The New County Wife - Singular Political Woman

Act II Scene I

It is now some 18 months since we left "The New Country Wife", Samantha Shag, and her plotting husband Sir Alan. In this time, much water, as they say, has passed under the bridge.

Sir Alan has failed in his attempt to implicate Samantha in an affair with her riding instructor, and it is she who has divorced him. He is now rumoured to be wedding the former wife of a Russian oligarch subject to "satisfactory pre-nuptial agreement". His energy and resources joint venture with Sir Ron Fastmoney is still on the cards, as is a possible peerage for both of them.

Samantha has also decided to enter the political arena. The sex industry, in which she occupies a thoroughly respectable position, has been doing very well, and Samantha feels that as a successful business woman she now has much to offer public life.

However, whilst the "allure of azure" last year turned Samantha's head in the direction of David Cameron's Conservatives, her well-developed political instincts have now secured her the position of Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate in a by-election following the resignation of the existing incumbent after a series of sex scandals.

The constituency, in a suburb of Birmingham, is ideally suited to Samantha's professional demographic as a key part of her business involves the provision of what she describes as "naughties" for women to buy at home-based parties. Indeed, this loyal clientele has provided an excellent campaign team.

Although some former members of the Social Democrats have re-joined the Labour Party as a consequence of Samantha's selection, she is, nevertheless, confident of victory in the forthcoming by-election. She regards herself as a "true liberal", and as someone who can restore the brightness of the Lib Dem's star, currently somewhat dimmed by Coalition politics.

Samantha's only regret at the present time is that she, along with children Zara and Harry, did not receive an invitation to the recent British Royal Wedding. The event has, however, set this singular political woman wondering whether re-entry to the married ranks might be good for her future ministerial career.

THE TAIL OF THE RUNAWAY HORSE

Some readers will be aware of a feline work in progress at Janet and Rocco's other blog - http://janetrocco.wordpress.com/ - entitled "Tails of Two Nations" - but today we turn our attention to a horse's tail.

The name of the equine in question is unknown, but the animal is famous, or infamous, following an over-hasty departure from outside Westminster Abbey after last week's British Royal Wedding. Discharging its Cavalry Guardsman rider, the horse defied attempts to catch it and raced back to Horse Guards Barracks, overtaking the carriage of the bride and groom together with their equestrian escort en route.

We observed at the time that, on occasions, this Royal "posse" did look like something out of a John Wayne film, but the BBC's coverage of the event seemed to have censored out the runaway animal, although we had detected a loose horse.

Interviewed later exclusively for our blog, however, a close friend of the equine, who wishes to remain anonymous, said it had early wind of a likely assault - codename Geronimo - by the United States cavalry on the hideout of a much-wanted outlaw in a distant part of the globe. The horse had, therefore, apparently decided that, as readiness for battle might be required, it would suspend all ceremonial work immediately and report for combat duty post haste.

In the light of this noble motivation, and notwithstanding that the animal's conduct was not entirely in accordance with military training and protocol, we would nevertheless request that the horse is forgiven any impropriety by the Royal Household.

Finally, perhaps consideration might be also be given to the horse receiving the honorary name Geronimo, in recognition of the prescience shown on this occasion.

May Day 2011 - Tribute To Three Great Empires

TRANSMOGRIFIED AGAIN - THIS SEASON'S IMAGE

Janet and Rocco feel that their satirical and other offerings this season may be more earthy in nature, and perhaps view subjects more clearly in black and white.

THE DIARIES OF A FOXY LADY....

...will follow shortly, but these will not be the journal of some new "Belle De Jour", and whilst there may be some spying on human animals this will pose no threat to national security. For the subject under scrutiny will be the planning system, admittedly sexed up from time to time....

RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT ORDERS COVER-UP

As Russian femme-fatale spy Anna Chapman (shown here) launches a new career as host of a television show called "Secrets", her country's government has ordered its women workers to cover-up. Low cut blouses and short-skirts must be replaced by more modest attire in a new code of conduct, which also covers standards of behaviour for government employees. It is unclear whether this applies to those engaged in espionage.

ON THE SECOND DAY OF CHRISTMAS....

Readers may remember that it is not long since we were lamenting the lack of potential satirical comedy in the UK Coalition Government. How premature this judgement was !

Enter Mike Hancock, Liberal Democrat MP for Portsmouth South, and a string of revelations that can only be described as an early Christmas present for the satirical observer.

So here's a little re-working of "A Partridge In A Pear Tree" in celebration of Mr Hancock's political indiscretions (a welcome distraction in these Oh So Worthy Times) :

On the second day of Christmas, my true love said to me
Two Russian blonds, and a Lib-Dem well over sixty....

