Thursday 30 April 2020

Planet of the Morons

Michael Moore’s latest documentary - Planet of the Humans - has succeeded in angering many of his usual supporters. Possibly because many of his supporters don’t really understand his point. Whether or not every statistic quoted is accurate is immaterial. Moore hasn’t turned on his audience, although a lot of them should be squirming at the inconvenient truths he has unearthed. His target is still global capitalism and he scored a bullseye; it’s just that being ‘the good guys’ is harder than you thought.

As to those numbers and their accuracy, there is no reliable way of working out what the actual cost of a single wind turbine is, let alone the price paid by the planet. Materials must be extracted, processed, transported, fabricated, assembled, transported again... They have to be erected on site and the infrastructure to support them must be created. Then you need to factor in their running costs – maintenance, repair, replacement, etc – and their end of life disposal costs. Little of these financials are ever considered when the PR departments publish performance figures.

But all of that is comparatively simple. With enough diligent research, one (or more probably quite a large team) could forensically examine the lifecycle of that wind turbine and tot up the numbers. However, this is clearly not in the interests of those who would sell you the technology. When it is claimed that wind and solar are ‘cheaper’ than fossil fuels they conveniently ignore most of the above costs. You may have noticed such claims began springing up over the last year or so, along with the ludicrous nonsense that electric cars will be cheaper to buy than conventional cars within two years. (A budget electric is currently twice the price of a far more useable family diesel.)

What is much harder to cost is the real takeaway from Moore’s film. The destruction of habitat, the displacement of people, the exploitation of heartbreakingly poor communities and the extinction of species is difficult to put a price on, but I’ll give it a go. It is too much. Also, in the case of certain supposedly green technologies, more carbon is emitted in their manufacture alone than is ever offset by their operation. Lest you think this makes me a rabid climate denier, I’m not, but like MM, I am highly suspicious of the way the green movement has been hijacked by profiteers.

Where we differ, I think, is that I don’t believe there is globalist collusion, as such. I don’t see shadowy conspiracies hatched in dark corners. What I do see, however, is how unchallenged markets work; what I see is human nature. The environmentalists lobby governments, infiltrate the thinking of teachers and hence children, spread the message that the planet is doomed (again) and eventually, as with all propaganda, the wider public begin to believe. This belief drives demand for more Earth-friendly products, so suddenly everything that can be labelled green is labelled green.


There is nothing sinister about this; this is just the human market working as it always does. As sentiment mounts it affects voting patterns and governments are driven to demand action. And then the big money gets in on the act. There was little profit in expensively developing alternative products for a limited market, but the gains are enormous if you can tap into a global demand for something so apparently wholesome. This process is organic; it is observable and repeatable and entirely human. The coronavirus is thought, maybe, to have originated in a Chinese wet market and experts are trying to find a cure. The voracious human consumption virus is inherent in all of us and if we are the only cure we are very probably buggered.

Wednesday 29 April 2020

Selling Socialism

One day the lockdown will be over; one day. And if I am any judge of human nature we will quickly get back to near normal. Maybe some nominal social distancing will continue for a while, but cash will definitely still be around much as people wish it would disappear; and people will still shake hands, so its probably back to business as usual. Of course, many forecasters are insisting that this isn’t good enough and that we will need to re-order all of society. I am expecting some token efforts, some weak campaigns for a ‘new’ normal. I wouldn’t be surprised to get a knock at the door:

Hello, do you have a few minutes? I’d like to introduce you to socialism.
Oh, yeah, what does that mean? Isn’t that where you run out of my money?
Margaret Thatcher said that. She was as bad as Hitler and she was so wrong.
Okay, so what does it really mean?
It means we all come together and care for each other, like we did in the coronavirus crisis. We all look out for one another; nobody goes hungry and we make a better world where the uber rich don’t get richer and the poor don’t keep getting poorer.

But I read somewhere that everybody is richer than they ever were.
Well, in so-called ‘real terms’ (does the quote-fingers) maybe so, but in relative terms the average working man is in abject poverty compared to the Bransons of this world.
You mean relative poverty as opposed to real poverty?
Relative poverty is real poverty. Denying that is what allows the rich to keep the rest of us as slaves.
But I don’t feel like a slave, I really don’t.

No, I expect that’s because you have a good job and live in a nice house in a nice area. What about all the people who live in overcrowded poverty in horrible areas?
Immigrants, you mean?
Let’s not go there; that’s a bit racist.
Do you mean the workshy council estate lot with loads of kids that live on the dole?
If you don’t mind me saying so that’s a bit bigoted. It is these very people we want to help. We need to step up and lift these people out of their destructive circumstances
Sterilise them, you mean?
Oh… Can we get back to socialism, please?

Okay, well what you said there sounds good, I’m on board with that. I mean, who doesn’t want everybody to have a decent living? How does it affect me?
Well, you will obviously have to pay more tax.
O-kaaay… how much more?
About 50% more.
But then I wouldn’t be able to live in my nice house. After saving for my pension I have nothing left over as it is. And then there’s the kids school fees coming up; I want them to have a good start in life.
Well, under socialism you wouldn’t have to worry about any of that because everybody would have free education.

Free?
Well, it would be provided by the state. There wouldn’t be any private education at all because that is inherently unfair.
But how come, even after people like me reducing the burden on the state, public education is still a bit, well, crap?
Ah, you see, under full socialism state education would be world class.
How so?
Because we would double investment in schools. Children are the future you kno…
Where does the state gets its money from?
Well, from the taxpayer, of course.
That’s me again isn’t it?

Only if you are in the private sector. If you worked for the state, as most people will, your tax is not relevant in as you will be paid from the public purse anyway.
But if most people work for the state, where does the state’s money come from?
The private sector, of course. For far too long they have been getting away with tax avoidance schemes and not paying their way. Under caring socialism they would have to pay their fair share.
But you already said my tax burden would go up by 50%
At least.


So, let me get this straight. You want me to sell my nice house in my nice area and move to a less nice house in a less nice area. Where’s my incentive to do that?
You would be contributing to a better world.
How is making me poorer, ‘better’?
It’s about equality, isn’t it? You see, we would be reducing unfairness.
Doesn’t seem very fair to me.
That’s socialism. Thank you for your time.

