I’ll whistle you a cheery tune in a moment, but first here is what brought it to mind.
Perhaps bored with his karaoke Churchill act, today Boris Johnson comes dressed as President Franklin D Roosevelt. That’s the depression era US president who launched one of the most expensive US government programmes after the Wall Street Crash of 1929.
Like FDR, Johnson is promising us a New Deal, in his case for post-coronavirus Britain. Where FDR built schools, hospitals and dams in the most expensive US government programme ever, Johnson is mending a bridge at Sandwell in the West Midlands.
He’s doing a bit more than that as he pledges to “BUILD BUILD BUILD” in capital letters and without any commas by way of mortar.
But of the £5bn being waved around, some has already been promised – and the rest isn’t as generous as it seems.
With FDR in mind, Johnson says he wants a government that “puts its arms around people at a time of crisis”. Yuck to that for an image, I’d say.
Professor Anand Menon, of the UK in a Changing Europe think-tank, isn’t impressed. “The notion that he’s going to turn himself into FDR seems absolutely fanciful,” Prof Anand says today in the Guardian. “FDR surrounded himself with experts, and drew on what they had to say in a way that Boris Johnson so far as not.”
Well to be fair, he has surrounded himself with experts in sycophancy, nodding dogs to a man and woman.
Anyway, onto that song.
On his early album Into The Purple Valley, Ry Cooder sings a catchy little calypso song called FDR in Trinidad. I’d assumed it was his own song, but Cooder is a musical archaeologist who unearths old songs, and this one was written by Fritz McClean to commemorate FDR’s trip to Trinidad in 1936.
Below are the lyrics of the song, subtly rewritten but keeping the hummingbird for the sake of the rhyme (if not for the sake of West Midlands reality)…
“When Johnson came to the Land of no hummingbird
Shouts of welcome were barely heard
No hummingbird, no hummingbird, no hummingbird
His visit to that region is bound not to be
An epoch in local history
Definitely not marking a bold new era
Between Dudley and not America…
Struck by his immodest style
We weren’t much intrigued by the unreliable Johnsonian smile
In fact hardly anyone was glad
To welcome Johnson to not Trinidad…”
As the next line mentions being privileged to see FDR, “With his charm and his genial personality…” this re-scripting exercise is now officially doomed.
Still let’s turn instead to a couplet based on something Johnson said this morning when asked about raising taxes to pay for all he promises…
My friends, I am not a communist
And if you thought that you must be pissed….
While the gloomy doomsters of the IMF defy Johnson by forecasting that the UK is on track for one of the worst economic downturns in the G7, Johnson insists “we will not just bounce back, we will bounce forward”.
Such gravitationally uncertain words sound like they belong on the election trail. Basically, he’s bouncily campaigning for the job he’s already got. And repeating that thumb-smudged line about levelling up – sticking to his standard routine: say something often enough and it might just be true.
Well, I’m sorry not to swallow those cheerfulness pills Johnson is handing around, but I’m inclined not to believe a word.
Theresa May promised much the same, then Johnson snatched that baton from her and he’s still waving it about today.
And the thing is, banging on about FDR’s New Deal (revisited again) only impresses people who know their political history. And even they aren’t going to be fooled by Johnson’s latest karaoke turn.