Donald Trump becomes American president again.

 Donald Trump becomes American president again.

In one of America's greatest cartoon theme parks in the world even Mickey Mouse must have stifled a chuckle and laugh or two. Florida has, it seemed, declared Donald Trump as President of the United States of America yet again. We knew it would happen like this so this was the way we knew this one would pan out. The election of a new American president always seems to bring some kind of emotional baggage with it but this morning the United States of America woke up to another thrilling instalment of Groundhog Day. The good people of America are resilient souls and they know how to roll with the punches. But today is just history repeating itself, a mirror reflection of 2016 and 2020.

This morning Donald Trump will become the 47th president of the United States of America and some of us are wiping our eyes with puzzlement and bemusement in a way we never thought we would. A vast majority of the American population will probably be just beside itself, delighted, ecstatic, relieved more than anything else, gripped with a sense of vindication, knowing full well Trump would get back into the White House again.

Objective eyes could hardly be less indifferent because we could never understand the complex machinations of American politics or any of the global political barminess that continues to follow the behind the scenes manoeuvrings and whispered discussions that get progressively louder before every American election. But today has a feeling of inevitability about it, a sense that of course we've been here before because we have quite undoubtedly. 

The cult of Donald Trump is now so firmly embedded in American culture and every political ideology you can possibly imagine, that this morning will not come as an earth-shuddering surprise. Trump has felt every conspiracy theory in the land for the last four years and still maintains he was unfairly robbed by Joe Biden and that all the forces of evil were hounding him. He was deeply incensed that it took America four years to come to its senses so it's about time justice was seen to be done.

Trump still thinks he deserves to be President of the Free World because his egotistical nature, which is the size of an American condominium, is confirming everything we always knew, anyway. Donald Trump loves himself and is convinced that he's the best thing since sliced bread. Britain doesn't know what to believe but it does like a winner. Trump fits the bill perfectly. He came to his podium in front of thousands of enraptured Trump fans and a forest of phones took their triumphant photos. 

But despite all the attempted assassinations which only grazed the Trump eardrum, the run up to this American election has become almost tediously controversial. Now of course such a statement seems to make no sense whatsoever but you can't help but think nobody has spiked anybody's drink. A sober assessment of the recent goings on across the USA reveals nothing more than two people grabbing each other's throats, attacking each other's faults and deficiencies and remaining steadfast in their hatred of each other. 

Both flagrantly questioned each other's sanity, both have accused each other of suffering from an incurably sociopathic illness and then finally dismissed each other as demented fools. Both, they believe, should be locked up in a lunatic asylum and never allowed to walk the streets of New York or Washington ever again. Trump, for his part, thinks the whole world should bow before him deferentially as one of the mightiest and most outstanding leaders of any country. He really would like be regarded as political royalty with all the trappings of British monarchy.

This morning though it does look very much as if Donald Trump has done it again. Surely the most comical, most incomprehensible, at times seemingly hilarious man ever to become President of the United States is about to put his feet under the table at the Oval Office again. Some will refer to him as one of the craziest, most ill educated and idiotic men ever to walk into the White House with a straight face. Maybe somebody will pinch us and tell us that we were dreaming this but Hollywood has our full permission to fulfil our wildest fantasies.

Now across the whole of America, the whole of the Democratic party are now crying into their beer yet again. Kamala Harris, the woman most of her ardent supporters hoped would become the first female President, is now licking the bleeding wounds of almost certain defeat. For Harris read Hilary Clinton who did everything to woo the hearts of the American public but then realised she was up against impossible odds.

Clinton lost her private battle quite convincingly and a man called Donald Trump came blustering into our vision, gesturing expansively with both sets of hands, raising his voice over and over again, grandstanding ostentatiously, showboating almost constantly and then doing a passable impersonation of Muhammad Ali. He was the greatest, floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee. At times Trump looked like a clubber at Studio 54, boogying and swaying from side to side and pretending to be a distant cousin of John Travolta.

At times it's almost felt as if time has been frozen, time revisiting another day from the past. Trump is genuinely conceited, narcissistic, a man now weighed down with a potty sense of entitlement and living in a world of a permanent illusion and delusion. Here we have a man with a frightening lack of knowledge about the job he's now been elected to carry out burdened by bonkers bombast and a self image so wildly distorted that even his closest advisers will be telling Trump to just tone things down. It's hard to know what to think of a man who never needs any introduction because most of us can hear him coming down the road from another suburb or village. So let's take this one from here.

Now we discover that it's official. Donald Trump is the 47th President of the United States, which for better or worse, means that to the outside world, it's time to board the roller coaster. The ride will be a swooping, sometimes unnerving, often terrifying experience where some of us may feel inclined to go weak at the knees, feeling sick with anxiety and resolving never to go anywhere near a fairground again. Trump, as has now been well documented, is never short of a forthright opinion and his comments are so cutting and acerbic that somewhere in the world, foreign prime ministers or presidents will be trembling with fear and trepidation. 

Then there is the Trump who goes off on some insane rambling rant about something completely inconsequential such as the consumption of cats and dogs, eating animals and doing so completely out of context with anything in particular. Then Trump goes off into his own private world of late night comedy where he takes enormous pleasure in verbally attacking any institution or religion, class and humanity in general. He'll roast you alive if you're in the wrong place or wrong time but you must never cross him because he'll just rip you to shreds if you criticise the colour of his shirt or the now infamous orange hair.

The blunt reality of course is that Trump has now acquired the kind of notoriety and shameful publicity that none of us can understand. Trump is a convicted criminal and felon, a figure of fun in the eyes of some, a sexual pest to the others, a hardened misogynist while claiming at the same time that he adores women. Earlier on Trump was addressing the kind of court charges that made the blood run cold. But it was a set up, totally unacceptable and unfair, illegal in the extreme. In fact, how dare they hurl savage indictments against this honest, respectable citizen of the world who just wants to be the Leader of the Free World? It was all a massive fix.

