An electoral dilemma

As my readers will have gathered, I have reservations concerning legalising assisted suicide. At the last general election, at our local hustings I asked the candidates their views. Rather uninterestingly, all four of them agreed with the idea that people should be able to choose the time of their death, when they were in terminal pain. 

😏😎😌🙊

That didn't help me decide, and so I voted with my old inclinations. However the urbane Conservative, David Johnstone, was comfortably elected. But if the same is true this time, I shall face a dilemma. In the wake of Esther Rantzen's comments, Sir Keir Starmer, who is likely to the next Prime Minister, declared that he would give some government time for a private members' bill to legalise assisted dying. And so I wrote to the leader of the opposition.

"Dear Sir Keir

"I had hoped to kick the Tories out of this true blue constituency and vote in a Labour candidate, as I believed was achievable.  I was at one time a member of the Labour Party when it espoused truly socialist values and policies.  However your latest pronouncement that you would make government time available for a private member’s bill and that you were yourself in favour of legalising assisted dying/suicide has been the final straw for me. 

"I clearly don’t know where our election candidates will stand on the issue, though I know our present MP’s views, but I view a change in the law dangerous, both from the precedence set in other jurisdictions and the pressures it would put on the vulnerable, and a betrayal of our past record of upholding the sanctity of life.  I know you won’t change your mind in an election year when polling (which depends on the framing of the question - for example ‘Would you prefer a Labour or a Conservative government?’) seems to indicate a majority of voters sharing your view. 

"So, anyway, regretfully, I’m writing to inform you that you have lost at least one vote here. 

"By the way I have Motor Neurone Disease.

"Yours sincerely..."

 

I wonder what the Reform UK Party's policy about it is...!

Mr Corbyn - in the spotlight

A comment I heard last night at our local coffee shop has driven me back to my blog. It went something like this, “I don’t know who to vote for. I might put an X by all the candidates and ‘Blow you for spoiling my Christmas’ at the bottom. My grandad was a true Labour man, but I’ve always been a Conservative. I don’t trust Boris but I’d never vote for Corbyn. He’s even worse.” When I asked why, she couldn’t really tell me. But I think I know the reason as I explained a week ago on Facebook. I think she’s been poisoned.

“I'm dismayed by the sustained disinformation attack orchestrated, I suspect, from Conservative HQ on Mr Corbyn ever since he became Labour leader. Like a snake's tongue it is two-pronged - that he is a communist (or as Boris would say, stalinist) when he's in fact a democratic socialist, and that he is anti-semitic, when in fact he's anti-racist but opposed to expansionist zionism. I'm more dismayed that mainstream media so regularly reinforces the myths. And I'm even more dismayed that the poison is so widely swallowed. It is not good for the political discourse in this nation.”

So why, if that’s true, does he not just come out and strongly deny the accusations raised against him and apologise for the few errors of judgement he may have made? I believe that, in fact, once he realises he’s made a mistake, he has admitted it and apologised, for example in the case of the Mear One mural. Partly I think it’s explained by his nature and his manner, perceptively observed by the distinguished linguistics professor, Noam Chomsky, on a lecture tour here a couple of years ago, in an interview with The Guardian. ““There are various reasons for that – partly an extremely hostile media, partly his own personal style which I happen to like but perhaps that doesn’t fit with the current mood of the electorate,’ he said. ‘He’s quiet, reserved, serious, he’s not a performer. The parliamentary Labour party has been strongly opposed to him. It has been an uphill battle.’
“He said there were a lot of factors involved, but insisted that Labour would not be trailing the Conservatives so heavily in the polls if the media was more open to Corbyn’s agenda. ‘If he had a fair treatment from the media – that would make a big difference.’”
 
And there is of course an honourable tradition of silence in the face of false accusations both in literature and life, from Cordelia to Jesus. If an accusation is groundless, an answer merely fuels the myth-making. We’re all familiar with journalists pressing for some slip-up. The fiercer the denial, the greater the doubt.
 
One line of criticism often raised against Jeremy Corbyn is that he has met our “enemies”, such as Palestinians, Irish Republicans, Libyans or Venezuelans, and even talked to them. When he reasonably asks in Parliament for evidence a precipitate government action, we’re told it demonstrates his lack of patriotism, not the scrutiny appropriate to a responsible opposition. As even Donald Trump recognises, progress in diplomatic relations depends on meeting the “other side”, talking to them, listening to them, building a relationship, even a friendship, with them. To demonise your “enemy” is only to deepen divides; whether individually or corporately one does not love one’s enemy by ignoring them. Accepted, as Mr Corbyn does, that defence of the realm is a priority, it's still true that jawing is better than warring. If we ever hope for peace with our “enemies”, escalating the means of violence is the answer of fools.
 
