Farage is attracting dead Tories to him like a body collector during the bubonic plague. We have a tax-avoiding Bond Villain with a penchant for tax avoidance, a nutty bonkbuster writer with a record of nepotism, huge expenses and unparalleled stupidity, and honest Bob, a failed Tory Leadership candidate, who’d rather line the pockets of his mates and confront fair dodgers on the tube in search of clicks than offer any serious political thoughts on how to get out of the situation the Tories and Farage’s Brexit created.

They are not alone; they are part of a parcel of rogues, rats jumping onto the vile vessel ‘Reform’ as an act of political survival, defection and infection in one move. Let’s list them for the sake of completeness:

Lee Anderson, the potty-mouthed ex-chairman of the Tory Party and paid pub bore on GBNews; Jonathan Gullis, the unemployed windbag blaming “woke” witchcraft for his unemployment. David Jones, the expense-swindling bigot who pocketed £81k from a public flat flip while deeming gay parents unfit for kiddie-rearing; Dame Andrea Jenkyns, the bird-flipping banshee who claims Reform bribes lured her in; Danny Kruger, the shadowy scripture-thumper under fire for £55k anti-euthanasia slush funds, peddling “cultural Marxism” paranoia against mercy killings; Lucy Allan, the threat-faking fabulist who doctored videos to smear foes and bullied staff with venomous voicemails till they snapped.

Sir Jake Berry, the out-of-touch oracle advising broke Brits to “earn more” or slash heating amid his party’s economic apocalypse; Anne Marie Morris, the serial whip-loser who casually dropped the N-word in Brexit babble like it was afternoon tea chit-chat; Marco Longhi, the sly divider bolding Indian surnames in letters to Pakistani voters to stir ethnic pots under a unity facade; Ross Thomson, the grabby ghost cleared of barroom gropes but forever stained by sleazy accusations.

It goes on, there’s Chris Green, the tinfoil tweeter sharing Rothschild rants and New World Order nonsense while decrying lockdowns as dictatorial drivel; Lia Nici, the flag-fetish fanatic spotting Brexit sabotage in every shadow, telling unpatriotic plebs to sod off while delivering deranged Boris defenses like a loyal loon; and Ben Bradley, the eugenics-teasing snob pushing vasectomies for the jobless, linking free lunches to crack dens and brothels, and fabricating Corbyn spy yarns for cheap headlines.

It has never been about Farage, not for one second. Farage is just the lightning rod. The real story is the people who finally saw themselves in him and feel validated by what they see. I believe most of them will blow away, like yesterday’s newspapers, when the cult collapses, like embarrassed fans of a one-hit wonder.

Many of them will swear they were never really into him. The Reform amnesia is going to be epic. I used to wonder how it was possible that Farage could have surged in 2016 and again in 2024, taking votes, flipping seats and shaking the establishment, given how emotionally toxic, morally vacant, and clumsily psychologically manipulative he is. I don’t wonder anymore. I think he is successful for that exact reason. He isn’t just a party leader; he is a dark mirror that shows and appeals to our worst instincts in a time of engineered economic and geopolitical crisis.

If you are a xenophobe, he’s your man.

If you are a racist, he’s your man.

If you are a Eurosceptic, he’s your man.

If you mock multiculturalism, he’s your man.

If you hated intellectual elites, he’s your man.

If you are a climate sceptic, he’s your man.

If you enjoy stirring up anti-immigrant sentiment, he’s your man.

If you’d done absolutely nothing to confront your personal issues, he’s your man.

If you are a serial party-hopper, he’s your man.

If you stiff political allies, he’s your man.

If you are a conman, he’s your man.

If you mock people’s backgrounds, he’s your man.

If you long for a toxic Daddy, he’s your man.

If you are dissociated and disembodied, he’s your man.

If you are unconscionable in every economic dealing, he’s your man.

If you lie as naturally as breathing, he’s your man.

If you can’t embrace a diverse Britain, he’s your man.

If you are a Little Englander, he’s your man.

If your ego runs riot and replaces logic with oily charm, he’s your man

If you are a sociopath who cares not one iota about other humans, he’s your man.

If you think the NHS needs radical change, he’s your man.

If you believe the 2024 general election was fundamentally an “immigration election”, he’s your man.

If you claim to have done more than anyone else to drive the far-right out of British politics, even as your party faced ridicule for it, he’s your man.

If you are Nathan Gill, he’s your man.

If you are Putin, he’s your man.

If you are Trump, he’s your man.

If you can pay him, he’s your man.

If he had only two of these traits, he could never win; but because he had hundreds of them and millions of people recognised themselves in at least one, he might. This has never been about Farage. It has always been about the people whose worst instincts were finally validated.

Farage didn’t create the cruelty; he licensed it. He handed out permission slips for hate. He is merely a symptom of a far deeper disease: collective toxicity. If there is one sentence that explains Farage’s power, it is this:

“He says the things I’m thinking.”

That’s the part that should chill the spine.

Who knew that millions of Britons were harbouring such unconscionable thoughts? A country seething with resentment over immigration and diversity, ready to undermine democracy and institutions, fueled by far-right polarisation, Russian ties, poll manipulation, and media corruption, to desperate to reclaim a sense of control, agency and identity?

Perhaps we were living in a fool’s paradise. We aren’t anymore.

They used to call the Tories the ‘Nasty Party’, but that was in the good old days. Reform has raised the bar and lowered the price of admission.

We live in far more interesting times.