I wrote in this space not long ago, in the context of Nicola Sturgeon, about how incuriosity can, when taken to extremes, be a sort of superpower. So it appears to be, too, with Nigel Farage. First there was this crypto zillionaire stuffing the pockets of his red corduroy trousers with cash. Did Nigel at no point wonder whether there was any agenda beyond rewarding him personally for being a smashing chap and a real laugh to have a pint with? If he had wondered that, and the thought had crossed his mind that the whole thing might look a bit iffy to the voting public, he would surely have thought it best to make a note of it in the register of Members’ Interests – y’know, just to be on the safe side.
The Reform party machinery seems to have shared Nigel’s lack of interest in the small stuff
It might have occurred to him, too, that there was a bit of a public-relations risk in the way Reform’s unusually well-developed policy on cryptocurrency aligned almost exactly with the interests of his great benefactor Christopher Harborne. As well, come to that, of his pal Posh George Cottrell.
Nigel knows in his heart that the alignment I describe is a matter of the purest coincidence: that it’s only natural far-sighted men of the world like him and Harborne and Cottrell would see the wondrous potential of this new technology in similar terms. His conscience, he knows, is clear. But it might also have occurred to him that his many political enemies would try to paint it as something different. Nigel knows that correlation is not causation, that post hoc is not the same as propter hoc – but the voting public can be obtuse about these things.