Of course, the most insidious accusation raised against Mr Corbyn is that of anti-semitism. This has most recently been voiced by the Chief Rabbi, the leader of the United Synagogue (membership about 40,000, out of the estimated 284,000 Jews in this country). This was unfortunately soon followed by a general comment about hate speech by the Archbishop of Canterbury, eagerly seized upon by the press as an endorsement of Rabbi Mirvis’ attack on Mr Corbyn. It’s worth examining his record which seems consistently to contradict the verdict, for example since being elected leader 20 new measures to counter anti-semitism in the party have been introduced. 

The Jewish author and poet, and former Children's Laureate, Michael Rosen’s Facebook comment on the matter is worth reading in full. Here are the last five paragraphs:
“Further: the whole question of 'antisemitism' has been fogged by an unknowing or unwilling lack of clarity over distinctions between slurs, prejudice, bias, discrimination, persecution, incitement to antisemitic violence, and the violence itself. There are times when you might have thought that UK Jews were experiencing a pogrom.
“Secondly, the minimum requirements for a claim that there is a 'problem' in a given area (e.g. antisemitism in the Labour Party) is that it is distinctly and measurably worse than in other places or in society as a whole. If that hasn't been shown (and it hasn't been), it's not a Labour Party problem it's a societal problem.
“I've known Jeremy Corbyn for 30 years. He is no antisemite. He has put his neck on the line hundreds of times in opposing racism, antisemitism, far right fascism, holocaust denial.
“For the record the sudden loss of Jewish support for Labour came when Miliband was leader who the Jewish Chronicle described as 'toxic' for Jewish voters. Miliband is Jewish. It was his support for recognition of Palestine before negotiations that did for him, they said. Being Jewish was no shield against this hostility.
“Ask me, who am I 'safer' with: a Johnson-led government with its record of the 'hostile environment', persecution of Windrush generation, and persistent antisemitic jibes from leading party members or this Labour Party, and I say, Labour every time.”
 
The witness of a 30-years’ friendship to me outweighs the slurs of a plutocratically owned press and broadcast media which generally dance to their tune. My observation of Mr Corbyn has been of a principled politician who sincerely wants the best for ordinary people, and they certainly need a champion. Mr Corbyn was initially a reluctant leader, but how much this country needs integrity, honesty and principle in its leader now! He's no more a saint than I am; yet I for one have to concur with Michael Rosen’s conclusion.

General election seen from a riser-recliner chair

I listened to two items on the radio this morning.  The first was an interview with Sir Andrew Dilnot and the second was a reading from Henry Marsh’s Admissions.  And I can keep quiet no longer.

Sir Andrew Dilnot, economist and the country’s leading expert on social care (You may remember his authoritative and widely welcomed report on the subject, which broadly recommended a national insurance scheme to take away the fear of the cost of care in old age - https://mydonkeybody.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/medical-day.html), was commenting on the imminent Conservative manifesto proposals concerning funding for the elderly.  You can hear the interview here - Today programme, at 1 hour, 10 min in. He was measured and he was scathing in his assessment.

According to a newspaper account, ‘Theresa May’s social care package fails "to tackle the biggest problem” facing elderly people, the man who carried out the coalition’s review into service in England has said.

‘On the election campaign trail the PM had said politicians could no longer “duck the issue” and that the Government had been “working on a long-term solution” for the needs of an ageing population. 

But Sir Andrew said he was “very surprised” by the new thinking from Downing Street. “New thinking that I’d argue shows a less than full understanding of the problems when there is a green paper that is due to come out later this year,” he added.

‘Speaking on BBC’s Radio 4 Today programme, Mr Dilnot, who is also a former head of the UK Statistics Authority, said: “The disappointment about these proposals that we’re expecting to hear in the Conservative manifesto later is that they fail to tackle what I’d argue is the biggest problem of all in social care, which is at the moment people facing a position of no control.

