Imagine having a shelf life shorter than an iceberg lettuce. Well, that’s the fate of former British prime minister Liz Truss after she resigned on Thursday.
But the joke played out by journalists at the Daily Star really got the Twitter memes flying.
The actual lettuce, that cost the whole of 59p, was live-streamed from their offices this week. On day six it was crowned the winner, complete with gold crown.
Memes had lettuces projected onto the Houses of Parliament, a Marvel comics-style Lettucehead dragging off a recalcitrant Truss, and the bust of Truss done as a lettuce.
It was Russian politician Dmitry Medvedev who set the tone with a tweet: “Well done lettuce”, to which Elon Musk replied, “Pretty good troll,” before asking, “btw, how are thing’s it going in Bakhmut?”.
Albert Ridsdale tweeted: “Lettuce pray for Liz Truss. And all those who can’t afford a cabbage or anything to eat due to tory policies,” in response to a tweeted prayer from the Archbishop of Canterbury for the disgraced prime minister.
Then yesterday anger rose when it emerged that departing prime ministers not only got very lucrative pensions but could draw an allowance of up to £115 000 a year to run their offices.
One tweeted: “Looking forward to receiving £115 000 a year for life for spending 45 days doing a job more incompetently than anyone in history.”
Memes had a revolving door fitted into the famed Number 10 frontage, while another showed Number 10 with an Airbnb sign above it and the words “Perfect for short stays”.
Many wondered if she had even had time to undo all of Boris Johnson's bad taste renovations of the famed property.
And many wits sharpened their pencils as to her legacy.
Patch Thompson noted: “Liz Truss never misses. The Queen, the economy and now the Conservative Party. All in a matter of weeks. Deadly.”
Another meme doing the rounds covers the same ground.
“UK prime minister Liz Truss has resigned.
“Her legacy is quite impressive: buried the queen, the pound, and the Tory party within a few weeks.”
One meme takes the picture of her meeting with Queen Elizabeth at Balmoral, with Truss saying “you don’t look like you’re going to last very long”, and the queen responding “neither do you”.
American commentator Reginald D Hunter makes this observation: “The beauty of having Liz Truss as PM is that we no longer have to wonder what a Sarah Palin presidency would have looked like.”
LBC noted: “It was like asking a hospital porter to perform brain surgery”, while Chris Elliott described “Liz Truss the political equivalent of a skid mark.”
A meme as a Gatsby era film poster shows Liz Truss standing dramatically back to back with Kwasi Kwateng and the title How to Lose an Economy in 10 days.
Perhaps one of the more offbeat observations comes from Parody Prime Minister’s comment on former home secretary Suella Braverman, whose odd resignation on Wednesday may have been the final straw that broke the camel’s back.
“Suella Braverman is what happens if you feed Priti Patel after midnight.”
Others speculated on Truss’s future.
Flappyhandski noted: “Nottingham Forest are interested in making Liz Truss their 185th signing of the season.
“Club thinks she can play in a variety of positions on the pitch except at No.10.”
While Glenn Evans noted dryly: “Let’s put a positive spin on it for the Tories… Liz Truss… the first postwar UK prime minister since Winston Churchill to have served under two monarchs.”
To which King Charles III might aptly reply: “Dear, oh dear.”
It was South African Suntosh Pillay·who took a longer view on the problem: “I feel like decades from now the prize-winning question on some arb reality trivia show is going to be, ‘Which Prime Minister served a mere 44 days in office?’ The (British) contestant will get it wrong, later Googles Liz Truss, and then falls into a rabbit hole of Twitter memes.”
The Independent on Saturday