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Notes -
Pointing out that politicians obeyed lockdowns, except of course when they didn't, is the equivalent of damning with faint praise. "Disproving with faint proof"?
Partygate was mostly bad because Boris lied to the House not because the infringements were all that bad. He got the fine in the end for a very mild offence indeed, one that I suspect most people were guilty of at some point during the pandemic. It's still unacceptable, but it hardly undermines the point that, in general, they too were subject to the rules.
The political culture that is the UK took intentional violations of the lockdown by pro-lockdown politicians and officials very seriously indeed. As well as Johnson and (arguably) Cummings, the list of resignations/firings includes:
Neil Ferguson (leading pandemic modeller at Imperial College and SAGE member)
Catherine Calderwood (Scottish chief medical officer)
Margaret Ferrier (SNP MP)
Matt Hancock (Health Secretary)
The Gavin Newsom French Laundry scandal and such like would not have been survivable in the UK.
Partygate was bad because a lot of Johnson's support within the Conservative party was based on the (probably true) belief that his blokey charisma made him an irreplaceable electoral asset, and suddenly he wasn't. The fact that Boris lies constantly about everything was already priced in, and lying to the Commons about Partygate would have been survivable if he was still popular in the country.
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