EYES, NOSE, CHEEKY CHEEKY CHIN

Read on – the title will become clear

1^st October 2020

As I sit here watching the UK news unfold I despair for all you who have to suffer the buffoonery of that man and his Cabinet of Incompetents.  Who would have thought that releasing people from lockdown so soon, sending kids back to school or letting thousands of youngsters flock round the country to start or return to University would unleash phase 2 of the pandemic?  Covid-19 is going nowhere fast and no amount of supposed Churchillian rhetoric about fighting and defeating this awful disease will make it go away.  And where he gets the brass neck from to insist it is for all of us (you) to do this together when his puppet-master Cummings goes un-reprimanded, never mind unpunished beggars belief.  He’s happy to point the finger of blame at you when it is his man who has done more than anyone to undermine the only really effective way we have to try to combat this virus.  I wouldn’t blame anyone caught falling foul of his dodgy, blurred and too easily misunderstood rules calling themselves Mr (or Mrs) Dominic Cummings and letting the boys (and girls) in blue try and sort it out!  Personally I believe the various Police forces involved in the Cummings affair have seriously undermined their own legitimacy and proven themselves to be no more than pawns to their political masters – as a one time Londoner I had a great deal of respect for Cressida Dick but she has just proved that old adage – Dick by name, Dick by nature!  There are more heavy handed restrictions on the way but they can be avoided if people behave responsibly and I would implore you all to do just that – you youngsters might get away with a mild dose but you might end up killing your parents or grandparents – so please be careful.

I’ve no doubt that as this blog evolves over the next couple of days I’ll return to Johnson and his dimwittery but for now I’m going to change the subject totally.  I have always been an avid reader, for as long as I can remember I’ve read and read.  If I didn’t have a book to hand sat on the loo I’d read the wrapper for the toilet paper.  Spazification has made me an even more avid reader as there is actually very little else I can do and as a consequence the books are piling up chez Brookes.  My darling wife is a linguist, English teacher, actor and published poet so besides my own library I have all of Karen’s books to go at – plays, theatre, ‘proper’ literature, even yoga – and I have to admit to having devoured almost all of Charles Dickens’ works – but then I have read a lot of John le Carre’s stuff as well.  My own personal tastes run to history, military history and biographies.  I’m also a nut for ‘heavy metal’ technical stuff about airplanes, tanks and submarines – but especially tanks.  Bovington Tank Museum is my favourite place in the world and I’d recommend it to any of you if you are near Dorchester.  The Fleet Air Arm museum at Yeovilton is another good trip and you can climb aboard a Concorde there.  I digress though – my imprisonment in bed or chair has seen me spread my reading habits – I now even read bits of poetry – and then I had a flash of inspiration – you might well have heard of the Booker Prize for Literature?  Well I’ve come up with the Brookesey Prize!

Now don’t get too excited, there’s no massive cash prize, there’s not even the remotest chance of fame, at best one or two of you might buy a copy of one of my recommendations and help a struggling author ever so slightly.  Nevertheless I intend to list the books I have read this year, with a few words of critique, good and/or bad, and then at the end of the year declare a winner.  I also welcome recommendations from you, my faithful audience – I’m happy to have a go at anything!

OK so to start the list off and in no particular order of preference:

1. Pale Rider by Laura Spinney 
2. Blessed Days of Anaesthesia by Stephanie Snow  
3. Nye Bevan by Nick Thomas-Symonds 
4. Clem Atlee. The Inevitable Prime Minister by Michael Jago 
5. Harold Wilson by Ben Pimlott 

A fascinating read with some strange parallels to how Johnson is being influenced by Cummings – and I’m not talking about Marcia Williams – but then you’ll have to read about Harold Wilson to find out!  The internecine machinations within the Labour Party at the time, vividly exposed in this book, remain true to this day.

6. Kier Hardy by Bob Holman 
7.  Decline and Fail by John Crace
8. Democracy for Sale: Dark Money and Dirty Politics by Peter Geoghegan 

This is a very troubling read and bodes ill for the future of democracies across the world.