During the 1970s, this sharp business mind and entrepreneurial genius, once appeared on a late night chat show on prime time American TV. Now in the general scheme of things, this was somehow regarded as normal since Trump was a successful, up and coming businessman who was about to make his first millions. But then we had to hold in our laughter when Trump dressed up as a chicken on a farm, promptly engaging in the kind of bizarre tomfoolery you're ever likely to see on any TV channel.

The fact is Trump could end up conducting vital foreign policy business from behind a draughty prison cell burdened by the knowledge that he has committed fraud and any number of financial improprieties. Here we have the President of the United States still at the mercy of those who still think of him as a master of bumbling banalities, utterances of tosh and trivia that barely seem believable.

 His campaign speeches resembled nothing more than inane comments about Kamala Harris mental stability. He continues to sound like a man who never sticks to the script and then uses the media as an obvious scapegoat for everything that is wrong with American society. Fox and CNN must dread his some of his more irrational outbursts and the national newspapers must hide behind the sofa every Trump opens his often vitriolic mouth. 

But then Donald Trump is an angelic paragon of virtue, flawlessly perfect and there are no flies on him. Trump talks coherent, perfectly understandable sense and his understanding of the world has been enhanced by everything he sees around him. The global wars of Gaza, Israel, Ukraine and Russia should be uppermost in his mind and undoubtedly his concern is a genuine one. But the judgmental and critical nature of the man has to be both disturbing and distressing. At times, Trump may have to bite his lip when the going gets really tough because diplomacy is something that just escapes him.

Today the world has been shaken to its core again. The Trump fanatical fans will see today's election victory as a triumph for good, old-fashioned pragmatic politics. Trump speaks from the hip and never wastes his words. There is an honesty is the best policy of course about him. The next four years should prove to be both a fascinating study of human behaviour, the rigorous examination of a man you simply can't make your mind up about. The permanent critics would love to see him fail miserably, a man who is still an embarrassment to the human race. But we do mellow with age and although Trump is rapidly approaching 80, we can only hope that things will get considerably better. Tony Blair certainly thought as much.

Quincy Jones dies.

 Quincy Jones dies at 91.

One of America's most influential and dynamic of music icons Quincy Jones has died at 91 peacefully and quietly. Jones was one of the greatest, most charismatic, productive, prolific, imaginative, groundbreaking and pioneering figures in the history of American music. Jones was a driven, determined and inspirational character who proved to be one of music's most important characters, an irresistible force, a permanently optimistic and galvanic record producer, music arranger, conductor, writer, instrumentalist and a man for all seasons. 

For much of his life Jones always seem to be around celebrities, showbusiness legends, a cheerful, happy go lucky man who devoted himself exclusively to the lives of the remarkable Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson, Ella Fitzgerald and countless singers and songwriters who knew all about Jones aura, his formidable presence and electrifying personality. To be in the company of Quincy Jones was to be in the earshot of musical geniuses, men and women who simply wanted to be surrounded by the Jones entourage. 

Jones was always the driving force and catalyst behind Mike Myers and Jones loved to be behind the movie camera as much as he felt more than comfortable around Jackson and Sinatra. Jones particularly enjoyed his relationship with the privately troubled Michael Jackson, a man who struggled with his psychological demons for ages but felt comforted to be among Quincy Jones. Jones worked on the film the Wiz with Jackson and there was a real rapport between the two. 

And then there was Michael Jackson's iconic and record-breaking album Thriller, a piece of vinyl so transformative in the history of popular music that Jones must have suspected that something very special had taken place. Thriller spawned so many singles and hits that to those observers who could only look on with astonishment, it must have seemed a life-changing moment for both men.

Tracks such as Beat It, the eponymous Thriller and the superbly funky I Wanna Be Startin, Billy Jean, the more reflective Human Nature and the Paul McCartney Jackson collaboration The Girl is Mine were always on our chanting lips. There was also that magnificent album Off the Wall where Jones first ignited the flames of a music revolution. Jones became the best of friends with Jackson but later discovered, much to his eternal regret, that Jackson was suffering behind the scenes and Jackson's death must have come as an enormous shock to Jones. 

Jones also revelled in the crooning superstardom of the unforgettable Frank Sinatra. Sinatra and Jones were inseparable with Luck Be A Lady and the Rat Pack narrative the perfect connection. Jones adored his life in a recording studio and just relished his friendships and enduring relationships with the stars, the Bossonova, the soul groove and the whole organic process of creating, shaping, inventing and improvising. 

There was a time when Jones must have felt a strong kinship with fellow songwriters such as the also sadly missed Burt Bacharach. Both of course were demanding perfectionists but shared a common interest in the sounds, layers and textures in between the great songs. Jones seemed to feel the music, experience its simple delights, smile at its simplicities and then turn into an artistic powerhouse. He drummed his fingers on the complex desks of record companies because music was Jones and vice versa. 

In recent years Jones went into semi-retirement but never tired of rising to the occasion at grand and lavish award ceremonies in Hollywood. He accepted lifetime achievement awards, acknowledged his leading role behind familiar musical compositions but was always modest in the extreme.  I Na Colida  and Stuff Like That charted in both the US and Britain but never really made the desired impact as such. Both were superlative disco soul floor fillers in the world's nightclubs and bars and did much to keep the Jones brand image in the public domain. 

