Boris in the dock
After last week’s shameless use of military metaphors, the would-be PM Boris Johnson succeeds in taking it down another notch with his reference to a “suicide vest” being wrapped around our constitution (Scotsman, 10 September).
To what constitution does he refer? The UK’S unwritten one that allows an advisory referendum to be the “will of the people” although only 37 per cent voted Leave? That allows a vote biased by older people to dictate the future for our younger generations? That allows the minority within the minority UK Government to dictate our future and allows that minority to put forward candidates for Tory leader to then be determined by the party membership, average age over 65, probably numbering less than 10,000 in Scotland?
By this “constitution” the charlatan Boris can become Prime Minister. Might Ruth Davidson explain how this makes us better together?
ROBERT FARQUHARSON
Lee Crescent, Edinburgh
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The legions of the self righteous – not to mention The Scotsman (“Brexit is no more than a game to Boris”, 10 September) – are in full cry over Boris’s use of the term “suicide vest” in his warning of the risks inherent in the Government’s Brexit proposals, with some claiming that his words are an insult to those who have suffered loss in terrorist attacks.
At the same time, the BBC is scoring record-breaking ratings with the new Sunday night peak time drama Bodyguard, which started with a tense and highly praised scene which exploited precisely such an event, featuring a suicide vest.
Strangely, no one seems to
have been insulted or upset by that. Boris may be a clot, but that does not excuse opportunist hypocrisy. GRAHAM M MCLEOD
Muirs, Kinross