Tuesday 28 April 2020

The Boss is Back

Were you to go to your boss and make a suggestion to improve the business, or improve your own lot, it is likely that an astute boss would challenge you to sell it to him. What do you mean, exactly, how would it work, what research have you done to validate this and what part do you intend to play in order to bring this about? In most cases where an employee suggests “I’ll tell you what we should do…” the conversation stops the second such a challenge is made. “Oh, I’m not the businessman here, but, you know, you should consider it.”

Such suggestions usually get stored carefully in ‘the round file’ where ideas go to die. Innovators, entrepreneurs, successful people generally, don’t just dream up an outcome and then assume it can come to fruition just because they’ve thought it. In large part this is the failure of vision of the Labour Party. They have a dream of a utopia in which they would have a marvellous time but haven’t considered how it will affect those who don’t think like they do, or even how it will reconcile the left’s own perpetually warring factions.

And they have never, ever, come up with a practical solution to pay for it, no matter how many times they use the phrase ‘fully costed’. At the moment, of course, in response to Rishi Sunak’s response to feeding people during the lockdown they are jeering and claiming that he has introduced the very socialist measures they were proposing only a few months ago. But he hasn’t. He is responding to a crisis and the government of which he is a part is doing its level best to follow expert advice, observe outcomes elsewhere and  do what they honestly think is right for the country, as a whole.

And it’s that ‘as a whole’ that is important here because no solution, not one, would satisfy everybody. The furlough funding? Yeah but what about the self-employed? Okay, we’ll sort out some system for them, if we can find a way. But why didn’t you think about that in, like, 2019, then? Er, because in 2019 all of you were trying to stop Brexit, you nuggets. And so it continues; every action is met with an objection, every criticism is non-constructive. And every tiny lapse in detail is forensically examined and presented as a massive structural failure.

Another thing that is important to recognise is that the government is actually doing something, many things. And it is reacting to the situation as it changes. Nobody in government or advising them is simply taking an enormous salary or consultation fees and glibly doing nothing. Yet everybody else thinks they know better. Because everybody lives in their own little socio-economic bubble which they imagine is a microcosm of the country at large. Except it isn’t; the chances of your own personal experience preparing you to tackle problems affecting millions of people is unlikely in the extreme.

But the government can’t be perfect; no government will ever be. Many good intentions end up in the black hole between conception and execution, between ministers and civils servants, between press release and reality. But this doesn’t mean that they aren’t trying and it doesn’t mean that you could do any better. And if you think you could you are as guilty as the press, the opposition, celebrities and all the other hordes who are rocking up to the boss with what they imagine are helpful suggestions.

History may have put him here for a reason...

Having said all that I am not an uncritical supporter of everything the current government stands for and everything they do or plan to do. But unlike so many I don’t imagine for one second I have the intellectual or managerial capacity to do any better. Now that Boris is back at the helm, maybe, just maybe, its time you all gave him the chance to demonstrate why he, out of countless contenders, is in the job he is.

Sunday 26 April 2020

Ding-Dong

Nobody can be in any doubt that we have entered the month of ramadan, a word unknown to 99% of Britons in the 1970s, but now known to everybody. Not least because at every possible opportunity we have islam rammed down our throats. When people speak of diverse communities they often mean segregated, ethnically monocultural islamic ghettoes, yet when politicians get to wooing their future core voters they are fulsome with their praise for all the wonders islam brings.

There’s… well there’s the science and technology for a start. Listening to some sycophants you would be led to believe that everything in the modern world was invented by nomadic desert dwellers in the middle ages. And then there are the simply marvellous advances in human rights. As everybody knows, the muslim culture embraces equality for all; let us never forget what they have done to advance the causes of feminism and acceptance of LGBT lifestyles.

Oh, lazy, I hear you cry; going for the same old anti-islamic tropes. Well, why not, I say, because they are there, in plain sight, even though an increasing number of dhimmies refuse to see it. There’s another islamic word that has entered into our lexicon, along with halal, haram, jihad and many, far too many more. This creeping acceptance of a culture which is simply incompatible, without reform, with a modern world is brushed aside by our representatives in Parliament in a manner which is almost sinister.

What’s brought all this on? Well, you can’t have failed to observe that on England’s patron saint’s day, the great and the good were falling over themselves to wish us all a happy… ramalama-ding-dong. But now the Limp Dumbs have gone a step further and taken up a suggestion by one of their local councillors that they undertake the Ramadan fast and share their joy at the new understanding this will bring. Already we have seen tweets declaring this intent along with pictures of pre-dawn breakfasts and self-applause at dusk.

This could be seen as simple, cynical vote-grooming, but the Labour Party is already the official party of islam on these shores and I very much doubt that the Libdems can muster the level of doublethink that hard-left Labourites are brought up on; when it comes to hypocrisy Labour has all the cards. But I don’t think it is simple politicking, I think it’s worse. In the excellent but depressing book Submission, the French author Michel Houellebecq describes a France which, without a shot being fired, is quietly conquered by islam.

Read it and weep, for what he portends is already in an advanced stage both in France and here in the UK. And it is our own fault. Terrified at the prospect of offending minorities successive UK governments and official bodies, universities, police ‘services’, the judiciary and large sections of the media have gone out of their way to accommodate them. And the biggest ‘minority’ (which is a clear majority in many boroughs) for decades has been the followers of mohammad (peas be upon him).

As a result, standards have been relaxed and limited shortlists have been introduced to allow recruitment based on criteria other than merit. The police, the army, the NHS and other public purse organisation have been relentlessly bombarded with diversity propaganda until it has become a mantra: brown face good, white face bad. Advertising, although driven by profit, has followed the trend, so wherever you turn you are presented an image of Britain which bears no resemblance to the one in which you live… unless you live in the woke bubble of Medialand.


The steady drip, drip, drip of Islamification is a process which, unlike open warfare, is hard to combat. We have a democratic system, notwithstanding electoral fraud, which allows anybody to stand. And we have electoral wards where the overwhelming majority will put muslim representatives into office. We have politically correct governance which promotes inclusion and applauds whenever a non-white, non-Christian is appointed to the cabinet, then calls for more. And we voted for all of this. Make no mistake: The future is dark; the future is islam.

Saturday 25 April 2020

Pressed

Donald Trump is an idiot. There, I said it. Actually, I have rarely thought of him in any other way, except for seeing in him what so many of ‘the usual suspects’ utterly refuse to comprehend. He is not whatever else is on offer. He is not a practitioner of slick politics. Far from it, politically he is like Tommy Cooper, busking away when his tricks failed, only to finally pull that rabbit out of that hat. (Or in his case “Glass, bottle, bottle, glass… just like that!”)