But Quincy Jones epitomised the American music scene because he touched hearts as one of its most innovative forces. Jones was one of the great conductors, presiding over the engine room of music's vital dynamics with subtle rhythms and infectiously pulsing beats. Yesterday the world of music lost its truth, its vital essence, its raison d'etre, the man who waved a magic wand and never failed to be lively, entertaining and wholly dedicated to the people who mattered.   

Non League Tamworth knock out League One Huddersfield Town

 Non- League Tamworth knock out League One Huddersfield Town.

The FA Cup normally reserves its giant-killing for the third round of the competition but we'll make allowances for early contenders. Normally, the Football League pyramid sits quietly in the background at the first round stage of the competition but we were now both stunned and shocked by the magical and unexpected. Last night, National League pace setters Tamworth, gently tucked away in Non League hinterland and unobtrusively minding their own business, sent League One Huddersfield Town toppling out of the FA Cup in this year's first cries of its infancy.

Ordinarily, most of us wouldn't have reacted with gobsmacked amazement at this startling turn of events but Huddersfield Town were the visitors to Tamworth's typically tight, neat, cramped and claustrophobic Lamb Ground in the middle of Staffordshire. But this one was a mighty conquest. Huddersfield, admittedly 100 years ago now, were old First Division League Champions under the legendary Herbert Chapman before Chapman came down to London and transformed Arsenal into a world-class League Championship side. 

So Huddersfield have bejewelled history and have also lifted their FA Cup and that was back in 1922. So much for those Football League superiors with all their flashy affectations, airs and graces and serial achievements. Huddersfield briefly ventured into the Premier League in recent times but that was just a fleeting flirtation and now they're back in the shark-infested waters of League One, fraternising with the less than glamorous, good- time boys who once mixed with the best and finest. 

Last night all of the FA Cup stereotypes were in full evidence. There were the matchbox terraces, shaking with breathless anticipation, little children dangling their legs over advertising hoardings, the seething, heaving masses and the hardcore, dedicated Tamworth supporters who have braved wind, rain and snow through innumerable seasons over the years. There were the signs for local steam cleaners, metal car showroom signs and clearly prominent sponsors from Staffordshire's most well- respected factories and companies.

This was Tamworth's greatest night in the TV limelight. Nobody would have ever heard about anything that in any way related to the club apart from perhaps that celebrated story of escaping pigs many years ago. Now though the fantasy story came joyfully to fruition. Yesterday evening, the tightly knit communities and amiable clubhouses of the National League were full to the gunnels with chairman, managers and fans munching away gleefully at well made, nutritious sandwiches, plenty of harmless and inoffensive booze, crisps and savouries and that pervasive air of rock and roll celebration. 

The obscenely wealthy environment of the Premier League seemed a world away and Tamworth amply demonstrated their non League prowess with their more than competent capabilities. It would have been easy to dismiss Tamworth as lightweights, little known minnows, purring pussycats who were just there for a severe battering at the hands of their once illustrious opponents. Instead, the National League got their come- uppance over League One, a classic example of the so called peasants and proletariats coming unstuck against the posh, swanky, bourgeois elite who play their football on an altogether different planet. 

Recently, my son and I had the enormous pleasure and honour of watching Prescot Cables, a cosy outpost in the shadow of Merseyside, a land of solar- panelled rooftops, crisp, leaveless, autumnal trees without any summer foliage and men in yellow shirts who could have been mistaken for Wolves. It was football of earthy authenticity and warm sentimentality, where the local lads play for simple, unalloyed joy and little in the way of national recognition. Prescot Cables were beaten 2-0 by Northumberland's Morpeth Town. There was no end of the world sense of apocalyptic disaster for the Cables because nobody had been hurt, there were no film stars or celebrities, no prima donna, pampered superstars. It was grassroots football at its most intoxicating. You were drunk with happiness. It was the FA Cup working its magic. 

At Lamb Ground last night, there were tiny cafes and busy refreshment kiosks doing a roaring trade selling warming cups of teas and coffees. There were shining palaces of commerce glowing in the evening light and the floodlights towering over the ground were truly uplifting. These were not the massive chandeliers of the Premier League, more the lovely studio apartment lights of the National League with a slender pole at each end of the ground.

But Lamb Ground is a glorious or, perhaps not so glorious throwback. Lamb Ground has a plastic,artificial pitch known in the modern vernacular as 4G. You were painfully transported back to the 1980s when artificial football pitches were all the rage. Queens Park Rangers became the trailblazers for plastic pitches at a time when the late and much loved Terry Venables was still writing detective novels and crooning songs with the Joe Loss Orchestra. Venables also happened to be instrumental in one of the most memorable moments for the England national side when he almost guided the country to Euro 96 winning glory but then saw Germany in the headlights and bit his lip. It was semi final heartache at its most excruciating.

Then there was Luton Town who also got into the act of this new fangled business of plastic pitches. To this day there simply seemed a nonsensical silliness about these synthetic grounds where the bounce of a ball reduced the game to the status of mockery and satire. Then there were the burn marks on the body where the friction caused by the scraping of players well honed legs and arms, just beggared belief. 

And yet the shiny green 4G pitch was somehow acceptable because this was the FA Cup and anything goes. There were no WAG girlfriends in the crowd, no VAR, no controversial decisions although the winning goal itself might have been chalked off. This was plain, unpretentious Tamworth, old school, old fashioned, illuminated by the splendidly heroic figure of one Tom Tonks. Tom Tonks may be an unknown journeyman who just loves the electrifying atmosphere of the FA Cup but Tonks revelled last night in one of the most magnificent long throw routines that saw off Huddersfield when none saw it coming.

The FA Cup was still weaving webs of withcraft and the supernatural even a night after Halloween. There were no orange pumpkins or broomsticks at the Lamb Ground but even the most wide eyed optimists were predicting a night to remember. How dare Tamworth assume ideas above their station. They should have been preparing for another National League fixture rather than planning for the world's most famous competition. But football of course can be the most richly fertile of level playing grounds. We all knew that. Football has an innate capacity for turning the world upside down.

