Christ on a bike you're naive if you believe that. His heritage dates back to Turkish/Germanic royalty and he was educated at ing ETON.
He left uni with an imaginary degree, lost his first journalistic job for telling lies, wrote click bait for the far right, span crap about straight bananas and if he was unemployed tomorrow, his kids by no matter how many women would all be set for life...not because he's a genius, but because his heritage afforded him access to connections.
He is not stupid......by no stretch should anyone think of him as he would like you to. Elected head of the Oxford Union is like being an apprentice PM. He is nobody's fool, although he'd love you to think he is....
He is a lot of things, but a self made man he isn't!

Didn't he get a scholarship to Eton?

After already attending a prep-boarding school.
Also, kings scholars are means tested with most paying 50% of the fees..... So hardly a paupers tale.
He was a bright kid, but he is a cunning self interested fellow who has little interest in the lot of ordinary folk.

Don't sweat it. That basically means you don't conform to the hard left.

All successful people have a cunning self interest - that is what drives them on.

For someone who lists 'history' amongst his hobbies you're not so hot on the fact-checking, as proven on your syllabus post.

There is a single tenuous link to royalty via one of his paternal great-great-grandmothers, who may or may not have been the illegitimate daughter of Prince Paul of Württemberg (a duchy, only elevated to kingdom status by Napoleon Bonaparte when it joined his Confederation of the Rhine). Being illegitimate doesn't really provide much of an advantage.

The Turkish link is a paternal great-grandparent - Ali Kemal - a journalist and later politician, who was stoned to death for opposing Ataturk. Not royalty.

Also on his paternal side one of the other great-grandparents hails from the Pfeffel family - certainly a successful bunch - but again, not royalty.

On his maternal side the ancestral mix is interesting, but definitely no royalty in there.

I'm not saying his family doesn't have some middle-upper class roots, and his father certainly moves in 'upper' circles having been successful in his own right (after starting out as a sheep farmer). But stating "he's from German/Turkish royalty" is simply not true.

As for the "imaginary degree", he gained an Upper Second Class Honours in the School of Literae Humaniores, more widely known as 'Classics' or 'Greats' - considered one of the hardest degrees Oxford offers and the degree the very best scholars tend to go for. For a start, fluent knowledge of Latin and Ancient Greek is required. I dare say you have achieved better?

That's a hell of a well researched cheerlead for Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson.

It's often said that a good chunk of Brits are still serfs, and are only happy when the posh folk are in charge. Their own lack of self esteem makes them distrust people who are from the same class as they are. Unless of course you're an old Etonian who is verging on aristocracy?

Not a cheerlead at all - just facts, clearly stated. When someone states Boris Johnson is descended from "Turkish/German royalty" I think to myself - not something I knew before, so I do some deeper research to find - oh look, it's simply not true.
I do give him credit for his Classics degree as it's a quite an achievement by any measure. I would do the same for anyone.

I did the same sort of research a few years ago when Corbyn first came to prominence and I first heard "he supports the IRA and various other terrorists", only to find that [iIS [/itrue.

Your final paragraph is utter nonsense. I couldn't care less who is in charge - I don't suffer from politics of envy - as long as they do a good job along the lines I believe in.

Your use of google is worthy of a 2nd....my knowledge of Latin is that I am pretty much fluent, but my greek is zero and my point, which you attempt to decry is still valid. BoJo is not a man of the people and his "scholarship" was one not open to common folk. His Grandparents were both literary and read folk...every family has a sheep farmer in it....not many were publishing books a decade before they entered politics...and not many attended Sherborne School...another Boarding School.....with firm ties to ETON.....who issued the friendly scholarship.

And just what lines of Johnson's do you believe in? The only believable thing about Johnson is that he's a proven liar, and a calculated act.

Do you consider that any of the three leaders in the last 3 years have actually done a "good job" ?
Cameron gave us a referendum, to (ironically) prevent his own party from splitting.
May, was just a wind bag and achieved nothing and Boris, just seems like a fantasist and again, apart from mickeying away his very slender majority, has yet to achieve anything, apart from fabricating promises, all of which have been proven to be somewhat exaggerated.

With Corbyn "leading" the opposition, what choice do we actually have - it's just depressing.

What chance has Boris had - he simply cannot get anything through Parliament and the whole political system is stymied until we move on one way or another on Brexit.

After your recent posts I'm not sure I believe anything you say. Tu loqueris stercora.



As I've already said, you stated something I hadn't heard before and when that happens I like to look into things. Now, you might use 'Ask Jeeves' but most folk turn to Google. And the reason I hadn't heard it before is because [iit simply isn't true[/i. You either lap up everything you hear on social media or you're telling lies to suit your agenda, or both.