Did he become a billionaire through brilliance or luck, or dodgy dealing? Did he even become a billionaire at all? But none of that matters because what Donald Trump really is, is ‘none of the above’. Politics has been mired in subversive deals with lobbyists, elected representatives not representing those who elected them and has been exercised in a manner detached from the lives of those who have to live by what politicians decide. The stench of corruption, real or imagined, is palpable, thick and offensive.

But, right now, as thoroughly loathed as politicians are, this position is being strongly challenged by a press which seems to have lost its mind. Just as in the UK the media as a whole think that their preferred politics – leftish, ‘liberal’, ‘progressive (in their estimation) – is the only obvious and logical stance to take. Anybody thinking otherwise is regarded as Untermenschen needing protection from self-destructive instincts and who really ought not to have a say, for their own good.

And so frenzied is their ambition to topple populist leaders, like Trump, that they cannot help but rewrite reality, even where no such rewrite is needed. Now forever dubbed Dettol Don, the president, unable to marshal his thoughts and consider them before opening his big, bellicose mouth, rambled along with a stream of consciousness which demonstrated a barely rudimentary grasp of recent research findings. But at no point did he suggest that people should inject themselves with disinfectant.

This ignorant monologue just wasn’t enough for the press, though; they just had to embellish it. It is possible that the alarming revelation that some people have actually done this and been admitted to hospital as a result may owe more to the way the press reported his words than what the orange-haired buffoon actually said. What he said was stupid, but what the press say he said was even more stupid. It might look like a clever move in retrospect, now that he has responded like a clumsy, guilty child, claimed it was just a joke and refused to answer more questions, but he never needed any encouragement to look like a clumsy, guilty child.


The press think their job is ‘to hold the government to account’ or ‘to speak truth to power’, but it isn’t. The job of the press is to diligently and even-handedly report the news. Not to distort it, not to inject it with spin which reveals their own bias. And certainly not to change it, communist style, especially when the actual source of their stories is available for all to see on the internet. So, journos, stop making it all about you. Report what actually happens and let the idiots hang themselves out to dry.

Thursday 23 April 2020

Shame

Watch, when Ramadan ends, how British politicians will fall over themselves to be the first to say ‘eid mubarak’. See them clamour to be effusive in their praise for every single celebration for every immigrant community in the land. As long as it doesn’t include the English the prominent talking heads of all parties will light up Twitter with competing messages of great joy at the drop of a hat. No matter from where you originated and no matter how little you care for Britain, you can be sure that the people charged with its protection care more for you than even the cultures you came from

There is normally a big shout out for St Patrick’s Day because who doesn’t love a good piss up and a nice fight? Other British patron saints are usually given a polite round of applause. Except for one. The flag of Saint George is the flag of England and is therefore a racist flag for a racist saint, for a country that has been deemed racist by those who have taken it over. At the time of writing I was unable to find a single member of the government who had written even the most cursory greeting although the former Archbishop York, John Sentamu had graciously done so.

So, the writing on the wall is quite clear – some animals are more equal than others. But while we unequal animals still comprise the vast majority of our nations population we do have one thing in our favour – a big voice. We should use that voice, that vote, to retain control of our nation for as long as is possible. And cry “God for Harry, England, and Saint George!” 


(Although I don’t expect any greetings from fucking Harry, either.)


UPDATE: It is now after noon and a number of 'dignitaries' have offered up their greetings. Some genuine, but some clearly to push the diversity and inclusion agenda: "We are all English now, even those who just washed up on a Kentish beach"
Notable by their absence, however, are the British Army, who nevertheless got in a tribute to ramadan, Rishi Sunak (Chancellor), Boris Johnson (PM. I know he's ill but he managed to talk to the Queen yesterday, apparently) Priti Patel (Home Sec), Dominic Raab (Foreign Sec) and numerous others who, you would have thought, would very much want to keep onside with the majority of our people who identify as English.


FURTHER UPDATE: It took until 13:51 for @10DowningStreet to post a greeting. Dominic Raab retweeted it. At a time when everybody is calling on everybody else to bring the country together, I am not convinced this is good enough.

Wednesday 22 April 2020

Skool Daze

As the lockdown continues, people are inevitably talking about how and when to ease restrictions. There is talk of getting the kids back to school quite soon, which, when you think about it is like introducing super spreaders into every region of the country. Imagine; one kid has the virus, within a few days the whole school has it and within a week the whole catchment area is exposed. The kids shrug off the minor symptoms, but a generation of Conservative voters start dying off. I’m not sure if they’ve thought that one through. (Or have they?)

But when it comes to education there are wider issues to consider. Everybody gets arsey when a parent takes a child out of school for a week in term time so the family can go skiing without taking out a second mortgage to meet half-term holiday prices. But the schools have been closed for over a month already, what damage - or repair - might have been done to impressionable young minds who have instead been over-exposed to the thinking of some of their parents?

The kids are not preparing for or sitting exams, so it could be argued that they wouldn’t have been tackling any new material at this point, merely consolidating existing learning. But to be brutally honest, given the pitifully ill-educated state of many school leavers, getting them back in school now to learn more about how Britain is a racist, homophobic country of xenophobic war criminals, while simultaneously being a country of immigrants, is hardly going to assist in the country's future prospects.

Given that the average reading age of the adult population of the UK is that expected of an eleven-year old – and some estimates put it as low as nine – you might wonder what on earth they were doing for the thirteen years most of them now spend in school. And for many decades now, fully one-fifth are functionally illiterate yet manage to survive, procreate and pass on their worrisome genes to the next generation. As reading is the foundation of all learning, what the hell does the education profession think it is there for?

Maybe it’s time to re-open the debate about school-leaving age? Many resent being effectively detained against their will until eighteen when they could be out doing a lot of the work we now rely on low-cost immigrants to do. At sixteen kids can easily learn whatever it takes to stock shelves, pick crops, staff production lines and pick up some valuable lessons in being useful contributors to society along the way. Frankly, I’m astonished this hasn’t been seriously mooted before.

Another boon, for which the benefit could be incalculable, would be a massive reduction in the harmful cost to the economy of non-degrees. Exposed to the world of work an element of common sense might be inculcated in the population. On a national level surely this would be preferable to 50% of them continuing to absorb leftist doctrine as they progress from school, through gap years, through university, eventually emerging from the educational chrysalis not as bright, beautiful butterflies, but as ugly, dusty moths almost a decade after some of their schoolmates began paying tax, saving money and being part of the solution.


