we can....

“Boris is the man!” He said as he leaned against the old stone pillar.

“Yup, Boris has charisma,” she smiled with fondness, “something none of the others have.” “But Boris has no moral principle other than being top dog,” I ventured.

”Oh,” she was lost in admiration, “he has such charm.”

Why, I’ve often wondered, are we addicted to charismatic characters? They are often pushers of their own agenda; psychologically and even physically they can be bullies. They sway us with their powerfully made arguments, we assume they are thence better than us, but step aside and think and you discover it can all be bluster.

I think back over the years and recall those I knew with charisma. Some were amazing, they used their natural charm to influence others to do good; others blethered on, using other people’s ideas as their own, stealing the light which ought to have gone elsewhere. I’ve had my own ideas taken. I’ve watched others crumble when everything they’ve spent years developing, is thus stolen.

The few readers I have left (of the thousands), must, if they live abroad, be giggling at this country right now. A man we chucked out because he is a constant liar, is flying back from holidaying in the Bahamas with the hope that he can once again be our Prime Minister. And our supposed representatives, our MPs, are eager to forgive him. What they see is a ticket to stay in their well paid jobs. What message does that send? Europe, our nearest ally and biggest trading partner, was delighted when Boris left….

“We sniggered that you, once the most stable of countries, voted out of the EU because of lies written on the side of Boris’ campaign bus,” French friends said.

We get the leaders we deserve, whether it’s Putin, Modi, Boris, Xi or Trump. It was us who put them there and we have enabled them to stay put, and it is their systems we have allowed to grow and it is these which have made them powerful. Yet we complain that they have become immovable.

What they give us is often what we ask for. Most of us live lives better than those of the queens and kings of yore, yet we want more. We, meaning me too, are addicted to the soft existence the current economic system gives us, and now we are too soft to revolt, for it would mean losing some of the comforts to which we have become addicted, so we let things lie. Which they use to their advantage.

I look at this my house and try to count the things I own. I give up after the coats, shirts, pencils, books and on it goes. Once everything I owned fitted in the back of our 2CV car. I’m not alone, I imagine almost everyone I know is as guilty and all this comes from an addiction to the system which has made the economic cultural world we live in. Things have become our entertainers, yet once we were content to lean upon the garden gate, listening to the world, chatting to our neighbours, now we are on this ladder of eternal consumption.

“The elephant in the room isn’t Boris,” said a woman standing with us, “it’s changing climate, which is too vague to concern us as we dash about.”

Our leaders, knowing the pulse of our consciousnesses, also ignore it. Did you realise that 25% of current global CO2 emissions have accrued since 2005? So what are we achieving with all these supposed Climate Talks? Well, our leaders, be they Boris or Xi, know we are still hooked on consumption and so they aren’t as serious as they ought to be.

Though we don’t believe it, we have the power to shift things. We have often changed our systems and leaders, think - French Revolution, they turned the system up-side-down. We can do so if we want - it is said that it’ll take roughly a year to retool to kick start a sustainable economy. They say there’s not the money, well, it is estimated that’ll cost about £30 billion; our outgoing Prime Minister just lost the country £87 billion in a couple of days… and we’re still here.

All it takes is for enough of us to know we can shift things. We can do it.