Maybe We Should Just Smile

Tuesday 31st January

Because in the end we have to; getting upset and crying won’t change things.

I was pretty unhappy in the small hours of June 24th last year as the early results were confirmed time and again and Brexit marched on to a narrow, but a victory nonetheless.  I hoped against hope that a new Leader of the Tories might seek a more neutral path; try to find a middle way between leaving and retaining the best bits of the EU.  At least we will have a real debate now in Parliament, and although I fully expect most M.P.s to allow the triggering of Article 50, there is still the chance of one or more amendments getting through.  And at last some real dissension.  Not that any that will change the suicidal course Mrs. May is taking.  She seems hell-bent on pleasing the Little Englanders and getting re-elected than she does in listening to commonsense.  But hey, all you can do is smile….

They say we get the Government we deserve, and maybe that is true.

And as America draws up the drawbridge and chooses an isolationist and Protectionist path, all we can do is smile again.  (And hope of course that it all doesn’t go too badly wrong.)  In the grand scheme of things it may not make that much difference.  And if it all goes wrong maybe people won’t be so daft next time…or maybe they will.  In a strange way the older I get the less I can really get upset by it all.   I do worry about the future for my Grandchildren, but maybe Global Warming and Roboticisation (is that a word even?) and Artificial Intelligence will be far more profound problems they may have to face than a Billionaire lunatic on the loose.

And the World is remarkably resilient too.  We have survived too horrific World Wars and each time managed to build a better world.  We have this strange ability to both fuck things up and come up with solutions almost at the same time.  So, my advice to you all is simply to smile.  Too many mirrors in the world to do anything else I am afraid.