meVolution

#JeremyCorbyn #LabourPartyLeadership #TheDarkLord

Mea Culpa

Firstly, apologies to our International readers. We’re having a bit of a political spat here in the UK following our recent general election. Basically we’re in turmoil as a government with a majority – though elected by a minority – feel they have carte blanche to run roughshod over the weakest and most vulnerable in our society by incentivising the poor with less money whilst incentivising the rich with more.

Consequently a number of posts over the next few months may seem somewhat disconnected from the greater world at large.

Anyway…

That said, and with the above in mind, the last few days have seen me scrabbling around in the Springstien Archives by way of a late spring-clean on some old drives. By chance I stumbled upon a folder containing approximately seventy dusty sketches. I’m unsure of both the date and the reason they were written?

At a guess I’d say they are from 2001 and were written possibly for a wonderful animated British satirical TV show called 2DTV. The folder is tagged ‘Sketches – Un-Optioned’ so I presume they were never bought.

Either way, the interest, for myself at least, is implicit in the content. I’ve chosen the following two for no other reason than alphabetically they were near the top of the folder.

The first of the two is called ‘Coming Out‘, whilst the second is entitled ‘A Little List’. They both explore the nature of being a Tory in Britain at the turn of the millennium following the demise of Margaret Thatcher as a political force.

Backstory

For younger denizens of these shores, the term ‘A Little List‘ stems from a minister in Thatchers cabinet called Peter Lilley who famously had a ‘little list’ of dangerous individuals who he was to gleefully target in yet another round of swingeing spending cuts. One such enemy within were single parents.

The reference (in the same sketch) to Thatchers’s health originates from her anger at the Tory lurch from the extreme-right to the Blairite centre-right following her party’s defeat. Seeing her neo-liberal agenda ameliorated in favour of future electability actually made her ill to the point where her physicians prescribed a halt to any and all public speaking. A course of treatment greeted with some joy by what remained of her Nasty Party.

Their resonance echoes the current oppositions lurch to the right (now called the centre) in its search for electoral viability at the cost of integrity.

Coming Out Party – Sketch (circa 2001) Click on the Image above.

A Little List/War on Single Parents – Sketch (circa 2001) Click on the Image above.

Anvil Springstien.

Ten Days To Save The World –  Vote ‘Dark Lord’.

[Note: None of the telephone numbers, addresses, or email addresses in the sketches are current]