Is Philip Hammond the New Prince of Darkness ?

Are we alone in thinking that the Secretary of State for Transport, Philip Hammond, bears some resemblance to Christopher Lee's portrayal of Count Dracula ?

Please see www.dft.gov.uk/press/ministers/philiphammond

Or might this just arise from our intuition that some unappetising road schemes may be resurrected ?

Either way, as we hot seated this morning - Janet in Rocco's place - yesterday's sense of satirical void was replaced by a feeling that we are due for a spell of gothic satire well suited to the witching season !

THE SAD STORY OF BEAUTY & THE BEAST

With the Season of Saturnalia just around the corner, the time has come for "The New Politics" to receive some satirical treatment, were it not already the case that some aspects of these are "Beyond Satire" !

Take "The Story of Beauty and the Beast", as we shall call it. ""The Beast" - aka Lib-Dem MP John Hemming who also has a very informative blog @ http://johnhemming.blogspot.com/ - is a self-confessed serial adulterer, whose wife recently stole a kitten, called Beauty, from the home of a (? former) mistress with whom he has a child*

Reference to the old story of "Beauty and the Beast" seems particularly appropriate here because the tale is, in fact, rather a sad one. Mr Hemming's wife has been charged with theft and the poor kitten is, it seems, still lost and much missed by his child and the little cat's brother. I can feel the tears welling up even as I write this !

So would the Coalition Government please dish up a good old-fashioned scandal, of the kind to which we became accustomed under the Conservative premiership of John Major, such as his own affair with Edwina Currie.

*A lovely photo of Beauty and her brother Twinkle appears in Mr Hemming's post of 21 October.

Eruption in Iceland to decide UK Election ?

Internet search engines threw up a satirical news site called The Spoof - http://www.thespoof.com/ - the other day, when we looked for an update on the consequences for air travel following the dispersal of an ash plume from the eruption of a volcano in Iceland .

Political relations between Iceland and the United Kingdom have not been too warm since the British Government froze the assets of Icelandic Banks, deploying anti-terror laws in the process.

Anyone familiar with the Old Icelandic Sagas will know that gods of the North do not take kindly to human provocation, especially when this comes from an Anglo-Saxon kingdom and source of historical enmity: some may remember the so-called "Cod War".

Iceland's volcanic eruption, co-inciding as it does with the UK General Election, is a reminder of our ancient European heritage. The gods of the North may yet overturn political process in Britain, providing a long-awaited government of national unity perhaps.

CAFE ROCCO NOW OPEN FOR BUSINESS

Following Craft's announcement last week that their Cadbury brand is to have a national coffee shop chain - some may remember the Lyons Tea Houses - we would like to inform readers that Cafe Rocco is now open for business at http://www.caferocco.com/

The new website has a welcoming feline image, which is just as well because the images have mysteriously disappeared from our previous posts.

Portentous events this week - notably the grounding of aircraft across the UK and Northern Europe following the eruption of an Icelandic volcano and a plume of ash moving through the upper atmosphere - remind us of the strange cosmic event which concluded our first creative enterprise in 2006, "The Court of the Red Tsar".

In this, Britain is mysteriously plunged back into the middle years of the 20th century and a time when Lyons Tea Houses provide sustenance on the High Street. At the stylish Cafe Rocco, we look forward to more post-election retro-kitsch !

BRING ON BREMNER BIRD & FORTUNE !

Like many fans of satirical comedy, Janet and Rocco are longing for the return of Channel 4's Bremner, Bird and Fortune show. The appearance of The Three Tenors - whoops The Three Chancellors* ! - the other day just didn't provide an alternative, if that is what Channel 4 had intended.

* Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne, and Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesman Vince Cable : all singing much in the same tenor.

PS. We enjoyed Rory Bremner's all too short "International Satirists" series on BBC Radio 4 - more of the same please !

Interlude - The Value of a Classical Education

Some readers may have been following the case of a financier being sued for £4 million for sexual discrimination, by former employee Jordan Wimmer.

The gentleman in question, Mr Mark Lowe of Nomos Capital, sent a lewd email to another female employee - a friend of Ms Wimmer - quoting the Latin poet Catallus (showing some resemblance to Mr Lowe in this modern representation).

The financier maintained that the email was sent as a joke, which could not cause offense because the recipient did not understand Latin.

However, it will be interesting to see who has the last laugh as Ms Wimmer has recently filed a further case against Mr Lowe and Nomos Capital.

