A Long Blue Monday by Erhard von Büren

Author:Erhard von Büren
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
Published: 2018-05-28T16:00:00+00:00

‘That rascally face. He lied to them, and now they’ve elected him again! He’s convinced he’s in direct personal contact with God, and he believes in his crusade against the rogue states.’

‘Calm down,’ says Anna. ‘Do you really think things would be different with someone like Kerry?’

‘Probably not, admittedly. The Americans are very good at electing peculiar presidents. Really, they’ve managed splendidly with Bush Junior. The goodies and the baddies, there’s nothing in between. Whoever is not for me is against me, ergo a rogue. And the idea that their own country might also be a rogue state is something that could never occur to them.’

‘Hey, keep your hair on!’

‘Why should I? Why not let me get in a flap about America and the Americans? I only get annoyed at them because they absolutely refuse to live up to the high opinion I had of them for such a long time. Babitt and Rabbit and Ishmael and George Willard and Wing Biddlebaum and Reefy and – don’t look so surprised! – Zuckerman, you know, they’re really not bad people, estimable and, in my view at least, far more likeable than Bush and Co. That lopsided, rascally grin! But apparently it’s the kind of simple-minded charm that appeals to a majority. It would’ve been better if the man had stuck to alcohol and if his visions came from whisky and not from up above. But what of it, possibly his pious friend Blair’s belief in his own lies is even stronger.’

‘What have you got against him? After all he’s your comrade, so to speak.’

‘So to speak – well said! To be honest, I’d do better to fume at him, I’d have even more valid reason. What a cuckoo in the Labour Party nest!’

‘Bush and Blair, the only ones still missing are Berlusconi and Blocher.’

‘And on to political smalltalk! You’re right to make fun of me. Why get annoyed? It’s no use, has no effect, not even the slightest. I might just as well pray to the Virgin Mary for a just peace in the Holy Land.’

‘And does that make you depressed?’

‘Why? Should it? Okay, perhaps it should. Not depressed, not outraged and not angry, no big feelings, it’s just sufficent to make me feel annoyed, always enough for that, for so much at least. Read the New Statesman and the WochenZeitung, listen to the BBC and, every day, to Echo der Zeit. You know such a lot and could know a hundred times more. But there’s nothing you can do. Not absolutely nothing, but hardly anything. Dutifully take part in referendums and elections, usually lose, but nevertheless go and vote again the next time.’

‘That sounds rather tame.’

‘So it is. Tame and dutiful, as behoves a model citizen.’

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