9. The Silent Deep by Jinks & James 

This a fascinating book, covering the technical development of nuclear submarines, the politics surrounding the Polaris and Trident nuclear deterrent and the way these boats were used during the cold war (more thrilling than any Tom Clancy novel) and the Falklands War.  A frontrunner so far.

10. These Are The Hands by Deborah Alma 

An anthology of poetry written in the main by healthcare professionals.  If you only buy one of these books make this the one.

11. The Five Giants by Nicholas Timmins 

A great read and, I have to be honest, a firm favourite in the Brookesey stakes.

12. Tribes: How Our Need To Belong Can Make Or Break Society by David Lammy 

I like David Lammy, a lot, and recommend this book – keep an eye on this lad as a potential Labour Party leader and, dare I say it, Prime Minister.

So that’s the first dozen for now (and no tank books you’ll notice!) but I’ll stop for fear of boring you but there are more to come I promise you.  The links will take you to a(n) (in)famous global platform where you can buy these titles – but Bellos has enough Billions and there are plenty of small bookshops in your area who would love your custom – please mention my blog if you contact one as a result of reading this.

Please feel free to let me have your recommended favourite reads.  I’ve read lots of American authors such as Ernest Hemingway, Jack London, John Steinbeck and Ralph Ellison and only Steinbeck and Ellison have really impressed me.  Hemingway in particular strikes me as being a bit of a know-it-all show-off, much to Karen’s disappointment as she firmly believes he’s the best short story writer ever.  Mind you I don’t like Shakespeare either – and that really disturbs her!

I’ll start to wrap up this blog now.  It’s 5^th October and still the Covid-19 news gets worse with an increase in the number of cases, an increase in the number of deaths and a continuing failure of the Test, Track and Whatever they’ve decided to call the system today.  And now Donald Trump has gone down with the virus – oh dear, dear me.  But then what did he expect?  Johnson was down with it within days of wandering through a hospital full of Covid-19 patients shaking hands with everyone he met –  Trump similarly days after a big hug and kiss garden party celebrating his chosen successor to the vacant Supreme Court position.  Do these people really believe they were chosen by God to rule and so immune to earthly pathogens? 

It’s heartening to see Kier Starmer increasing his popularity daily over Johnson and that the Labour Party is starting to look like it has the potential to govern the country – my vote for him wasn’t wasted then!  I supported Jeremy Corbyn when he was elected Party Leader, even though I never voted for him, but I truly believe he messed up and never was the right man for the job.  Having said that I do think John McDonnell would have been a good Chancellor of the Exchequer.  Nevertheless we now have someone in charge who I believe can, and will, do a good job for the whole country – but sooner or later he needs to come clean with some actual policies, although only after we’ve seen the end of the pandemic, and if you’re reading this Kier how about:

1. Electoral Reform – First Past The Post only works to the benefit of the major political parties and their vested interests, not the people of or the country and given the growing influence of third-party actors on democracy, be they foreign governments or business interests, the time for change is now.
2. Constitutional Reform – the mish mash of old (even ancient) ‘gentlemen’s agreements’ and precedent that form our unwritten Constitution need throwing out and replacing with a written Constitution that ensures that carrion crows like Johnson cannot pick off and discard the bits they don’t like and treat the rule of law, the very bedrock of a functioning democracy, with total and utter disregard.

I’m happy to get into a conversation with any of you who’d like to discuss this and I’m tempted to write at length about electoral and constitutional reform as I’d like to see it – we’ll see.

Having said all that, there’s time enough between now and the next election so I’ll continue to look forward to Prime Ministers Questions every Wednesday – the weekly intellectual and professional evisceration of Johnson is the best watch on TV at the moment (except maybe for ‘Ghosts’ on the BBC iPlayer).

I intend to close this blog on a high note though – and so, in an attempt to help our embattled Prime Minister, his alien advisor and Cabinet of Incompetents in their hour of need, and not wishing to be accused of sniping at him from the side-lines, I offer my own catchy little slogan intended to encourage the population to take heed of the latest Covid-19 guidance – click the link and enjoy:

Eyes, Nose, Cheeky Cheeky Chin

 Please – stay home where you can, stay safe and keep doing what you can to keep others safe.

Jem