Andy Munro comments on Dominic Cummings and the reaction so far.
I’m heartily sick of the repetitive post-mortems on Dominic Cummings and his actions, not least as there are more important things to tackle as we try and ease the lockdown.
However, I’m now going to compound that sin because, first of all, let’s get it straight. Dominic Cummings is an ace plonker (in Del Boy parlance), as is his boss. Their blustering has fooled nobody except their arch-fans but let’s face it, the whole crew, right down to the medical advisers (and I use that word advisedly) couldn’t manage the proverbial social distanced event in a brewery. To further compound that, they seem unable to ever admit making any specific mistakes.
Mind you, large sections of the numpties that even on a good day appear to make up most of the British public seem equally stupid, with their mantra that if Dominic Cummings can flout the rules so can we. It’s not a punishment, you haven’t been grounded for not tidying your room – it’s for your own good.
Returning to Mr Cummings, to say that he can’t remember if he filled up with petrol on his return journey defies my belief, as somebody who is age and memory challenged but can still remember when I last put fuel in my car. I’ve always thought of Cummings as sly and disingenuous, and that confirms it to me.
What I will give him a tiny bit of credit for is facing the media alone (unless Boris ordered him to, of course) and admitting that he makes mistakes every day. There’s nothing wrong with that, although unfortunately he failed to elaborate.
Finally, noticing the feeding frenzy from the lefties/Guardian readers on social media, I partly blame YOU. Blind support to a plonker of BoJo proportions left clueless Corbyn in charge when Labour would have romped home last December with Keir Starmer as leader.
That last paragraph is dreadful.
Sometimes public opinion is a dreadful thing (support for capital punishment after a dreadful murder) and sometimes you can end up on the wrong side of public opinion and it really matters.
In an issue like a pandemic – WHEN IT WAS IMPERATIVE TO TAKE THE PUBLIC WITH YOU – getting on the wrong side of what the populace thinks, and more importantly feels, is less failing to hold your hand up after a calamitous own goal than standing on the sidelines doing nothing while a mass brawl develops that gets you chucked out of the competition.
I suggest Andy Munro reads some of the letters from people who respected the lockdown ‘rules’ while and after loved-ones died, and from medical staff who had coped with the virus avalanche and have condemned Cummins and the PM, before passing judgement and classing them and others as ‘lefty/ Guardian readers’.
Or is the new sense of community that has developed in the wake of Coronavirus not significant enough to warrant breaking free of old stereotypes and fervently held convictions?