Boris says awesome things...

Boriswatcher Steven has emailed in to alert us to Boris4Rector, a site dedicated to Boris’s quest to be Edinburgh University Rector!

There’s an interesting debate on the “Rome is an Education” post, and one which I have to say has knocked me off my perch. “TC” wrote a comment yesterday bemoaning the lack of critical coverage of Boris here. At first, I was affronted – but then I thawed. It’s true that there should perhaps be more critique – but in all honesty there is very little negative coverage of Boris these days. One article that drew TC’s attention was “Crikey, Boris you missed the big Tory story” which appeared in The Guardian yesterday. It’s written mostly from a New Statesman perspective – a publication in competition with The Spectator, but with very different views – and this fact does not bode well for any pro-Boris paragraphs appearing. It is, however, a decent stab at explaining the other side of Borismania – how, underneath the sheen and his undoubted eye for publicity, Boris’s success may be slightly inflated.
However, be it biased or not, I can’t help feeling that they may be clutching at straws. My colleague Tim and I – joint purveyors of the online presence Boris now has – went to The Statesman Media Awards last year, a trip I detailed here on Boriswatch. Boris was up for a category he should have won, if only because the competition was so terrible. However, instead of deciding on a winner, they announced that there would be no result in the category, blaming the “postcode lottery” of applicants – a phrase whose relevance I still can’t fathom to this day. There was never a decent explanation.
And it is that night that crept through my mind as I read The Guardian’s article. Of course there are people who don’t see the interest in Boris. Rivals may try to dumb him down. He might slip up once in a while – he’s not perfect, and neither are his critics. He or his followers may defend him to the hilt. It’s all part of the circus of media. What we do know, however, is that we’d prefer to see him make it to the top than the rest of the bland political folk…

The first online review for The Dream of Rome, Boris’s new book, is in The Times, and it seems they like it!
P.S. Remember Boris’s appearance tonight in the from The Dream of Rome, 8pm, BBC2.

After making small but important media waves in defending “Mickey Mouse” degrees on his website – pronouncing “One man’s Mickey Mouse course is another man’s literae humaniores – this week has been a busy
one for BoJo followers. He first appears in a decent-length and enjoyable article in The Guardian. In “ href="http://politics.guardian.co.uk/conservatives/story/0,,1693655,00.html" target="_blank">Ich bin ein Frankfurter” – so named after a BoJo utterance during the interview – Boris manages to lay down some home
truths while staying reservedly on the fence on many major topics, blunting any possible attacks from other parties. But the real gem of this article is the attached “podcast” (??) of the interview, in which we get The Full Audio Boris. I recommend setting aside a good half hour to listen!
The Times also pops up with a fairly fawning article with Boris, describing Boris as one of the “cleverest acts in British politics.” Damn right!
And while we all discuss that article, Boris has been plugging the Conservative educational cause up north in Edinburgh. Your humble Boriswatch host – by complete coincidence – was also up there, but I’m afraid there were no reported sightings of BoJo. And more’s the pity, as he managed to get around a bit, by all accounts. In the day or so he was up there, he managed to share breakfasts with students, get baffled by his popularity and wallow in pride as he managed to garner an enormous amount of votes. The only fly in the ointment came in the hours before he arrived in Edinburgh – his declaration in support of Top Up fees did not go down well with the student community. As Boriswatch readers “Saxmachine” and “Rich May” revealed mere minutes after it happened – and The Scotsman later revealed in their article “Beer, jeers and cheers for Boris” – Boris had a pint of beer thrown over him by an angry student. Boris remarked on it later: “I tried to make a speech but I couldn’t hear anything because of the noise. At the end, someone very kindly poured a pint of beer over my head. I am most grateful because it was the first of many
drinks I received one way or the other over the evening.” Pure Boris!
Coverage overall, though, has been favourable. Google News has target="_blank">a collection of stories about the trip. And to top it off, reader “chromatius” informs us that while Boriswatch was snoozing this morning, BoJo appeared this morning on Sunday AM with Andrew Marr, bringing up target="_blank">allegations that Blair agreed to go to war long before it was announced. Chromatius details the appearance target="_blank">here in his blog.

Eagle-eyed Boriswatch visitor Dafyd J has spotted a new Boris book in the offing at Amazon. Called “The Dream Of Rome”, it ties in with a television series which sees him travelling throughout the Roman Empire uncovering Rome’s secrets. Coupled with the imminent release of The New British Revolution, it looks to be a big literary year for BoJo… (permanent links to these books are in the Things by Boris section).

For morbid personal reasons that don’t need airing in this delightful haunt, Boriswatch has dragged its hind quarters in the last couple of weeks. So without further ado, let us fill you in.
The news that Boris is eagerly gunning for the rector post at the University of Edinburgh has picked up steam in the media this week. Boriswatch notes that the news handily complements his new Higher Educational role in the Tory ranks (see the new Education forum on his official site). In fact, several Boriswatch readers (presumably scottish ones?!) emailed in with news, so thank you “Anon”, “JamesP” and “The Saxmachine”! Predictably, Boris has already secured more than 275 signatures on his nomination paper – and, as the Guardian notes, “just 40 are needed in order to stand.”
In an article on boring MPs, “The bland leading the blind” (Ed note: Shouldn’t that be “the blond leading the bland”?), Libby Purves mourns the lack of personality in parliament nowadays. “Take Boris Johnson,” she says – an idea which many female Boriswatchers would gladly take up – “He is incomparably the most intelligent, well-read and energetic of younger Conservative MPs; his columns breathe great humanity and good sense; he is courageous and has a decent integrity… but could never have been leader of his party.” A statement that goes against the grain of Boriswatch, let me tell you. But Libby goes on to explain, “[The] secret is to stay bland. The thing which really sinks a serious British political career is rampant, undisguised character.”
And that’s the problem – the Big Brother paradox, as we like to call it. The most interesting, likeable characters rarely win the day. But we at Boriswatch are never defeatist. If anyone can buck the trend, let it be Boris!

After a short break to relax from an increasingly hectic year, Boris has now returned fit and fresh – and ready to get his teeth into Higher Education. And being a forward-looking chap, he’s embraced the web with fervour, conjuring up a new Higher Education section on his official website. He explains its purpose in this post. Looking good…