AUSTERITY IS THE NEW TERRORISM
George Osbourne does his best. The trouble is his best is the worst. That guessing look upon his face. The realignment of fiscal furniture to dust away Darling’s cobwebs. Within 2 years he’ll be minister of sport and asserting his expertise over the state of football’s debt. He is inflicting austerity as a form of terrorism and the media are in on it too. The fools.
I have an idea. It may be misguided but it’s better than the chancellor’s. What if we were trusted to self-impose pro-rata budgets in the same way we are asked to self-assess our tax return? By stripping away the colossal administration costs of HMRC and making it self-regulatory we could dredge this country up from the depths, or at least blow our last counters in the casino with some style. Anyone up for a march to number 11?
CLAIRVOYANCE REVISITED
Is the future going to be as anti-climatic as the past?
Will all the mistakes I make add up to one decision I get right before my time comes?
Is a wish just a regret in a time capsule?
How pissed off is the present moment with peacemaking?
Do the tea-bags know more than tea leaves?
Is an ache a no-through road?
If we were able to jump two lifetimes ahead, might we rue the one we leapfrog?
Is it true that Mystic Meg & Russell Grant have a lovechild, but he was born before them?
Are cats tired of reincarnation?
GORDON BROWN DRAFTED INTO ENGLAND SQUAD
We’ve just heard that David James and Gordon Brown have agreed to swap roles in an historic deal. The former England shot-stopper was always one of the brighter exponents of the beautiful game and is the son of an abstract artist, which ironcially, has paved the way for his entry into abstract economics under the watchful brow of Harriet Harman. In exchange, Mr Gordon Brown will don the gloves in nets at South Africa thanks to his grandmother’s sister who lived in Carlisle. Both goalkeeper and politician are ‘doing fine’.
TORRES KILLS THE STOAT
I am at a conference in a poorly made YHA with Fernando Torres and a famous author who nobody recognises, including me. We walk into the gents for a pee. Torres spots a stoat in the urinal. This stoat has grand status in the dream, he/she/it is the leader of the land we are in, like King Julian the lemur in Madagascar.
Torres stamps on the stoat, killing him/her/it. He then kicks the urine sodden body down the drain and we leave the gents and walk down the stairs only for the handrail to collapse. As we re-enter the conference I am told to read several passages of unpublished words by an author and told to name that author or there will be serious consequences. Torres and the earlier author with a name I can’t recall stare at me as though I am about to detonate a bomb.
Here, the dream ended.
What I’d like to know is what were those serious consequences and did they happen to me?