“There is nothing you can do to protect yourself against care costs; you can’t insure because the private sector won’t insure it and by refusing to implement a cap. The Conservatives are now saying that they are not going to provide social insurance for it, so people will be left helpless knowing that what will happen is that if they are unlucky enough to suffer the need for care costs they will be entirely on their own until they are on their last £100,000.

"The analogy is a bit like saying to somebody you can't insure your house against burning down. If it does burn down then you're completely on your own; you have to pay for all of it until you're down to the last £100,000 of all your assets and income," he said.’

(The Independent)

Someone whose political views are unusually well-informed and reliable messaged me this morning. “Cruel, cruel Conservatives! Sir Andrew D very good on it on Today. Cost needs to be socialised not put on individuals like this."

And he’s right. It’s not just social care which is at risk. Henry Marsh is an eminent neurosurgeon. His book, Admissions – a life in brain surgery, was published a fortnight ago. He retired from the NHS in 2015. In today’s reading he recounted a day’s operating list, of whom the fourth was a lady with diabetes. It revealed the unsustainable pressure that “efficiency” and “targets” have increasingly imposed on the service. The result for one patient was fatal, and for one operating team clearly traumatic. The episode ended with him breaking the news to the family:

‘… I wanted to scream to high heaven that it was not my fault that her blood sugar level had not been checked upon admission, that none of the junior doctors had checked her over, that the anaesthetists had not realised this. It was not my fault that we were bringing patients into the hospital in such a hurry that they were not being properly assessed. I thought of the army of managers who ran the hospital and their political masters who were no less responsible than I was and who would all be sleeping comfortably in their beds tonight, perhaps dreaming of government targets and away days in country house hotels and who rarely if ever had to talk to patients or their relatives. Why should I have to shoulder the responsibility for the whole damn hospital like this when I had so little say in how it is run? Why should I have to apologise? Was it my fault that the ship was sinking? But I kept these thoughts to myself and told them how utterly sorry I was that she was going to die and that I had failed to save her. They listened to me in silence, fighting back their tears. “Thank you, doctor,” one of them said to me, eventually.’

It happened last night that a group of us were enjoying each other’s company in my favourite coffee shop, the Cornerstone Café in Grove. We were talking about the questions we’d like to put to candidates in our local hustings on 1^st June, and I found myself concluding that Labour was more likely to provide adequately both for health and social care – and more surprisingly that their financial plans were not as daft as the corporate media would have us believe. Nationalising utilities does not increase national debt, in that they become national assets, like a house (or recovering the family silver). Borrowing for investment when interest rates are at an all-time low makes good sense. Raising tax revenues from corporations and the wealthiest 5% in society doesn’t wholly work only if those firms and individuals decide they don’t want to contribute to the common good and set about avoiding or evading their share. Sir Andrew’s comment about the social care proposals is relevant. 'Mr Dilnot said he was “very disappointed” by the proposals in the manifesto. “Not personally. I feel very disappointed for all of us – the millions of people who are very, very anxious about this,” he added.'

I guess that’s what all of us have to decide, captains of industry, the comfortably off, those with no jobs and those who depend on benefits and food banks - and everyone in between. Will we care about the millions or will we care just about ourselves? It’s all too easy to think, “I’m all right, Jack. The rest can go hang.” The issues are really too important to be reduced to schoolyard name-calling and character assassination.

Life's little ironies

How ironic! From my constitutionally informed friend, Mark Berry, I learned the following. 'In all this fascinating and ongoing story of the General Election it's worth noting the contrary nature of the local council results. In terms of councillors...
Conservative -122
Labour +413
Liberal Democrat -138
Others -106.' Which I find extraordinary.


And I suppose there's an irony in the continuing horse-trading between the right-wing Tories and progressive left-wing LibDems. One hopes there is a moderate and constructive outcome. Hopefully Mr Cameron will spend some time on his knees tomorrow. Mr Clegg apparently doesn't believe in God, and presumably therefore prayer.


Meanwhile, I have to admit I'm disappointed by other pole results from a local point of view. Neither of the Williams cars have made it into the top ten for tomorrow's Spanish Grand Prix. There's something ironic, isn't there, with the spectacle of gas guzzling boys' toys burning up petrol while the Gulf of Mexico is threatened with ecological disaster from the unrefined raw product? 

