Looks like Britain’s new prime minister is jolly well serious about exiting the E.U. ~ Boris Johnson Puts Together a Brexit All-Star Team ~
As Allister Heath explains in the Daily Telegraph ~
Johnson’s decision to purge the Cabinet of anybody who couldn’t or wouldn’t deliver was spot on: many of his critics feared that he would be too weak to wield the axe. Instead, he proved ruthless and decisive, launching the most radical reshaping of a Cabinet outside of a change of party in living memory. It’s do or die, and he means it.
His appointments so far have been exceptional – as good as they could have been from a free market and Eurosceptic perspective.
Johnson’s supporters are no doubt jubilant. He’s tapping into their energy, which is fueled by a determination to reclaim their own history and control their own future, a phenomenon that seems to growing both in Europe and America.
In a commentary written shortly after the E.U. elections – “Why Are the Western Middle Classes So Angry?” – Victor Davis Hanson looks at the rapidly-widening gap behind the elites and the regular, non-elite citizens; basically the driving force behind Brexit ~
Put simply, the middle classes are revolting against Western managerial elites. The latter group includes professional politicians, entrenched bureaucrats, condescending academics, corporate phonies and propagandistic journalists.
Turns out, millions of regular citizens aren’t yet ready for the utopian one-world-order that their betters envision for them – for a variety of reasons – as Hanson notes ~
• globalization enriched the cosmopolitan elites who found worldwide markets for their various services, as actual jobs moved offshore
• unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats multiplied and vastly increased their power over private citizens
• the new global media reached billions and indoctrinated rather than reported
• academia became politicized as a shrill agent of cultural transformation rather than focusing on education
• utopian social planning increased housing, energy and transportation costs
While the ruling classes can insulate themselves from the destruction their policies have wrought, regular folks cannot ~
The wealthy had the means and influence not to be bothered by higher taxes and fees or to avoid them altogether. Not so much the middle classes, who lacked the clout of the virtue-signaling rich and the romance of the distant poor.
In other words, elites never suffered the firsthand consequences of their own ideological fiats.
Green policies were aimed at raising fees on, and restricting the use of, carbon-based fuels. But proposed green belt-tightening among hoi polloi was not matched by a cutback in second and third homes, overseas vacations, luxury cars, private jets and high-tech appurtenances.
Non-elites are also awfully tired of being labeled as xenophobic, racist or nativist, simply because they cherish and want to maintain their own distinct cultures ~
The middle classes became nauseated by the constant elite trashing of their culture, history and traditions, including the tearing down of statues, the Trotskyizing of past heroes, the renaming of public buildings and streets, and, for some, the tired and empty whining about “white privilege.”
Hanson believes this middle class movement will only continue to grow ~
In the next few years, expect more grassroots demands for the restoration of the value of citizenship. There will be fewer middle-class apologies for patriotism and nationalism. The non-elite will become angrier about illegal immigration, demanding a return to the idea of measured, meritocratic, diverse and legal immigration.
We can only hope. Voting for Brexit – and now Boris Johnson – the British are certainly moving in that direction ~
In his first speech as prime minister, on the steps of Number 10 Downing Street, Johnson made clear that his administration will be all about Brexit:
“The doubters, the doomsters, the gloomsters – they are going to get it wrong again,” he told Remainers who continue to bemoan the results of the 2016 Brexit referendum. “The people who bet against Britain are going to lose their shirts because we are going to restore trust in our democracy.”
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