So, they’ve lost a few weeks, I doubt another few weeks is really going to make that much of an impact. It is reported that two-thirds of them haven’t logged into online learning during the lockdown; I expect that the third who have are not the ones who will end up semi-literate with Masters degrees in finger painting. And some of the greatest minds in history had little or no formal schooling. Education; the solution, or a big part of the problem?

Monday 20 April 2020

Notes from the Front Line

Covid Lockdown, Day 29 (I have been chalking up the days on my living room wall because I no longer trust calendars.). Dear Diary, Dear Friends: I would have hoped by now that this would all be over. I know for a fact that had Jeremy Corbyn (peace be upon him) – who is STILL my Prime Minister– had been in charge, this whole affair would have been sorted in a matter of days from the first knowledge of the virus. Yesterday’s Sunday Times article, which is a brilliant exposé of the government’s genocidal policy, could have been written by me, so closely did it mirror my thoughts and confirm all my suspicions. Surely the end is over for Boris the butcher now?

Also, the PPE crisis: Much has been made of the fact that a lot of the clinicians (the new title for nurses) appearing in social media and phoning in to talk radio stations are Labour supporters. Well, of course they are because only Labour cares. if MY Prime Minister had been in charge this wouldn’t have been an issue. As for the PPE made by Burberry and Barbour, it is clear that this is only going to be for Tory doctors, the rest being consigned/condemned to wear the pre-infected tat from sweatshops in Singapore.

Jeremy (pbuh) would have negotiated with his friends in the CCP and persuaded them not to send the virus our way and by this act of simple international cooperation and basic human kindness we would have been saved. The virus would then have been quietly de-fused and stored away in the laboratory fridge it came from. And he would have done all this without fanfare; as we know from his many former acts of international diplomacy he does this out of the goodness of his heart and as far away from press attention as possible, saint that he is.

Here in Britain the police state lockdown continues as neighbour spies on neighbour and the Stasi kick down people’s doors to drag pensioners off to the gulags for daring to collect prescriptions… for their parents. I haven’t seen any evidence of it here, yet, but I have it on good authority that gangs of thugs are roaming the streets and beating up anybody who looks like they might not have voted for Johnson’s government. We, the enlightened, need to look out for each other because we might not all get out alive. With the BBC clearly supporting this new-age Kristallnacht we have to be vigilant.

In the United States it is even worse, I hear. Satan – by which everybody knows I mean Donald Trump – has deployed the national guard and has already imprisoned most of the Democrat Senators. Machine gun posts have been built along the Mexican border and all state lines have been closed. This might not be what you hear in the mainstream media, but I know. Over thirty million people have already been disappeared for expressing the wrong opinion. Ask yourself, have you seen ANY broadcast news from the USA lately? No, you haven’t; I certainly haven’t, so it is unlikely that you have. And there is the proof.

People's Liberation Army uniform

But it turns out it is bigger than even I imagined. Through the network of contacts I have cultivated on Twitter, I can reveal that this is all really a cover for a globalist plot to rid the world of globalist plots. While the press are obsessed with bringing down the government there is no room for covering the great crusades of our age. These include climate action, gender diversity, the great race wars, open borders, defeating capitalism… all that great work gone and all for what? Freedom? Pah! You don’t deserve freedom!

Saturday 18 April 2020

Life Support

An interesting shift occurred in this week’s battle for political control; let’s go for the care home angle. It’s Brexit, Mk II, isn’t it, with pretty much the same players? And in many ways it is like a real war. Let us attack on this front. Oh yes, the hated enemy is reeling. Take that, you hateful morons; you didn’t know what you were voting for, did you? A few skirmishes in the trenches and when it became obvious that not only did we know what we were voting for, we’d do it again in a heartbeat, they went for the bus.

“You were stupid enough to believe a lie on a bus!” they jeered. Er, firstly, what ‘lie’? An aspiration, a suggested possibility and suggested by a campaign group, not a political party which would ever have the power to enact it, does not amount to a promise. Unbelievably, some of them are still pursuing that same, long discredited attack line. The people making this argument were the ones who held up signs saying “We welcome refugees” yet would not, personally, take any responsibility for housing and feeding them.

We got ‘xenophobic little Englanders’ and we got flat out racism levelled at us and all the time the EU and various world leaders were complicit in the attacks. Even our own government of the time, the soft Tories of Cameron’s cabinet joined in. Britain could not survive on its own they said, despite the vast period of history disproving that lie. In any case it was never about closing the borders and hating foreigners, but about healing the harm done to our nation by years of ‘progressive’ politics and interference by unaccountable powers.

Even after the deed was done and the long-argued and legally-challenged issue of Article 50 settled they would not back down. It was as if they were so offended by the idea that ‘the little people’ could by the effrontery of exercising their vote, compel a government to do their bidding that it must be resisted at all costs. They dreamed up conspiracies, fabricated acts of fraud and deceit and attacked the majority of those who voted as gullible, simple, poorly educated and beneath contempt. They regularly and openly called for the vote to be nullified.

Even now, they are using the coronavirus outbreak to try and further delay our separation from an organisation which has proved itself toothless and impotent in the face of that same pandemic. But worse than that, after four years of fighting against the electorate and frustrating attempts to hold a general election they are so incensed that, once again, we voted ‘the wrong way’, they are using the deaths of thousands as a political tool to seek power.

By calls for a so-called ‘government of national unity’, which would be anything but unified, through questioning the motives and actions of the elected government at every turn. By deploying activists posing as honest brokers in media interviews. By politicising what was originally a spontaneous round of applause for the NHS. By accusing the government of bungling at every turn. But even as unfounded accusation after unfounded accusation has been refuted, still they bay for blood.

From the problematic issue of testing, calling for lockdown, calling for the end of lockdown, challenging the PM’s illness as a hoax, apparently exaggerating the situation with PPE they are now applying pressure on the sensitive and emotive lever of care homes. This is not compassionate concern for their residents; it is the cynical exploitation of their plight for political ends, aided and abetted by the bloodthirsty adversarial media. And it is truly disgusting.

If anybody has a handle on what is happening it is the UK government and its advisors. Keeping an eye on international developments, watching how other countries’ strategies are working out, while all the while doing ‘whatever it takes’ to manage the situation over here is exactly the right thing to do. As issues, like care homes, are brought into focus they will be dealt with, but everything takes time and money and thought, none of which is helped by the obstacles the same old suspects insist in throwing in their way.

