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Showing posts with label green. Show all posts
Showing posts with label green. Show all posts

Friday, 12 May 2017

The Politics of the Parrot

So: dearest Theresa is now playing the patriotism card whilst declaring her love for murdering innocent animals; to appeal simultaneously to both the rich backers who own her and the working classes that she despises but wants to vote for her, and definitely won't let the grubby little buggers publicly ask her any questions, whilst parroting her strong and stable motto.
Jeremy is having to prove how tough and strong he is by stating he is not a pacifist and would send the army to war at some point, if needs dictated. Perhaps even if needs don't dictate, or else what's the point having an army? Half the mp's in his own party publicly despise him, as do the media, and would happily knife him in the back at a moments notice, whilst parroting his own for the many motto.
Jeremy's leaked manifesto is microscopically examined point by point and costed by people who wouldn't vote for him anyway, yet no one questions how we can afford the billions to renew Trident, or how the bankers who almost brought this country to its knees and were bailed out by the public avoided prosecution, or how Brexit, hard or soft, will take us back to the 1870's, never mind the 1970's.
Nothing new from the media, just the same old ways of reporting everything; stock phrases, cut and pasted from previous elections. This one to make so and so sound good, that one to make so and so sound bad. Tired, lazy, can't be bothered click bait hackery; their own profession as out of touch with the people they depend on as the politicians, serving no one but their own wealthy owners.
Here in Colchester, Labour and the Greens have gone begging for the UKIP vote, (which the Tories will get anyway). I assume the Lib Dems will at some point; all of them arguing publicly and amongst themselves as to which of them is the only party that can unseat the Tories, a vote for any other party is a vote for the Tories, etc etc etc, blah blah blah blah blah.
And on it goes. Nationally and locally, the same old same old. Rhetoric, insults, posturing; claim and counter claim. Anything to score a point when political careers are at stake.
Am I the only one who is sick and tired of all of it? More and more of us benefit less and less, whichever party gets power. How demeaning is all of this, to us and to them? I've never felt more like not voting for anyone; never felt more ignored and more insignificant.
It's 2017 and we are still arguing over who funds education, the NHS, transport and necessary utilities when more and more people are relying on food-banks to survive, more and more people are suffering with physical and mental illness, whilst we fill our oceans with plastic, pollute our rivers and choke to death on exhaust fumes. More and more slipping through the system, yet at the same time we have more millionaires than ever. Hoofuckingrah!
Is this the best we can do as human beings? Does this serve us? Do we benefit any more from individual party politics with one prime minister elected, whatever their colour, whoever foots their bill?
At some point, somewhere, we are going to have to start talking to each other, all of us; putting differences aside and deciding priorities. Will this ever happen? I don't know, I genuinely don't know anymore. I know that if we don't, we will all lose (if we haven't already), whatever the result of the general election.

Wednesday, 15 October 2014

Green



For the Green Party in Colchester, 10th birthday bash, held at the Waiting Room. I was invited to perform (what a privilege), and decided to write something especially for the occasion. In a desperate attempt to be original I called it this!


Green

Green is the colour of my son's wellington boots
that he lets me wear for wet dog walks
around the village green.
Green
is all around us

England: still the land of pleasant green
with its little villages
and football pitches
cheese and onion crisp packets
and leaf strewn ditches.
Though fast becoming wrapped
in a cloak of lifeless grey
the woodland sacrificed
for the motorway.

Green was the colour of my Dad's estate car
he would drive us to the swimming pool in it
and himself to the pub
(and back again)
and once on holiday to the Isle of Wight.
But we all know that a car
even a green coloured one
is not very green.

Green is the colour of Spring
those little shoots that appear,
heralding the start of
another year.

The sea is sometimes green
a pea is green
it's also the colour
of mint ice cream which
even on a rainy day
eases the cares of life away.

I always ate my greens
especially on a Sunday.
They're good for you Mum would say
and she was right.
But now we all eat too much brown
and white.

Mum sleeps with the green now
she has for some time now,
green is the blanket
for her long goodnight.
And that's all right.
That's all right.