Leftist hears a death threat when there is none

On 29 September, Andrew Marr, the BBC’s lead political interviewer, accused the prime minister, Boris Johnson, of something to do with death threats.

Marr started by asking Johnson if he knew the murdered MP Jo Cox. This immediately personalised the subject and raised the stakes. He then reminded Johnson that he had responded to Labour MP Paula Sherriff’s impassioned appeal about death threats against her and other MPs by saying ‘humbug’. Then, across a series of interruptions, Johnson was accused of ‘whipping up’ bad feeling in the country, of ‘playing with fire’, of inciting violence, and of (sounding like he was) threatening an uprising unless he got his way.

It was a disturbing 20 minutes, both in the vagueness of the charges and the hostile manner in which they were put. Johnson can speak for himself, and he did. But note: our politics have got to such a pass that the prime minister can be accused of being responsible in vicarious ways for death threats made by madmen, and murders that have yet to happen, also by madmen, and no one should be in doubt that if one should happen, God forbid, he would be the prime political suspect. It’s a long way for a small word, ‘humbug’, to travel.

Johnson was saying ‘humbug’ not to the fact, or to the idea, of Jo Cox’s murder or Sherriff’s fragile state, but to the notion that his use of language was responsible for future murders, or death threats, or both. This was a bad day at the office for Marr.

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