Kinds regard

+Every so often, and for reasons unfathomable to me, the Russian broadcaster Izvestia which runs a programme called Glavnoye rings me up for an interview. This is such a flattering concept these days that I always accept. It gives me a chance to tell our arch-enemies that actually, they don’t need their government to interfere with Mighty England, because our government is doing such a fine job destroying our country it doesn’t need outside help. Today’s subject was Covid-19. It hardly needs me to point out the level of incompetence Johnson and Co. have inflicted on us, but I did make the point that thanks to Conservative Party crony capitalism we have a new breed of war profiteers whose moral status is equivalent to their forebears who made a packet on the backs of those who sacrificed so much in the First World War. What’s changed? At first sight perhaps not very much—except for one major factor: the ‘enemy’ is now invisible and obeys no ‘High Command’ but its own evolutionary path. Covid is not some alternative ideology or demon Kaiser, it is but one disease of our civilisation. Yes we’ll ameliorate its impact eventually, but thanks to our interference with nature and our belief we are above nature, what follows Covid could be much worse. Nature is no passive bystander to our ravages of it. I didn’t get as far as saying all that on Izvestia Glavnoye this time round, so hopefully they’ll ring me about climate change soon enough. [The programme will apparently be broadcast this coming Saturday. In Russian]
 
+I’m always willing to go the extra mile on behalf of this blog’s readers (thank you, both of you) and today I watched Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs). I did so specifically to test the idea often expressed in pre-Covid days by those oh-so-clever media commentators that the bear pit of PMQs was a turn-off for the public, resulting in occasional pledges from party leaders to end the weekly yah-boo confrontation. It’s my theory that the new lockdown style of PMQs will be an even greater turn-off, and I am willing to bet that the audience for this weekly bash, probably not very big in the first place, has diminished to rock bottom. The idea that MPs now behave with a little decorum will come as a blow to those who always understood MPs to be rude, shouting tribal louts. The core audience for live streamed ‘democracy in action’ is probably confined to nerds who find the word ‘committee’ full of exciting mystique. I now have to confess that I didn’t watch it all the way through. Part of the explanation for this has to be that absent the usual banter from a crowded chamber, the sheer repetitive nonsense spouted by Johnson is wearingly numbing when one hears it in isolated silence. We have a fountainhead of garbage as Prime Minister. I was also distracted by his new basin bowl haircut which makes a bale of hay look positively ordered. The first questioner, Michael Fabricant’s plastic wig looked equally absurd in its close-up Zoom existence. Nothing there to enhance a vomit-inducing, fawning ‘question’ to Johnson. Kier Starmer in comparison to these fools does come out well, but sadly his questions are nearly all pre-scripted and he doesn’t seem to have the knack of on-his-feet cut and thrust. I wonder how much longer his courtroom schtick will seem impressive (and I’m told he never actually prosecuted any cases himself). So only half way through I had to give up. Bring back the good old days!
 
 
+This spam email really made me laugh:
 
THIS IS JOHN BUTLER UNITED STATE AMERICA DELIVERY DIRECTOR, FROM WASHINGTON DC,
 
ARE YOU DEAD OR ALIVE?
 
This mail is to make inquiry if you are still alive because I have been receiving different kinds emails here from different individuals claiming that you have asked them to receive your Consignment Box Fund on your behalf, which I am obliged to release to them but because they do not have the (delivery) 4 digit DDW# at the right hand top corner of your Consignment box of ($75 Million USD) (seventy five Million United State Dollars ) shows that they are not from you.
 
So therefore if you are still eager and wish to receive your covid-19 Compensation fund which i wanted to deposited here in (DHL Courier Service) the Key and the Boxes, to be delivered to you since I did not hear from you, As I am going for a business trip which will last for 5 months in 2 weeks time [etc., etc.]
 
My reply:
 
Dear John,
 
I’m dead. Keep the money.
 
Kinds regard
 
Colin