Um, Theresa May Wants to Fight the Next General Election

Guys, guess what: Theresa May is literally not quitting. She's going to try to stick it out and fight the next election. Outstanding. I simply can't. I'm screaming. She's going to fight the next election. Hellfire.

In an interview with Sky News, the Prime Minister countered rumours that she was planning on stepping down in the next two years, committing to the fact that she is "in this for the long term" – much to the eye-watering disbelief of her whole cabinet, her whole party, the whole country, all of the EU and probably the world. Up until now I'd sort of assumed the only reason she was still in office was out of some bizarre checkmate with the rest of the party, who couldn't let her go because there was no suitable replacement. Today's revelation, on the other hand, would suggest something far more troubling is at play. After everything that has happened – after proving herself to be, quite simply, worse than David Cameron – she still wants the job.

This is not going well at all, Theresa. Your ratings are terrible, you lost your government's majority, all of your flagship policies have folded and you've ended up stealing ideas from the opposition. This is the transfer deadline day news nobody wanted to hear.

Which sort of begs the question: are you alright, mate? Like, are you actually OK?

All of Theresa May's post-election statements to the press have seemed a bit unhinged, but this one is special. It's like she can only contain all the horror, anguish and distress of her waking life for the exact three minute running time of the interview. So she pushes it all down, deep down into her soul, like a jack-in-the-box full of animal carcasses and toxic waste, and hopes that she can manage four questions without the seams haemorrhaging and all the sadness bursting out like poisoned soup.

The Guardian always refer to her as the "Maybot", but I reckon that sounds too high-tech. In this interview she seems manually operated, like a mechanical waxwork slowly melting in the interactive Victorian museum of a forgotten seaside town. Her face pulls and contorts as though off camera press officers are dragging her emotional responses into shape with fish hooks and cheese wire. Stranger still is how she keeps trying to laugh. I guess this is supposed to make us feel at ease – "teehee, don't worry: everything is under control" – but the whole thing is so obviously not funny that it looks totally batshit.

Ultimately this just betrays how oblivious the Tory leadership are. Not only oblivious to the reality that a Theresa May premiership is a death sentence for their party, but also oblivious to how transparent these "nothing to see here" interviews are.

After all, nothing looks less fine than repeatedly saying everything is fine.

@a_n_g_u_s