Political hang-over

Well, the experts have got excited. Britain is going to have a 'hung' (or will it be a 'balanced'?) Parliament. It's not actually such a strange beast. But personally I think it holds some promise - as long as the financial gamblers don't exploit it on the money markets and stock exchanges. The situation could well have a moderating influence on extreme dogmatism and even generate - dare we hope? - cross-party cooperation in the face of national need. That would be a happy outcome of a not very edifying campaign. There's a sensible response to the churches from leading establishment Christian, the Rev Steve Chalke, on http://email.premier.org.uk/interface/external_view_email.php?A8754222636804222421636311812. It's noticeably different from the speculative horse-trading indulged in by politicians egged on by media men and women. I don't like to sound pompous, but isn't politics too important a matter for that now? I've said it before, but it's still true, politics is about service not power. Here's wishing the new MPs a large dose of humility in the heady celebration of election. And let's hope they don't forget the most vulnerable and needy in society. (Didn't someone talk about the 'Big Society' in the campaign - something different from High Society?)

PS I've just come across an interesting local footnote to the election, which concerns our neighbouring constituency of Abingdon etc. The Lib Dem incumbent MP, Dr Evan Harris, was not my favourite Parliamentarian, having an aggressive pro-euthanasia and humanist stance. Driving through the north of the constituency last Wednesday, the leafy suburbs of North Oxford were a forest of bright orange Lib  Dem diamonds. Well, the Tory Nicola Blackwood, who was supported by a woman vicar who trained with me, overturned his majority of 7,000 and squeezed in by the skin of her teeth. I wish her well. (The full story's on http://www.ccfon.org/view.php?id=1070&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter.)

Value what you've got!

Woke up to an historic day - possibly. Certainly an intriguing one. The General Election which is 'too close to call' according to the pundits, who all hope there'll be a hung Parliament (i.e. no party with an overall majority). Then they'll be able to speculate about alliances, unstable governments etc. In other words they'll have so much more to bore us with. I really think there's a danger of opinion overload, which will just turn the public off politics again.  

Anyway we got up deliciously late, had my favourite breakfast of coffee and croissants - and dreamed of Paris! And then went off to do our civic duty and voted at the Grove Old Mill Hall. There weren't queues there but a steady trickle. I have to say this is one of the safest Conservative seats around, which I guess discourages some from voting, but Sally, a friend of mine on Facebook, wisely and pointedly observed this morning: 

VOTE friends - VOTE!!! (people died so you could and people in other countries queue for days to vote under high risk of bombing - we have no excuse NOT to walk to the end of our roads...)

I was mildly encouraged to watch Facebook's vote-meter pass the million mark. It's admittedly still a minority of UK FB users, but it kept going up. Sally's comment reminded me of Andrew White's latest letter from Iraq, which really should shake us out of complacency on many levels:

"Election News

As elections are prepared for in the UK, we are still in the position we've been in since the election here in February 7th, without a new government. Yesterday, however: 

Iraq's two largest Shiite electoral blocs announced that they have formed an alliance that gives them a strong chance of setting up the next government, though they have yet to work out the contentious question of who will become prime minister.
The coalition deal between Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's State of Law coalition and the conservative Shiite Iraqi National Alliance leaves them just four parliamentary seats shy of a ruling majority.

(AP)

 So we are a lot nearer to having a Government. The big contentious issue remains Kirkuk. This major oil area is claimed by both the Kurds and Arabs. Having Kurdish support remains very important. The other major problem with this coalition is the support of the Sunni community. The block is Shia dominated so the Sunni could feel very side tracked by it.

Tragic News from Nineveh

The sad news, as some of you already know, is that on Sunday, two large buses taking Christian students to university in Mosul were attacked close to Nineveh.  They included family members of people in our congregation at St George's.  Whilst at this stage we only know of two deaths there were over 100 people injured.

Added to this one of our congregation was telling us about members of her family injured in the Easter day bombings.  One lost both their eyes, two lost their legs and others were injured.  So Sunday was a day of pain.  

Despite all these difficulties we do not give up hope.  As I have said so many times, and say at the beginning of every service, THE LORD IS HERE AND HIS SPIRIT IS WITH US."

I've given a link to a short YouTube clip of Andrew talking about the uncertainty and asking us to pray. I think the same applies here, as whoever or whatever combination comes into power, they will certainly need all the wisdom God gives to steer us through the next few years. Frankly human ingenuity won't prove enough. (http://www.youtube.com/frrmevideo)

PS I meant to mention that we went on to the shops after voting to buy some mince - and there it was - gone. The butcher's, that is, which people come to from all round the area. Just metal shutters down. I considered it one of Grove's treasures. So the glory of the world passes away: Sic transit gloria mundi.

