Boris Johnson, the UK Foreign Secretary, has recently looked as lack-lustre in the role as his US counterpart Rex Tillerson. Now Bojo has bounced back to form with an ‘optimistic, positive and glorious’ vision for Brexit, just days before Theresa May is due to give a definitive speech on same. Not a … Read more
George Osborne, the former UK Chancellor, famously dubbed ‘one of the posh boys’ by Theresa May, has been getting his own back since taking over post-Brexit as editor of the London Evening Standard, describing her as ‘a dead man walking.’ A fervent Remainer he’s become almost the voice of opposition to the … Read more
‘Like the Living Dead in a second-rate horror film, the premiership of Theresa May staggers on oblivious.’ Even given former Chancellor George Osborne’s personal axe-grinding, his words do strike a chord amidst growing alarm of UK voters and businesses about the non-progress of the Brexit negotiations. There are two views about the Brussels contest … Read more
Big Ben, the iconic symbol of London, is to fall silent for four years from noon tomorrow for repairs. Health and Safety have managed to accomplish what five years bombing by the Nazis failed to do in WW11. It was the first subject addressed by Theresa May as she arrived hot-foot from a … Read more
Civil wars do leave their mark, sometimes for centuries. The English Civil War 1642-1651 pitted authoritarian Royalists against democratic progressives. Though underlying it, was the bitter Roman Catholic v Protestant battle which had been waged since Henry V111 baled on Rome (Vatican) a century before. And that antipathy carried on into the … Read more
The fallacy that history is progress is very seductive. Past conflicts are done and dusted, tied up with a ribbon and peace reigns into the future. World War 11 was won and lost and out of the ashes of the conflict grew a united Europe. The Cold War ended, the Berlin Wall came … Read more
A final act of remembrance for the deaths at Flanders one hundred years ago in the First World War will be held this weekend. Passchendaele was one of the bloodiest battle of WW1, leading to 320,000 allied deaths and German losses of between 260,000 and 400,000 men. The Allied assault was … Read more
The drift of eastern EU countries away from democracy towards authoritarianism and Russia is causing considerable concern. A 2017 report described 18 of the 27 Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries as being in democratic decline. The most worrisome are Poland and Hungary, in the 1990s seen as success stories. Hungary under Viktor … Read more
The US isn’t the only polarised country with a rudderless ship of state. The poor Brits are getting increasingly perplexed watching a motionless government murmuring hopeful platitudes about Brexit while the doomsayers are getting louder. The UK’s spending watchdog has warned the post-Brexit IT system for customs is heading for a “horror show” that could … Read more
Never has Plato’s thought, that the problem with democracy is that it elevates opinion above knowledge, seemed more true. What with Trump being elected by precisely those voters his policies will damage most. Macron shoehorned into the Elysee Palace with no experience, but spurred to victory because he wasn’t like his rivals (except … Read more