I'm flying blind here because I can't be entirely sure that the people coming to this humble town square are bent on building boats, up for the cut and thrust of modern debate or aiming to contemplate the vagaries of life and death. But as life draws on to its weary conclusion, it is hard not to reexamine all of what we might have taken for granted heretofore.
And one is whether or not democracy really is an asset for the West, or whether it is just a form of pantomime that nobody believes in any more, like that beanstalk?
Without picking on any party in particular, this is arguably the UK's historically most successful ~ at least in terms of political popularity ~ and what it had to say in 2020 as against what it had to say last week.
I have suggested before that offering to lead the world in green initiatives ~ which is one of the few options remaining ~ is much like the British offering to jump from the Titanic long before its final moments, rather than enjoy what's left of the music.
Had the same party really been bent upon avoiding this course of action, however, it could have started with Margaret Thatcher not closing the coal mines; though she was motivated in doing so as much as anything by a pathological hatred of the working class of the sort that the Labour Party has gone on to inherit.
When I worked in China, people didn't seem less happy than they do here; if anything they appeared more satisfied with their lot, a peculiar blend of communism and capitalism outdoing the West on every metric you could consider with the possible exception of free speech.
Which is declining here anyhow. So turn over your papers, please, and compare and contrast.
And no shouting.
(Ed. you're not Joe Rogan, you're a very naughty boy.)
