One of the following must be true

 

It’s been a while since I wrote about the world of politics, but I had to return to it at some point, so here goes.  😊

 

One of the following must be true, or perhaps they all have some semblance of truth?

 

1)      Politics or other high office jobs attract the delusionally idiotic, the corrupt and the perverted.

2)      Power corrupts.

3)      Even a saint cannot go unscathed through the scrutiny that falls on our public servants and others whose position gets them media attention.

 

This started while watching Morning TV over my breakfast.  There was a talking head expert on a piece about one of the eternal problems in the NHS, who came out with the following informative statement, “As people get older, they have more risk of dying”.   I bet you never realised that before.  I wonder haw much they pay these TV experts to impart that level of wisdom to we, the public?

This was closely followed by the local news, a large part of which was devoted to the trial for child sex abuse of the ex-leader of a local political party, the DUP (Democratic Unionist Party – originally formed by Rev. Ian Paisley).  His name is Jeffrey Donaldson, if you really want to look up this sordid story.  The DUP has been plagued by scandals for years (including Paisleys son, who was crooked in the extreme), but like Trump’s supporters, local right-wing protestant, unionists keep voting for these idiots.  There was for example a case last year where a woman that I had dealt with in work was eventually encouraged, with others, to take an ex-DUP councillor to court for abusing them as children at a local church.  He was jailed.

In another scandal, many years ago, when I worked for Belfast City Council, the head of their Leisure Services was yet another extremely religious DUP supporter.  Yet this man had managed to get himself spread all over one of the local Sunday scandal papers, when he was caught ‘cottaging’ on Council time with a junior member of staff from one of the leisure centres.  He appeared lazy, and verging on incompetent in the dealings I had with him, but I’ll not go into those stories here.  In later years, the same man was co-opted to become a local DUP councillor on the resignation of one of his colleagues.  Then, and remember, he was co-opted, so never even had to go through an election, he was made mayor of that council!  Living by the standards you claim to uphold is obviously optional in the DUP.

Another DUP, let’s say ‘abnormality’, was told to me by a guy I used to go to class with, and who had a pretty high-level job in Northern Irelands Civil Service until he took early retirement.  One DUP politician, who had even managed to be promoted to be a minister in the NI Assembly, was, he told me, almost impossible to work with.  The reason for this was that minister’s religion.  He was a creationist Cristian, who fervently believed that he had a hot line to God.  Thus, whatever thoughts sprang into his head, were God’s, not his, and therefore sacrosanct.  He was uncompromisingly impossible to persuade and could not envisage any other path than his ’vision’.  Now I don’t know your thoughts on things like this, but I would have thought that listening to voices in your head was not a good qualification for leadership or indeed for any position in public office, but rather would be a good case for the application of anti-psychotic drugs, and perhaps also a strait jacket.  There is a good reason for the separation of church and state.

 

So, given that there have been plenty of other examples of bad behaviour from the rich and powerful, below are a few examples.  This is by no means a comprehensive list, so I have ignored the obvious candidates like Boris Johnston, Liz Truss, Trump, Musk, Stamer, Mandelson, Peter Murrell (former SNP chief executive and husband of former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon), etc.  Even the list of those recently caught is almost endless, and then there are wider groups like those involved in the Post Office scandal, the Contaminated Blood scandal etc.

 

Tony Blair:  We may well be reaping the whirlwind on this first issue now, since divisions in society seem to be increasing at an exponential rate.  It seems to me, that if you want people to live together and to accept each other, then a good place to start would be to educate all our diverse ethnic, cultural and religious groups together.  That way, people are more likely to realise that they are not so different from other people after all?  Instead after coming to power in 1998, Blair allowed the expansion of religious schools across the country.  For comment, see here:   Never Mind the Evidence: Blair's obsession with faith schools,  ABSTRACT Tony Blair's governments sought to increase the number of schools controlled by churches and other religious groups despite a mass of evidence about the dangers of faith-based education and in the face of widespread professional, political and public concerns.

Of course, this is not the only stupid thing that Blair and his government did.

 

Neil Parish :  Former Conservative MP, admitted to deliberately watching pornography on his mobile phone in the House of Commons chamber. He resigned as the MP for Tiverton and Honiton in April 2022 after two female colleagues reported his action.  It’s nice to know that your representative in parliament is paying attention to what really matters!

 

Zack Polanski:  Before entering politics the Green Party leader worked as a hypnotherapist.  A 2013 article in the Sun featured Polanski offering a reporter hypnosis to increase the cup size of her breasts!  The reporter claims the session, at Polanski's Harley Street consulting room, had the desired effect, to her surprise. Since entering politics and becoming leader of the Green Party of England and Wales in September 2025, he has distanced himself from the claim, but the BBC investigated his claim that he denied it years ago, and found no evidence.  He also recently was caught on for not paying his Council Tax.  Yet more evidence of intelligent, honest politicians.

 

Of course, this is a mere glimpse of a few scandals in the UK, otherwise a book (or a whole series of books) would be required rather than just a post here.  If you want more check out this Wikipedia link and note how the number of scandals seems to grow exponentially over the years:  List of political scandals in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia

Then there is Trump!!!!!!!