Pondering assassination
I was down in the village on Thursday afternoon.
Naturally I had to visit the coffee shop. Actually Herself insists I go for a coffee every week as she says I need an hour to myself. She’s very kind in that respect.
It was lovely, sitting out on the terrace in the sunshine, I was joined by Dave the owner who uses my visit as an excuse for a fag-break. We were even joined by the Marry Widow who as usual was absent mindedly fussing over something she had lost or couldn’t remember. She’s very confusing is that woman.
Amyhows during a break in one of the Widow’s monologues Dave made an announcement. He told us that the village was being shut down at Saturday lunchtime. I immediately assumed someone was trying to film something, but he said no, that Our Glorious new Teashop Simple Simon Harris was bringing his family out for lunch. I asked where. “Here” says he. “Not across the road?” says I. “No. Here” he announced.
To be honest, if his story is true then I am delighted. There is another coffee shop in the village straight across from “my” one, and there is constantly a blast of rivalry between the two. My one tends to win hands down every time because apart from being owned by a lovely couple, it has a nice terrace out front on the sunny side of the street whereas the other place always looks gloomy and has uncomfortable wooden benches out front in constant shade. The owner of the other place never misses an opportunity though to brag about his place so if he had been hosting the Teashop’s lunch we’d never hear the end of it.
Now I never know when Dave is winding me up or trying to wind the Widow up, but to be fair he never knows when I’m winding him up. But he seemed sincere and said that there was to be a ring of steel around the village with no access for us mere Plebs in case presumably we were tempted to take a pot shot at him.
“Do they seriously think we’d waste a bullet on him?” I mused. “Ah no” says Dave. “He’s scared shitless that Mary Lou [leader of Sinn Féin] will find him.
For once my sympathies would be with Simple Simon.
Faced with Mary Lou, I think I’d take my chances with a bullet.
I’ve pondered assassination *purely as a thought experiment* before. I’ve concluded that even if you could magically remove an ‘evil’ politician or tyrant there’s no guarantee that they wouldn’t be followed by a spasm of chaos as the new person took over – somebody who might even be worse. And that’s assuming the main stream media report the ‘evil’ nature of the tyrant accurately.
Assasination only works in a situation where a country seems to be in the thrall of an individual. Hitler was an obvious example in history while now it seems to be Trump, Nuttynyahoo ;or whatever his name is] and Putin. I can’t imagine anyone filling Trump’s shoes but Putin might well have some equally mad ex-KGB type to fill the gap. As for yer man in Israel, a lot of his own are turning against him.
SO sadly assassination doesn’t seem to have its appeal any more.