FINISHED READING - Thomas Cromwell by Diarmaid MacCullough

This finely written and absorbing biography of Henry VIII's most effective, yet least loved, minister is a compelling page turner to read. Even though the historical story itself is well known. That it should come out now must at least be in part because of Hilary Mantel's heavily fictionalised and Booker Prize winning Wolf Hall Trilogy.

Like Mantel, Diarmaid MacCullough has the unenviable task of bringing the man to life from often such slender sources. For the historical biographer, making up what's missing and going straight for fiction, is not a route you can take. Informed conjecture and supposition, simply putting two and two together, is how you fill in the gaps in the narrative. With Cromwell there are significantly more gaps and traces that need following up and fleshing out, to give a better sense of the man. Other people's recorded impressions are important, Eustace Chapuys, the Emperor Charles Vs ambassador for instance. An unusual level of respect and a friendly relationship developed between them, but one has not to forget that what his communications back to his master will always be slanted towards what he wants to hear.

Immediately prior to Cromwell's fall and execution, it is clear that a large part of his correspondence is disposed of, lest it proved to be too useful to his accusers, by adding to the incriminating evidence for treason. So what is left is only half of a conversation. Mostly of people are either writing to Cromwell, or are people who knew him writing of him to others, or about him after his fall from power. All done with a large dollop of hindsight. From this McCullough skilfully weaves a different sense for what the man may have been like. Cunning - very likely, a bit of a chancer - true, able to improvise policy on the hoof - certainly. But he always semed to have a clear idea of where things might go should he be able to either bend the kings will in his direction or more often take full advantage of Henry's whims or disinterest when they arose.

Henry himself, later spoke of regretting the loss of his most loyal servant. Chosing, as he was often prone to, to place the blame on others for this rather than his own vengeful anger. Cromwell's loyalty to him was certainly there, but also an ongoing and developing religious reformism that he found ways of slipping past Henry disguised beneath the king's own rapacious desire for increased sovereignty and money.

The idea for dissolving monasteries to fund other projects came from his former master Cardinal Wolsey. Once the idea of breaking with Rome, as a way to resolve the King's Great Matter over his marriage came to the fore, the dissolving of these papist institutions was not rolled out fully formed. It evolved in fits and starts, and its clear Cromwell himself was pragmatic and didn't initially think a root and branch fundamentalist removal was necessary. That it went as far as it did was entirely at the King's behest. Though when it came to his worst intentions and actions Henry always appeared to find ways to make them appear to be other people's ideas. Particularly if it went wrong or his subjects disapproved..

Stern portraits by Holbein don't really give you the real sense for what the qualities of Cromwell were. Who rose from being the son of a brewer to becoming the Earl of Essex. He lived close to the edge of disaster many times, surviving - Wolsey's infamy - Henry's marriage crisis - the  Pilgrimage of Grace where the rebels all blamed him not the king - until the arranged marriage to Anne of Cleve's proved to fatefully trip him up. 

One of his main legacies to us in modern Britain is the increased centrality of Parliament as a governing body, beginning to act independent of the Monarchy. The dissolution itself profoundly changed the religious and cultural landscape of England. From which many current day attitudes towards Catholicism and overseas bureaucratic institutions, have their origins.

The English Reformation did not arise out of religious principles, but was driven primarily by the lust of its sovereign, his greed for increased sovereignty, self interest and a pecuniary driven land grab on a huge scale. As a period in history it holds many echoes of the Brexit movement and the divisive atmosphere of contemporary Britain, where 'Remainers' are the equivalent of the Anti-Christ. Increased sovereignty may be what grabs the headlines, when more importantly 'for whose economic benefit' is the question that should really be being asked.

CARROT SCORE - 6/8

ARTICLE ~ The Brexit Creed

We believe in the one true Brexit,
the Farage is almighty,
maker of Us and Them,
of all things risible and divisible.

We believe in one Almighty Boris,
the Only Begotten Son of Brexit,
born of the Farage which he has conveniently forgotten.
Brexit means Brexit,
Leave means Leave,
A Hard Brexit is the True Brexit,
begotten, not negotiated, endorsed by the Farage
As through him all things are made.
For the democratically deficient, for their salvation
Boris came down to us from America
And via the Holy Gove was incarnate of the Virgin May,
and became Foreign Secretary.
For our sake he was crucified with accountability,
he suffered death and was buried,
and rose again on the third day
in accordance with the Deadlock.
Ascended unto heaven
and is seated upon the right hand of Farage.
They will come again in glory
to rule over the doubters and remainers
For their vanity hath no end.

We believe in the Holy Grail, the Sovereignty,
the bringer back of control,
that proceeds from the Farage and the Boris,
that with the Farage and the Boris it is adored and glorified,
endorsed through the divine oracle of the Daily Mail.