More meanderings

Talking of books, this week I completed checking the proofs of I Choose Everything, and on Wednesday, after Jane had helped at Riding for the Disabled, we decided to deliver them in person to Lion Hudson rather than send them by Royal Mail. There's just something about knowing they're there. So round to the Jordan Hill Business Estate and Jane popped out and handed the envelope over.

Then it was time to celebrate. This time it was Aston Pottery, where we'd been in February, near Witney, in the heart of Cameron country. Not that there were many posters up - just one big six-footer. I couldn't help reflecting on the irony of the most English of the candidates for the top job having a typical Scottish name, while the most Scottish has a typical English name. Such profound thoughts show how demob happy I was. The sun was shining and the air was heady with the scent of the tubs full of blue hyacinths along the path from the car park. We headed straight for the tea-room for some lunch and unsuspectingly decided on filled baps - I think mine were prawn marie with salad in sun-dried tomato baps. When they arrived they were HUMUNGOUS. We could have had half each! But very nice they were too. Taking it slowly I completely finished it, not a crumb left. And then we had coffee. Excellent! You can see the view from our table, above. The chap facing is Stephen Baughan, who founded the business with his wife, Jane, in 1990. He's a potter and she's an artist. And they're very friendly.

It's grown from its small beginning into a sizable business - they employ 25+ people now. They're just launching a new size (1 pint jug) and had a wonderful display on the way to the tea-rooms, called the Auricula Theatre. Auriculas are exotic relatives of the primrose. We were given one when we moved here. All the jugs and plates are decorated with different coloured auriculas. But no item is exactly the same as another, as they're all hand-painted. This picture will give you an idea of the beautiful displays in the shop part of the Pottery. Very tempting. We wandered around, and were tempted - a little. A bonus was meeting old (not old old) friends there, and catching up with each other's news.

And so we came home. I did watch the last PMs' debate last night. I'm afraid I was frustrated by the lack of engagement with the serious issues and specific policies. It seemed to me that at least two of the gentlemen were more concerned about projecting image, and that, frankly, doesn't interest me. I admit the debates have apparently aroused people's interest in the election, but I think the cost will be too high if we decide our Prime Minister on how telegenic he or she is. By the way, I've still not had a reply to my letter from Mr Vaizey... How odd!

And á propos of nothing in particular, by way of light relief, here's that donkey story from Brian I promised you. 
Father O'Malley rose from his bed one morning. It was a fine spring day in his new Ballina parish.

He walked to the window of his bedroom to get a deep breath of the beautiful day outside.  He then noticed there was a Donkey lying dead in the middle of his front lawn.

Not knowing who else to call, he promptly called the local police station. 

The conversation went like this:

''Good morning. This is Sergeant Jones. How might I help you?"

"And the best of the day ter yer good self. This is Father O'Malley at St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church. There's a Donkey lying dead right in der middle of me front lawn "

Sergeant Jones, considering himself to be quite a wit, replied with a smirk, "Well now Father, it was always my impression that you people took care of the last rites!"

There was dead silence on the line for a long moment and then Father O'Malley replied:

"Ah, to be sure, that is true; but we are also obliged to notify the next of kin."

Out and about in Grove (part 2)

By popular demand...!

I apologise to those who have been impatiently waiting for the next episode - but there's something about deferred gratification sharpening the appetite. And to be honest, you need it, because on the whole Grove is quite bland - rather like custard. However my excuse is a good one, as yesterday I finished the painstaking task of checking the proofs, which was concentrated hard work. Last night we packed them up and they're ready for dispatch to Monarch this morning. It's a great feeling. Nothing more I can do!

Over the weekend we had a good friend from our days of camping with Pathfinders in Windermere in the 90s (I almost said in the last century - which is true, but makes it sound so long ago, doesn't it?). Lisa does signing for the deaf, and blind, and leads worship in her church. So when she came to VEC with us she automatically signed in the songs - which I love, it's so expressive. However she was here for a chill-out weekend, and so I went out on my own on a politician hunt on Saturday morning and caught one in the Millbrook shops.

