‘Tis the season to be jolly. Tra la la la la la la la la.

Not a lot of jollies going around this year, all the same. Except maybe in Newry…
It’d make you laugh. The British government shaved a few points off the VAT rate, in order to give the UK economy a bit of a boost on the run-in to Christmas. A smart move? No one was quite sure. Essentially, the purpose was to get British people spending in Britain. But Ireland, as we know, is a complicated little island. Northern Ireland remains a part of the UK. So what happens as a result of the reduction in the UK VAT rate? A bunch of mercenary Taigs head for the border as if there was a friggin’ Toy Shortage in the Republic. Is there? No. They just want things a few bob cheaper.
The prospect of getting ‘better value’ north of the border was enough to lure them in their droves, with the result that over the weekend there were six-mile-long tailbacks on the road into Newry.
No offence to anyone on the Northern side of the border – I’m sure Newry is a lovely place altogether to shop – but what a bunch of plonkers! There has been a price shift, in recent weeks, of approximately 4% in favour of Northern Ireland. In the grand scheme of things, it is as far from Armageddon as you can get.
But it was enough, apparently, to cause a stampede. The cars poured over the border (what border?). The roads weren’t built to take the upsurge in vehicle numbers. Traffic jams built up. It took ages to get to where you were going. When you got there, it was next to impossible to find parking. People spent miserable hours cooped up in cars, getting to and from their destinations. We’re lucky someone wasn’t murdered or run down in a road-rage incident…
Think about it for a minute. The extra hour or two that people spent travelling and parking would in itself be enough to negate any saving. Add to that the extra cost in wasted fuel; the whinging kids; the frayed tempers; the awful feeling of being cooped up in a car going nowhere for hours on end; and the accumulated stress, frustration and humiliation. Sitting there behind the wheel, knowing in your heart that this was an exercise in arrant foolishness, and one that had an element of disloyalty and selfishness about it too, could you possibly convince yourself that this was a good idea all the same? I doubt it…
It’s depressing. The fact that people are willing to traipse like lemmings over considerable distances in search of a poxy little price advantage seems kinda pathetic. Objectively, there is nothing to choose between traders on either side of the border. It’s just that it is ludicrous for people to travel for hours to make what amount to pretty minor savings – all the while abandoning the shops that have served them for years to whatever fate awaits them at the hands of the banks, and indeed the authorities if they haven’t got the cash to meet their tax bills.
Our advice: shop local. It’s what we’d say no matter which side of the border the cheaper goods were on…

Of course, none of it matters a damn placed alongside what has been going on in Mumbai these past few days. At the time of writing, observers are still trying to piece the story together, to establish who was responsible and precisely what their motivation was.
The detail will make no difference to the hundreds of people who were killed in what was, by any standards, a shocking terrorist atrocity. We can weep and gnash our teeth all we like, to no avail. The dead are gone: destined to become tiny footnotes in the strife-torn history of a place that has never truly been at peace with itself.
And as for the wounded, it’ll take whatever time it takes to stitch them back together if that is possible. The psychic scars for some will never heal. Others will find it impossible to recover physically.
The mass murder was a product of Islamist extremism. That the killers came from Pakistan is also clear. That it was aimed to hit western interests in India seems certain. That it can be traced at least in part to the ongoing presence of US and British forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, and their support for Israel in its suppression of the Palestinian people, is hardly in doubt.
It doesn’t make it right or justifiable. Nor does it lessen the possibility that India will react in a way that will dangerously escalate tensions between the neighbouring countries. But it is necessary to recognise the part played by Western imperialist adventuring in the Middle East to appreciate also that there are ways in which the dangers might at least to some degree be alleviated. Until the new US President-elect Barack Obama is in the White House, we are in a holding pattern. But when he is sworn in, Obama and the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown between them have the capacity to undo much of the damage inflicted by George W Bush and Tony Blair.
As long as the US and the UK continue to prosecute what is seen as an anti-Islamist war, and as long as they support the outrages perpetrated by Israel against the Palestinians, the region will remain a powder keg. And if it explodes further to the south east, with both India and Pakistan possessing nuclear capability, there is no knowing what the consequences might be.
So don’t let the vicissitudes of the economy get you down too severely. It could be much worse. Imagine having to live in the middle of all that tortured shit?
Happy Christmas everyone....