We believe in the one, whole and undiluted Brexit.
A baptism of fire for remainers and compromisers, sinners in word and deed
We have faith in the resurrection of the Empire
the land of milk and honey, in England's right place and true entitlement on earth .

Amen.

DEMOCRATIC DEMENTIA ~ The Early Symptoms

The most common early symptoms of democratic dementia are:

Memory loss
Declining memory, especially short-term memory, is the most common early symptom of democratic dementia. People with ordinary forgetfulness can still remember other facts associated with the thing they have forgotten. For example, they may briefly forget their next-door neighbour's name but they still know the person they are talking to is their next-door neighbour. A person with democratic dementia will not only forget their neighbour's name but also the context.

Difficulty performing familiar tasks
People with democratic dementia often find it hard to complete everyday tasks that are so familiar we usually do not think about how to do them. A person with democratic dementia may not know in what order to put clothes on or the steps for preparing a meal.

Problems with language
Occasionally everyone has trouble finding the right word but a person with democratic dementia often forgets simple words or substitutes unusual words, making speech or writing hard to understand.

Disorientation to time and place
We sometimes forget the day of the week or where we are going but people with democratic dementia can become lost in familiar places such as the road they live in, forget where they are or how they got there, and not know how to get back home. A person with democratic dementia may also confuse night and day.

Poor or decreased judgement
People with democratic dementia may dress inappropriately, wearing several layers of clothes on a warm day or very few on a cold day.

Problems with keeping track of things
A person with democratic dementia may find it difficult to follow a conversation or keep up with paying their bills.

Misplacing things
Anyone can temporarily misplace his or her wallet or keys. A person with democratic dementia may put things in unusual places such as an iron in the fridge or a wristwatch in the sugar bowl.

Changes in mood or behaviour
Everyone can become sad or moody from time to time. A person with democratic dementia may become unusually emotional and experience rapid mood swings for no apparent reason. Alternatively a person with democratic dementia may show less emotion than was usual previously.

Changes in personality
A person with democratic dementia may seem different from his or her usual self in ways that are difficult to pinpoint. A person may become suspicious, irritable, depressed, apathetic or anxious and agitated especially in situations where memory problems are causing difficulties.

Loss of initiative
At times everyone can become tired of housework, business activities, or social obligations. However a person with democratic dementia may become very passive, sitting in front of the television for hours, sleeping more than usual, or appear to lose interest in hobbies.


If you are experiencing any of these symptoms or are concerned about a friend or relative, visit your doctor and discuss your concerns.

* Source https://www.alz.co.uk/info/early-symptoms  Alzheimer's Disease International ~ with one minor editorial  adjustment.

ARTICLE ~ When Democracy Has Cut Its Own Throat

I keep waiting for the residual anger to subside, but over two years later, it hasn't. The moment my thoughts go anywhere near the B word I step potentially onto an escalator towards a self enfeebling frustration. Every week appears to provide more fuel to feed this fire. I'm still hopeful for equanimity on the subject to come, or at the very least apathy. But so far its no show on both counts. The  worrying thing is that I fear I'm far from alone in this.

Merely to mention the B word in polite conversation these days makes everyone go stiff and ready to be on the defensive. You never know the lie of the land ahead, there might be 'one of them' someone who holds a different opinion to you, potentially hostile territory anywhere.There seems to be an elephant under the carpet in every room. Its as if The B word is a trigger word releasing pre-programmed responses, turning the minds of previously reasonable people into folk who only speak in slogans, loudly volatile and beligerent.

I've never voted Tory, voted Labpur only twice, Green once, mostly it was LibDem until their foolish Faustian pact with the Tory's. I voted tactically last time, simply to prevent a Tory from getting in. In a fair and fully functioning modern democracy you shouldn't have to do that. I've got used to wasting my vote on a party with no chance of getting represented or under represented in Parliament due to the gerrymandered nature of the majority vote system. I vote, but as the options increasingly narrow, I do so with ever diminishing enthusiasm and increasing frustration. The political response to the Dumb Ref result of ' any majority will do', silenced my voice, creating another democratic deficit withdrawl from my goodwill account.

Dumb Refs are generally bad democracy masquerading as good. Used by governments often split within their own party on an issue, that wants to shift that division, responsibility and any potential blame, external to themselves. To bury it in the 'democracy' of public opinion. Cross your fingers and hope that with effective brainwashing by the media the people will do what you want them to. Ah, the fool Cameron, where are you now? That it made a whole swathe of society feel like their opinion suddenly mattered and be effective for the first time, tells you how broken Parliamentary Democracy has become. Its ironic that they would give Parliament the finger whilst at the same time returning it full sovereignty.

