“Tom, what the hell are you doing here?”
Boris Johnson’s voice was in full boom when we last met in Manhattan at the book launch for his biography of Winston Churchill hosted by the Anglosphere Society at the packed Yale Club of New York City in November 2014.
Then Johnson was near the end in his second term as Mayor of London. Spearheading the successful Vote Leave campaign in Britain’s EU Referendum with stirring speeches on sovereignty; aborting his Conservative Party leadership bid at the eleventh hour after being knifed by his campaign manager Michael Gove; returning as Foreign Secretary under new Prime Minister Theresa May. All of that lay ahead.
I replied that I was covering Johnson’s book launch for the London Evening Standard. “I haven’t seen you for ages,” he exclaimed. “How are you doing?”
Boris then answered his own question. “You’re doing very well. I’ve been following your career. You’ve been doing some great reporting.”
Crikey! The Mayor of London was a fan of my journalism in New York. It turned out I was doing my own bit for the Special Relationship.
Then came the kicker.
“But you’re normally in war zones and things,” Boris continued. “Why aren’t you in Iraq? ”
I am never found in war zones, have not been to Iraq and have no plans to go there, at least not in the near future.
I realized Boris had got me confused with Tom Coghlan, who I had previously worked with at the Evening Standard‘s Londoner’s Diary many years previously, and who does go to Iraq and other dangerous regions in his capacity as Middle East Correspondent of The Times newspaper.
Boris swiftly apologized and we ended up discussing America’s enduring adoration of Churchill and his encounter a few days previously with actress Jennifer Lawrence who he found “transcendental” when they were both guests on David Letterman’s CBS chat show.
After his speech, Boris headed out to dine with Henry Kissinger and historian Andrew Roberts.
@BorisJohnson good show Boris. You might look like you brush your hair with a fucking firework mate, but I liked your campaign. Cheers.
— Skip Licker (@SkipLicker) June 23, 2016
The resolution of my mistaken identity cleared up an earlier mystery. Boris and I had met briefly on several occasions and a few years back at a party for The Spectator – which he used to edit- he proceeded to tell an unknown third party that my father was a “truly great man”.
Naturally, I happen to think my father is a great man but he also happens to be a retired chemical engineer who lives rather a quiet life in west London. How would their paths have ever crossed? My father stated he had never met Johnson when I subsequently relayed Boris’s kind words concerning his character.
All this makes one wonder what mishaps will ensue abroad during Boris’s time as Foreign Secretary which began earlier this week. Sonia Purnell’s excellent biography of Boris give a few clues what we can expect.
Bumbling encounters will surely abound but as long as they remain innocuous, as ours was, I predict Boris will convey more charm than harm and all the talk that his return from his brief period of political wilderness spells armageddon for Britain will turn out to be wildly misplaced.
As Pippa Crerar, an Evening Standard political journalist and by no means a card-carrying Tory, wrote yesterday: “Boris has an unmatchable ability to open doors — both at home and abroad…Boris is a world-class salesman.”
Many of his notorious gaffes (suggesting President Obama’s attitude to Brexit might be based on his “part-Kenyan” heritage and dubbing Hillary Clinton a “sadistic nurse in a mental hospital” for instance) have been committed not in person but on the page where, like many a columnist, he tends to get carried away.
So Theresa May should make him give up his weekly column for The Telegraph. She is betting that Boris will able to overturn the blow to the amour-propre felt by Britain’s EU trading partners following the Brexit vote. Naturally cautious, May’s instinct is that Johnson won’t squander his shot at political redemption.
But there’s another reason why Boris will be an asset to the new administration. May was my boss for six months during a stint in political research early on in my career and if she ever told any jokes, I can’t recall any of them now.
To paraphrase what was said about former pop star Andrew Ridgeley’s purpose as one half of the 1980s British music duo Wham!, Boris is on hand to supply the exclamation mark to May’s government.
More seriously Johnson will have to oversee negotiations of new free trade deals and clarify Britain’s status with the EU Single Market.
This will require diplomacy at its finest. So forget Tom Coghlan or myself- I hope Boris hasn’t lost Henry Kissinger’s cell phone number.
Phew!
Just when Britain was starting to become a laughing stock around the world,
Boris Johnson is appointed foreign secretary.— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais) July 13, 2016