It was cold, bright and icy in Yorkshire today. I didn’t venture out apart from retrieving the newspaper from the shop and putting the rubbish out.
I have spent the whole day wrestling with editing the Beefheart book. It’s been torturous – analysing, twisting, reworking, rewriting and tweaking. Sometimes it proceeds easily; sometimes it’s a real struggle. Today was a struggle. The right words would not come easily. I had to fight every one of them to submission. I eventually managed eleven pages. At this rate it’s going to take a long long while!!
You know that frustrating experience when the word you are looking for refuses to coalesce in your mind? I’ve had that all day!!
My wife is my editor. We work on it together. I’m not sure it’s good for either relationships or sanity!!
I am feeling as if I’ve been smacked round the head with a wet haddock for six hours!
Meanwhile, out in Coronaland, the Tories are out in force pushing their mantra. They are good at it. They are very disciplined. They know their future depends on it. They have decided (for now) that Johnson is their meal ticket.
I’m sick of hearing what a great leader the invisible clown is. What a great job he did with Brexit and the Pandemic. They must be joking!! He killed more than nearly everyone else with his dithering and complacency. He was appalling!! As for Brexit – the whole world is laughing at us. He jumped in to get it done – telling us it was ‘Oven Ready’ and going to take us to the ‘Sunny Uplands’. The whole thing has been a disaster. Johnson was never one for wasting energy on details. There was always too much shagging, drinking expensive wine and guzzling good food. Just sign it, make it up and blag it. The result is a mess.
This fool is unfit to run a chip shop let alone a country!!
What the Tories are trying to do is spread doubt, sow confusion, create a narrative. Johnson has been toiling day and night to get Brexit done, roll out vaccination and solve all the problems associated with it – the HGV, shortages of staff, the NHS, carers and all the poor people struggling to make ends meet!
What a pile of bollocks. He doesn’t give a stuff. He’s been partying, disappearing and passing law after law that will create untold misery then lying about levelling up!!.
The guy is a lying bastard!
So, in the UK yesterday we had 76,806 new cases with another 297 deaths.
Interestingly the government claim we have had 153,787 deaths (one of the worst in the world) but the ONS say it is 177,000 deaths – that would put us even higher up the table.
We lie 7th in the table of shame with our 153,787 deaths. Above us are the USA (Trump), Brazil (Bolsonaro) India (Modi), Russia (Putin), Mexico and Peru. It seems that the bonkers populists are doing the worst job.
We have to ask ourselves why a country like New Zealand has only had 52 deaths and China, where it all started, has only got 4,600 deaths despite its massive population.
And these Tory twats keep telling us what a good job Johnson has done!! Yesterday alone we were nearly 6 times worse than New Zealand throughout the whole two years!!
I think we can see why. This bunch of cretins keep making decisions based on their own populist policies rather than sound science. Drakeford said today that the Tories in the UK have abandoned the science.
So we teeter. What happens to the vulnerable now? Are those millions of cancer patients and those without any immunity being thrown to the wolves? Looks like it. Then we have the variants to consider. A simple equation – more cases; more variants. How long before we get a really nasty one??
I was reading today that all that antivaxxer propaganda was coming out of 12 sources!! I wonder what political motive they have?
Stay safe!!
Opher – You sound in need of a break from editing…you can’t force the pace, the words control that – the universe doesn’t bend to your will. Why not take a few days off, take a road-trip in celebration of the ending of Covid restrictions! That should pep you up!
‘Bashed round head with wet haddock’. One of those phrases that with the right accent, intonation, and tone, would bring Victoria Wood readily to mind. Another single word is wazzock. Good days.
The P.M’s pets are distracting from the main narratives: Partygate, Sue Gray’s report, standards of behaviour from Tory whips, and possibility of yet another alleged party, this one in BoJo’s flat involving friends of his wife. The Partygate panto – O how we boo and hiss! – is heading to its finale. There is huge public expectation for the clown to go as a result of the findings, and further calls from Opposition parties for the MET to take up an independent inquiry. From what has been reported in the press already, it is becoming increasingly obvious there was and is perpetual law-breaking.
Tory sycophants pushing forward the clown’s narrative of alleged successes in both Brexit and management of the Covid pandemic, do so in advance of the forthcoming Inquiry into the government’s handling of the pandemic. Gauging public reaction to these claims will help direct their rebuttal of any negative findings. It’s all theatre and bullshit really.
New Zealand have been well governed by Arden. Her decisions were, in the main, well-judged, and well-received by the public who were supportive of her policies. It really could have been very different here in the U.K if we had mirrored their stringent, cautious response and used it as a basis for managing our own fiasco. I wonder how they will now fair as Omicron takes hold?
Your last paragraph makes for very sober reading Opher.It’s saddening, and totally avoidable if common-sense prevailed, if our charlatan P.M weren’t bent by back-benchers. This is no way to run a government.
In the States, Tucker Carlson, Fox News, compared federal vaccination and mask-wearing mandates to Nazi experiments, suggesting compulsory medicine is unethical: people shouldn’t have experimental medicines forced upon them. (It’s not known if he is or isn’t vaccinated) It’s outrageous! Yet more drivel to drive division in the electorate still deeper. Hosts even went after Fauci, aligning him with Mengele! It’s bonkers. Why aren’t these people censored? The world has gone mad. So, could TCarlson be one of the twelve sources you mention distributing propaganda? Fox News were pro-Trump.
The days ahead are probably better managed using an abundance of caution. Stay safe!
DN
I will take a break. It is hard to retain focus. Meeting up with a friend today for a lunch! That’ll reinvigorate me!!
I’m not sure that the Tories will be able to distract much longer. Reports start piling in and reopening wounds. Im not sure that people are that easy to bring back on side. The bubble has burst. They no longer see Johnson in the same light.
Now whether Rishi can convince them that a multimillionaire has the interests of ordinary people at heart? We’ll see. I somehow doubt it. He’s too smarmy.
If you say black is white often enough and in unison many people begin to believe that it is. The Tories are good at telling lies in unison. That’s how they get elected. Labour have never been anywhere near as disciplined.
The truth is that Brexit was a disaster, Covid management was inept and the vaccine had nothing to do with Johnson but the Tories will continue their narrative that Johnson got Brexit done and steered us through this terrible pandemic. He vaccinated the country. He’s our saviour. We’ll see how many fall for their lies.
The ERG are, and always have been, a bunch of extreme nationalist nutcases verging on fascist. The nastiest bunch we’ve ever had in charge.
America has gone completely nuts and is fast disappearing down an extreme right-wing black-hole. I think there will either be civil war or TRump again. He is poison.
What is wrong with people???
I think you are right. Now is a time for caution. Stay safe!!