Boris for Mayor?

http://www.backboris.com

When I saw the headline “Boris to run for Mayor” I said to myself, what is this?, he is either dead or Circling Shannon*!

But no, it wasn’t Boris Yeltsin (Quiet right too, as you couldn’t have a drunkard in charge of London or its transport) but even stranger somebody called Boris Johnson, jester at the court of Toffy Dave and the Eton Massive.

Hang around long enough and you’ll see everything! Who will the Lib Dems put up in this epic Battle of the Showmen known as the mayoral election, Gerry Cottle and his 3 ring circus!

The serious question is what does this say about the democratic process of electing a Mayor of london where only a minority of a minority of people resident in the London Boroughs elect a Mayor? This Mayor then has very little responsibility for instance they can influence only ONE of the 4 police forces responsible for London (Metropolitan, City, Royal Parks and Transport Police) but he has very little responsibility as he can only be "blocked" by a 2/3 majority of a London Assembly of 25 of which only 14 are directly elected. This Democratic Defecit and lack of delegated powers is at the heart of why the office of Mayor of London is not in the realm of serious politics.

*
In July 1994 Yeltsin failed to get off the presidential plane in Ireland for a meeting the Irish premier Albert Reynolds.

Legend has it that plane had previously circled six times over the airport in the hope that he might sober up before the plane had to land to refuel. The Irish Times cartoonist celebrated this epic state occasion with a cartoon showing an empty bottle of Stoli trundling down the steps. The phrase "circling over Shannon" has since passed into Irish drinking slang where there are acknowledged to be three degrees of drunkenness: Drunk, very drunk and, worse of all, Circling Shannon. www.moderndrunkardmagazine.com