As for the football itself in this often free- flowing and rewarding FA Cup first round match between Tamworth and Huddersfield there was something very raw and natural about the game. It reminded you of one of those old Pathe newsreels where the rattles and rosettes can be both heard and seen the length of the local shopping centre. This was never football designed for the purists and connoisseurs of the one touch, instinctive variety seen in matches involving Brazil, Germany, France and Spain. But it was good to watch and essentially pleasant on the eye.

Tamworth had Jasbir Singh in goal who was the very epitome of bravery, flinty courage and absolutely bravura heroism, flinging himself at everything, being hit in every part of his battered body and sacrificing life and limb. Hadyn Hollis and the wonderfully named Jordan Cullaine Liburd were towers of security and reliable as front doors at full back and centre back, locking up the home defence rather like yeomen at the Tower of London. Luke Fairlamb was a busybody, ubiquitous, here and there midfielder, various fingers in different pies, scurrying and scampering to all points of the compass, helping out when necessary and urgent. Ben Milnes, Tom McGlinchey were always intelligent and perceptive while Rico Browne just stood tall and assured for Tamworth. David Creaney, up front, buzzed, darted and probed for the ball rather like a kid hunting for a lost ball that had landed in a neighbour's garden.

For Huddersfield of course this was a deeply uncomfortable, distressing and humiliating defeat which wasn't supposed to happen but did. Their small knot of away travelling fans could hardly look through bemused eyes. Tom Lees, Nigel Lonwijk, Matty Pearson, David Kasunu, the hapless Serbian Bojan Radulovic were never on the same wavelength and frequently moved the ball about between themselves like a wartime grenade, never quite knowing where they were going with the ball. When they did get anywhere the Tamworth goal, it looked as if too many cooks had spoilt the broth. 

It was all very well intentioned and honourable but Huddersfield were going nowhere. The up and under, long ball nature of football at this level always ruined the spectacle at times. But Tamworth did try to play it the right way and for that they have to be commended for their enterprise and willingness to keep the ball on the deck. At times it was all very higgledy piggledy, dreary and desultory occasionally descending into the typically awful. But this was the FA Cup and, besides, who cared?

The winning goal itself was both accidental and ever so reckless and careless. Tom Tonks, Tamworth's man of the night, wound himself up for one of those long throw-cum missiles for which he is now renowned across the whole of Britain. Rubbing the ball on his chest and staring menacingly into the eyes of petrified Huddersfield defenders eyes, Tonks held the ball high into the air and launched a miraculous throw into the away side's trembling penalty area. 

Chris Maxwell, the Terriers goalkeeper, leapt up for the ball confidently but then broke every goalkeeper's time- honoured rule. Maxwell fumbled and bumbled, dropping the ball clumsily and getting punished for his negligence. The ball fell into no man's land and,after an unseemly scramble, prodded the ball into his own net with his back foot. It was not the way Maxwell had imagined the night would turn out for him but his Huddersfield team had now unravelled. 

You remembered the Huddersfield of yesteryear, the immortal and exceptional King Denis Law who began his career at the old Leeds Road ground but then discovered Manchester United and never looked back. Then there was the lovable socialite and party animal who went by the name of Frank Worthington who started his career at Huddersfield. Worthington once scored one of the most spectacular goals ever seen while at Bolton. Trapping the ball deftly with his back to goal, Worthington juggled the ball with both feet, back- flicked the ball over his shoulder impudently and drove the ball into an Ipswich Town net, a goal to treasure in an unforgettable 3-3 draw.

But last night Huddersfield were back in less enlightened company. It felt as if they were almost completely overawed by these humble surroundings. Your mind drifted charmingly back to Herbert Chapman, the Huddersfield manager who revolutionised the club overnight. The formal waistcoat, bowler hat and cigarette characterised the man but even Chapman would have been at a loss at the modern incarnation of Huddersfield Town. It was not a pretty sight.

The Budget

 The Budget

The Budget used to be one of those eagerly anticipated events in the British calendar, a springtime ritual that would normally coincide with the first sound of the cuckoo, the magical manifestation of the tulip and the daisy and general optimism. We always knew it would make for unpleasant reading, watching and digesting the following day but we loved that moment when the Chancellor of the Exchequer would open the door of 11 Downing Street, battered black suitcase in their hands, smiling almost triumphantly at the details inside that suitcase.

For those of us completely unaffected by matters that we considered irrelevant to us, it was a moment frozen in time, completely bewildering and not of paramount importance at all. Both my late and wonderful mum and dad were smokers but never drinkers. But their two doting and loving sons and always respectful brothers, didn't seem to care that much although we did look at the family's living room curtains with a good deal of horror at times. The brownish-black cigarette stains were something of an eye sore but of course we loved mum and dad because they were the best and finest. 

But come Budget Day during the 1970s we all knew that Denis Healey, the Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer, would emerge from 11 Downing Street with a hearty chuckle under his breath and all kinds of seductive goodies. Britain would not be destined to follow the road to ruination and the country's finances would be in safe and capable hands. Some of us, though, hated the smell of cigarettes because that was just repulsive, none of us would ever smoke, while booze and alcohol were strictly off limits. 

Yesterday though, you could almost hear the tumultuous and thunderous applause echoing around the streets of Westminster. It was an almost historic moment, a moment to hold the breath, to gasp in wonder and then the realisation dawned rather like some epic revelation that none had ever seen. Rachel Reeves had become the first woman Chancellor of the Exchequer and it was as if some Biblical figure had walked on water.

