 "Boris Johnson to take over British PM: 'Hey Dude! Don't make it bad', UK media reacts with headline spins on Tory leader's elevation")
Britain’s incoming prime minister and new Tory leader Boris Johnson prepares to take office this week as reactions flood in about his to-be premiership. Newspapers in Britain splashed their Page 1 with the photo of Prime Minister-designate Johnson emphatically gesturing his victory in front of 10 Downing Street but some with descriptions of the same perhaps in not so many kind words. This is what The Guardian had to say: “Many of Wednesday’s papers use the same photograph of Johnson on the steps of No 10 waving with his right hand and giving a thumbs-up with his left, the gesture caught at an odd moment to make it look like he is giving a bizarre salute.” While his short victory speech as prime minister-designate gave few clues as to how he will persuade the EU to renegotiate, he stated, “Dude, we are going to energize the country!” “We are going to get Brexit done on 31 October. We are going to take advantage of all the opportunities. It will bring in a new spirit of can-do and we are once again going to believe in ourselves and what we can achieve, and like some slumbering giant, we are going to rise and ping off the guy ropes of self-doubt and negativity,” he said. Most newspapers called Boris, ‘dude’, an acronym coined by Johnson in an apparent attempt to make a catchy campaign: DUD, ‘Deliver, Unite, Defeat’ and now with his victory speech, he added an E saying, “I know some wag has already pointed out that Deliver, United and Defeat was not the perfect acronym for an election campaign, since unfortunately, it spells DUD, but they forgot the final E my friends, E for energise. I say to all the doubters: Dude, we are going to energise the country.” The Sun’s front page published this particular gesture’s picture with the caption, “Hey Dude! Don’t make it bad”, a wordplay on The Beatles’ song ‘Hey Jude’. The entire headline reads: “Naa naa naa na-na-na-naa Hey Dude! Don’t make it bad”.
The Sun Boris Johnson front page. "Hey Dude! Don't make it bad" pic.twitter.com/76lobFTtN4
— Kate Lyons (@MsKateLyons) July 24, 2019
The Telegraph carried the front page with a ‘Dude’, with an asterisk down the page to spell out the acronym’s promise. The lede carries a story about how Johnson is to appoint Brexiteer Cabinet as he spends his first 100 days in 10 Downing focusing solely on leaving the EU on 31 October.
The front page of tomorrow’s Daily Telegraph: 'Prime Minister Johnson to appoint Brexiteer Cabinet as he spends his first 100 days in No 10 focusing solely on leaving the EU on October 31' #tomorrowspaperstoday pic.twitter.com/CQbhLqQ2UL
— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) July 23, 2019
The Times lede story was on Boris Johnson promoting a 47-year-old Brexit hardline Priti Patel as new home secretary on Wednesday as he builds a cabinet to sell an optimistic vision of Brexit to “modern Britain”.
THE TIMES: Johnson goes to work #tomorrowspaperstoday pic.twitter.com/IOYFzhDVRI
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) July 23, 2019
The Daily Mail UK also published its front page with the same picture of Boris’ awkward salute, along with a photo of that compares the gesture to that used by the late comedians Morecambe and Wise. Its headline is a spin-off on a song performed by the duo: “Now bring us sunshine!”
Wednesday's @DailyMailUK #MailFrontPages pic.twitter.com/LNEX9hVhCh
— Mail+ (@DailyMailUK) July 23, 2019
Impact Shorts
More ShortsThe Daily Mirror seemed disappointed at the outcome as it dug out unflattering pictures of Johnson including the infamous photo of him in a blue helmet, strapped in a harness, dangling from a zip wire, waving British flags. “Boris Johnson, prime minister. It’s really not funny any more.” read the headline.
Tomorrow's front page: It's really not funny any more...#tomorrowspaperstoday https://t.co/UfTfZfaWkV pic.twitter.com/T4S710urr9
— The Mirror (@DailyMirror) July 23, 2019
The Independent, a British online newspaper, had a strikingly dark cartoon by Dave Brown, of Johnson as former prime minister Winston Churchill, smoking a cigar while the country burns in the background. ‘Just 100 days to avert no-deal disaster. A border conundrum that cannot be solved. And the new prime minister?’ says the headline.
Front page of the @independent - cartoon by @DaveBrownToons. Subscribe here, free one-month trial>> https://t.co/eo5UfPtgO4 #TomorrowsPaperToday #BorisDay pic.twitter.com/n69OilUGdL
— Christian Broughton (@Christian_B) July 23, 2019
Meanwhile, many opinion articles and editorials of British media publications were just as funny and crass about the new Tory leader as these headlines. A Washington Post opinion piece called Johnson, “a bombastic, Latin-quoting Oxford classicist with a mop of intentionally mussed yellow hair — made his name as an over-the-top journalist and a colorful London mayor. He then galvanized the successful Brexit campaign in 2016, winning himself many fans but also many enemies.” The Guardian described him as “Someone who could easily be rejected as a Guess Who character for looking too ridiculous is now to lead the country. A man whose DNA profile is the exact same as a Bernard Manning joke,” with the headline: Boris Johnson: the clown is crowned as the country burns in hell. While the The New York Times described the new prime minister as someone ‘who has an air of personal disorganization, tends to lose things, and used to lug his belongings to and from work in a backpack slung over his shoulders.’ The Daily Star is the only publication that decided not to lead with the political story, instead running a story about Coronation Street and previewing its third-day story on the seagull that allegedly snatched a chihuahua in Devon. With inputs from agencies
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