I've seen a fair few British Prime Ministers come and go. The earliest I know I have actual memories of was the Tory PM Alec Douglas-Home who came just before Labour's Harold Wilson. Oddly enough Mum and Dad seemed to have some respect for the fellow, regarding him as a decent sort of bloke. Not sure how die-hard Labour supporters reached that conclusion, but it was a sign of a fundamental sanity in politics as they were practised back in the day. Since then there have been a fair few leaders I have roundly detested, but even at their egregious worse (I'm thinking of Thatcher here, who Mum utterly detested) I didn't doubt a basic competence in them and their administrations.
I suppose that's what's so strange about current circumstances. The lack of even entry-level competence in relation to the current UK government, and the grotesquely stark absence of anything approaching a sense of integrity, is both comical and frightening. How did we get to this place? (Fortunately, my happy sojourn in a very Far Place means the question only really troubles me when I watch Sky News or read British newspapers, and it's fairly easy to avoid both - or just turn to the football results instead.)
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