To be honest, I'd had wind of him from the internet, but I wanted to do my bit of lobbying. I'd emailed four local PPCs earlier asking them to support the National Strategy for MND and to ask them how they'd vote on assisted suicide if it came to it. Only one, Adam Twine of the Greens, replied personally and promptly and, lo and behold, there's his name on the MND website. Good on him! Although two of the others subsequently expressed their support for better MND care, they've not bothered to sign up - which is a shame, as it lacks that same commitment. The fourth - HE KNOWS WHO HE IS - hasn't bothered to reply at all, even though I emailed two addresses. I'll leave you to speculate whether it's a case of complacency or of a lost cause. I'm afraid he's forfeited my vote, if he ever had it. Sadly but perhaps not surprisingly all three respondents sat on the fence with regard to assisted suicide. One would hope they had backbone enough to vote for protecting the vulnerable if push came to shove.

PPC Steven Mitchell talking to BBC reporter. My pal, Peter Gill, who's his agent, on the right.

Yesterday Benvolio landed in our garden and has been making his presence known. I assume he's the offspring of Benedict and Beatrice, our local blackbirds. He's really far too big to need feeding now, but dad seems to have a soft heart. There was a hullabaloo at 2.30 this morning. My guess is it was parents mobbing a cat out to get Benvolio. If so, they were obviously successful, as he's back large as life (perhaps his name is Adrian...).

Brian's kindly sent me another donkey / parish priest story. But that will have to wait.

(By the way, have you signed the MNDA National Strategy petition yet. At the conference we were told  the total was 8,000 - which to my way of thinking is not great. Surely there are more than that who'd like to see good care provided nationally for sufferers with MND?)

MPs' judgement day approaches

The following is not a theological document. As readers of I Choose Everything will discover, its picture of heaven is seriously flawed. However it made me laugh, and these days when everyone is trying to convince us how seriously competent they will be at bringing us Shangri-La, it's a good antidote. (I'm indebted to Brian for the story.)

'While walking down the street one day a Member of Parliament is tragically hit by a truck and dies.

His soul arrives in heaven and is met by St Peter at the Pearly Gates. 

'Welcome to heaven,' says St Peter.

'Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see MPs around these parts; so we're not sure what to do with you.'

'No problem, just let me in,' says the man.

'Well, I'd like to, but I have orders from higher up. What we'll do is have you spend one day in hell and one in heaven. Then you can choose where to spend eternity.'

'Really, I've made up my mind. I want to be in heaven,' says the MP.

'I'm sorry, but we have our rules.'

And with that, St Peter escorts him to the lift and he goes down, down, down to hell.

The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf course. In the distance is a clubhouse and standing in front of it are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him.

Everyone is very happy and in evening dress. They run to greet him, shake his hand, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the expense of the people.

They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster, caviar and champagne.

Also present is the devil, who really is a very friendly and nice guy who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that before he realizes it, it is time to go.

Everyone gives him a hearty farewell and waves while the lift rises....

The lift goes up, up, up and the door reopens on heaven where St. Peter is waiting for him.

'Now it's time to visit heaven.'

 So, 24 hours pass with the MP joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing.  They have a good time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St Peter returns.

'Well, then, you've spent a day in hell and another in heaven. Now choose your eternity.'

The MP reflects for a minute; then he answers: 'Well, I would never have said it before, I mean heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in hell.'

 So St Peter escorts him to the lift and he goes down, down, down to hell.

Now the doors of the lift open and he's in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage.

He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and putting it in black bags as more trash falls from above.

The devil comes over to him and puts his arm around his shoulder.

'I don't understand,' stammers the MP. 'Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and clubhouse, and we ate lobster and caviar, drank champagne, and danced and had a great time. Now there's just a wasteland full of garbage and my friends look miserable. What happened?'

The devil looks at him, smiles and says,

'Yesterday we were campaigning.. ...

Today you voted!’

Brian commented, 'If only I wasn't so cynical....' Well, it's hard not to be, isn't it? A pastor I know writes all politicians off, so that you think, 'I might as well not vote.' It's true there's a limit to what they can achieve, but it's not true that they can't do any good or change society for the better. That's why we're told to pray for those in authority. Personally, I'll be asking canvassers where their man or woman stands on assisted suicide and care of the dying - you'll not be surprised to know. I was sent details of the Westminster 2010 Declaration which lists some major moral issues for our politicians to face; it's based on the premise that our society is based on Christian values and that we're in danger of losing them (www.westminster2010.org.uk). 