My understanding is that anyone can apply for the notoriously difficult King's Scholarship although I'm not blind to the fact most will come from certain prep schools (happy to be corrected on any of this).

And so what if his family has been successful in various fields? Yes, the wealthy and successful will go to the best schools. So? Or are you suggesting they've all had everything handed to them on a silver platter? True, he got a couple of early journalist jobs through connections and acquaintances - no different to "son, my mate owns a garage, I've got you a job as a trainee". But he still had to work for his impressive academic achievements and to get where he is today.

You smack of envy, nothing more.

I didn't say they had done a particularly good job, although referendum aside Cameron was a reasonably good PM, May never had chance to do anything except be frustrated at every turn - even if in hindsight her approach to the EU was far too 'softly-softly' and she undermined her Brexit team. Boris has been in office for 5 minutes and hasn't had much chance to do anything yet, though with a minority government he still got the Withdrawal Bill through.

If he gets a majority and the opportunity to actually govern, I'll judge him by his record in 4-5 years. So far he's done ok.

And yes, you're correct about Corbyn. In fact Corbyn, Swinson, whoever the hell is up for the Greens or Brexit - none should ever get a sniff of No.10.

You are an extremely forgiving person.
Firstly, Boris and his friends in the ERG could have helped ensure that May's deal got through and then, having ensured that May had to go, he PROMISED, DO OR DIE, that we would be out at the end of October, in the full knowledge of how parliament was paralysed and now, he is trying to do EXACTLY the same as Mrs May and go for a quick land grab so that the can DICTATE his own laws.

100 years since the first remembrance service and our fractured country, along with parts of Europe is moving ever further to the right and it does seem that some people have indeed "forgotten" how dangerous the extremists actually are.

We have Trump in the states, looking after the "Whites" first and a racist xenophobic Prime Minister over here already walking uncomfortably with Trumps hand very firmly up his backside.

Already, we are leaving our kids in a position where they will be financially less well off than their parents and now we give them Trump and Johnson.

Even more codswallop!

Care to elaborate or is that the best you can do ?

You dismiss everything everyone says. What do YOU think will happen?

It's your own reply that is codswallop.
You appear so utterly brainwashed by the Tory press that you can no longer recognise fact from fiction.
Please explain which part of my post is codswallop.

Just because it isn't what you believe, doesn.t make it wrong. Btw, the Earth is not flat

200+ Labour MPs didn't vote for May's deal that is the major reason it didn't go through - you can't absolve them - their red lines amounted to remain and everyone knew that it was disingenuous to suggest Labour were interested in any kind of leave.

May had a choice - her majority was only 17 so hardly huge - Johnson didn't have a majority at all so Parliament could function that manifested itself the Benn act which basically wrecked his negotiating position.

We look in China, Russia, Cuba, Venezuela, most of Africa etc where hard left policies don't really serve the freedom of the population and these are countries where Corbyn takes his influence. If you look at blood shed the likes of Mao, Lenin, Stalin, Castro have killed far more in the name of left wing dictatorships than anything undertaken by the far right.

Trump is interested in America first - he is antidote to Obama - who was a disaster as president possibly the worst in the last 100 years - American's hate Socialists.

What will make kids worse off is a Corbyn government - the scary bit is that him and McDonald and especially their sponsor Lansman just want to trial a government dominated economy its a game - there isn't an economy including China that doesn't give business the necessary room to breath that benefits its citizen's standard of living. Corbyn will kill business and he will raise taxes for ordinary citizens

And again with the distortion of history.
It's
not
the
opposition's
job
to
vote
through
government
policy.

When will you Tories ever take any responsibility for anything? You had a majority, you negotiated a pretty hard, Tory-style Brexit. Too many of you voted against it to get it through. Your reason: "it's the opposition's fault". It's tedious and the sad thing is some voters actually believe it.

I think we've established by now that thinking is not IR80's strong suit.

Yet the opposition campaigned on respecting the referendum - your absolution of the Labour party is simply getting repetitive and shows your blinkered view of the whole Brexit argument. Labour's red lines were so close to remain i.e. staying in the single market and the customs union and allowing the EU to determine our laws on workers rights and our laws on climate policy as well consumer rights whatever deal had been negotiated Labour would never have voted for it. You know it and so does the electorate.

Bile and insults are certainly top of your repotoire!

Anyway, I'm going for some chlorinated chicken whilst you go and warm up the next serving of codswallop between you and drownedpuss.

Brexit is a Tory project. How about your party takes some responsibility for the chaos it has caused rather than blaming everyone else all the time.