Livingstone, I presume?

In other news, Barry Manilow comes out as gay, the Pope confesses his Catholicism and a bear was seen leaving a nearby wood clutching a copy of The Sun and a roll of toilet paper. But, seriously, Manilow? He got married three years ago. To another man. But he left it until now to come out because he didn’t want his fans to think he was batting for the other side? You’d think this level of delusion would preclude people from credible participation in society but no, they simply construct their own world and surround themselves with bit-part players to maintain the illusion.

I wonder if, in Corbynland, Labour is a credible opposition, representing the ordinary working man? Or if the Green Party imagine their rag-tag band of merry vegan flatulents will somehow save the world? Perhaps the nine LibDem MPs believe they are genuinely a force for beneficial change and not just the ditherers’ party the rest of us see, led by a boy/man-puppet with an amusing anagram for a name? And when an SNP representative looks in the mirror do they see a muscular and passionate blue-daubed warrior looking back? The secret life of Walter Mitty isn’t just an amusing fantasy, it’s practically a way of life in politics.

We all harbour delusions about ourselves: Maybe, one day I will fit into those jeans; the ones I have kept neatly folded, in a storage box... for a decade now. Half marathon? I could if I wanted. I really will finish that book, honest. But these are simply the little white fibs we use to keep our spirits up; we stopped imagining we would be fighter pilots and astronauts and secret super-heroes long ago. There is a certain charm in not growing up fully, cherishing a secret ambition... but not when you are under public scrutiny.

Take Guy Verhofstadt, who the yesterday tweeted “I am 100% sure that - one day - there will be a young leader who will try again to lead Britain back into the European family.” Ah, delusion personified! If I a 100% certain of anything it is that young people become older people and generally become wiser people with it. But they’d say there is no fool like an old fool and I dare say there will be some, currently young, people still clinging to the wreckage of the EU long after the main hull has sunk.

Adolf Livingstone?

But all this is for the future. For now the most important thing on the planet appears to be whether or not Ken Livingstone did or did not say that Hitler was, or was not, in favour of the Jews having their own state, or not, or whether the holocaust did or didn’t happen... or didn’t not, or something. I lose track, but honestly is this really a matter for serious consideration by a party which has aspirations of government? Or is it just a load of old bollocks?

Fake 'em all!

Eleven year-old Liam Corcoran walked through five security checks unchallenged and ended up on a flight to Rome. The poor, confused lad appears to have mingled  with some other children, then simply followed them to board the Boeing. Naturally it has caused a retrospective hoo-hah, but at the time, officials who were responsible for counting heads, searching bags and checking credentials appear to have accepted his right to be there without question. Who, after all, would suspect a pre-teen to be travelling unchaperoned?

Not all juvenile adventurers manage to pull it off, however. In Newquay an intoxicated under-age drinker tried to blag his way into a pub using a fake ID in the name of Rodney Trotter of Peckham. After his ill-conceived stunt came to nothing he went on his way, minus the card, leaving the management wondering if he'd have had more luck under the pseudonym of Trigger. (Alright Dave?)

And recently, Stuart Elliott from Hull was exposed as the latest in a long line of a modern-day 'Walts' (after Walter Mitty) peddling a fictitious back-story of heroic derring-do, based on a dubious peripheral connection with the boys at the sharp end. (He could tell you what he used to do, but then he'd have to kill you.)

Fortunately none of these people will ever be in charge. But,wait? Is that a youthful Nick Clegg I see, wandering aimlessly onto the political stage by tagging along with another group of boys, not of his own family? And where are George Osborne's credentials to be drunk in charge of the economy? Has nobody checked his papers? And just this morning I hear on the news that Vince Cable believes he'd make a good chancellor. (So which of the proper parties were you planning on defecting to, you daft old sod?)

It seems the political world is awash with fakers, chancers, wannabes and fools. It does seem that they are the only people mad enough to ever crave a job in power. And while the current incumbents are hardly the stuff of legend, the Labour alternative embraces such colossal levels of delusion as to somehow believe, even after their craven attempt to bring the country to its knees, that more of that self-same same medicine is what's needed. In fact, so gullible are they, they swallowed the line that Tony Blair is a socialist!

We have seen the rise and rise of the 'professional' politician; those who play politics for politics itself and appear to have no connection with or understanding of the world at large. At least the USA once had the good sense to accept that in the world of Walter Mitty nothing was real and elected a Hollywood actor to the highest office in the land. He did okay, too.

Come 2015 I'm voting for Brian Blessed!