And I must say, as a counter to cynicism, there are those in Parliament who are not in it for the power or the money but 'to serve and not to seek for any reward save that of knowing that they do your (God's) will'. I guess we should pray and vote for them!

Sunny days

What’s more from Stanford they were being sent to the estate in the north of Abingdon. It was obviously more an administrative blip! Well, to err is human. Not surprisingly, our (former) local MP, Ed Vaizey, managed to make political satire at the Lib Dems’ expense out of the 40,000 mistakes. Not immensely logical but all’s fair in love and elections, I suppose.

You may remember I got a bit heated a year ago with Mark and Sparks about the lack of imagination of their delivery men when we ordered a wardrobe. A nice troubleshooter in the big boss’s office had said we’d get a ‘goodwill token’, but it never arrived. Then, out of the blue, last month I received an email explaining that for some reason my order hadn’t been recorded as complete on their system but to ignore their next notification which do the business. I thought, ‘Nothing ventured, nothing gained. So sent an email back saying, ‘Perhaps it’s incomplete because I never received that promised goodwill gesture!’ To my surprise, one came back from Victoria C. of Customer Services and due course a £50 store token followed. Which is what took us to Newbury on Friday last week. 

Another warm sunny day - we drove over the Downs, passed Snelsmoor Common with its primroses and down into Newbury. Previously we’ve gone round and round the houses to park. This time we reckoned following the disabled shopmobility signs was a good bet. And so it proved. We ended up in a multi-storey, next to the main shopping precinct. But even better, it lured us into Shopmobility for the first time. This is where you can hire out mobility scooters to go round the shops. I’ve avoided it in the past as I didn’t trust myself with a scooter weaving in and out of display stands in the shops, but we discovered they also lend out powered wheelchairs, which I’m used to. So we signed up and the very jolly man brought a wheelchair from their extensive store - and off we went. For the first time, on a shopping expedition, Jane didn’t have to put up with me whinging, like Smallweed in Bleak House (‘Shake me up, Judy!’), every time I wanted to see a different rail (‘No, over there, Jane!’). 

We enjoyed spending Sir Stuart’s money - and more, regrettably, and then sallied forth to Waterstone’s down the road. They were a bit short on Trollope, but I found The Last Chronicle of Barset and Sathnam Sangheera’s Boy with the Topknot (which I’ve wanted to buy for some time). This time it was thanks to a book token from the clergy of the Vale of the White Horse. 

Altogether an excellent expedition. As was Saturday’s. What an incident-full life we lead! It was the AGM of the Oxfordshire Branch of the MND Association, and the first time we’d managed to get to it. It was at the Holiday Inn on the edge of Oxford. It’s an impressive group, many of them having lost wives, husbands or parents to the disease, now devoting themselves to caring for others and raising money for the association. For example our friends, Jan and Joanne (who’s doing the Great North Run in September, in memory of her father, John, whom I wrote about last year : www.justgiving.com/forpops). After the business meeting, there was a sandwich lunch, and then a talk by Professor Colin Blakemore (who’s now president of the MNDA, and one of our top men on the brain). He’d a few weeks before given the Ferrier Prize lecture of the Royal Society, on ‘Plasticity of the brain: the key to human development, cognition and evolution’! We didn’t get a rerun of that lecture - quite - but we did get an incredibly comprehensible insight into the marvels of the human brain, and then into some of the advances in research most of which have been made recently. He wasn’t focusing on MND, but I don’t think anybody nodded off in the traditional graveyard slot. It was fascinating. I thought, I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

It was also nice to meet up with a number of friends whom we don’t often see, like Peter Durkin, the seemingly endless source of jokes, such as:

A woman walked into the kitchen to find her husband stalking around with a fly swatter.

‘What are you doing?’ she asked.

‘Hunting flies,’ he responded.

‘Oh...! Killing any?’ she asked.

‘Yep, three males, two females.’

Intrigued, she asks, ‘How can you tell them apart?’

‘Easy. Three were on a beer can; two were on the phone.’ !!!

Peter writes his jokes now, as he finds speaking much more difficult than me. But we’re still able to laugh together.  

