Just Three Pricks.

I was trying to put my finger on what the news this week reminded me of. Something to compare it all to. And then it hit me, very cleanly. A medal table – the Olympics, or a football league, whatever you want. Watching the push and pull at the top, no, the bottom. And this would be a medal table or a football league dominated by three. Three contenders that just wouldn’t let up. Of course, the news this week hasn’t been about medals so much as dirt. The dirt of arrogance and privilege. The dirt of realising that sometimes it won’t all work out, regardless of how special you are. As the days have unfolded the headline of the hour has shimmied and darted, almost constantly, starring three of the biggest dickheads you’re likely to meet in 2022. This has been the week of Novak, Boris and Andrew. Djokovic, Johnson and Windsor, the world’s least reliable firm of solicitors.

And I am being literal. Last night it was Andrew in front, with Boris drifting slightly and Novak really starting to fade a bit. On the way to work this morning Boris (and those parties) was back on top, Andrew right up behind him and bringing up the rear was Novak. Novak who? And then, like a particularly unwelcome phoenix from the shitted fireplace of infamy, up comes exactly that Novak again to storm in front once more. And every hour the pack will be reshuffled; today, tomorrow, but hopefully not forever. Each of the three will jostle for the most unwelcome attention they’re ever likely to want, but at least it will serve as a timely reminder that mud most definitely does stick.

From best to worst, well that’s a tough one. Novak, as a personality, has become increasingly eccentric (not the good kind of eccentric) and, worse, needy. Yes, he is a formidable player, but he cannot assume to demand the love of everyone who watches him. With his continued success, as his old war horse competition expose their exhaustion, he has seen it fit to hoist himself up as the greatest, when we all know that true greatness is rarely a comfortable bedfellow of arrogance (Muhammad Ali was an exception, not a rule). That he remains such a hero to many is an achievement, but the reality is that as a role model he should just get on with it and have a jab or three. Personally I don’t care if he is allowed to stay in Australia or not, but for all the wrong reasons he has shown it might serve some good to not have him play tennis while he’s there.

Boris, a man who is no stranger to gaffs and pratfalls, has never looked so beleaguered. Here is a man who is clinging onto power simply because there is no one else left to take it off him and wield it any more effectively. Battered, buggered, balder-dashed Boris; the man can’t catch a break. And nor should he. For unlike Covid, this party time mess that he’s in is one entirely of his own making. He has shown he either has no control or no concern, and whether it’s one, the other or both it draws acute attention to exactly why he is not the man that the country thought (but not necessarily hoped) it would get for the great leap forward. Frankly, I don’t really care all that much if there were parties; we’re used to politicians being hypocrites, but again it is the sheer arrogance that baffles. I wonder what politicians get into politics for. It rarely seems to be to serve the people; how can you when you’re busy serving oneself? Every day brings a new story, and now the government are even apologising to the Queen; as if she hasn’t got enough to think about.

Which brings us nicely to Prince Andrew, who is such a prick we should really just fire him hard into space and watch him drifting into the distance, as his head explodes with a different kind of inflation. This planet just doesn’t need people like Prince Andrew, who is still a prince but not a royal highness, as if that matters any more. This grubby, thick, ugly deluded toad (my apologies to all toads for the comparison, he is far worse) has, through a magnificent misuse of his own stupidity, managed to dig a hole to hide in and then realised too late that all along he has been digging his own grave. He may now be a ‘private citizen’ but that doesn’t make him anything like a normal human being, and my sincere hope is that he ends up in court, televised, and is sent down to some awful wing of some awful state penitentiary where he will be used as a glory hole for many years to come. Only a turd like Andrew could make someone like Charles seem like a good option in a crisis. And again, it is arrogance that has brought all this on his slight, saggy shoulders. In swift conclusion (because this is just a ramble) of the three he is the worst: whatever you think of them, at least Novak worked hard for his and Boris got a public vote, but no-one over wanted or needed Andrew, and they definitely don’t want him now. He may not be guilty yet, but I doubt anyone cares too much; you can bet he never cared about anyone like you or me. And he should have known better: when you have to rely on Fergie for support you really know you’re in trouble.

G B Hewitt. 14.01.2022