She looked happy, thrilled, honoured and privileged. She held up the red box and she could hardly believe what was happening to her. It must have felt like the weightiest responsibility that anybody had ever been entrusted with. The pressure would be both onerous and perhaps unbearable. It had been bad enough that men had been in charge of the country's finances for so many centuries but a woman-  what a daunting prospect and the reactions would be frighteningly stereotypical. Surely you couldn't trust a woman to hold onto the purse strings of Britain with any kind of fiscal prudence, efficiency and skill. 

But yesterday Rachel Reeves, although polarising opinion as everybody half expected anyway, announced the first bombshell. The central issue of the Budget would be the hike of overall taxes soaring by £40 billion. To the uninitiated and in the dark, £40 billion sounds so ridiculously astronomical that you imagined that the accountants and economists of the UK must have been shaking in their boots, trembling with shock and wondering whether the world would come to an end immediately.

We will only find out the more widespread repercussions of these financial punches to the ribs in forthcoming weeks and months, but it does sound painful and unnecessarily punitive. Besides, who knew we had £40 billion in the kitty anyway. The Tories of course played so many games of Monopoly with our monetary resources that at times none of us knew whether we were completely broke, destitute or not.

 Liz Truss briefly threatened complete bankruptcy and Boris was so caught up with a global virus that it was hard to imagine how any investment in the essential infrastructure of the country would ever be usefully felt at any time in our lives. So we just rolled with the punches, hoping that by the end of the week, the working man or woman would still be able to look at their bank balances and puff out their cheeks with blissful relief.

In the old days it used to be the case that only cigarettes and beer would be our only foremost consideration. Of course they'd slap an extortionate 20 or 30p on booze and smokes but then they always did. My late and delightful mother in law once memorably gave up the fags or cigarettes because they had become criminally expensive and her brothers followed suit. But they must have known that the rest of the country were probably making the same decisions.

The tobacco industry though got off fairly lightly yesterday with only a two per cent rising to 10 per cent hike while VAT on school fees and private school fees were hit equally as severely. The recent introduction of the Inheritance Tax meant different things to different demographics. But the hard truth was that the basic rate of this new tax would continue to rise quite significantly. A huge £325,0000 tax free plan would remain in action but then we were informed of a £500,000 rise to those whose estate is passed to direct descendants.

National Insurance contributions would be going up 15 per cent next April while Capital Gains Tax would be increased by 10 per cent to 18 percent. Five billion pounds would be coughed up for housing  and more luxurious apartments on every council estate that had been so obviously neglected for the last 60 years or so. So that was alright, wasn't it?

But then you thought of the essential services, our eminent and highly respected doctors and surgeons, our invaluable teachers, the policemen and women on our local high streets pounding the beat every day with little in the way of recognition and respect. You thought of the decaying Victorian schools with alarming cracks in the brickwork, science laboratories that had last seen a lick of paint when Alexander Fleming was a lad in shorts and then you thought of those classrooms. Of course they had been modernised and updated with the latest technological advances but then there were the books, the stationary, the pens and pencils, the maintenance of these noble buildings. What would become of them?

It is easy to be judgmental and full of knee jerk responses to the yearly Budget. We all know where we think our taxpayers money should be allotted, what exactly our politicians should do for a living rather than mess with our taxes, our wages, our vital income, our livelihoods. They were playing with fire. Of course they were and they must have been privately aware of the damaging effect they were all having on the country. 

And so today Britain takes stock of its finances once again and not for the first time, it must be added. Most of the ladies and gentlemen who take up their positions on railway Tube stations in London with those familiar pink pages of the Financial Times have seen this all before. They run their eyes over their stocks and shares in oil, steel, uranium, property and some on the gold bullion market. These are the people with the serious money, millions and billions to spend and country estates in Gloucestershire.

But today looks different. The first female Chancellor of the Exchequer has just spoken for the first time and for this reason alone, she must be acclaimed and congratulated. Budgets, of course, come and go rather like the passing of the seasons and, dare we say it, England football managers. But then the likes of Roy Hodgson, Terry Venables and Sir Bobby Robson were all excellent managers and never should be a derogatory word ever be uttered in their direction.

Still, Britain wakes up to a financial landscape that some will either heavily criticise and condemn or praise to the skies and wax lyrical about depending on where you happen to be. Rishi Sunak, the former Prime Minister, almost exploded with fury and righteous indignation.  Once again, Sunak insisted, the Labour party had led us all to hell in a handcart. Their taxes would just destroy the country overnight and how Britain missed the wonderfully patrician figure of Sir Harold Mcmillan because, as we knew, that under the Tories during the 1950s, Britain had never had it so good. Besides Britain, you'll always have enough in your pocket for a bag of chips and a soft drink when you come out of the cinema. Rejoice, rejoice. 

US Election just weeks away.

 US Election just weeks away

We are now just weeks away from what could be an era defining election in the United States of America. Next month the USA has to decide one way or the other. Their choices are unenviable because the options are so limited and you have to feel so sorry for them. Whenever we have dilemmas or dodgy patches throughout our lives we normally turn to people we feel we can trust and who love us. But in early November, one of the most powerful and influential countries in the world will be voting in the next President of the United States of America and that's a thankless task. 

Now the reality is that America is now faced with a straightforward decision. Do they pick as President a man with perhaps the most humiliating track record as former President or do they plump for the first woman to lead the country? In one corner, we have Donald Trump, whose very name is designed to send shivers down your spine, the feelings of dread and foreboding that young children normally get when mum and dad tell them that their long summer holiday is over and it's time to go back to school.