The British Media... RIP

When it is all over – and it will be all over, before too long – I hope that the people who put their trust in Britain, those who voted for Brexit and Boris and a return to the simplicity of governing for the national interest first will see the charlatans and opportunists and the baying mob for what they are. The same press which daily attacks the government on whatever spurious grounds it can is also fighting for its life as sales dwindle. It is time to switch off life support.

Friday 17 April 2020

Diary of a Survivor

Covid Lockdown, Day 25. Dear Diary, Dear Friends: I had hoped never to write these words but the enemy is now at the gates. During my time in lockdown I have become, like many of my faithful comrade followers, an expert epidemiologist and investigator. I am afraid to say I scoffed at the early warnings but having diligently researched the subject I now understand that 2 plus 2 equals 5G. Yes friends, it all makes sense now; I am not a ready believer in conspiracy theories, such as the idea that the Tory lockdown is to help the NHS cope – such bullshit – but the evidence trail is clear now.

You see – and there are videos to prove this if you look hard enough – the microwaves from this deadly network are set at the exact wavelength to interrupt the transfer of oxygen from the lungs to the bloodstream and the frequency just happens to interfere with the regular heart rhythm. Coincidence? I don’t think so. There is also incontrovertible video evidence of birds falling from the sky and rodents and even small dogs dropping dead in the vicinity of anybody using a mobile phone. You don’t believe me? Try making a call while your cat is between you and the nearest cell mast. See? You daren’t risk it, dare you?

Simultaneously, the Bill Gates Foundation, which directly funds the New World Order has managed to secretly develop the technology to shrink a spy down to a size at which he can be injected into your bloodstream, where he can travel to your brain and directly monitor, possibly even control, your thoughts. This will be achieved via the Gates Universal Vaccinen (GUV - short for guvernment, see?) which will be administered eventually to every person on earth.

Ah, you say, but under what authority will Bill get you to accept the vaccination? Here is where the World Health Organisation enters the scene. They purposefully said in January that the Covid-19 disease could not be spread by human contact, even though they funded the Wuhan lab to develop such a strain of virus. And who do you think funds the WHO? Think Microsoft and you won’t be far wrong. Ask yourself, do you know any Apple users with the virus? No. So there’s the proof.

How are these things linked? Well, the virus itself is pretty harmless, but – and here is the real result of my detailed investigation – 5G radiation activates the specially adapted Wuhan element. It is the catalyst which turns a cold into a killer. The lockdown is to prevent the spread of the virus? Pah. You already have the virus and all it is waiting for is for the cell phone network to be completed. Think about it; how much easier is it to erect those masts while the roads are clear and there is nobody around to ask why!

From my window I can see that what I always took to be an odd-looking tree is really a deadly 5G virus spreader. They were there, yesterday, tweaking, testing, or some such. And despite their high viz jackets and their BT Openreach van it was clear what they really were. Now I am not a racist but one of them had a distinctly oriental look about him, and I am enlightened enough to know what that means.


The principle of Occam’s Razor says the simpler explanation is the more likely, but that is clear bullshit and I am not fooled. “Stay home. Protect the NHS. Save lives”? Too simple!  Fortunately, I am made of sterner stuff and not gullible at all and it is obvious to all who will open their eyes that a secret lab in China, funded by an international cabal of illuminati, under the control of a Machiavellian billionaire has, without hitherto raising suspicion, developed a population killing virus activated by mobile phones. Under our very noses! I will update you once I know more. Stay safe.

Thursday 16 April 2020

Lockdown Diary

Covid Lockdown, Day 23: Dear Diary, I have been keeping up my spirits by engaging in the fight for freedom and truth and social justice. This I do by retweeting all the evidence I have found online for the government’s criminal mishandling of the crisis. By evidence I mean the opinions of all the people I have yet to block on social media and by criminal mishandling I mean they are not MY government. Jeremy would have closed down the economy long before this shower got round to it.

I am on furlough thus receiving only 80% of my salary as a diversity and inclusion officer for a healthcare trust and I can tell you, £48,000 goes nowhere these days. Those on universal credit and pensions are still receiving their full entitlement, so this is blatant discrimination against me, a key worker at this time of national crisis. I applaud the ‘You clap for me now’ video but fighting against fascism is a full-time job and it is hard to realign social norms when working from home.

I can feel my revolutionary soul stirring with every day we are literally imprisoned by the system, in our own homes. So Boris, where is all the PPE? Yes, we’ve heard all of the lies from your Tory plants in our NHS, claiming they have plenty but one of my social media followers is a hard-working Labour activist on the front line at reception in a rural hospital and she is prepared to phone James O’Brien on LBC to claim they are down to only a week’s supply. So don’t try telling me the government is handling it.

As for the fake infection of the PM how come he was hospitalised only ten days after first symptoms and then recovered after only three in intensive care? That – I have it on the authority of Twitter – is impossible. So something smells fishy and I support Marcus Thingummy’s FOI request. And as for your recuperation, Johnson, you are rubbing the nose of the electorate in it by sitting out the war in your sunny garden in Chequers. You are literally Hitler and we will come for you when this is over.

Talking of fake, the amount of bullshit out there is ridiculous and the sycophantic fawning of the Tory BBC – The Ministry of Truth – over the government’s appalling handling of the crisis is sickening. When I want real news, untainted by right-wing bias I go to the only reliable source left, Novara Media. They are the only outlet I trust because they tell the truth without any of that partisan propaganda. All the other mainstream channels try to manipulate our thoughts and deeds, which must be resisted at all costs. I repeat, Boris Johnson is literally Hitler. 


And now I must leave, dear diary, for the sun is out and we have an anarchists' socially distanced meeting in the local park, although I expect the state’s stormtroopers will be there to break it up. Then, tonight I shall be clapping for the glory of the NHS, as required. Tomorrow is clapping for migrant workers, flying in to rescue our crops. The weekend is given over to clapping for BAME, as natural law now rightly insists. Monday is reserved for key-worker worship, which only gives us two nights to clap for social justice and bringing down the government. Power to the People!

Monday 13 April 2020

It’s Not Racist; It’s a Very Naughty Virus!

