Dawn

Dawn

Sunday, February 09, 2014

The princess and the judge; Rightful resignation; Flooding fallacies; Lyrical lyrics; & A cultural question.


Well, Princess Cristina duly went to court yesterday, to answer questions about the business owned by her and her husband which is implicated in corrupt practices. To no one's great surprise, she said she loved her husband so much she did everything he asked her to, without question. Other than that, she was 'evasive', according to one of the interested parties who was allowed to attend. It's all a complete waste of time, of course, as the Princess is indisputably cannot be guilty. We know this because the President has told us she is innocent. Not just 'deserving of the presumption of innocence' but certainly innocent. Perhaps he knows something that we don't know. After all, the State Prosecutor has striven manfully to stop the Princess getting this far, on the basis that he feels she has no case to answer. Funny business. But riveting for the masses.

Talking about wrongdoing and its consequences . . . The British Minister for Immigration has resigned after it was discovered his Rumanian cleaner had, he said, produced false documents which hid the fact she was an illegal immigrant. Most Spaniards will never understand resignation for such a trivial matter - you have to be an serial rapist to resign here - but I have to admit there's something odd about this. If he innocently accepted forged documents, why is he guilty of anything? Unless merely embarrassing a Prime Minister is a hanging offence in the UK now. Spaniards would certainly understand that a little better, as no one strays from the party line here. With the possible exception of PP plans to take the abortion law back 30 years. 

I've seen numerous reports on the flooding in the UK and discussions on TV this morning. What is astonishing is that almost no one mentions that the reduced river dredging which has caused the floods (along with the rain) has happened because of an EU directive dating back to around 2000. This favours wildlife over human life on (potential) flood plains, on ecology grounds. Click here for more info on this. Incidentally, the floods are featured on the News here in Spain. I find it hard to imagine Spanish floods being shown on UK News programs.

They don't make lines like this any more, from the Jerome Kern 1936 number, A Fine Romance, with (tremendous) lyrics by Dorothy Fields:- 
We two should be like clams in a dish of chowder

But we just fizz like parts of seidlitz powder

Finally . . . What did we call philistines before the Philistines came along?


The Environment

January: 31 days. On which it rained: 28 - 93% (revised down)

February: 9 days. On which it has rained: 9 - 100% 

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