It’s the Fourth of July. I’ve just heard an American on a podcast Phil was listening to say “It’s Independence Day. Independence from what? We’re independent from London but are we independent from Washington?” This may not quite be his pessimistic words but they cover his main ideas.
Its symptomatic of what seems to be a general feeling of disillusionment with government all over the world. Here’s a post from Zarah Sultana:
“Parliament in a nutshell:
Yesterday MPs, including Yvette Cooper, celebrated the suffragette legacy of civil disobedience that won women the right to vote..
Only to then vote to designate non-violent direct action group Palestine Action as terrorists.
Westminster is broken.”
Zarah Sultana has left the Labour Party, which is not very surprising considering that they didn’t want her to stand for parliament in the first place and tried to prevent her being selected to be a candidate in the last election. She’s been a bit of a thorn in their side and had the whip withdrawn for her troubles. Now she’s resigned from the party and is supposed to be teaming up with that other “rebel”, Jeremy Corbyn, to form a new properly left wing. We shall see how that goes!
Palestine Action, the protest group, is taking the government to court to try to prevent the law deeming them terrorist organisation from coming into effect. If it comes into effect anyone supporting them could themselves be liable to up to 14 years in prison for terrorism. Take another look at Zarah Sultan’s post I quoted earlier.
On a more local front, Thursdays in our house have taken on a new character since Granddaughter Number Two came home from university. She’s waiting to start a temporary job but they keep delaying her start date because of administrative messing about. And so for the last few weeks she has called me on a Thursday morning to ask if she can come over to our house. She has a second breakfast, we go for a walk, we collect her small siblings from school and all have dinner together when her mother calls in on her way home from work.
Usually after dinner my daughter gives Phil a lift to chess club and takes the small people home. Now she leaves her various offspring here while she runs her father to chess club and then returns. We then go for a family walk round the village, have a bit of a chat and eventually they all go home. We’ve been fortunate that the weather has stayed fine. An evening stroll is a splendid thing. A new family tradition has been created.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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