If it comes to pass – and to listen to some commentators it already has – that the coronavirus has a racist slant, it would be wise to remember that it is a virus. It has no agency, no logic, no predilections; all it can do is reproduce and it is our own body’s reaction to its invasive reproduction that cause illness. It has nothing to do with the colour of your skin, or the flavour of your religion. And yet…

The lockdown response adopted by virtually every organised government on Planet Earth works for a reason. Limit the possible contact with the virus, limit the spread of infection. We have been told many times that a large proportion of virus hosts will be asymptomatic. We also know that the virus can survive for some time on all kinds of surfaces and it is spread by contact. It will live on that doorknob, the banister you hold onto, the lamppost you padlock your bike to and the money you handle. It will live on envelopes and parcels – and who knows how many have had physical contact with that parcel?

But despite these simple facts, the usual suspects among the commentariat are trying to make this a racial thing because they say it disproportionately affects BAME communities. It doesn’t; it is a virus and just as it has no agency, it has no agenda either, unlike the BAME flag wavers. And the use of black and minority ethnic is really a cover for saying this is a virus with an anti-islamic slant, because everything is about islam these days. Interestingly, repeatedly touching your face – as in the ritual act of cleansing before prayer five times a day – is a known method of transferring viral matter.

Ah, but, no, but hold your racist horses there: it isn’t just the muslim community. It affects poor people more adversely, see? And because BAME people are disproportionately represented among the poor and disadvantaged, they are especially vulnerable. Another way, of course, of contracting the virus is to ignore or deliberately flout lockdown rules and mingle with others; something that certainly does seem to occur more often in certain communities than others. Especially those communities who openly defy the laws and practices of the United Kingdom.

I repeat, viruses are not racist. But they may have a more lethal effect on people with underlying health issues, such as is found in many recent immigrant communities. We are an overcrowded island and one of our many burdens is somehow accommodating the millions who flock to our shores to take advantage of our naïve generosity with little or no reciprocal economic input. And if you sacrifice the health and possibly the lives of your family to the unprovable nonsense of religion and alien social practices, I have little sympathy for you.

Yes, yes, yes, many BAME British citizens work in the NHS, but is there any evidence that they are not getting infected via family members mingling in the wider community? This needs to be investigated in the fullness of time and of course we need to know if, indeed, certain ethnicities genuinely are at greater risk for possibly genetic reasons, but the most likely answer is that it is cultural, not racial.


If one good thing can come out of this it might be to impress on certain sectors of our society that their way is not better than our way. That the government governs for the country as a whole and you deserve no special favours just because your imams tell you that you do, or that the coronavirus is a soldier of allah and only affects infidels and insufficiently pious muslims. That there is one law for all and that segregated societies – often harbourers of disease and death and inbred congenital fragility – are just not welcome here. I’m not holding my breath.

Sunday 12 April 2020

I, Activist

I’ve come across a large number of Twitter accounts in which the account holder describes themselves as an activist. In every case I can recall, this is linked to a self-declaration of also being a socialist. Being a socialist, one has to wonder what they mean by ‘active’ in the first place. Do they mean they actively lead a socialist lifestyle, owning the means of production and taking from each according to their means while giving to everybody according to their needs?

Or do they mean going on endless pointless marches, signing petitions which nobody will read, holding candle-lit vigils for minority issues and generally identifying with the right-on poster people for every lost cause? Or – and this may ring truer for most – do they just serially retweet every negative claim made against the government and continue to bang the drum for their lost Magic Grandpa? Maybe they just believe that declaring themselves as a socialist isn’t quite enough for their bio and the word activist sounds so much better than sore loser?

I don’t recall seeing anybody identifying as Conservative describing themselves as an activist. Possibly this is because, in being industrious material contributors to society, active is a normal state for them and to make a claim for what is normal just seems superfluous. Certainly, from the Conservative side of the fence, socialism and socialists, if anything, are characterised by inactivity, non-productivity and getting in the way of any form of progress at all.

And while we’re on the semantics ‘progressive’ politics seems to hark back to a world of a century and more ago where the advance (regression) to a socialist utopia sounded so good, to some. The use of the word reactionary to describe their opponents and the rational choice of most working people is also odd, portraying as it does, some actual response, as opposed to the indolence of socialism in general.

Oh, I know that many determinedly left wing people are industrious, working in the NHS and academia in particular, where their activism takes the form of following the approved doctrines and spreading it wherever they can. Such bubbles, such echo chambers of belief are maybe part of the reason why the left are easy to mobilise. Whole communities exist where the ‘Evil Tories’ mantra, taught from birth is never questioned, even as 120 years of the Labour movement has brought no improvement to their lives.

But ‘the left’ is the only visibly coordinated political movement in town because these bubbles can persuade them to board buses and descend on the capital with thousands of other like-minded (wrong-minded?) ‘individuals’ for their regular day-trip, carnival marches. It must be a powerful reinforcer of their beliefs, much like mass Friday prayers. Look at us, as far as the eye can see, all worshipping the same totems. We must be the chosen ones.

This collective identification with some higher moral purpose also allows them to unleash the most vile and hateful attacks on those they see, not as fellow citizens, but as inhuman monsters, complete with their own mythology of wrongdoing. A lefty lie on Twitter – like the one which claimed that only one MP turned down the (non-existent) £10k ‘bonus’ and that man was the sainted Jeremy Corbyn who, they insisted, donated it to the NHS – will get a thousand retweets within minutes and will persist long after it has been comprehensively debunked.


While there are obviously some such shenanigans on the right, it is right-wingers themselves who are quick to debunk and shut down falsehoods. It is not a look we would wish to be associated with. As for activism, given that right-wing thought is most typically characterised by individualism, it would feel distinctly odd to go on marches demanding that things stayed ‘more or less the same, but with a few tweaks’! Seeing how little all that lefty activism has achieved, I think we can be forgiven for saying ‘what’s the point?’.

Saturday 11 April 2020

Basic

A few days ago I saw this Bloomberg snippet, claiming that Spain wants to roll out a basic income scheme: This is a popular idea among many who believe that the role of the state is to cosset people from cradle to grave. It’s a nice, feelgood kind of a thing; everybody is housed, everybody is fed and everybody stays warm. In theory.

The basic tenets of a Universal Basic Income are that it would be:

·       Unconditional and Individual - everybody of the same age would receive the same basic income, regardless of gender, employment, family size, etc.
·       Automatic - basic income would be automatically paid into your bank account.
·       Non-withdrawable – that is UBI would not be means-tested and you would be free to earn whatever you wished on top of it.
·       A right for every legal resident, following a minimum qualifying period of residency.

