Lost in translation

I haven’t been able to face politics for a while – events have been so awful – so I have not been blogging. The world goes on.

I come back to it to discover that having suffered amnesia since regaining control of the sacred Union, our dear leader, DC, in attempt to talk tough and show he’s a match for dear old Boris seems to be suffering further cognitive difficulties.

Why is it that he just cannot understand what Manuel Barroso is saying?  Does he imagine, perhaps, that in his final moments the European leaders is advising him in Portuguese? Is it because DC doesn’t have a ‘foreign’ wife, like his rivals, so he is not used to listening to different accents? Does he think, perhaps, that because Barroso doesn’t speak like an Old Etonian that the man is actually an ‘Argie’?

How are we to understand this comprehensive misunderstanding, with John Bull’s gutter press cheering him on like a rabid mob? I know he had the ‘finest education in the land,’ but honestly, how dumb can you get? Please excuse my frustration, I do know I shouldn’t talk like this, but, you see, I really want a bit more effort from my leaders.

So to help DC out, here’s apparently what Barroso actually said, in translation, and extrapolation for the sake of emphasis.

Manuel B:

“I said talk to us, Dave – I mean with us, not at us. Make some friends, do a bit of work relating to people, like John Major did, actually! And then you will find we take your concerns and interests seriously, because you’re one of us, and we care about our friends, like normal people. Trying to bully us won’t work, because we haven’t downloaded the App for being bullied, cos we are not a bunch of ex-boarders.

And regarding the free movement of labour, capital and firms, that is one of the original principles that Ted heath signed you up to and is part of the definition of what the EU is. No, it is not just firms and the rich that are able to move where they want, but people too. Yes, the workforce – yes, I know, Dave, that means the people who aren’t rich. Yes, I know you don’t understand them. Why don’t they just get a top job in their own country like you did, you say, by hard work alone?

No, they don’t actually smell. I said it means you can also “sell” on the continent. Yes, it’s a libertarian idea, Dave. Free movement was the original idea, it’s a principle of the European Union. No, a principle is not an option – a principle is something you believe in, like a value. Yes, it is a bit like not wanting the Scots to leave your Union and keep the pound, but by value I mean something that is objectively important and part of the original plan. Yes, such a principle could be changed, in theory, Dave; but to do that it means all the others have to want it; they’d have to discuss it, to agree it and vote on it. Yes, that’s right, talking together, taking each others views into account and then making a considered choice.

Are you there? Did you hang up on me….?”

Or is it that DC just can’t believe in a ‘WE’, in belonging to something because he has had to erase those ideas form his mind in childhood during his privileged abandonment?