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Letters | Why Boris Johnson is just like Donald Trump: both play to the gallery
- The British prime ministerial hopeful does it with his sloganeering; while the US president does it with his tweets
Boris Johnson’s noisily simplified parochialism and Jeremy Hunt’s more tempered approach represent the worst of the elite Oxbridge brigade bankrupting Britain’s moral reputation (“Brexit promises to be focus of UK leadership debate between Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt”, July 11).
Johnson’s exhortations incite the primal fear that his constituents’ hard-earned livelihoods continue to be parasitised by Britain’s impoverished continental cousins, with the collusion of the European Union. His sloganeering call to “end the defeatism that has engulfed us all … to show we believe in Britain,” key to Brexit’s birth and its conundrums, is a populist dish spiced by the recidivist conviction that the good ship Britannia still rules the (global) waves, an empire upon which the sun will never set.
Joseph Ting, Brisbane
Mr President, it’s all about the way you do it
US President Donald Trump is addressing domestic and foreign issues, but his in your face approach has brought criticism from voters and even members of his administration. Immigration, the Middle East, tariffs, cosying up to dictators and his potty-mouth comments aimed at Democrats add to the confusion. It all reminds me of a Big Band era tune by Trummy Young and Sy Oliver, recorded by Jimmie Lunceford, Harry James and Ella Fitzgerald. It offers constructive criticism of the president’s way of handling these crucial issues. Mr President: “’Tain’t what you do (it’s the way that you do it)!”
Herb Stark, North Carolina
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