The Resistible Rise of Nigel Farage

Nigel Farage is a superficially "impish" version of a type that I find familiar, latterly from the ghastly networking breakfasts that I used to go to when I was trying to set up a business.   He is a commercial person who has not got much intellectual training behind him, and has spent his life concluding that what his "common sense" tells him must be right and true, because all the chaps in the saloon bar or at the nineteenth hole agree with him, largely because, like him, they are not strong on critical faculties, and their knowledge of the world, society, humanity, economics is restricted to the small number of things they have experienced.

Their views are comforting, because they do not encounter opposition or disagreement, since most of the people they meet are either their employees, or people similar to them.  When they do meet someone who disagrees, they can easily dismiss them as a "leftie" or a "nutter", or, perhaps a "foreigner".  

We all have a bit of "them-ism" in us.  Few of us can agree with the humani nil a me alienum puto (I don't find anything human is alien to me) of Terence - we all have our prejudices, our dislikes (one of mine being heavily blinkered small businessmen).  UKIP seems composed of people who have formed a party against everything and everyone that challenges their limited worldview.  Unhappily, there are many other people in the country who have had even fewer opportunities to understand the world and are happy to follow UKIP's lead.   Something is rotten in the state of England, and unfortunately it cannot all be put down to a scheming uncle.

If, as shorthand, and on the understanding that this is an over-simplification, I refer to the typical UKIP candidate/activist as a small businessman (women too sadly) then a great deal of their policy becomes clear. For years there have been various spokesmen (not women usually) for the Federation of Small Business(men) interviewed on the radio on phone-ins and consumer programmes, and they have usually argued fiercely against any improvement in conditions for workers... no statutory sick pay, no maternity leave, compassionate leave, flexible working, job-shares, paternity leave, adoptive parent leave.  Left to them, children would still be drawing coal trucks underground and going up chimneys.  Of course, not all small business operators are the same: we don't have employees in our business, Architectural Archaeology, so we haven't been destruction tested on these issues.

These views, dictated by common sense and self-interest have been transferred wholesale into the UKIP manifesto.  In addition, they apparently wish to privatise the NHS.   This is wonderfully Un-English/British of them.  It has long been known that large sections of the population would probably go to the stake for the NHS - it has been apotheosized during the 2012 Olympic opening ceremony.  Yes, GPs make mistakes (bad ones), yes people die, yes, there are useless individuals in the system - welcome to the real world... but on the whole, the UK is very proud of the NHS and loves it, warts and all.   Yet UKIPers, who claim to love their country, would deliver their fellow citizens to unaffordable insurance and illness and toothache and so on so that they could save a bit of money.

Why?  Because UKIPers are not really for anyone except themselves.  Their agenda is to reduce their own expenditure - they will pay less tax under their regime, unhealthy, disabled babies will not be born to be a burden on the state, the small businessmen will not have to subsidise the feckless and weak who get ill, or manage to have accidents, and this will mean more money for them.

This whole Poujardiste agenda is actually half-concealed, while they use people's ignorance and anxiety about "them" - whether these are Eastern European gypsies, or famine dodging Sudanese, to attract attention and support. The EU is composed of foreigners, so they can't care about us, so they must be screwing us in some way.  Foreigners wish to come here to work - how very dare they?!  Who would have thought people were so frightened about schools being full, about having to wait a little longer for a doctor?  Whatever happened to British pluck?  We are now such a nation of snivelling ninnies apparently, that we will tolerate suffering people being refused asylum, rather than have to spend an extra 30 minutes in an NHS waiting room.

UKIP shamefully like to try and use Christianity too - not because they are Christians, but to highlight the fact that they are not Muslims.  When Jesus said "who is my brother?" he meant everyone was, not just a few special people who were his siblings.  But if you ask Nigel and his chums "who is your brother?" their answer would probably be "Fuck 'em, I'm an only child."   Who was it who said the only true interest is self-interest?  The trouble with UKIPers is, they don't really have any other interests.

Astrology - a denunciation

I have always been interested in astrology - but it was something I renounced not long after Ned was born - I was persuaded by the more ardently Christian members of the family that it was the "devil's work" - and I ought to have faith in God.  So I obeyed this - sold my expensive astrology books to second hand bookshops - I made about £60 from this - nearly 20 years ago, and actually disposed of one of them in a bin in Burgess Park (or did I just dream that?)

The fateful events of 2009 drove me back to astrology in a big way - and I felt my choice was vindicated as I consulted ephemeris charts, found that Uranus was heavily implicated in the turns of events that year.  I thought that much of my "madness/love/delusion/creativity" that year was due to Neptune - things seemed to fit.  Unfortunately it was not enough to be aware, I came to lean on it - and expect things from it.  After my mother's death there was a crisis - partly because I had "predicted" her death that autumn - and I extricated myself a little - took a more objective view.

Then I became a follower of the dreaded Susan Miller.  Having previously dealt with my own chart and transits - and found them helpful, if not particularly exciting, I was suddenly dragged into a wildly optimistic monthly outlook - which usually, around this stage in the month began to look increasingly ludicrous.  This coincided with a point at which everything seemed to be coming up nettles - so I became fairly desperate for something to lighten the atmosphere.  The lure was that she made everything sound as if this was going to be the time when the tide turned.

A few nights ago I decided I would give it up.  (Until the September horoscope comes out).  I felt it was feeding expectations and adding to depression (see blog passim.).  It seemed to me that very few of the transits that were meant to be helpful were any help at all - Jupiter could do what it liked, nothing it did seemed to benefit me.  I watched our domestic/financial situation go from bad to worse, while the skies beamed upon me and told me I was living through a fortunate phase... God save me from the predictions of disaster.

And yet... underlying the perky chat from S Miller, there was a sense that some things were allied with the stars - the need for hard work and resilience - the underlying gloom engendered by Pluto-Uranus square, (my 3rd and 5th houses at odds might explain why communication, creativity and family matters are not going well).  And now, waking at 4 am and feeling the need to write this - while the Full Moon shines down.  Some sort of ending, some sort of crisis.  Having said all this, what difference will it make?  Well, I have deleted a number of files - but I can't help hoping that the  Jupiter sextile Mars  transit will have a positive effect.

Am I an idiot?
Well, yes, in scientific rationalist terms I am an idiot - I don't mind being a fool for Christ - but being a fool for a transit of Saturn is ludicrous. On the other hand, I would have to be in complete denial if I didn't notice that there had been certain correlations at significant times in my life with planetary activity.  Yes, I know... there isn't a direct "effect" - it's simply that the positions seem to reflect what's happening - not cause it.  And if you see a particular pattern coming up - you can anticipate certain conditions.  But the problem is not in our stars, but that we follow them, or believe in them too much.   I would still love to believe in the Jupiter/Mars transit - but I am fed up with disappointments.  And because of that, I will be reading my September horoscopes as usual, and wondering whether new moons will bring opportunities etc. and trying very hard to bury my hopes under several buckets of salty realism.