Boris Bloody Johnson, you compel me to write.  I cannot help myself; it’s like a horrendous itch that I cannot scratch.  If that sort of thing would make you laugh and/or feel great about yourself, then whoop-de-doo.  Have a nice laugh on me, mate, and all the rest of the 63% of the population who think you are a simpleton who couldn’t even run to the shop properly, never mind run a country.

In the week since he became Prime Minister, he has been to Scotland, Wales and now Northern Ireland. You may briefly wonder why he did all that, but it shouldn’t take you too long to figure out the answer.

Why, Brexit, of course!

While the UK voted overall to leave the EU by 51.9% to 48.1%, it was a different story among the four nations that go to make up the United Kingdom.

Here in England, we voted in favour of leaving by 53.4% to 46.6%.  Wales, too, voted to leave 52.5% to 47.5%.  But Scotland voted to Remain in the EU by 62% to 38%, by far the biggest majority either way in the United Kingdom, while Northern Ireland voted to Remain 55.8% to 44.2%.

You can look at the results far more closely than that, and look at the counts constituency by constituency.  In that event, you will discover that, in Scotland, not one single Parliamentary constituency voted to leave the European Union. Not a single one.  The constituency results in Northern Ireland were slightly different and reflected in a far more realistic manner the actual percentages of votes either way.

I take it that, in Boris’ first seven days as PM, he has been primed like nobody’s business on the things he needed to do and say (not always necessarily the same), especially where Brexit and the potential deal in terms of departure from the EU are concerned.

I made the point in rather blunt fashion this morning on my social media page at FaceRant, that Boris, intent on delivering Brexit by October 31 deal or no deal, that, in order to fashion a departure from the EU with a deal, he must somehow find a way to include the “Northern Irish Backstop” in the deal, or risk tearing up the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and returning to the days of violence and murder in that province, something I’m sure even he would rather not do.

I’m also sure that I don’t need to explain the backstop in any great detail, but essentially it involves free movement and trade between the UK, specifically Northern Ireland, and the Irish Republic, who are and will remain EU members.

I also don’t need to explain to either of you the fact that the DUP, with its 10 MPs sitting in the current Parliament, are propping up the Conservative minority government right now, because when former PM went to the country in a snap general election in June 2017, she went and lost the Tory majority in Parliament by something like 13 MPs.

And the DUP are against the backstop.  They want a specific ‘hard border’ between Northern Ireland and the South, which should nicely reinflame the differences between those two nations and quickly bring the conflict to a head, and who knows what may happen.

But representatives of the remaining 27 EU member states, including the Irish Taoiseach, will not accept any trade deal with the United Kingdom without the assurance that the backstop will be included as a part of it (the deal).

I don’t like putting too much text in bold and italic, or both, because it tends to draw the eyes to those words and sentences before either of you have had the chance to read the rest of it; but the above sentence ought to be both bold and italic in its entirety.

Because it’s a bit of a choker, that one.  It means that: because the EU will refuse any attempt by the UK government that does not include the backstop, the government negotiators will have to feature it, which means that the DUP, whose votes are vital in Parliament, will not vote for it; ergo, the government will lose any vote in Westminster to get the deal passed into law, unless the Conservatives can garner significant support from its opposition, i.e., Labour and any of the other fringe parties over there, such as the Liberal Democrats.

All of that, in turn, means one of two outcomes for BloJo: either we simply sail past October 31 this year without a deal, which I’m sure is his personal preference (and that of the DUP), or Boris calls another snap general election before the deadline three months from today, hoping that by some miracle he can increase his numbers in Westminster, and have all his MPs whipped to vote in favour of the deal.  Because that’s all that matters right now; no NHS, no schools, no libraries, no transport – just Brexit, bloody Brexit… without Brexit we cannot do anything else at the moment.

Despite the presence of our third unelected Prime Minister in a decade (although Mrs May did “win” a subsequent election, to be fair, despite the loss of the majority), we are no closer to a deal with the EU than we ever were since the Referendum on June 23, 2016.  And, because of that, we face the biggest political crisis – and, who knows, maybe even a social/political crisis, we’ve ever seen in my lifetime, and I can remember the three-day week back in 1973/1974.

Neither are we any closer to the option that I would prefer (and, according to recent polls, a majority of a nation that – shock, horror! – has changed its mind!!!), which is to TEAR UP BREXIT ALTOGETHER, apologise profusely to the European Union, and beg fervently to be allowed to come back in and have tea with the rest of the children.

Sorry, Boris, but you have fulfilled your so obvious ambition just at a time when the Prime Minister has been tasked with what seems to be an impossible job.

And please, no more of that “doing what the country voted for” business.  The country didn’t vote for it.  Only half the country voted for it, with a very slight majority in favour of leaving the EU.  With a decision as important as that, it should have been a minimum two-thirds majority, preferably three-quarters.

It seems to me that it will be difficult, if not impossible, that this is all going to be solved and put to bed by October 31.  Even if a deal was to be reached (bwah- hah ha ha ha ha haa ahaaa ha ha ha hah haaaaaa!!!! – Ed.), then the divisions in this country that Johnson’s predecessor in office, David Cameron, caused would fester and burn beneath the surface for years, if not decades, to come.  And who knows, it may well all explode into violent conflict – a scenario that I certainly would never like to see.  x