Polling day gridlock

The end of the first week of campaigning... It didn't get off to a very auspicious start. Labour called the Tories a bunch of toffs. The Tories said, 'Not another five years of Gordon!' The Lib Dems said, 'A plague on both your houses!' Not exactly the height of political engagement. Meanwhile our local council (or its printers) has excelled itself. We were somewhat surprised to receive our polling cards which told us our polling station was in Kingston Bagpuize (about 10 miles away), while Rachel who lives in Watchfield found hers told her to go to Abingdon on 6th May (15-20 miles away). Jeremy Clarkson might approve, but I suspect the Greens would be sucking lemons. Apparently the printers made 'a mistake'. One has a picture of cars crisscrossing the district in a mad gridlock on general election day - or else a massive abstention of apathy!

To be continued...

They're off!

Well, that's what we needed to hear. No more phoney election, just one month of campaigning, and then the vote. Can I get in my plea quick, viz that you look at http://www.mnd2010.org/, which is the MND Association's push to persuade the next government to adopt a National Strategy for MND. 'A National Strategy will ensure people with MND receive high quality care and support from the NHS and social services, no matter where they live in the country. Help us raise the awareness of MND with those people who have the political power to make a difference.'


Having seen the 'chancellors' debate' a week ago, the parties don't seem to have much room for manoeuvre on the economic front, but there are quite a number of other important issues. Especially for those with faith, but not only, there's another site worth looking at, Christian Concern for our Nation http://www.ccfon.org/view.php?id=1043, which flags them up. Old habits die hard, and so I'm not likely to be using this blog as a party campaigning medium. I enjoyed, however, an interview with the 77-year old Michael Heseltine yesterday by Jim Naughtie about news coverage of political campaigns. He said in effect, 'You (journalists) try to elicit a gaffe first thing in the morning (eg. on the Today programme), and then you run it as the main news story throughout the day...' (and, thought I, you concoct it in the case of the Archbishop). And being a wily campaigner, he refused to be drawn on his divergent opinion on Europe from the main Tory line. 

And yesterday there was another Cambridge victory, when Emmanuel College trounced Oxford's St John's, in University Challenge! In terms of the boat race Oxford would have been at Hammersmith Bridge when Cambridge were finishing. I tried not to gloat, though I did join in the admiration of geekish Alex Guttenplan who seemed to combine a compendious general knowledge, lightning intellect with a disarming willingness to say, 'We don't know.' I imagine he'll end up a professor. I suspect the General Election will be somewhat closer, but this year's Oxford/Cambridge clashes augur well for the outcome...!

Maundy Thursday

There's now a Facebook fanpage for 'I Choose Everything'. It's got rather a long link address, and so I've put a link here. Just click on it and you'll be there. I'm sure you'll want to become a fan; it will keep you up to date with the progress towards publication.

Today's 1st April and I enjoyed learning about Shakespeare's French mother, Mary Ardennes (not Arden, you see). The Today programme reported that a locket had been found in his house in Stratford.... But I particularly enjoyed the Guardian report of Labour's supposed seven new adverts: 'Labour strategists look set to embrace the PM's reputation for anger and confrontation with a national billboard campaign.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/gallery/2010/apr/01/labour-gordon-brown-campaign-posters?picture=361041597

On the subject of politics, I was pleasantly surprised by Channel 4's potential chancellors' debate on Monday. It wasn't a tiresome 60 minutes of point scoring. It was actually a substantial discussion of how to deal with our current economic plight. I hope the election campaign doesn't descend to 'Punch and Judy' politics, which politicians once vowed to eschew. 

Meanwhile more seriously I gather my former colleagues went to the cathedral for the Blessing of Oils. It's a custom on Maundy Thursday to get oil for anointing blessed by the bishop. I'm not sure why. I think it's to do with priests renewing their vows. I used to like the Maundy Evening service, the last communion before Easter morning - the institution of the Lord's Supper, when I used to wash people's feet, recalling Jesus' new command (mandatum, hence maundy) to love each other as he loved us.  

I was thinking about that this afternoon while watching Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ. It's not a comfortable film to watch; in fact it's a long time since I've seen it. Canon Winkett says it has gratuitous violence. I suspect the Romans were gratuitously violent - think of gladiators, and crucifixions. But today I noticed the way it was cut between Pilate's handwashing and Jesus washing his disciples' feet - and then the cutting between crucifixion and last supper. And I love the ending: the stone rolled away, letting in the sunlight, and the restored body sitting there and then walking out into the new day, just a nail mark showing in the hand. It's powerful, the film and even more so the fact. No wonder people react so strongly for or against.