The sun sets. It rises. For you a Caribbean vista. Another palm tree. Another cove. Despite the repetition please relish your days. Not because you are in a sun drenched idol, waves of clear blue water lapping against your hull as you head to a new port. No because you are not here in the UK. We have entered the End of Days. Parliament has been dissolved. The General Election is in 37 days and before us awaits a flood of platitudes, untruths and condescension. After my short winter hiatus I thought I’d mark this doom laden day with a reawakening of this blog. Consider me your companion through this festival of banality.
Today, David Cameron announced that he was presenting a stark choice to the nation. Cosmologists talk of a potential end state of the universe in which all matter is driven through entropy to a state of heat death, a point at which there is no thermodynamic energy change. This was the state of the British electorate at the last election. Five years later, we have to break the standard model and equate voters to be somewhere akin to political dark matter. We are there, but politicians can’t engage with us, observe us and cause any action in which we would react. Sadly however, the next stage for us isn’t the welcoming arms of heat death but government by the weak, holding power influenced by the few. A stark choice? Between what and what? A party for those inured of the impact of their own policies. Or to a party scared to voice any view whatsoever. At least the Conservatives are going through the motions of portraying themselves as some sort of one nation, we’re all in it together (ho ho) pantomime. I’m not even sure that Labour are standing at the election. Is this the end game from that initiated by Tony Blair in his drive for the middle ground where both main parties stage conflict over inconsequential issues in the centre. Their message so muted that voters find themselves driven to the causes of minority parties. Opinions they’re unsure of but at least it’s a choice for something…? Current polls suggest that no party will achieve an overall majority. This places power in the hands of the larger minor parties such as Scottish National Party (SNP) or UK Independence Party (UKIP). Each have their own agendas to elevate beyond the confines of their electoral reach. Come May’s General Election a majority party is going to make...well I pause because I was about to say difficult but I’m sure the lust for power will significantly aid in the decision making process.
In the short gap between reporters standing in front of empty buildings, discussing politicians located hundreds of miles away and the bit at the end of the programme normally devoted to pandas trying to procreate in front of the world’s media in a zoo in Paraguay comes come the rest of news. Filed under light relief this past week has been a passenger jet crashing in the Alps. It frustratingly made top billing in the news for a while. I’m not anti-tragedy, just anti-sensationalism. On the day of the crash I pettily resorted to browsing the EUs statistics database for comparative fatalities. Yes, this is who I am. Every 10 days, a plane crashes somewhere in the world involving a fatality. In Europe it’s estimated that each day 157 people will commit suicide, 104 will die in road traffic accidents and inexplicably 270 will die in what the EU refers to as home/leisure setting. These numbers dwarf air crash fatalities but aren’t accompanied by tracking shots of rescue helicopters circling alpine peaks forlornly. As the story moved from the crash to the cause, evidence was presented that the co-pilot had manipulated the pilot out of the cockpit, locked the door from the inside and instigated the plane’s descent into the mountains. It is now emerging that he was concealing mental health issues. A tragedy, larger in scale that most but still one of many taking place every day.
There’s always sport to distract us from thinking things through. The morphine drip that is football has been turned down this week with just international fixtures in the schedule. England strolled to an easy win against (and whilst it was only three days ago I’ve just had to look this up) Latvia. Rooney edged towards the top position in all time English goal scorers….but was eclipsed by the new sensation on the block Harry “he’s one of our own (™ Spurs, apart from when they kept sending him out on loan in previous seasons)” Kane. A substitute half way through the second half and within 79 seconds he got on the score sheet. It’s why sport always suffices, obscuring reason, allowing hope to be invested in an abstract concept when reality remains unfulfilled. That some young bloke with slicked back hair can run about some grass and shove a ball in a net means we can safely disengage from what really matters.
A short circuit has prevent the Large Hadron Collider being turned back on. When working again the drive in part will be to break the standard model, to challenge the frontiers of knowledge and discover answers to the fundamentals affecting everything we observe in the universe. Meanwhile, closer to home a politician will fumble over remembering how many food banks/immigrants/enterprising new businesses (delete as appropriate) are in their constituency and then rather than offer a solution, denigrate their opponents.
Ludwig Wittgenstein is quoted as saying “if we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.” It’s going to be a long 37 days. Let me act as your bitter, prejudiced guide.
