But EVEN WORSE BY FAR, Evidently America Has Been Shown to Have Been Involved in Training Ukrainian Troops Upon Ukrainian Soil PRIOR TO THE RUSSIAN INVASION...

But in including this shocking but apparently absolutely correct claim (cited upon a recent global edition of the New York-based radio programme 'Democracy Now'), however unbelievable it may well be...

I in no way, shape or form consider it provided the Russian dictator and his military cronies/lackeys even a skerrick of justification for invading the fair land of Ukraine...

...much less for carrying out the war crimes and crimes against humanity which the world has witnessed ever since that fateful day (of February 25th, New Zealand time, I believe)...

If President Biden Proceeds with His 'Executive Order' to Revoke the US Supreme Court's Own Revocation of 'Roe Vs Wade', He'll Be Entering Dangerous Territory & Stirring Up a Hornet's Nest of Ongoing, Never-ending Political & Cultural Trouble & Repercussions...

Joe Biden Needs to Tread Exceedingly Carefully, For His Ongoing Presidential Leadership of the United States of America is Looking Increasingly Precarious, & THAT'S JUST GOING BY HIS UNPOPULARITY AMONG DEMOCRATS...

And his decision to walk back his commitment upon the Washington Post correspondent is shameful in the extreme!

And That 'Minority-Affirming' & Racially 'Progressive' British Labour Has *Virtually No Dark-Skinned, Much Less Refugee-Born &/Or Middle Eastern or Asian (or African) Person In Its Highest Echelons...Whereas the U K Conservative Party Has Had (At Least) Three of its Twelve Leadership Contenders Coming From Such Backgrounds, All of Whom Have Served in Some of the Very Highest Cabinet Positions of Recent Times...One of Whom Might Very Well Go On to Secure That Much-Coveted Position and With It the Prime Ministership of the United Kingdom...

          Disclaimer: Is it my fault that Blogger et al are assiduously rearranging and re-ordering the layout            of this particular blogpost? Hardly!

*Evidently fake news once again (see immediately preceding blogpost), as not only had Keir Starmer 'appointed...the most female and ethnically led shadow cabinet in [British] history' (according to 'Diversity Today' on April 6th, 2020), but Jeremy Corbyn's own ones had 'been the most diverse in [British] parliamentary history' (according to 'The News'), with this important caveat: 'the [then] current composition [of Corbyn's shadow cabinet] [was]n't the most diverse ever (taking either gender or ethnicity in isolation'.

          Nevertheless, surely one expects as much from a party profusely professing equity in all things,                  whereas supposedly the UK Conservative Party has hardly - at least historically - ever been                        associated with such...

          That's the point I've been seeking to make, but yes, it's ever a dangerous temptation to seek to make            the facts conform to our own pre-conceived opinions!

Anyhow, how many and what percentage of Labour leadership aspirants, let alone ultimately successful ones, have been 'ethnically diverse' as such?

Isn't It - More Than 'Just a Tad' - Interesting/Intriguing Even How A Political Party (I.e. the U K Conservatives) So Renowned/Infamous For Its (Supposedly) 'Rabid Right-Wing' Politics Has Now Had Two Female Leaders - Each a Prime Minister (One For Over a Decade, and THAT Three-Four Decades Ago) - & *Potentially (If Fairly Unlikely, Admittedly) Soon a Third...Whereas 'Liberal' 'Gender-Friendly' UK Labour Has *Yet to Select Its First Female Leader, Let Alone U K P M...

*Two of the remaining candidates contesting the Conservative Party leadership (and hence Prime Ministership) being (well-respected and popular) women in the party.

Postscript: (Sunday July 17th)

Indeed evidently I  -  wholly - underestimated the number of women contesting the leadership, and hence the relative proportion/ratio of female to male candidates seeking that office...

As the globally-acclaimed, British patriot, and admittedly shamelessly pro-Tory international (British-based) newsweekly the 'INTERNATIONAL EXPRESS' reported (New Zealand edition, Thursday July 14th) in 'Who would you bet on being the next PM?', five of the twelve Conservative Party MPs seeking the nomination are/**were women...

