This morning when we awoke after a good night’s sleep, it was evident that it had rained locally overnight and so the day had quite a nice feel to it. As I was getting washed and dressed, I noticed with some dismay that my watch in which I had just put in a new battery had stopped once again as it did twice yesterday. I must have had this watch for 7-8 years I would imagine so I have to bow to the inevitable and buy another one. I went online and purchased a watch quite similar in design to my now defunct one and it ought to arrive within a day. I am making do with an emergency self winding watch which is a bit chunky but seems mega reliable.This morning, we are looking forward to a nice journey down into town where we can make contact with our Saturday crowd friends, all being well. The journey down was pleasant and we made contact with two of our friends, the third still having problems with her shoulder which stops her from getting out and about.
I suspect that the BBC has realised in its programming of the TV schedules that they should provide some alternatives to the wall-to-wall coverage of the Olympics games. So last week, as Meg and discovered at the very last moment, there was a showing of the classic film ‘Dr Zhivago’ which is the all time favourite of Meg and myself. This week there was a biopic of ‘The Great Caruso’ made in 1951 and starring the acting and singing of Mario Lanza. The reviewer for ‘The Times’ was faintly scabby about the picture calling the plot plodding and Mario Lanza’s acting wooden. But Meg and I enjoyed it tremendously if only because in both brooding appearance and in the range of voice, Mario Lanza was a fairly good match for Enrico Caruso himself as it was said of both the opera star and the singer portraying him that their careers first burned bright and then became burned out. The trouble with biopics is that one never knows how much is accurate biography and how much is invented for the sake of artistic license. But the thing that we did learn from the film review was that the Caruso family hated this biopic when it was released but, on the other hand, both Jose Carreras and Placido Domingo (i.e. two of the three of the ‘three tenors’ fame) were inspired to venture into opera as a career having seen the film.
Whilst the country is either on vacation or else glued to the Olympics, there is a surge of Far Right violence sweeping across the country. More than 30 protests – many of them organised by far-right activists – are set to take place this weekend in the wake of the Southport stabbings, according to Sky News analysis.They would follow violent protests earlier this week, which saw more than 100 people arrested outside Downing Street on Wednesday and 10 arrests in Sunderland on Friday night after a building next to a police station was set on fire and objects thrown at officers. The spark that set off these incidents of violence across the country was the stabbing and death of three young girls in Southport and the injury of several more and the adults who were trying to protect them. There was a certain of fake news that spread across the social media and the crimes were said to have committed by an illegal asylum seeker. When the identity of the disturbed 17 year old who perpetrated these acts of violence was allowed by court order to be released to the press, it turned out that much of the social media speculation was completely misplaced. But the fact that the disturbed young man came to these shores from Rwanda was enough for the hundreds of violent young thugs to wreak mayhem upon many British cities. The response of the government is to threaten harsh penalties for those successfully caught and then then successfully prosecuted but one suspects that the face recognition technology deployed by the police will be utilised to the utmost and there is always the possibility of miscarriages of justice if the technology is not 100% reliable.
The reports from the other side of the Atlantic are speculative in the extreme but fascinating nonetheless to those of following the US elections. Donald Trump’s selection of JD Vance as his running mate ‘may be one of the best things he ever did for Democrats,’ according to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. Seemingly every day, the Republican senator from Ohio has made headlines for resurfaced misogynistic comments, awkward campaign appearances and fringe policy positions on issues that the former president’s campaign has desperately been trying to avoid. Vance stepped off the stage of the Republican National Convention with the worst favourability ratio of any non-incumbent vice presidential candidate in nearly 45 years, while presumptive Democratic nominee Kamala Harris erased Trump’s leads in crucial swing states and saw a surge in donations within just weeks of her candidacy. He later was revealed as a close collaborator with the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 authors and a natalist evangelist with a history of supporting extreme ideas about abortion care and IVF. So the speculation is arising by the day that Vance may be such a liability to Trump that it is quite possible that he gets replaced before the election. This is quite a dilemma for Trump because to keep Vance will only hurt his cause whilst to get rid of him shows that he made a very bad judgement call in the first place. I doubt that the Republican’s system will allow Vance to get replaced at this stage but the Democrats must be rubbing their hands in glee as every new day more indiscretions seem to appear. But Trump has finally decided to undergo a TV debate with Harris on Fox TV which, one might imagine, might be slightly kinder to Trump than to Harris but we shall have to wait and see.
© Mike Hart [2024]