Britain heading for the sidelines – delusional, demented, daft and drunk

Outstanding article in The Times today by Matthew Parris about the Madness of King Boris. From the perspective of history, when it comes to be written, this will be seen as a period of national insanity. I remember Suez and the brave voices who spoke up against it – mainly from the Left. Whilst the most guilty men this time are the headbangers of the Tory Right (and beyond) the abject failure of Jeremy Corbyn to honour effectively Labour’s unequivocal 2015 manifesto pledge in favour of Britain in Europe was also culpable.

We know the dangers of rabid Nationalism and the horrors it brought. No British family in the twentieth century was untouched by it. My mother was bombed during the Blitz by the nationalist Nazis whilst my father was a Prisoner, in Siam, of the nationalist Japanese. In my own lifetime I have witnessed raw nationalism still extant in the dying days of the British Empire and in the equally imperial Soviet Union.

The “English exceptionalism” of Boris Johnson is no less than a resurgence of nationalism. It will lead to the break up of the United Kingdom , of course, as similar nationalist forces north of the border secede from the Union. And the Irish will unite, peacefully we must hope. Collateral damage of stupidity, but who can blame the Celts ?

Little England will be like the sad cousin in the family who went off the rails. You know, the one who took to the bottle and is an embarrassment at family gatherings to the extent that he stops being invited. We will sit on the sidelines pathetically waving our faded flag proudly boasting of the recovered sovereignty we never lost. Delusional, demented, daft and drunk. And do you know what might really hurt – no one in the real world will care. Our stock of goodwill will long since have vanished.