The Angry Exile: The best of times, the worst of times?

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Thursday 13 August 2009

The best of times, the worst of times?

Unemployment may be at its highest level for nearly fifteen years, which is rough for the 2.5 million or so concerned (as well as all the ones that aren't working but don't count towards the unemployment figues) and pretty fucking grim reading alongside the news that much of the west is fucked and the UK in particular is even fucked-er than first thought. But it's not all bad news. Three quarters of a million people entitled to benefits, but not taking them.

Many are thought to be middle class professionals. A Government source was quoted as saying: “We are very keen to make sure we are reaching out to everyone who may find themselves without a job. That may include people who do not think of themselves as the sort of people who claim benefits.”
Has it not crossed their minds that these people may not wish to be reached out to, do not need the money, may be using their redundancy to get by and are preparing to start a new job or invest in a new project?

Couldn't have put it better myself. Having been there myself and also got by without help I take my hat off to the lot of them. If only rather more than 750,000 liked to think of themselves as the sort of people who don't claim benefits.

But it's not just individuals that prefer to rely on themselves rather than join the queue for handouts. Jaguar Land Rover is doing it too, which is great news when half the car makers in the world seem to be sucking ministerial cocks for money to prop up their ailing firms.

Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has rejected assistance from the Government and has found the financing from foreign banks needed to secure 14,500 jobs.

Ratan Tata, head of Tata Group, which owns JLR, wrote to Lord Mandelson, the Business Secretary, to say that the terms of the Government’s aid were “very onerous and hence unacceptable”.

Okay, to be fair here it is true that Jaguar Land Rover did ask for money, but decided to stop after unzipping the fly and taking a look at what it was expected to swallow in return for the cash.

Tata said yesterday it would secure financing from commercial lenders, thought to be mainly foreign institutions. The State Bank of India, part-owned by the Indian Government, is said to be providing guarantees.

JLR’s Indian owners are said to be baffled at the Government’s reluctance to offer help, given the large number of jobs at stake. The Government is thought to have been unwilling to bail out a private company and set a precedent for other troubled manufacturers.

Who cares? In an ideal world I'd prefer that governments didn't go baling out badly run businesses, and that JLR didn't feel the need to go running to the government in the first place but had the confidence in itself and its products. I confess to having always had a soft spot for Jaguar ever since getting a ride in a family friend's XJ12 some 25 years ago, and I would be saddened if the firm went tits up just when it's trying really new designs and getting a fair amount of praise for it. I saw an XF in the flesh for the first time a few months back, and if we hadn't both been doing 100 kph on the freeway I'd have been tempted to get out and lick it. It's not pretty from everywhere but it knocks its predecessor into a cocked hat if you ask me.

So well done and good luck to the 750,000 self reliant people who've decided against taking benefits and Jaguar Land Rover, despite having asked and also despite some tenuous involvement with the Indian government (which is, after all, the least inappropriate government to be involved in financing what's now a division of an Indian company) - in my book you all deserve to succeed. Now if you could all give some thought about what you should demand of the next government...

UPDATE: Wat Tyler thinks that many people aren't signing up for Jobseeker's Allowance because they think the Job Centres are a waste of time and hopeless for actually finding a job. Probably something in that.