Could Farage be right about the people vs the establishment?

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Farage presumably thought that resigning and fighting a by-election in which he expected to vanquish all his foes was a wizard wheeze. But then the other parties decided not to play, leaving him to fight a campaign against Count Binface and potentially a few other fringe candidates. There’s something rather pleasing about the man who refuses to play by the rules laid down by others now complaining that the others aren’t playing by the rules he has attempted to set for them.

The pundits all seem to be expecting that he will win an easy electoral victory, albeit one that will prove nothing, and probably leave him facing the same jeopardy. I wonder, though. In the first place, turnout is likely to be low – without other parties campaigning at all, who will be working to get the vote out – and for what? Secondly, in a country where ‘the people’ chose to name a boat Boaty McBoatface rather than honouring official national treasure David Attenborough, is it really too much of a stretch to imagine a victory for Count Binny McBinface, especially if the latter opted for such a scotification of his name? Farage claimed that it would be a fight between ‘the people’ and ‘the establishment’, and maybe he’s right. It’s just that he doesn’t understand that in a fight between these two titans, he – a multimillionaire public school-educated city trader – is the establishment candidate, and McBinface the anti-establishment insurgent. Farage also said that it’s an opportunity for people to stick two fingers up to the establishment – is there anything more likely to have that effect than sending a bin-clad warrior to Westminster? If I lived in Clacton, I’d certainly be tempted – and on a low turnout…

For those of us who see Farage as a danger to community cohesion, bringing his political career to an end would surely be a cause for celebration. And could there be a better – or more humiliating – way of achieving that than seeing him turfed out by a man wearing a refuse bin on his head? Maybe the pundits will be right, but we can surely dream in the meantime.