Endings

So Margaret Thatcher is going to have a ceremonial funeral. Not quite as good as a state funeral but still pretty impressive with soldiers marching in procession and her coffin pulled along on a gun carriage and so on. The Queen has to give permission for this type of funeral. This puts Mrs T on a par with the Queen Mother and Lady Diana Spencer. Who knew? 

In Brixton and Glasgow I hear that they had street parties when they heard the Iron Lady was dead. I wonder if they asked for permission to organise them. After all, for the Queen’s Jubilee and the Royal Wedding (please note the use of capitals!) people had to apply for permission for street parties. So why not this national celebration as well? 

 Is it somehow subversive to organise street parties to celebrate the passing of a politician, one who cracked the unions and defeated the miners? Will those who organised them be investigated by the police? Maybe they’ll be ok so long as they have not tweeted or twittered about it. 

This tweeting can be dangerous as 17 year old Paris Brown has found out. This young lady was employed as a “youth advisor” to the Kent Police Commissioner. Not a bad job: £15,000 a year to tell the police what young people are like. But then they found out that young Paris has been tweeting about drinking, drugs, sex and other such young people pastimes. Well, they wanted the views of a typical teenager. What did they expect? And she did all the tweeting before she got the job. But still .... Now the police are investigating her tweets to see if she has committed any crimes. And today it is reported that Miss Brown has handed in her notice. 

Shouldn’t the police be doing something better with their time? 

Are my friends who made derogatory comments on Facebook in any danger? 

Do I really pay taxes to pay for this sort of thing? 

 Come to that, do I want my taxes to contribute to Margaret Thatcher’s funeral, ceremonial as it might be? Can I opt out? 

Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, they have been digging up, sorry, exhuming, Pablo Neruda. The Chilean poet/politician died in 1973, supposedly from cancer. Now they think he might have been another victim of Pinochet (friend of a certain MT) shortly after that person’s coup. 

 If this proves to be true, will he be given a ceremonial re-burial?