We have also been gifted those divisive terms Remainer's and Leaver's too. Fracturing cohesion, unity, tolerance, understanding, reasonableness and compassion for others and other people's opinions~ giving a voice and platform to the Riff Raff the darker shadowy beasts in society. There's been a lot of mock hand wringing about the Leaver's being left behind and democratic deficits. I can tell you from my point of view, you don't have to be an Leaver to feel left out of the conversation. its happening all the time.

This has been accompanied and fed by the rise and rise of 'the untruth.' People sporting noses as big as Pinocchio's are unquestioningly believed, as they wave national myths and prejudices around like Febreeze. Allowing the Riff Raff to adopt the Dumb Ref as a patriotic cause.

The result was closely hung. The result of the binary Yes/No vote gave politicians democratic legitimacy to do whatever they wanted to do in the first place, and claim they are carrying out the B result. Hoping there will be a dividend for the fortunes of their own party. Seeing that the country is so divided, you could've tried to find where a unifying consensus might lie on the B word, or you could say 'the winner takes it all' and give a V sign to everyone else, whilst elbowing your way towards the TV cameras, like Boris does. All the talk is of 'taking back control' but you have to ask for the benefit of whom. Have the electorate unwittingly become a tool in someone else's agenda? Shadowy, but wealthy individuals who's intentions are likely to be less democratically accountable than the European Commission's

So a small majority is repackaged as 'the will of the people'. The country fracturing further into countless pseudo 'religious' sects of believers over what the B word actually means. Each of them holding aloft 'the truth' - its all so simple, why is it taking so long? Because it is neither simple nor speedy to do. I would have resigned myself to B had I not felt that the bouncers on its door were aggresively preventing me from entering the debate.

Say you are a company with shareholders, and you had a new financial strategy for the company but needed to get the shareholders backing before launching it. Say the result was 52% for the proposal, though a majority, you might consider it an insufficient endorsement to go ahead with your strategy, and go back to the drawing board.  With shareholders you are looking for a decisive incontrovertible thumping majority, not any old majority will do. It has to be a majority that will unify and pacify dissenters, not fuel them. The Dumb Ref result wasn't thumping or conclusive and hence failed in its primary objective to resolve the issue for a generation.

Ordinary people, media, government and Parliament mindlessly babble slogans like 'B means B', 'Leave means Leave.' But its all a bit like the Emperor's New Cloths with everyone behaving as if they knew exactly what 'the will of the people' was, and what the B word really meant, whilst leaving nearly half of the country completely out of the conversation. Untruth becomes Truth, further corroding peoples trust and faith in democracy, the media and civil institutions. The Government's way of responding to the Dumb Ref and how its handled the negotiations with the EU, has provided us with a classic example of what Really Bad Democracy looks like. The words arrogant, entitled and self-deluded describing some of its least worst characteristics.

Carrying out the consequences of the B word was always going to be a bit like a heart transplant operation, a good chance of survival if you are patient, clear what you want, plan, prepare well and stay focused. But if you are impatient, unprepared, unclear what you want and lose your focus all the time, so when it all goes tits up you just rip out the old heart and thrust in the new. Something is going to die.

Our Parliamentary representatives are trying to find their way through a maze that has no map. We should not be at all surprised, nor blame them alone for what is really of our collective making. They very accurately reflect us. We are all floundering in a chaotic sea, but not personally wanting to own that chaos. Not one of us feels willing to reach a consensus about a way forward for the country, one that everyone, Remain or Leave, can get behind. We all want our own way to prevail, and democracy simply cannot function in an inflexible scenario. Trenchant divisions repeatedly slit the throat of compromise.

Out of the 17th Century Civil War came the creation of Parliamentary Democracy, beginning when Parliament executed its own King. Let's hope that something regenerative happens to our sense of decency and democracy post B.  But at present we are still in an idiotic Civil War between Remainer's and Leaver's. After B happens, it won't be over, because unrealistic promises have been made and there will be a day of reckoning for them all at some point. This could get nasty.

With democratic liberal society reputationally in such a bad state, people may be tempted to grasp for simpler more authoritarian certainties. If so, if you are not white, from another country, or simply different from the perceived norm, beware. Whilst deeply distrustful of Union Jack waving populist patriotism, I do care about the future of the country I was born in. I'm fearful for where all this going to lead, I really hope to be proved categorically wrong, but its looking like where we are heading is not going to be a good place, not a good place at all. 

The consequences of the B word will be a Revolution of sorts. Revolutions tend to have just one aim, to topple a dictator, remove a despotic King, to change a countries political or religious orientation, or to liberate an oppressed people. But once that aim is achieved nine times out of ten no one has a fully worked out a plan for what to do next. In that vacuum arises anarchic situations around which the Riff Raff circle. Their bull dogs sniff the air and get a sense for 'when Democracy has cut its own throat' so they can come out to feast on its carcass.