old smoothie cannot be taken seriously

William Hague of the Baskervilles

This guy was a lapdog to Thatcher, when he was a kid. His accent is so smarmy
that I cannot take him seriously.

He could be saying the most profound things and I'd be on the floor, laughing.

Imagine:
"The end of the world is niiiiigh."
"That asteroid will destroy us ooooooaaaaaaall"
"We shall fight on the beeeeeeaches,
in the coooooountry clubs and
on our gooooolf caaaaaaarts..."

the kid's got...marbles in his mouth

a deadringers joke