Many are simply incapable of joining the dots on Curtaingate and are unable to make the obvious link between anonymous donations, bribery and corruption. So long as it's not public money that paid for Boris' flat refurb, they're not concerned. It's a genuine misconception about how corruption works. However, they're wilfully neglecting the PPE scandal.
Many couldn't care less about the corruption, even if it's under their noses - their priorities are making ends meet, jobs and regeneration. If Boris promises cash for their area then that's enough for them, even if it's a tissue of lies and a temporary sop to garner votes - it's enough to swing them away from Labour.
The dedicated Boris sycophants aren't in the least bothered by corruption anyway - they'd be just as crooked in a similar situation. They're simply ecstatic that Boris delivered that crock of shit, Brexit. Their irrational hatred of foreigners clouds their judgement and they are willing to cut their collective noses off to spite their collective faces. They worship at the altar of the Daily Express, which these days makes even the Daily Mail, Telegraph and Spectator look decidedly left wing. For them, Boris can do no wrong and they wouldn't vote Labour if their lives depended on it. They vote according to the colour of their scarves and their perceived tribe, not policy.
For others, what sticks in the memory is how the Covid crisis ends, not the multiple cockups leading up to it and compounding the misery. 127.5k have died from Covid, half of them (according to estimates) avoidable, but at least it wasn't them and the vaccine rollout is therefore a resounding success. That's enough for them. They're only interested in themselves.
We're living in a time of infantilism of the electorate - cheap loans allow profligacy without thought of the consequences. Consequences of actions are meaning less and less. It's the 'now' that's important - being able to buy that big telly you don't have or go on a holiday, the price of which you stand little or no chance of paying back. We're in a time of rampant consumerism and a generation that wants it all - NOW! If Boris gives it them now, then he's the boy for them.
Despite Starmer being a poster boy for working class aspiration, most of the working class probably aren't actually aspirational. They're living hand to mouth, so Starmer, in his comfortable position, is identified by Corbynistas as a class traitor and too Metropolitan. Quite why that would make a Labour voter choose an elitist Conservative though, is a paradox (revenge can be a powerful emotion that drives people to do counterintuitive things), unless the Corbynistas simply wanted to give Starmer a good kicking - they are capable of a bit of self-flagellation at times. They need to give their heads a wobble and accept that Corbyn is history; too many distrust him and he's unelectable, regardless of how they feel about him.
Does Labour need someone like an Andy Burnham, with impeccable working class credentials and a working class accent? Well, the evidence says not - Blair wasn't exactly working class and delivered three stunning victories, despite Iraq.
There's a Westminster wisdom that says elections are usually not won by opposition parties and vote winning policies, but by governing parties losing through internecine backstabbing, civil war and destroying themselves from the inside, as happened in the Major and Brown administrations. Labour still hasn't exorcised the ghost of the unelectable Corbyn and it's the Labour Party that's currently engaged in a low-level civil war. Until that war is ended, they stand no chance and, even then, not until the Conservatives are turning on themselves in a feeding frenzy of monstrous egos and ambition, as they surely will due to Boris' embarrassing incompetence and tenuous relationship with truth.
What brought all this about was the fact that Labour chose the wrong Miliband brother.
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