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It shows how low the bar for ‘political satisfaction’ is set that
the fact that a homophobic, racist, unconstitutionally acting, twice fired
judge, bigoted, accused paedophile Roy Moore fails to make it to the American Senate as
representative for Alabama. By just over
1% of the popular vote.
As Alabama is a deepest red Republican state, a Democrat
successfully elected is a triumph, no matter how small the margin of
victory. It has been estimated that over
70% of the white vote went to the Republican, no matter how vile a candidate
was standing to represent them! And they
call themselves God-fearing Christians!
Well, amid the unrelentingly awful progress of Brexit in the hands
of a group of Conservatives who, at cabinet level have yet to even discuss what
sort of Brexit they are actually working towards, a little ray of reason in the
form of the wrong person NOT being elected to office is something to relish.
As is the fact that the failed Republican candidate was
enthusiastically supported by pussy-groper-in-chief, good old
kiss-of-death-to-reason 45, POTUS. In an
astonishingly polite and reasonable twitter 45 actually congratulated the new
Democrat Senator! Could it have been
written by 45 himself, or is there someone in his office with a shred of
decency who managed to get in first?
45 has, of course, started to twitter a ‘justification’ (sic) saying
that he knew that the Republican would lose which is why he supported his
opponent in the Primaries and . . . hold on, I am not going to repeat the
mendacious Jesuitical (not that 45 could ever rise to the height of
sophisticated casuistry that the Storm Troopers of Roman Catholicism reach)
rubbish that spills from his mouth and dribbles from his small handed typing
fingers. He lost. He backed a loser. Who lost.
Like him. Tarred with the same
brush of failure. Sad.
This loss of a crucial vote in the Senate should make the passing of
the shameless tax grab by corporations, big business and greedy donors more
difficult to pass. Does anyone truly
believe that the new tax cutting laws are going to be revenue neutral, or that
they are going to create an economic miracle, just like the similar plans in
Kansas didn’t? One waits and hopes.
But, above all, congratulations to the voters of Alabama for doing
the right thing and rejecting a clearly obnoxious bigot from high office - and
that is something that I did not expect to write in my lifetime!
For those not aware of ‘ghoti’ I should explain that it spells the
word ‘fish’. And here’s how:
Take the ‘gh’ from enough
Take the ‘o’ from women
Take the ‘ti’ from nation
Put them all together and you have all the sounds to make the word
‘fish’
But it doesn’t end there, ‘ghoti’ also has no sound at all! And here’s how:
Take the ‘gh’ from night
Take the ‘o’ from people
Take the ‘t’ from ballet
Take the ‘i’ from business
Put them all together and you have . . . nothing.
And that, if you still remember what I was talking about, is like
what has been ‘agreed’ about Brexit and what the British government (I use the
term very loosely) have stated/promised/negotiated/said/suggested/mentioned/insinuated
- or any other word you might think of to explain exactly what they have done,
because for me, I feel that we are dealing with the second pronunciation of
‘ghoti’ and that we have a wordy nothingness to get on with.
The trouble is, of course, that ‘wordy nothingnesses’ while they
might keep the perennially warring EU factions of the Conservative Party
momentarily apart, they do nothing for life as it is lived in the real world
where real people have real needs.
Living in Spain as I do, what does this ‘triumph’ of negotiation say
about my entitlement to healthcare in my adopted country? What does it say about my ability to travel
on the continent on which I live? My
right or not to stay in Spain? My rights
as a Brexit blighted citizen in a re-defined country relationship?
You try finding concrete reality in the vacuous mouthings of
dithering, incompetence from the British government, added to the astonishingly
lazy arrogance of Davies as he ‘negotiates’ by the seat of his pants with no
apparent need for projections of what his airy pronouncements might mean. Because the Spanish government is going to
ask all the hard ‘W’ questions like: What?
When? Why? Which?
Who? and so on. To these our
government has no answers, mainly because they have not had the wit to think of
the questions themselves.
So, what about the Spanish government?
After the stealing sequestering of art works from Catalonia
and sending them to Aragón in defiance of the natural course of law yesterday, the
powers that be have today declared that the number of political prisoners
jailed at the moment is woefully inadequate and there are plans to incarcerate
40 more of the officials who participate in the dangerously democratic
referendum held on the 1st of October of this year. You remember, that was the referendum when
the world saw pictures and film of members of the Civil Guard and National
Police smashing their way into polling stations and into the people who were in
them.
Our President is in exile in Belgium and, while the craven Spanish
Government has withdrawn the international arrest warrant for him, because it
was likely to have been thrown out of court and humiliated the government by
its rejection, it has retained the Spanish arrest warrants. So, if our President were to step foot on
Spanish soil he would be immediately arrested.
For the time being our President continues to canvass and participate in
the Catalan election via video from Belgium.
Our President speaks a number of languages including French and
English and so he is more than able to communicate with the International
Press. The Spanish President speaks one
language, and his command of Spanish has been, um, a little individualist at
times. He has also rejected questions in
press conferences which have not been in Spanish. It is almost sad to watch Rajoy at
international gatherings as he attempts to show that he is chums with people
who look mildly irritated and embarrassed when he approaches.
We are now only eight days away from an election that could define
the course of Spanish history for generations, and indeed the course of
European history. The election in
Catalonia involves us all. What happens
to Catalonia will be seen as an indication of the strength of democracy not
only inside Spain, but also within the EU and the wider world.
You are involved in what happens on the 21st. Keep watching! Your future is at stake!
