Punch and Judy show revived

I was recently stopped by someone in the street who told me he knew me from my rantings on the Times and asked me to pass on a message. He asked me ‘If this is politics what is Punch and Judy?’ I wonder whether he has ever seen the hand puppetry in some English beach and would have liked him to explain the deeper meaning of such chosen words but, alas, he quickly left, leaving me looking blank and pretty much speechless.

Speechless as I’ve oft said here I’ve rarely been in my life and pretty—well if one bars the time when I was a babe I would say I never was that either. And I would say even then I looked pretty only to my mother. My father had a bit more sense.

The man however had a great point. We have truly moved into Punch and Judy territory.

I never remember times as strained as these. While the treaty of Rome practically burns and the Euro crumbles we grumble about silly sordid tales of woe—like ministers being annoying and Arriva buses being latish. Or whatever latest piece of ministerial ministrations is being scrutinised and moved to resignations.

While in some European quarters more than a quarter of the population is unemployed we talk and squabble about how the employment numbers are manipulated and stretched. We do not discuss how to make our life better and preserve what we have for the future—we discuss little parochial ways of who said what and who did when, to whom, and how.

Like the Punch and Judy show we have progressed to a souped-up soap opera which can go dramatically wrong. We laugh at our Punch and Judy antics but hey this is our precarious present and potentially fatalistic future.

But on we trudge while Europe weeps—we keep up our Punch and Judy show of silly muppets while we, silly puppets, are driven madly bored and sickened by the shenanigans of our parliamentary fowl.

And if anyone tells me it’s all Gonzi and his clan who are at it in the bickering ring let me be as honest as I’ve hardly ever been and burst this silly bubble.

What has dear leader Muscat led us into? Has he gone above the fray and kept away from the silly punching of Judy (sorry Lawrence) and her brood? Has Dr Muscat soared high above the muck and come up with a real roadmap he talks so much about? We hear so much about how his is a united team and a team with a plan.

Give it to us so that we, eager as we are to move forward, will, in one deafening chorus, shout out ‘we want you and we want you with your new politics, with your roadmap and ways to take over the country now. Give us the real plan of how you are going to ride above the economic woes of this world and we will, even without an election, pledge our allegiance to you in one unified, unifying wail.’

Get off your fence of saying the rats and their friends in power are all obsessed with power—show us your ways and we, the people, will lift you high and take you straight to Castille.

The power of the people will beat any Gonzi and his prodding brood of JPOs.

Save us from our Punch and Judy show and let us tell the world we are going to get rid of Gonzi and install a true, real, messiah-like creature who does not just talk but who can explain to us what he really and truly is.