Back during the height of the pandemic, one of the great scandals (if you want to call it that) in Great Britain came to be known as Partygate. People were outraged at reports that Government leaders, including then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, were holding drinking events at 10 Downing Street and other government enclaves and having a grand old time while everyone else was locked down in their homes and forbidden from socializing. It was arguably one of the driving factors leading to BoJo’s eventual ouster from office. Despite initial denials about the true nature of these “meetings,” information has continued to leak out to the press. The latest revelation involves a video from one of the parties that makes the PM’s staff look even worse than they were originally described. (The Mirror)

The Tories face a new Partygate police probe as previously unseen footage shows staff boozing, dancing and mocking lockdown laws at the height of Covid.

A bombshell video exposes for the first time how officials joked about their lockdown rule-bending Christmas bash at the Conservative Campaign Headquarters in London.

At least 24 revellers were there and, shockingly, they include two named on ex-PM Boris Johnson’s controversial resignation honours list.

Johnson and his staff consistently characterized the events as “working meetings” where some alcohol may have been served. But the first video to emerge seems very different than how these shindigs were billed. Take a look for yourself at the clip published by The Mirror.

There is no suggestion that any “work” is going on at this event. People are dancing to loud holiday music, laughing, and drinking cocktails. You can overhear some of them talking about how it’s important to not stream the video and they openly make jokes about “bending the rules.” They are essentially mocking the rest of the country where such parties were outlawed, even at Christmas.

I’ll confess to originally having thought that some of the accusations regarding Partygate might have been overblown. But this video clearly seems to be the smoking gun in the case. This may not be on par with Watergate, but it’s still very bad. Britain’s leaders were obviously treating the lockdown rules as the joke they turned out to be while threatening to literally arrest anyone who was doing the same things they were doing in secret.

Of course, we were dealing with the same situation in the United States. Plenty of elected officials were caught flaunting the rules. The most famous (or infamous) was California Governor Gavin Newsom with his widely publicized trips to the Wine Bar, but there were many others. Officials were regularly seen flaunting the face mask rules and social distancing guidelines.

The difference in America was that these people genuinely didn’t seem to care. Nobody was fired or otherwise lost their jobs. A few mouthed some unserious apologies, but most of them clearly treated the situation as a non-issue. More than a few of us suspected that some folks in Washington had purchased fake CDC vaccination cards, as many athletes did. Lockdown rules and other COVID restrictions were, much like paying taxes, intended for “the little people.”

Unless and until we start electing people with actual principles, none of this will change. It’s always” rules for thee, but not for me,” as far as the Swamp-dwellers in Washington and most state governments are concerned. The main difference between the UK and America is that the Brits still at least maintain a pretense of caring about the rules being equally applied and occasionally prominent officials are held accountable when they are caught coloring outside of the lines.