Night’s candles are burnt out, and jocund day stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.
Spanish life is not always likeable but it is compellingly loveable.
Living La Vida Loca in Spain and Galicia
God knows, reports of illegal constructions and deserved/cruel demolitions are not infrequent in Spain - including the houses of (conned) Brits bought in good faith Down South - but I was surprised to read yesterday that, in Vigo alone, more than a thousand homes had been saved rom demolition by some happy judicial verdict. I was even more surprised - though shouldn't have been - to see the size of some of the flat blocks that had been illegally constructed.
I was less surprised to read that, because of local political wrangling - a hospital down on the Costa del Sol has been finished but unopened for some time. And might not be so for a while yet.
Reports of corruption are, likewise, not a rare occurrence here in Spain. The latest I've read of is 5 councillors of his own party demanding the resignation of a mayor in Ourense province, for ‘misuse’ of party funds.
For reasons unknown to me, yesterday was Bats Day in Pontevedra. Possibly not as popular as usual during the Covid crisis . . .
Another foto of the 'world-first' lighting system on our O Burgo bridge:-
María's Dystopian Times, Day 15. What happens when an ex British colony goes wrong and becomes unrecognisable from the mother country . . .
The UK
When we need innovative leadership, the government harangues remote workers back onto commuter trains to save commercial landlords and Pret. It won’t admit “normal” is dead, living patterns have changed, whole professions are defunct, cities must repurpose or die. It should convene entrepreneurs, economists, tech experts and social forecasters to imagine the products, services and possibilities of a new world. Young people are best placed to intuit the way forward but need investment, support and guidance.
The Way of the World
Here's the reaction of 'Grumpy Old Man' to an article on how tough kids have it these days. I'm guessing we're of a similar age and were raised in similar circumstances: I didn’t realise that I was brought up in such a golden age. A golden age when there was still rationing. A golden age when we had no central heating and the windows were frozen on the inside in the morning. When we had no fridges, washing machines, tumble dryers, dishwashers or microwaves. A golden age when we had to walk to a phone box if we wanted to talk to our friends, and we had to catch the bus to school, or even walk. A golden age when we had to go to the library if we wanted to find out any information. A golden age when we worried, not about our exam results, but whether Mr. Kennedy or Mr. Kruschev would launch their missiles first. A golden age when inflation was nearly 30% and mortgage rates were 15%. ¡A golden age when women had to give up work when they got married, when rooms to let said “No blacks, no Irish and no pets”, when homosexuality was illegal. I’m not saying young people today don’t have problems, just that every generation has its own, and has to work through them.
I recall all of this - except the rationing - but particularly the ice on the inside of my bedroom windows . . .
The USA
The Democrats' embrace of BLM may be about to monumentally backfire: The anarchy caused by the Black Lives Matter movement has given Donald Trump's campaign an impetus it had so far lacked. See the article below. And weep.
English
The title of this song - top of the US 'pop chart' in 1950 - is If I knew you were coming I'd have baked a cake. In standard British English, this would be the shorter: If I'd known you were coming etc.. But what makes it odd is that the singer is American and most(all) Americans I know - and most Europeans - would say If I would have known you were coming etc.' Feel free to disagree.
Finally . . .
Life is full of coincidences, some of them more incredible than others. Yesterday, in a book on groupthink I read of the volcano of Mauna Loa in Hawaii. Earlier in the day, in a novel by David Mitchell I'd read of a mountain called Mauna Kea in Ha-Why(Hawaii). Another volcano there.
This is said to be the answer to an exam question but is possibly a very, very old joke:-
Q: Why does Judaism practice circumcision?
A: To get better at it.
THE ARTICLE
The Democrats' embrace of BLM may be about to monumentally backfire: The anarchy caused by the Black Lives Matter movement has given Donald Trump's campaign an impetus it had so far lacked. Freddy Gray, editor of Spectator USA
The Black Lives Matter movement could sink the Democrats and ensure Donald Trump's reelection. If I had made that statement a few weeks ago, you might have thought me mad. After the police killing of George Floyd on May 25, the world was horrified. The Democratic Party made considerable political hay from massive and widespread protests and riots which followed. Joe Biden, still then the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, and his top allies all firmly aligned themselves with BLM. They repeated BLM slogans, took the knee, demanded radical change - then enjoyed a surge in the polls.
Now, however, we are approaching the end of August, the riots haven't stopped, and the Democrats' embrace of BLM is starting to look like a monumental mistake. Every night, across America, cars and shops are being smashed or set alight and property defaced with graffiti saying "BLM". The worst affected areas, in cities such as Portland, Oregon or Seattle, Washington, now resemble war zones. American voters are sickened by videos of police killing black citizens. But they are also increasingly disgusted by endless images of carnage and they are disturbed by the radical BLM blather that senior Democrats seem much too keen to echo. Every sane person agrees that black lives matter, but BLM's other big slogan, Defund the Police, starts to sound like madness when homicide rates are spiking and maniacs exploit the lawlessness. BLM spokesmen often encourage violence, threatening to burn places down if they don't get what they want.
Voters find that off-putting. An interesting new Civiqs survey shows that, in the immediate aftermath of Floyd's death, support for BLM surged among non-college educated white people in crucial election battleground states such as Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan. By the end of July, a majority of those same voters said they opposed the movement.
Biden finally took to Twitter this week to say that "burning down communities is not protest; it’s needless violence". But that sounded a lot like too little too late.
In 1972, Richard Nixon, a president less loved than perhaps even Donald Trump, managed to win his second term in a landslide by campaigning against crime and social decay.
Who knows what will happen in this mad year, but the widespread sense of BLM anarchy has given Trump's campaign an impetus it had hitherto lacked.
The BLM riots have also validated the other big Republican point: the media's perception of what is happening in America is hopelessly warped by its Left-wing perspective and its loathing of Donald Trump.
Over the weekend, the disturbing clip of a policeman shooting a black man, Jacob Blake, emerged from Kenosha, Wisconsin. A CNN reporter covering the unrest was filmed standing in front of a raging street fire as the caption on screen below him called the protests "largely peaceful".
People aren't stupid. The Democrats could learn an old lesson the hard way. Don't play with fire. You might get burned.
* A terrible book, by the way. Don't be tempted to buy it, unless you're a very religious Protestant.