“Jester, toff, self-absorbed sociopath and serial liar”. Polly Toynbee describing Boris Johnson, the ole Etonian joker who has announced that he’s running for Mayor of London.

That just about sums him up! It was interesting that David Cameron made a point of saying that Johnson wasn’t his candidate for mayor. He was, said the boy Dave, “Boris Johnson’s candidate”. Polly thinks this will backfire onto the Cameroonians. She’s right. Remember the famous Bullingdon picture which shows Cameron and Johnson as young toffs.

Actually, I’ve never thought Boris was a harmless joker: I used to know people like him in the Pitt Club at Cambridge (I was an occasional visitor, not a member) and beneath their amiable Woosterish exteriors many of them were as reactionary as they come. Toynbee has spotted this in Johnson. For example:

What about Boris the sociopath? Apart from being caught often lying to all and sundry – he was fired from the Times for making up a quote – how has he survived the Darius Guppy scandal when he was recorded agreeing to find a journalist’s contact details so old Etonian friend Guppy could have the man beaten up? How badly? Guppy suggested just a few cracked ribs. Later when Guppy was jailed for a £1.8m insurance fraud, Boris explained his role with: “Oh poor old Darry was in a bit of a hole. He was being hounded.” Can Cameron really get through nearly a year’s mayoral campaign by just laughing and saying, as he does, “Boris is Boris”? If he were to win, Cameron would be in a worse hole still.