Tag: EU
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Deflection Reflection
Yesterday, while pondering on the ongoing coronadebacle and how we got to where we are, I recalled Hitler’s Enabling Law (Ermächtigungsgesetz) of 1933 which carried a formal title of Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich (Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich). It’s the kind of historical snippet that is never…
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I Am a Free Man
Now that freedom of movement has been curtailed, we’re now at the mercy not of the law but of the police who will be enforcing it. Freedom of movement has never been so popular in the UK, which must be prompting some guffaws in Brussels. Well, it would if the virus hadn’t already pulled their…
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Man Over-Bored
As I’ve mentioned already, it won’t be the virus that kills you. It will be the circus that has gone woomph around us. And there is no shortage of clowns. We do nevertheless appear to be favouring collapsing economies over collapsing cars. It’s boring me rigid now. All those asshats posting messages on LinkedIn or…
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It’s All About the Money, Honey
Every day is bringing fresh computations of hysteria and nitwittery. People used to cough to cover up a fart; now they’re farting to cover up a cough. But back to the bug and more pertinently, the government’s fiscal stimulus. It was never going generate a Joker-strength smile for everybody, but then again, the money pit…
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Just Checking the Smellprint
I’m getting nostalgic for Brexit. This whole corona-clown cluster is withing touching distance of peak buffoonery. Helpfully though, because anti-inflammatories suppress the immune system, we have been advised not to be taking ibuprofen. That’s a relief. Mind you, it takes a Kofi-Annan-grade negotiation just to but a few packets under normal trading conditions, so it’s…
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Jolly Rogered
I probably should just wash my hands of the whole coronavirus business. We’ve become engulfed by viral hysteria to the extent that the nation has misplaced its rational compass. Let’s hope common sense kicks in before we do ourselves some serious damage. And by that, I mean crippling economic carnage long after the last coughs…
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Bug Chasing
Tom Hanks has become the highest-profile person to confirm a COVID-19 diagnosis, so it’ll be fascinating to see him as a man battling a stigmatising disease. Mind you, he’s already survived World War II, Vietnam, a plane crash, being cast away on an island, being stranded in space, jumping into a volcano, and a kidnapping…
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A Long Spoon
One person who may be counting his blessings about the coronavirus may be Irish Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, who had in the past month been unceremoniously defenestrated by the Irish electorate. With not even a coded telephone warning from Sinn Fein, old Leo has been bounced from inner-circle EU acolyte to has-been dead man walking. Although…
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Rubbing It In
Billions wiped off the stock market in the worst trading day since the 2008 financial crisis. People bashing each other up in supermarket aisles over the last packet of toilet roll. Countries placing themselves into voluntary lockdown, Where will the absurdity end? The only respite from the madness was the troll who ventured that the…
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McLovin It
In Paraguay, former Brazilian football megastar Ronaldinho has been arrested for entering the country on fake documents. Yes, this is one of a handful of the most recognisable people on the planet, and the said document was in his own real name. It’s stratospherically wacko. In fact, this was no border incident per se, and…
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