The very mention of Trump  is so offensive to the ear and deeply abhorrent to contemplate that you wonder if this is really happening to the country the United Kingdom continues to call its most enduring ally since the end of the Second World War. There is now a painful awkwardness about everything connected to American politics that has now been festering ever since Trump first held the reins of power in the White House as President. 

These are worrying times for the United States because both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have now become such a toxic influence on their country that it's hard to believe that there could ever have been a worse time for those living in Washington, New York, Los Angeles, California, Ohio, Michigan, Chicago and Pennsylvania, Texas and Dallas. Throughout the 50 states and innumerable ghetto lands of the US and those cohesive communities in the deep South, there is an uncomfortable fear of the unknown, a terrible suspicion that life may never be the same after the Election and anything can happen or not as be it the case.

It is still hard to believe in hindsight how Donald Trump came so close to power and how anybody could attract such a hard core, dedicated following from such a vast majority of the American population. We all know about the potty mouthed nonsense that continues to pour from Trump's mouth, the ludicrously illiterate ravings and rantings, the totally indecipherable absurdities that continue to reverberate around the world.

Trump is an undoubtedly a political loose cannon, a dangerous liability to the whole of the globe and even now some of us are trembling in case he gives his consent to another Vietnam. Now of course that's an exaggeration but you never know because Trump looks like he's capable of inflicting so much damage with his mouth that even innocent civilians must be biting their fingernails. By his own admission, war does appear an appealing prospect to him but we must hope that even Trump will try and think through his more outrageous statements.

And yet you can't help but feel sorry for the Americans because Trump is so full of his own vaingloriousness and pumped up pomposity that if anybody dare puncture his monumental ego, he may threaten to take you to court and sue you for every dollar that he may have at his disposal. Trump is so ferociously opinionated and unapologetically tactless that if somebody had just suggested he join a charm school he may well have just dismissed them as village idiots.

In the case of Kamala Harris the jury is well and truly out since little is known of her as a potential president of the United States. She does have her fanatical supporters and, of course, the rational commonsense and exceptional intelligence that Trump will never be able to claim or perhaps we've got it all wrong about him. To his credit, Trump will always have their ear for all of those eccentrics who still think of him as the best thing sliced bread. Trump fires off all manner of mockery and vicious vitriol at Harris because he knows that she could yet beat him on the day of the election.

Yesterday Harris delivered from her pulpit, preaching to the converted and pontificating on all kinds of issues so close to America's heart. There were the traditional promises of a healthy economy, low levels of unemployment, the Constitution which enshrines the gun culture and a secure, prosperous America. Both Harris and Trump have the best interests of the United States at heart but only one can be right and we all think we know the answer to that conundrum.

Last week, former President of the USA Jimmy Carter, now so highly esteemed and most commendable of Presidents, celebrated his 100th birthday. Your mind travelled back to that now famous handshake between Anwar Al Sadat and Menachem Begin, the notable Prime Minister of Israel. It signalled a beautiful peace agreement between Egypt and Israel. Standing between Sadat and Begin was that admirable man who grew up as a peanut farmer and then became President of the United States. Carter was the face and voice of peace and reconciliation.

The thought occurs to you that now either Trump or Harris will have their work cut out in the ongoing war between Israel, Hamas and Hezbollah. Trump was the man who once dressed up as a chicken in some easily forgotten American variety TV show and this is the man who wants to take America to the promised land, this power crazed megalomaniac who aspires to rule with a rod of iron at the White House and the Oval Office.

Kamala Harris simply wants to be remembered as the first female President of the United States. There are rumours that some of her policies are less than palatable and a vote for Harris could be wantonly wasted. The other day, in a head to head TV debate on American TV, Harris just started giggling at Trump barely believing what she'd just heard. Trump, with that blond orange head of hair still playing games on Trump's head, kept blustering and bellowing away like one of those highly amusing characters at Speakers Corner at London's Hyde Park. 

Here in the UK, the USA will always have our unwavering admiration and support. But the truth is that come early November, decisions will be made and fates sealed. It's either Harris or Trump. Some of us believe that it may just as well be those other legendary American comedians who went by the name of Abbott and Costello. Rest assured America. Here in Britain we are thinking you.

Nova Memorial Day for October 7th

 Nova Memorial Day for October 7th

They came from all the world, those tightly knit and loving communities, the towns, cities and global villages, the vast continents, over land, ocean, sea and the expansive lands where Judaism is so richly celebrated, cherished, and treasured. They stood together in poignant unison and just reflected on the events that, a year ago to the day, so horrifically scarred the beautiful country that is Israel, damaging and then destroying humanity and leaving nothing behind it but the repulsive smell of death, heartache and suffering. 

Today, a year ago, hundreds of music concert lovers were leaving the Nova music festival in Israel just happy and euphoric, delighted to be among each other on the glorious festival of Simchat Torah. And then their world collapsed around them and the evil forces of murder and pathological hatred spread their tentacles around, poisoning the air with its deeply distressing aftermath. Over 1,500 innocent Israelis died in the most horrific outbreak of violence and terrorism ever seen in modern times. Even a year later, the rest of the world is still numb, still speechless, traumatised and still asking questions, still rationalising with senseless killing.

And yet amid the devastation, destruction, brutal barbarity and the relentless onslaught of gun fire, bullets, bombings and missiles that fell on that fatal and fateful day, we have yet to find answers to those crucial questions. We will know exactly why October 7th happened but will never discover how it was allowed to happen. The events are well chronicled and the depth of the personal loathing brazenly expressed by the despicable terrorist networks of Hamas and Hezbollah leave most of us cold, stunned, shocked beyond reason, appalled and just lost for words.

But on a grey and uplifting Sunday afternoon in Hyde Park in London, we held up our Israeli flags with the kind of immense pride that has almost become customary since last year on October 7th. We have marched defiantly along the Embankment, animated, angry and determined to let the rest of the world know that we were still here, passionately supportive and never going away. We were wholeheartedly committed to the cause, imploring that the Israeli hostages held in captivity be released immediately.