People think that the current furlough situation – 80% of normal income for those to whom it applies - is some illustration of what UBI would mean to many. But this is exceptional and unaffordable beyond a very brief period. Basic will only ever mean basic; breadline. It wouldn’t even cover current rents in our major cities. Basic would not cover entertainment, internet access, or any form of luxury; it would be penury.

Now some might say, hey, I’m already poor, bring it on. Okay, let’s take a look: There are currently almost 68 million officially in the population, approximately 53 million of them adults. National ‘Living Wage’ is currently £8.72 per hour. That’s £348.80 for a 40-hour week and thus £18,137.60 per annum. Multiply that by 53 million and we get an annual bill of £961 billion, almost half of GDP, which puts the current short-term rescue measures in the shade.

And of course, no taxes would be paid by the recipients, just as no ‘actual’ tax is paid by anybody earning from the public purse. All effective taxation is paid by private companies and individuals from the surplus they generate. UBI would reduce this private sector considerably as people find ways to pool their meagre incomes to live tolerably well, in much the same way as some people manage to milk the benefits system.

Universal Basic Income is, essentially, a socialist ideal and so, in the same way that socialism always ignores the real outcomes in favour of its fairy tale imaginings, there would be social consequences which would further break down the social contract which currently exists. That is, we go to work, pay taxes and behave ourselves and in return the state provides education, healthcare, law and order, defence and a basic system of care and welfare to look after those unable to look after themselves.

If the tax burden rises too high, people remove themselves from the UK tax regime. It’s a balance that one side of the political divide takes seriously and the other side would wantonly abuse. In the socialist mind UBI would liberate the proletariat from the daily grind and free their creative potential. In reality there would be an increase in idleness, squalor and all kinds of fraudulent and anti-social activity. This would lead to an even greater stratification in society and even greater levels of inequality.


Just as ‘real socialism’ has never worked in any country which has tried it, neither has UBI. And just as ‘real socialism’, they insist, has never been tried, everywhere a UBI trial has been implemented it has been introduced for a short term, to specific parts of the populace and with conditions attached; which means it is not ‘real UBI’ either. As with all forms of socialism, unable to encourage and empower the population to level up, instead it commands the population to level down.

Wednesday 8 April 2020

The Bright Side?

It is tempting to imagine that, after the lockdown, after the Covid-19 threat subsides, after we’ve won ‘the war’, Britain will enter a period of contemplation and industrious unity to rebuild our society in a form fit for the future. But whether your idealised future is a return to a simpler, agrarian past or a great technological surge into the robot age, it is likely that all will be disappointed. I don’t believe much will change. Oh, for sure, a small minority, already in a position to do it, will change their lifestyles entirely, but on a national scale this will be insignificant.

The naysayers will continue to say nay – it’s what they do; they just can’t help themselves. The agitators will carry on agitating – it’s all they know and now they will be invigorated by their self-told myths about how the party they hate so much deliberately tried to thin the herd. And all the tensions that already exist will continue to exist: left versus right, the west versus the rest, the educated versus the ignorant and of course the great imaginary crusade of the Labour Party… whatever it is they think they stand for now.

The one thing which will not be happening – even for the briefest period – is any form of national unity. If ever such a thing happened in the past – and it’s debatable whether it ever really did – the chances of this happening now or ever again are remote. And it is mostly because despite all the open mouths and begging bowls we are actually doing pretty well.

Our personal freedoms are so great we imagine that every request, every short-term curtailment is a cruel diminishment of them. In the past people behaved with greater discipline and respect, so little formal inducement was needed; now you are free to be as obnoxious as you wish and some human rights lawyer will argue your case, no matter how harmful your intent. Compared to any time in history our lives are so rich we believe that any reduction in our riches is impoverishment.

Freedom of religion and religious expression has led us to beliefs so narrow and partisan that any dissent from our personal orthodoxy is regarded as the most acute form of oppression. Practices utterly alien to the national psyche and interest are defended so firmly that it feels like a snub to the national interest. Whatever happened to the idea of all being part of a nation and all contributing to its interests? In striving for the vibrant, multicultural vision a great many are fearful that their indigenous culture has become second-class.


Not given to futurology much, the coming years are likely to find us become even more multi-multicultural, even more economically stratified and despite all predictions of that robot world of leisure, the majority will be brown and low caste. The best we can hope for is that the mouths of the masses are stuffed full enough to quell the urges to revolt. I don’t believe the future is as bright as some wish for. Covid-19 notwithstanding, we are probably living through the best times most of us will ever see*.


(*On the bright side, what do I know; maybe we WILL be stirred to positive action?)

Monday 6 April 2020

Correlations

Everybody is a bigot. This is undeniably true. Nobody has a mind so open to other people’s opinions that they can smile beatifically and accept the validity of every such differing view without question. You simply can’t survive in the vast herd of mankind without taking sides. Family, village, county, country, football team, political affiliations, etc, etc, etc. We ALL harbour antipathy towards some views and look more kindly on others.

Well, maybe there’s a the odd little, old, white-haired guru who has mastered his consciousness and conquered human concerns, but what use is he, sitting there, cross-legged on top of his holy mountain? Besides, no matter how other-worldly his mien, surely he must be working a scam, no? But put aside such ignoble suppositions and grant that there are a handful of such mystics who can actually practice true impartiality and there are still 7.8 billion of us who are in thrall to bias; possibly the best we can do is accept it and take steps to moderate it.

In these days of lockdown I am spending far too much time on Twitter, exposing myself to the plethora of deadly, infectious, perverse beliefs that inhabit that realm, and in the process I am aware I am reinforcing some of my own entrenched beliefs. I know it is my own biases which drive me to certain conclusions, but there are some quite clear correspondences between certain collective mindsets which may help to explain some of the lunacy out there.

As a big fan of the principle of Occam’s Razor I tend to view with deep scepticism any attempt to add two to a potato and get conspiracy. But there they are, Occam-free disciples of what they think is ‘the bigger picture’. The more likely they are to have been struck done by the Covid-5G connection, the more likely they seem to think that the Conservative government is somehow to blame. Those who harbour antipathy against the current government are also highly likely to have voted to remain in the EU; some of them even signal their delusions by keeping the redundant FBPE hashtag in their Twitter bios.

But one thing which universally seems to connect the more fragile and gullible is the insistence that they, alone, possess the open-mindedness to tell fact from fiction. When this is coupled with the characteristic exchange and response mechanism you can usually predict the outcome. It goes like this:

·       Here's my totally hatstand theory, founded entirely in truth!
·       That's just ridiculous.
·       But, see the facts. Look at my research! (Link to nutjob blog)
·       Those are not facts.
·       You have a closed mind!
·       No, I have a functioning brain.
·       Hater!!!!