Further Extract from The New Country Wife

Act 1, Scene 2 : Sir Alan Country House, The Shag Pile - follows on from July 2009 Post

....On the advice of "Apprentice" Tristram, Sir Alan has abandoned plans to marry into the Worcestershire gentry or County aristocrats : too poor ! Instead Tristram has proposed the recently-divorced former wife of a Russian oligarch with an "excellent settlement". However, the grounds for Sir Alan's divorce from his present wife, Samantha, have yet to be determined, although he and Tristram are confident that "the Secret Agent" will deliver these.

In the meantime, Sir Ron Fastmoney, an old friend, has paid an unexpected visit to "The Shag Pile".

The relationship between the two men goes back to the 1980s, when Sir Ron was knighted during the boom years of the Thatcher Government for services to property development. Much of Sir Ron's fortune was subsequently wiped out during the crash of the early 1990s, forcing him to flee the country to avoid creditors.

Since then, he has spent much of time "off-shore" - the Caribbean, Dubai, Far East etc - and in the process created a much larger fortune. Sir Ron now spends most of his year on a large ocean-going yacht, entertaining the rich and their hangers-on. However, he is currently "setting up ship" in St Petersburg, having also recently acquired a new Russian wife : "There'll be no New Austerity for me, thank you very much...!!

Sir Ron wants Sir Alan Shag - whom he regards as "a cunning old fox, if rather cash-strapped these days" - to join him in a Russian energy and resources joint venture, which he promises will deliver the kind of returns unimaginable in "a poky little country like Britain.... Naturally, I am sparing no expense in entertaining the Russians....."

To be Continued....

Advertisement for The (Original) Country Wife

THE NEW COUNTRY WIFE* - PREVIEW

Act 1, Scene 1 - The Bacchus Bar in Birmingham**

"Lying in the Gutter, and
Spying on the Stars....." ***

* Follows on from "The Right-On Lord Shag of Solihull" (Working Title Only) of 22 July 2008
* * A Real Place *** A recent leader title in the Financial Times NB : Any resemblance of the characters in this drama to a real person is totally co-incidental

Samantha Shag is reading a recent editorial in the FT on the use of private investigators by the British tabloid press to intercept the personal communications of celebrities and politicians. She awaits the arrival of her old friend and onetime associate in the Birmingham's bondage scene, Titania : who now runs a successful lap dancing enterprise of the same name. Samantha wants Titania's advice on husband Sir Alan's machinations to divorce her, including employment of his own personal spy. Titania in turn wants Samantha's help on problems with a New Labour Wag, and former Home Secretary, who objects to the expansion of the lap dancing trade in her West Midlands constituency.

To be continued....

Please see also our other Blog @ http://janetrocco.wordpress.com/

DO POLITICIANS MAKE GOOD PETS ?

Janet is always keen to expand her mind and decided to have a look at the Times Educational Supplement yesterday, which carried an article about psychometric testing on the front page and gave the following "taster" :

" Pet topic

A psychometric-style question

The cat is a small carnivorous mammal that is often valued by humans for its companionship. The cat is a skilled predator and is known to hunt over 1,000 species for food. Cats use a variety of vocalisations and body language for communication, such as purring, mewing, hissing and growling. The cat is an intelligent mammal and can be trained to obey simple commands. Typically, a cat will weigh between 2.5kg and 7kg. Cats are extremely sensitive as they have highly advanced hearing, eyesight, touch, and taste receptors. People’s belief that cats are solitary animals is incorrect, as they are actually highly social. This misconception is due to cats not having a social survival strategy (“pack mentality”) like animals such as dogs. This means that they look after their own needs, even when living in a group.
Q: Cats make good companions for humans
A: True
B: False
C: Cannot say
Source: Aptitude Tests Online."

Our answer would, of course, be A : True. However, could this be a trick question, with a politically correct sub-text, intended to weed out humans (and potential teachers) who also "look after their own needs, even when living in groups" notwithstanding that they have a "social survival strategy" as well.

In thus reflecting, Rocco (a cat) finds himself asking : Do politicians make good pets ? : or, more politically correctly, do they make good companions for cats ? Answers, please.

Yes, says Tango, who appeared on BBC1's political "Question Time" recently.

THE RISE AND RISE OF MS PIGGY

In the year 2000, a gentleman friend - and erstwhile Big Shot in the World of Advertising - advised Janet on the return of the fuller figure for women. At the time, she forgot this piece of advice almost immediately, but has since often recollected it.

So it was only the other day, that whilst perusing the political shelves in a local bookshop, she came across two volumes which recalled her former gentleman friend's words. One book, whose name she also forgot immediately, was an extended diatribe by Julie Birchill and someone with a double-barrelled surname (unclear whether male or female).

