Danskcolin: Saturday July 13th 2024 "Why does democracy have to be so difficult? I wonder...! "

Democracy - it's a funny old game, isn't it, and difficult both for politicians and for voters alike.

Look at former US President, George W. Bush, who in 2004 was prevented by US officials from following his preferred daily routine - much like mine, i.e. writing a very personal and emotional blog - and instead forcing Bush to attend to some of his country's more pressing political issues, something which my wife Lois and I always thought was something of a shame [Source: Onion News].

Oops!!!!

Perhaps McLaughlin was right, but on the other hand, taking the long view, it's a pity that future historians were prevented by the CIA blanket ban from finding out intriguing insights into the President's thinking at that critical time for the Western world.

I wonder....!

And democracy is no less difficult a matter for the ordinary voter. I bet a lot of you reading this blog today were ruminating considerably on July 4th before you cast your vote in the UK's most recent General Election. Am I right? Or am I right (!) ?

Well, no voter had more trouble than local man Dale Swanwick from the lovely Worcestershire village of North Piddle - did you see the story [Source: Onion News West Worcestershire edition] ?

Poor Dale !!!!!

And I, personally, was thinking very much about Dale this week. You see, I myself had a different problem from Dale's but no less wounding - for the first time since my very first vote in a General Election, back in 1970, my vote was "disallowed" by the local electoral authorities.

My vote could have swung the election nationally, but it turns out that it wasn't even counted.

The cheek of it !!!!

But more worrying still, this so-called "dis-allowal" casts huge doubt on my mental competence as a whole, which is a pity.

the letter I received this week from the Malvern Hills

District Council Electoral Registration Office [some details redacted]

I seldom get my date of birth wrong - was I distracted by something - or maybe by some body [no names, no pack-drill, Lois haha!] at the vital moment?

Lois and I lived in the States 1982-85, where they put the month first followed by the day, and then the year, and we both got used to doing that while we were over there. Could I, in a moment of madness, have "reverted" to this way of thinking, maybe?

flashback to 1983: Lois and I (both 37), and US residents for 3 years,,

visit the first English colony in North America, at Jamestown, Virginia

Or, then again, while casting my vote, was I simply confused by the complex instructions for postal votes - e.g. place Form A into Envelope A and then put Envelope A with Form B into Envelope B, ensuring the address shows through the window - it's worse than trying to assemble an IKEA sofa or so-called "Grandpa Chair", isn't it!

[No, face it, you're just mentally incompetent, Colin, I've been saying it for years! - Ed]

Next election I'll get our old mate, and local man, "Flatpack" Jim, who put together my shiny new IKEA "Bingsta Chair" a.k.a. "The Bingsta" or "Grandpa's Chair", to come round and help me assemble my postal ballot - just to be on the safe side!!!

flashback to March: Lois and I "test-drive"

my shiny new "Bingsta" chair from IKEA,

shortly after it was assembled for us

by my old mate "Flatpack" Jim

- nice one, Jim!

So my vote didn't count, it seems. "So what!", I hear you cry! [Not me, I don't care! - Ed]

Well, why did the country reject the Tories? You read a lot of "bunkum" in the papers, don't you, but at last somebody sensible has said what I've been thinking all along, that the Government were just "rubbish", embarrassingly incompetent, and richly deserved to be turned out of office - that's my considered opinion.

Call me crazy if you like! [Don't tempt me! - Ed]

And who's the sensible person who said what I've been saying all along? Step forward, William Hague, the man whom some have called "the best Prime Minister we never had".

Look at the Politics page in Lois's copy of "The Week", which gives a digest of the week's events, and which "plopped" through our letter-box yesterday, and which analysed the so-called "Tory Wipeout".

Yes, 71% of Reform voters said the Tories lost because they were "incompetent". And "Haguey" says, "A revived Tory party will need to be [both] competent and broad-based".

By coincidence, our elder daughter Alison saw "Haguey" in person at Wimbledon this week - he was sitting in the Royal Box and our son-in-law Ed took this picture:

flashback to Wednesday: this is the picture our son-in-law Ed

took of the Royal Box, where "Haguey" (ringed) was sitting

in the row behind the Queen's row

Ali says they waved to Hague, but he didn't respond. Maybe the Queen thought they were waving to her, but we aren't told whether she waved back or not - perhaps we should be (told, I mean(!) ) ?

13:00 Apart from electoral "lessons learned", it's a quiet day for me here in Malvern, together with my long-suffering wife Lois, and also our daughter Sarah and her twins, who stayed with us overnight. Sarah takes Lois and the twins to the County Library, while I work on preparation for the next Skype meeting of the local U3A Intermediate Danish group (as you do (!) ). When they come back, we all drive over to Upton-on-Severn and drop into Clive's Fruit Farm for lunch.

Lois and I, with our daughter Sarah (left) and her 10-year-old

twins Lily and Jessica, have lunch today at Clive's Fruit Farm

The weather isn't as bad as it usually is at the moment - I wear my coat "to be on the safe side", but the others are risking it in short-sleeved tops etc.

How different, though, is the weather in much of Europe, including Hungary, where Tünde, my Hungarian penfriend, says that the intense heat, e.g. 41.5C (107F) in the operating theatre of the capital's Uzsoki St Hospital, has led to operations being cancelled:

The article reveals that there have recently been no operations in all the operating theatres of the Uzsoki Street hospital. Air conditioners have failed, and all interventions were halted after the heat in the operating rooms of Uzsoki reached 41.5 degrees [107F]. Air conditioning has also failed in another of the city's main hospitals.

Tünde writes, "Hungary is the real Africa: the weather, the corruption, the [theft] of EU money and [the state of] our health service".

And I thought of Tünde's words - 'Hungary is the real Africa', when we received word today of Alison's elder daughter, 17-year-old Josie's 2-week school trip to Tanzania, where her group are going to be, not just sight-seeing, but also helping a typical village with various projects, to be agreed locally on their arrival. She'll be flying out from London's Gatwick Airport on Monday - yikes!

flashback to Christmas 2018: Josie, then 12,

demonstrates her jumping skills. Note the attempted

"photobomb" by family cat Dumbledore (bottom right)

- nice try, Dumbles !!!!

Try to keep cool, little Josie, and keep sending us those texts! And I expect to hear Lois's Huawei beeping at us under the bedclothes night and day over the next 2 weeks!

15:00 As usual, when our daughter Sarah and the twins stay with us, there's the usual ton-load of their family laundry to be done - their washing-machine still hasn't been fixed. Oh dear!

Lois wields our shiny-new washing-line-prop again.

Some garments have been redacted (out of shot to the left)

And talking of "redacted", have you ever noticed how, if you're told not to use a certain word, that you for some reason can't stop using it? Yes, me too !!!!

I think of this kind of self-censorship later this evening, when Lois and I are on our own again, and watching an old episode of the 1990's sitcom "Coupling", and the issue of "taboo subjects" comes up again.

In this episode, the "girls" are all sitting in the staff canteen, when one of them comments that you shouldn't use the word "naked" in front of male colleagues, because they find it too disturbing. The next biggest no-no is for women to hint to men that they may have lesbian tendencies.