The President, visibly strained, released a statement urging calm, dignity, and the immediate cessation of Starmer's interpretive eye-rolling since Burnham won the Makerfield by-election. While neither man has formally declared any kind of war, they have stopped exchanging Christmas cards. Burnham agreed in principle to a ceasefire but insisted that it must recognise historic grievances about who has the most coiffured side-parting.
Both parties refused to sit at the same table, instead conducting negotiations via passive-aggressive memes. Burnham escalated tension by unveiling a 47-page document entitled Why I hate Starmer, consisting largely of annotated WhatsApp timestamps. Trump is reluctant to give his support to either side, while JD Vance is said to favour Wes Streeting—as a comic interlude.
The President issued a stern warning about dangerous rhetorical escalation, which both men interpreted as tacit support for using the "C" word. As he convened an emergency summit; both men agree not to refer to each other as "the bland one" for a period of 24 hours. Talks nearly succeeded when both agree on a shared dislike of Trump’s mediation style, but collapsed again when they argue over who wanted to be his poodle more.