...which to my reckoning is around 42% of the total, close enough to 50% or half far as I'm concerned...

Post-Postscript: (17/7)

My sins have caught up with me, King Solomon's Proverbs noting how '(s)he sins who hastens with his (her) feet', for indeed, as 'Diversity UK' (April 6, 2020) noted, the new shadow cabinet that Keir Starmer appointed that day was 'the most female and ethnically led shadow cabinet in [British] history'.     

In addition, 'The News' back on October 4, 2018 noted Jeremy Corbyn's own shadow cabinets to have themselves been the most diverse ones in parliamentary [British] history, if not strictly speaking the most diverse ever - 'taking either gender or ethnicity in isolation'.

*Yes, I'll concede Labour has had at least two female deputies (over recent times), so perhaps even more in its history (I'm not sure of the corresponding number for the UK Conservatives), but far as I've ever understood, none of these ever stood a chance in hell of succeeding to Labour leadership much less British prime ministership...

**My use of the imperfect past tense being quite deliberate as there have already been a number of elimination contests undertaken, the actual result of which I'm at present admittedly not wholly au fait with...

...except that long-term favourite Rishi Sunak is still standing, as is Penny Mordaunt...

On the Contrary, For 'Getting Brexit Done' - In the Process Almost Singlehandedly Securing the UK Conservatives Their Most Resounding Electoral Victory Ever/In 100 Years - For *'Defending' British Statesman Extraordinaire Winston Churchill When His Defenders (At Least Amongst Today's So-Called 'Intellectual Elite') Have Become Few & Far Between...In a Churchillian Act of Statesmanship Putting His Money Where His Mouth Was Vis-a-vis Russia's Horrific Invasion of Ukraine & Shameless, Shameful Butchering of Civilians There (Whether Young or Old, Disabled or Able-Bodied), Even Venturing (More Than Once) Onto Ukrainian Soil to Show the United Kingdom's Heartfelt Solidarity with Ukrainians...

 ...Boris Johnson ought to be thanked...and even if he ain't - by self-righteous Western 'progressives' - anytime soon, he'll have earned Ukrainians' undying gratitude for time immemorial...

And, moreover, if this planet lasts long enough - which, admittedly, it probably won't - the plaudits of the history books in time to come...

And for the Likes of Former EU Chief Negotiator on Brexit, the Recent French Presidential Candidate Wannabe, Michel Barnier, to Have the Bare-Faced Cheek to Pontificate As Johnson Exited the Scene...

Yes, what a spectacle to denounce someone (PM Johnson) who - whatever else one might happen to say -  stood strong for sovereignty both at home (vis-a-vis the Brexit) and abroad (in the Ukraine)...

...while - according to a news report in Aotearoa-New Zealand a couple days ago (though I cannot find any such reference upon the internet) - Monsieur Barnier is only now declaring (as the head of a human rights watch outfit, I believe it was reported) that

he believes Russia may well be committing war crimes and/or crimes against humanity in Ukraine...

All I can possibly respond with is:

Well, what a revelation! Who'd'a guessed?

Boris Johnson 'Lacking in Moral/Ethical Integrity'? Evidently, Even Unquestionably - Playing Fast & Loose With the Truth Readily Comes to Mind...

But for someone (who happens to be a political leader of one of the UK's four component 'nations'), to wit Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who singlehandedly character assassinated her reputable predecessor, Alex Salmond, to have the gall, the temerity, to dare to level such a charge against her perennial political foe Boris Johnson, is just a little bit rich, and even exceedingly hollow... 

Indeed, Having Said Much of the Foregoing, If (As We've All Now Heard) Putin Et Al ARE SO VERY KEEN to See the Back of Boris Johnson, Positively Rejoicing Even in a Perverse if Wholly Predictable Spate of Schadenfreude at His (Quite Predictable) Demise... Perhaps He Really Wasn't - ANYTHING LIKE - the Unmitigated Disaster & Embodiment of Moral Evil the (Largely & Vehemently Anti-Brexit) Mainstream Media (Both in the UK & Elsewhere) Were Ever Depicting Him...