We knew we were probably wasting our time but we had to hold onto something, an indefinable optimism, a delusional belief that Hamas would just surrender and give back those innocent people who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. What we didn't know was that Hamas had stubbornly dug their heels in, refusing to allow commonsense to prevail and intent on the complete annihilation of Israel, wiping the country off the map of the world.

In the distance there was a stage ready to host yet another rousing concert to the thousands down below them, the stoic ones who held the Israeli flags and innumerable photographs of the hostages. We looked around us and heard the voices that mattered most, both Jewish and Christian contingents with the same message, the same proclamation of freedom and liberation. They'd heard enough about torture and mutilation of babies and children, the inhumanity of it all, the dreadful conditions that the hostages had been undergoing for so long. There was, above all desperation, a plaintive plea to just be released from stinking hovels and then reintroduced to families, smiling mothers and fathers, grandparents, cousins, aunties and uncles. This, though, was one emotional reunion that would never take place.

For exactly a year we have seen nothing but burning buildings, charred ruins, flattened homes, supermarkets, post offices, chemists, government organisations and, above all rubble. We have seen plumes of black smoke soaring into the skies, fires and explosions, children buried in the ground being pulled out of broken girders, piles of bricks, twisted metal, the skeletal remains of once proud structures. They were now drenched in blood, faces caked with yet more blood, dripping blood from torn clothes, bodies now unrecognisable, all hope gone. Israel was now inconsolable and crestfallen, families were now murdered and never to see each other again. It looked like the worst of all Greek tragedies but this particular disaster had been situated in the Middle East.

The hardest pill to swallow was the one after October 7th when, after the  inevitable retaliation from Israel, Hamas and now Hezbollah were now claiming that there have been almost 40,000 fatalities when we all know that such figures have been grossly exaggerated. Of course the propaganda machine is functioning more efficiently than ever. It is one long, agonising nightmare where once again the law abiding civilians have suffered and died in the general madness and maelstrom.

And then we go back to the beginning of this human catastrophe. A recent BBC documentary highlighted the terrible magnitude of one continuous day of rabid terrorism. We saw young teenagers fleeing for their lives to some warm sanctuary where they could hide but were still petrified in case one of the bullets and bombs had fatally hit them. They concealed themselves in building skips and containers, in improvised trenches, behind the remnants of shops, anywhere that could provide them with a safe haven. But then we heard the crying, terrified youngsters, throwing themselves onto the ground and praying for their lives. 

We all know that at some point a ceasefire must be considered and peace will be declared. But that's not even on the imminent agenda soon because one side simply want to murder every Jew and Israeli on the planet. It's personal, a vile vendetta against the state of Israel, the extinction of the Jewish race and ruthless persecution of all Jews. We should shiver with revulsion at such vicious victimisation, a simple desire to rid the world of Jews from every Jewish population. Of course we should express our disgust and condemnation for all those 1,500 Jewish youngsters who lost their lives for no reason at all. 

Yesterday, Hyde Park echoed the sentiments of our private thoughts. They listened to Chief Rabbi Mervis, prominent Jewish poets and historians, hugely eloquent orators, dignitaries and dignified folk who delivered their sermons with heartfelt emotions. We were undoubtedly moved to tears but didn't really know how to articulate more and more grief because this is one conflict that can have no resolution without compromise and acceptance of the status quo. Hamas and Hezbollah insist that they will never stop until every Jew is blasted into oblivion, so that just seems like a forlorn hope. But we have to hope because hope means progress and finally, victory over Hamas and Hezbollah.

Across the whole of Hyde Park we saw a movement in a positive direction, thousands of Jews and non Jews, the old Iranian flags fluttering away gratifyingly on the side of Israel. We saw Friends of Israel stalls from all over Britain and our North London location. We saw all religious denominations backing Israel and Standing by Israel. They were wrapped in the blue and white of the Star of David and we felt secure and united, harmonious and, quite literally, singing from the same hymn sheet. 

 Occasionally there were gentle drizzles of rain and occasional flickers of late autumn sun but there was something very enriching and invigorating about the day that restored your faith in man and woman kind. Your family were there for you and of course they mean the world to you. By the end of the day it felt so good to be Jewish and so deeply proud of your Jewish identity that you simply wanted to chant Hava Negilla a million times with resounding certainty. Being Jewish is so wonderful.

World Teachers' Day.

 World Teachers' Day.

Teachers have always been models of respectability and the people we look up to for reassurance, a thorough education and the figures of authority who are simply there to offer wise guidance and experienced pearls of wisdom. Teachers should be our friends and confidants when childhood becomes both difficult and challenging. They're the ones who we can trust and believe in if we're just a couple of minutes late because the bus or train was late and mum had forgotten to pack our lunch. Teachers soothed feverish brows, alleviating anxiety at the drop of a hat and explaining everything carefully.

Today is World Teachers' Day and it's all about taking just a couple of hours for our young students and imparting the best possible advice. School is all about learning, developing those first friendships from a young age and telling your teacher that you may be struggling even though you may think you're not. From our first infant or primary school day, we are all bewildered children because none of us know exactly where we might be going. So who do you ask for help? You turn to the man or woman who rings the bell for playtime and you stop immediately. Teachers instinctively knew what may be going through a child's mind when that bell goes. They may be laughing and giggling but it's all a bit daunting.

Teachers are our first points of academic contact, the ones who point at what used to be blackboards with rubbers and chalks in their hands. Then, all manner of multi coloured chalks scratched out the multiplication table, the alphabet, grammar, new words, the first seeds of a burgeoning vocabulary. So you sit at your desk, waiting patiently and then looking at sir or miss with increasing levels of fascination. Your attention may be diverted by events taking place outside your classroom and the windows with long wooden poles.