In this volume, Ms Birchill and her friend hold forth on range of subjects - political with both a large and small "p" - including women of "the fuller figure", of which Ms B is a Big One. She also has a rather shrill voice, which amongst larger ladies also seems to have made a comeback.

As it happens, Janet chanced upon a couple of these Modern Harpies fighting for a car-parking space - one in gold 4x4 Merc and the other in similar Chavrolet* - as she took her bike towards the train station on a very hot day. "How Very Uncool !", she thought.

The other volume was a biography of Boris Johnson, whose title Janet has also forgotten, but which bore a quotation on the front cover from Ken Livingstone : "the scariest book I've read since The Silence of the Lambs". Boris himself incidentally describes the book as "Rubbish...but well-written rubbish !". Lot of "That" about !

However, this book does indeed contain something quite extra-ordinary : photographs of the young Boris which bear more than a passing resemblance to the character of Vicky Pollard in Little Britain !

* Ms Birchill is a defender of "Chav", being Upper Chav herself, and perhaps a Chavrolet driver.

A New Cosmopolitan Agenda...

A recent visit to Cheltenham has prompted us to reflect on the meaning of "cosmopolitan" in contemporary politics and society, and, indeed, for modern English satire, given the association of Georgian England with Rococo Satire, and Cheltenham, in particular, with the lighter (and liter ?) satirical writings of the so-called "Water Poets", who drew their inspiration from those places where people went to "Take the Waters".

Our Mini-Guideto Cheltenham (Obtained from the helpful Tourist Information Office) describes the town as "cosmopolitan", but what does this mean : urbane architecture and planning, handsome gardens, cafe society, famous literary festival, horse-racing ? For us "cosmopolitan" is a state of being, but does Cheltenham possess this, or just its outward accessories as a sort of living manifestation of some, ultimately rather shallow, contemporary "Style" magazine.

In the absence of any real or meaningful definition (or bench-mark, to use the current jargon) for defining "cosmopolitanism", we are, therefore, going to propose a few indicators, as follows :

• Serial Re-Marriage and the creation of multiple households are not considered "De Rigeur". A discreet lover or two of the opposite or same sex are quite acceptable, but no more. Too many children are also to be discouraged.


• Naked flesh (bosom, belly, buttock etc) should not be excessively on view in public places, and particularly if not aesthetically well-proportioned. Beer guts may be just about acceptable on middle aged men, but not on young ladies.


• The general populace do not bore their fellow wo/men with accounts of their personal lives in the workplace and public realm, thus disrupting professional and civic discourse, but keep these for private occasions.

The Right On Lord Shag of Solihull (Working Title Only)

The story so far....

Sir Alan Shag - knighted during the John Major Government, later switching his allegiance to New Labour - is now in his mid 50s, and contemplating a change of Party (back to the Conservatives) and wife (someone more conservative than former doyenne of the Birmingham bondage scene, Samantha Shag). Substantial donations to New Labour have not brought that much-desired peerage (Lord Shag of Solihull), with accompanying ministerial appointment (following in the footsteps of Lord Digby de B'rm), so Sir Alan is now courting "Heir to Blair David" Cameron.

With an early fortune made in carpet manufacturing, Sir Alan transferred his indisputable business cunning to housebuilding and the motor trade in the 1980s, for services to which he was later knighted. However, he has never forgotten his commercial beginnings and his neo-palladian mansion in Warwickshire is fittingly known as "The Shag Pile". It is here that Sir Alan and Samantha Shag now reside with little Harry and Zara; where his wife and children receive riding lessons from former guards officer Captain James Blewitt, and where he employs "Apprentice" Tristram (Oxford graduate and former right-of-centre think tank researcher) for advice on political etiquette.

Hoping that Samantha might be having an affair with James Blewitt - and indeed, positively encouraging this - Sir Alan has engaged the services of a "private eye" and ex-secret service operative Richard "Spook" Dickinson to provide evidence for his much hoped for divorce. Tristam, meanwhile, is researching possible future marriage partners for his employer, paying particular attention to women from old Worcestershire gentry and aristocratic families who might want to develop their country estates for affordable housing, and similarly worthy projects.

However, Samantha (nee Bond, and former Proprietress of The Birmingham - Strictly Adults Only -Bond Age Club) is aware of her husband's plot, and has her own plans. Upon their marriage in the early "Naughties" (as she likes to call the beginnings of the 21st century), Samantha encouraged Sir Alan to invest in some enterprises in the respectable sectors of the sex industry, which, as it happens, are now performing rather better than his housebuilding and motor trade interests. Whilst enjoying the life of a country gentlewoman, Samantha has also tired of Sir Alan's company, and longs to return to "The Business"; not, however, ruling out a future career in politics herself ...with the Lib Dems.

To be continued...