Yes, if the likes of Ukraine's 'man of the hour', folk hero of the day Vlodomyr Zelensky, sees Johnson in polar opposite terms...

...then you needn't guess which of these two men - Vlodomyr or Vladimir - let alone various  ('right' or left) streams of ideology Yours Truly at least would much rather be eternally associated with...

However, If Boris Johnson Supposedly Is the Sum Incarnate of Moral Evil Upon Present-Day Planet Earth, It Would Seem Necessary - Indeed Long Past Time - to Seriously Question, Even Impugn, the Sanity, Judgment &/or Morality of Those Making Such An Utterly Ridiculous, Even Preposterous, Insinuation

Ever Looming Larger Than Life, Perhaps Not Only the Best But Arguably the ONLY Way to Do Proper Justice to the Legacy of Boris Johnson the Politician...Is To Say That He Passed the Personality (& Charisma) Test With Flying Colours, But Flunked the Character Test With Spectacular Form

But he left a number of interesting landmarks along the way and across the ongoing wreckage of his political career, and these I will endeavour to evaluate in blogposts to come, suggesting that while he ultimately and spectacularly failed the character test (whilst pursuing his lifetime political fantasy), he left a legacy that suggests a much more nuanced and complex person, about whom and about whose ongoing legacy, as New Zealand's own Gerry Brownley has well stated, 

the history books may well be much more kind.

A Real Clayton's Apology If Ever There Were One - I.e. the Apology You Give When You're Not Really Giving An Apology: Boris Johnson Bows Out, Suitably Chastened But Not Remotely Contrite...

In a Trumpesque 'anything but an apology and/or acknowledgment of the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth' staringly him and every reasonable-minded onlooker blindingly in the face, Boris has bowed out...

...a colourful, idiosyncratic (and *in some ways iconoclastic even) character **the likes of which the United Kingdom and the watching world had seldom seen before and doubtless will never ever be seen again...

*Admittedly Johnson showed himself anything but an iconoclast when it came to fearlessly championing his lifetime idol and hero Sir Winston Churchill from folk who were themselves iconoclasts of the very first degree and very worst order.

**Although of course a similar statement/'argument' could obviously be made about Donald J Trump in his own respective sphere.

However, Also 100 Years Ago (Presumably), the Conservative Party's '1922 Committee' Evidently Set in Motion An Historic Process, And Though Somewhat Flawed, It Would Seem - But Who Could Possibly Have Foreseen the Unusual Circumstances in Which Its Usefulness Would Now Be Demanded? - It Must Now Be Employed to Get Rid of Someone Who Has Seriously Outlived His Usefulness...

Though Yours Truly overnight felt that a special letter to Prime Minister Johnson would have achieved the desired result - and in a more seemly fashion, surely, and infinitely less humiliating to Boris than what has been transpiring blow by blow, hour upon hour, over recent days - 

the game is over, the writing's on the wall, for none other than Boris Johnson himself...

As a noted prophet said of a partying king (Belshazzar), self-indulgent to the very last whilst his empire was crumbling all around him,

God hath numbered thy [administration], and finished it.

Thou art weighed in the [political] balances, and art found wanting.

Thy prime ministership is [splintered into smithereens], and given to [one better than yourself].

*'Apologies' to the Older Testament biblical prophet Daniel, I simply couldn't resist...

**'Taken' (so to speak - in very generous paraphraseology) from Daniel chapter six (King James Bible).

At Long Last - & That Despite Internecine Resentment & Opposition - British Labour Leader Keir Starmer Has Bitten the Bullet & Turned A Corner: Yes, Brexit Is Here to Stay - Indeed, It Was Delivered to the U K Conservatives With Boris At the Helm Amid the Greatest Election Landslide, Bar None, In Pretty Well 100 Years...

So good on Sir Keir for doing the only right and proper thing, even if he has effectively been dragged kicking and screaming to his new position, and for a (B)remainer - unlike Jeremy Corbyn at heart - it would hardly have been an easy decision to arrive at...