Last night, I watched the UK runner, Josh Kerr, whose ambition it was to land a gold medal in the 1500 metres. Although he was in the lead with a few metres from the tape, he was so intent on beating his long time rivalI(which he did) that an American runner ‘snuck up’ on the outside with an incredible sprint to secure the gold medal for the US. Later on in the evening, I took the opportunity to Skype my University of Winchester friend and we were chatting with each for the best part of a couple of hours. We share a lot of notes as well as emotional support concerning the condition of our respective wives who both have long term health conditions and we had not been in touch for some weeks and hence the long Skype call. So it was fairly late when I got to bed but Meg and I both seemed to have quite a good night’s sleep. This morning, being a Thursday, is my shopping day and it was not long after breakfast when our sitter arrived, a young psychology graduate with an incredibly sunny disposition, so I got the shopping sone and then we took Meg into the kitchen so that the carer and myself could put the shopping away.
Overnight, we awoke to what must be good news. Yesterday evening, the police were intimating that they might have to attend up to 100 Far Right demonstrations or more accurately confrontations right across the country. But the government and police are determined to crack down hard on this Far Right thuggery and already some of the rioters have appeared before courts and have been sentenced to quite hefty prison sentences. The government machine is also publishing the mug shots of those given a custodial sentence and the hope is that this will act as a deterrent to demonstrations in the next few days ahead. But what happened last night was remarkable. It looks as though Anti-racist groups as well as ordinary citizens had come out in force to defend their communities against Far Right attack. In particular, as the Far Right were intending to target hotels in which it is known that asylum seekers have been given accommodation, then the anti-racist groups had managed to assemble great numbers in front of the hotels and other Far Right targets to form a massive human shield. So when the Far Right did turn up, it was not in the anticipated numbers and they seemed powerless to vent their ill-will when faced with the massed ranks of the individuals across the country. So they generally slunk away without causing any of the mayhem that we have come to expect in the past few days and the government, police and most of the rest of the country must be breathing a massive collective sigh of relief. So far, the Government strategy of confronting the Far Right with immediate force and judicial sanctions seems to be working but of course we shall have to see what happens in the weekend ahead. The more cynical amongst us are crying out for some rain (as indeed it has rained today) because this always seems to have a dampening effect upon those who wish to continue the rampages of the past few days. The government is also intending to pursue those who use the social media to promote random acts of violence across the community and are also trying to hold the social media companies themselves to account but I doubt that they have the wherewith all to challenge the social media companies head on.
In the late morning, we spent a certain amount of time watching the Olympics. We witnessed some sailing although it is a little difficulty to discern what is going on at times, quite a lot of the mens spring board diving (at which the two Chinese athletes excelled) and our two divers made a bit of a hash of things after their success in the synchro diving and finally some Taekwondo which did not interest us greatly. Then I pressed on with making a stir-fry of a fairly traditional nature for me (onions, sweet peppers, fragments of ham ends, tomatoes, petit pois, some gravy leftovers, a diced apple, some sultanas and a dessert spoonful of brown sugar, served on some basmati rice and with a big dollop of yogurt. I always tend to make a it too much of this mixture but I can always eat up the rest as a bite of supper. After that, having enjoyed ‘Pride and Prejudice’ so much over the last few days, we followed it up with ‘Sense and Sensibility’. This was a complete film but we watched the first half of it and will follow up with the second half tomorrow.
On the other side of the Atlantic, it looks as though Kamala Harris is slowly starting to pull ahead of Donald Trump in the race to the White House. One particular tactic of the Harris team, particularly after the choice of a running mate for Harris, is to poke fun at Trump, repeating the observation that he and his coterie are weird. Politicians can often cope with direct attacks but to be made fun off or be ridiculed, they all seem to find very difficult.There are some indication s also that Trump and the Trump campaign is imploding, or at least finding if difficult to cope with attacks made upon them. Trump’s running mate, Vance, attended a meeting of Republicans the other day which was very sparsely attended and his past pronouncements on women has made him the object of ridicule. Trump himself seemed to be promising that if Christians voted for him, they would never need to vote again – all of this adds to the sense of weirdness and unreality.The whole election, though, will be decided by comparatively few voters in about half a dozen swing states. It is almost certain, though, that if Trump loses the election narrowly, he will cry cheat, refuse to accept the result and bring out his supporters onto the streets. So we may see something approaching a civil war after the November elections.
© Mike Hart [2024]