office last month vowing to leave the European Union on Oct. 31, with or without a withdrawal agreement. Since then, his government has been shifting cash around, reassigning civil servants, launching “one of the biggest peacetime public information campaigns this country has seen,” and otherwise noisily affirming its pledge to pursue a no-deal Brexit if needed.