Thread by @jonworth

One thing that nagged at me at the press conference today (and not for the first time listening to Johnson recently) was his lack of comprehension

@dasvee was also wondering about this

It needs a bit more investigation

1/11

It was most clear today when Peston asked Johnson a semi complicated question - and then Johnson went off on a circuitous and plain strange answer you were just waiting for it to stop because it was too painful

2/11

"He's just a bullshitter" you might say

But I am not sure. Today I had the feeling he did not even understand what he was being asked

There is an emptiness to this version of Johnson that I find hard to fathom

3/11

I went back over some old films of Johnson on Youtube

Here he is asking his first question at a PMQs, in 2003

4/11

Here he is in an interview in 2006

5/11

Hosting Have I Got News For You in 2006 (we also learn he can use an autocue from this one)

6/11

And a Mayor's Question Time in 2014

7/11

Johnson is pretty awful in many of those. But - in comparison to the Johnson we see today - he is sharp. His words flow more easily. He speaks faster. His eyes are alive. His body language less strange.

8/11

Yes, what he says is often still waffle, and the umms and ahhhs are all still there. But there is a sharpness, a liveliness about him that he now no longer seems able to exhibit.

9/11

It has been a hell of a year, *and* he had Coronavirus, but this is not the Johnson of old. How he handled questions was not always this excruciating.

10/11

When we ask ourselves today "how did anyone fall for this guy's politics before?" I think we need to add a further question: "is this the same Johnson?"

The transformation is quite marked.

11/11