As a young child it all felt like the most intimidating challenge of them all, that first week back in early September after an ecstatic summer holiday. Some of us genuinely cried into their bed pillows as kids because we were dreading this new environment or perhaps one we knew everything there was to know about but wished we couldn't be subjected to again and again. Besides, why on earth did we have to go to school because the kids were naughty and nasty, always disobedient and never well behaved? 

All the kids in the playground were just troublemakers, letting off stink bombs, a singularly disruptive influence and just a pain in the neck to all the teachers who were there to maintain law and order. So, as primary school children, we can all remember vividly those eternal playground days of chasing each other for no apparent reason, playing Tag by catching each other and then tapping each other on their shoulders. The girls were always playing Kiss Chase or skipping because gender stereotyping was years away.

But then teachers came into our lives and were always there for us, constantly available for a word after lessons. They'd sit us down in private when the rest of the kids had run out of the gates and were desperate to get home for games of football in the park with our classroom mates. Kids were always hungry for knowledge whereas others regarded school as a painful imposition that just had to be endured and tolerated. So teachers would be our confidants, the ones who would always listen to all of our childhood grievances and long term problems. 

Most of our primary school learning was conducted in either long corridors with classrooms inside or huge huts outside and although the memories may be totally unreliable, we can still visualise it all with a certain amount of accuracy. Within minutes and hours of our first lessons, you could still hear the incessant clattering and pounding of footsteps, five or six year old children running down the passageway while every so often the teachers yelled out severe reprimands to those kids who just continued to run and laugh. You had to stop because if you didn't, the punishment would be a hundred lines after school in an empty classroom.

Teachers were those individuals who set vitally important standards, morals, values and, above all discipline. They stood there in all weathers, whistling every so often in the playground and bawling out strict orders above all the pandemonium  around them. They shout at their pupils with ferocious conviction since they just want them to succeed in life and get on in adolescence. But we were just oblivious to the adult world because school was a meeting place for fun, sharing football Panini football stickers and swapping magazines called Jackie for the girls and Shoot magazine for the boys. 

Most of us tend to think of teachers as horrible and condescending individuals who just lecture you and humiliate kids because sir and miss simply don't understand us.  They make all manner of belittling and facetious comments about you because you were the one who kept flicking pieces of paper at the other kids or using an elastic band that would normally miss its intended target. Teachers are supposed to be instilling the groundwork for further education in later years but, at the time, kids have no boundaries.

Then there is the dawning realisation that teachers are the most patient and understanding of any person, apart from your loving parents who  love you and care for you. They have a very specific role in our lives, always influential, always compassionate and hoping that one day you'll be grateful for everything they've tried to give back to both you and the rest of society.

Long gone, of course teachers and headmasters would confidently march into your classroom, wearing a a black cloak with a mortar board, a university cap on their heads and the infamous stick. The old St Trinian's films from the archives of film history are still engraved on our minds.  St Trinian's of course was just slapstick comedy and nothing more really. The kids would always be up to mischief, plotting something unsavoury and then poking merciless fun at those they may see to  them as terribly threatening authoritarians.

Nowadays teachers are still underpaid, undervalued and almost dismissed as mean spirited, heartless members of their noble calling. The kids are the ones who leave behind them huge piles of books consisting of questions that have to be ticked as right or not as be it the case. Teachers are the ones who usually confronted with mountains of exercise books that never seem to come to an end. But teaching is, essentially a vocation, a natural calling, a profession to be acknowledged as something to be proud of.

Above all the madness and deafening noise, you can still hear a despairing voice in a chemistry lesson from way back when.  You can still see a helpless and struggling Asian gentleman who just wanted to be heard and not simply disregarded as some battering ram. Here was a man who was being mercilessly beaten over the head with loud jeering and sneering of the most cruel kind. But teachers are worth far more than relentless verbal punishment laced with insults and hurtful jibes.

But for some of us primary school was all about a certain husband and wife team who guided us to our first promised land of academic virtuosity, the first building blocks towards a bright sunset of an educational paradise, the foundation stone of our early lives. We still remember Mr and Mrs Cole because they were somehow inseparable and that was comforting to us at the time because we admired them for that reason alone. Mrs Cole used to take us for country dancing lessons on Friday afternoon. She was a maternal, a beacon of stability to us because our mums and dads had given us those first guiding hands and the world was a treacherous assault course. 

And then, finally there was our masterful primary school headmaster. Ken Aston had been a distinguished World Cup football referee at the 1962 World Cup in Chile and then was present at the 1966 World Cup in England as a pacifist. Aston, in the now infamous Battle of Santiago where the players of Chile and Italy quite clearly intended to kill each other given half a chance, raced over towards the scene of the crime and pointed towards the players tunnel. The match was immediately called off and before you could blink, feuding players from both sides sheepishly walked off the pitch. It had now degenerated into a playground scuffle, fists were flying, but Aston,  like a ruthless sergeant major, stood for no nonsense and the players were back in the dressing room in no time at all.  

So there you have it Ladies and Gentlemen. It's World Teachers Day and please try to pay attention when you're being spoken to. You don't have to do detention nor write 1,000 lines about firing pea shooters at each other when sir or miss are trying to teach you about phonetics, pronunciation, verbs, adverbs, pronouns, numbers, division and long division. It'll stand you in good stead later on in life and besides, we'll thank them profusely later on in life. Oh and my wonderful son Sam and lovely daughter in law Lucy are brilliant teachers and they love what they do. Enjoy World Teachers Day because you may learn something.