This is immediately followed by a block because then, see, they must have won the argument. Or at the very least they have protected themselves from yet another source of dissent and wrapped themselves more tightly in the self-reinforcing bubble of delusion. How fragile must be your grip on reality that you cannot tolerate dissent and get so angry with anybody who challenges your unhinged gibbering?

Confucius, he say: Don't eat bat and cat and shit...

Anger is, in my worldview, an immature emotion and one engaged in by people of a less rational bent. There is no need for it and it usually indicates a low-information approach to life. But the knee-jerk blockers are so confused by other people’s lack of anger that even that makes them angry. They seem to even hate the fact that you wish to engage with them in a civilised manner. I find this highly amusing… which is why I continue to do it.

Saturday 4 April 2020

Ah, but that's what they WANT you to think!

Well, what an entertaining few days on The Twitter. We have passed from Wuhan biological weapons theory into far more fertile nutjob conspiracy action. 5G, by all accounts – well by some accounts – is a space weapon, wielded by, among others, Elon Musk, designed to subjugate and sterilise … and possibly eradicate, the human race, to what purpose none of the theorists can really explain. One such gullible, tinfoil-hat-wearing advocate led us to the Georgia Guidestones: As prophetic and meaningful as the Edstone, I’d say.

Then there is a plethora of this kind of hysterical nonsense:  There you have it, folks, 5G radiation ‘locking out oxygen, in the blood’, in order to kill people… AND make them into slaves. Wait, what; dead slaves? Ah, but there’s more; apparently a miracle vaccine will be produced and rolled out by edict. And this ‘vaccination’ will involve microchipping you so that you can be controlled by some shadowy central force. Even at Looney Toon levels of sophistication this would be an unwatchable movie.

But we do love a good conspiracy and the scale doesn’t have to be global; in the UK people are spreading the idea that the coronavirus crisis has been deliberately mishandled, or ineptly tackled by the Tories because they want to… what, exactly, kill off their elderly voter base? But hang on; for the last four years the same idiots have been claiming that ‘old people’ want to steal the future of the young. But why would they? Those young are THEIR offspring and grandkids. You would have to be monumentally gullible to believe any of this for one second.

It’s like the idiots who believe that the aim of capitalism is to keep people poor. But, but, but, rich people want to keep the money for themselves! Of course they do; so would you, were you so fortunate. Nobody sets out to acquire wealth for the sole purpose of redistribution to the less industrious. Yet rich people do redistribute much of their wealth; they pay far more in taxes than low earners and then often pay again by procuring private healthcare, education, transport, etc.

Besides, capitalists grow rich by selling things; impoverishing the majority does not help their cause one little bit. If anything it is the socialist system whereby a select few people become wealthy for selling unsubstantiated opinion, for peddling arguments about gender identity and unattainable ‘equality’ and so on, which is the enemy of the poor. Money which could otherwise be put to use to create wealth, or food, or medicine is instead funnelled into the coffers of vested, but unhelpful interests.

Of course, if you are unemployed, in poor health and with poor prospects ahead it is tempting to imagine that powerful forces are ranged against you. But ask yourself this; why? Why would governments, captains of industry, religions or otherwise want to grind you further into the dirt? There is no gain for any of them. In fact the very opposite is more likely. Compassion is not the exclusive preserve of the Corbynites. And charity depends on there being an excess of resources.


The simple fact is you are far more likely to get reliable and consistent help under the British system of taxed capitalism than you are under any form of central planning. This has been proven again and again and again, yet many people are still susceptible to a Robin Hood narrative of ‘greedy Tories’ and rapacious ‘bankers’. It’s just as well such people are not running the show; if you really want bungled conspiracy, just imagine what the gullible led by the partisan, cheered on by the ignorant could achieve.

Friday 3 April 2020

What remains?

In time will come the post-mortem; some are already conducting it while the patient is still alive and a few are forecasting it; the Daily mirror is stating that as many people could have died in the UK by Easter Sunday as have already died, to date, worldwide. At a time when people are abandoning print news in their hundreds of thousands, this is irresponsible and foolhardy. Sooner or later, even the most prurient grow tired of being fed bullshit, garnished with horse shit... and sprinkled with batshit.

But after the Covid-19 affair is over, counting the real cost will occupy the time, the lives, even, of many of us. We will hardly be slapping our backs in congratulations; in effect, all forms of physical contact may become verboten for some time. And I can see that, for some, hearing a simple cough or sneeze will summon up PTSD levels of fear and revulsion. Everybody is now a potential killer, or victim. And it’s not only the virus itself which will be responsible.

People will lose their lives to suicide over despair, to starvation and cold, due to loss of income and inability to pay. Many will become homeless and prey to the many illnesses which befall those who live precarious lives on the street. Those with delayed treatments may suffer a loss of life quality which could easily be deemed unnecessarily harsh punishment for something over which they had no control. And some will succumb to the perils of lockdown; domestic violence, indolence, drink… sheer stupidity. Not to mention the mental toll on those insufficiently robust to endure a few weeks of isolation and introspection.

But there will be wider and lasting casualties. Distrust in the mainstream media has possibly never been higher. Print media, already in decline, may not survive. The police, while performing an essential role, are coming in for unprecedented levels of distrust and certain ‘communities’, whatever the truth, will be held forever to have broken the lockdown rules, furthering the antipathy towards islam in the west. In short, trust will be hard to win back.

But perhaps the most despicable of all has been the behaviour of many Labour MPs, stoking up tensions and invoking fear, in the name of ‘holding the government to account’. Constant naysaying is not a valid form of opposition. Refusal to join with the government and support the measures being taken, however grudgingly, are not the actions of a responsible alternative party of government. And a refusal to slap down their misguided useful idiots, like Kevin Maguire, does little to demonstrate responsibility. We are no longer a two-party state.

The next ten years...

International relations, at a time when cooperation ought to be paramount, is at a low ebb. Never mind that nobody will trust China for a generation, the countries of Europe are aghast at the partisan behaviours of their neighbours. But maybe some good will come of this. What remains when nobody trusts anybody else is self-reliance. At an individual level this is something people have neglected, to their detriment. At a national level this is something that has been derided, to our shame. Post lockdown we have much work to do.