ANOTHER SHORT POINT OF VIEW

News on the march! First sentence after the opening word, Rosebud, and now it appears after Brexit. There have been a number of op-ed pieces in a variety of newspapers and digital news services streaming round the internet concerning the continuing divisions within the United Kingdom, and its struggle to find its place in the world. They read rather like obituaries.

My own view is that the United Kingdom is the Norma Desmond of Europe. If a weary traveller were sailing along the English Channel, rather like Sunset Boulevard, and happened to turn into land, he might venture to remark “You’re Britain, you used to be big”, and the reply might be “I am big, it’s the world that got small”.  So it did, and the UK, along with it, got even smaller. Now it holds up its deluded face waiting for a closeup, shinning a light on the faded remnants of what used to be, to the tune of Nimrod and the theme from the Dam Busters.

The so called government attempts at ‘levelling up’ have only revealed just how increasingly high and low the levels have become, and the paucity of ideas emanating from ministers completely incapable of accepting the reality of the suicidal referendum of the 23 June 2016, as they twist and turn from that shot in the back, and, rather like William Holden’s Joe Gillis, will end up face down in the pool. Fade to black.

But do not despair, there are small deals being made round the world, and though they might not add up to the deal that previously existed within the European Union’s nearly 500 million customers, they have the great land masses of Australia and Canada with their combined population of 63.5 million customers to trade with. Of course, those countries will, in their turn, be seeking greater economic ties with the nearly 500 million customers in the EU. The Conservative Government has always been of the view that the ‘market will set the agenda’, and indeed, it most likely will. So what price Britain?

The constant distractions of the rather serious pandemic, the Royal Family’s, less serious, domestic problems, sporting tournaments, Netflix, Amazon and Channel 4’s public broadcasting status, have taken the public’s eye off the harsh realities of the situation. It is not just Dominic Cummings who is hopeless, but the entire government and voting system that put them in power, that is hopeless. Mind you, given the statistics on the ignorance and disparity of thought of the majority of the citizenry, it is not surprising. Perhaps that is a harsh and bigoted point of view, but does that make it inaccurate?

 I try to remain upbeat. I am told to smile and to find more joy and fun in my surroundings. Indeed, I do find my personal environment is joyful and I have little to complain about; but one is assaulted on a daily basis with the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, that makes one want to take up arms against this sea of troubles. I oppose them but cannot end them.

I ponder, eat, and drink nice wine. I watch old movies and savour the repartee out of the writings of Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, Ernst Lubitsch and Preston Sturges, spoken by Joel McCrae, Claudette Colbert, John Barrymore, Don Ameche, Eric Blore, Alan Mowbray, Mercedes McCambridge, Helen Broderick, Edward Everett Horton, Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson and many others. It is actually research out of which, like a would be Jacques Derrida, I can deconstruct a point of view. Nobody’s pefect.