Should politicians make jokes? Is it right for prime ministers to make fun of slaughtering pigs? About nuclear alliances? About important issues like drug addiction? Won’t the public be furious this winter when inflation bites that they have a buffoon in charge of the nation?
Well, Twitter certainly thinks so. The outrage was so intense at Boris Johnson’s gag-tastic conference address you could almost smell the melting keyboards. Which is precisely what he wants, of course.
When he makes jokes about Labour’s policy on hard drugs coming “straight from the powder rooms of North London dinner parties”. He wants Twitter to be furious. A joke publicises Tory opposition to decriminalisation more effectively than a line in a boring speech precisely because angry Labour metropolitans, and Islington lawyers, will recycle it contemptuously.
All serious politicians make jokes - it’s often the first thing ministers ask for from aides and colleagues when they start drafting a speech. Gordon Brown used to employ the humourist John O’Farrell to write jokes into his. Remember Theresa May and “dancing queen”. Keir Starmer made a joke last week about Boris Johnson being a tool.
The difference probably is that Boris Johnson’s are funnier because he has a sense of humour.
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