Politics As Panto

I try as little as possible to listen to the news, and aside from one or two columnists, I avoid the mainstream press. Like an increasing number of people who reject the mainstream media I get the bulk of my news and information via the web - including a range of scientific and political blogs (including spiked online, climate resistance, EUReferendum, Autonomous Mind, cafe Hayek, Watts Up With That, Indymedia and others). However, try as I must I do occasionally slip up and catch a blast of something noxious from the radio or TV. Such was the case yesterday, when the non-headlines were all about Theresa May, Ken Clarke and whether a cat is legally qualified to decide on deportation for criminals, or not.

This is, of course, yet another example of politics as panto - the cat was there, so was the villain, all we needed was Theresa May to don her panto boots and Ken Clarke to slip into his ugly sister outfit. In the real world, it's all bollocks. What the press were doing is selling us soap opera headlines about splits in the government, complete with tales of bitter in-fighting. Politics as entertainment. Noticeably absent from the story was the reality that the whole thing is decided elsewhere - Europe trumps Westminster, as should be clear to anyone with half a brain cell still functioning.

And, as should be clear as day, this government is not about to take us out of the EU or withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights. It's play acting, the whole thing. The media know this, and yet they play their part in the game. Even the most brain dead of Tories must realise by now that their leaders owe allegiance to the greater state, not the tiny province we inhabit.

While they try desperately to breathe life into the stinking corpse that is the British body politic, the reality is that increasing numbers of people are waking up to the looming disaster. The sinking of the Euro will cause more pain than most care to think about. And when it gets bad, then the calls for the political class to be called to account will be impossible to ignore. The beggared populations of Europe will need to take revenge on those who have caused this mess.