'Nice Hotdog,
Mick?' Said John muffling through the last of his hotdog.
'That's nothing
compared to what I am about to show you.'
'No seriously,
best hotdog ever. I say that every time I come here.'
'Ok, let's get
going.' Mick had a level of concern for what he was about to do. He figured it
would be entertaining, he was simply unsure if John was in the right frame of
mind.
Heading
northwest along Cowper bay drive, the Finger wharf on the right, Woolloomooloo
Bay hotel across the road on the left. After having spent several hours in the
woolly bay hotel having a drink or two, it would be interesting to see what
John gets onto. He had not gone into any
of his traditional rants; Trump and America had not even be mentioned.
'So where are
you taking me?' John asked as they were making there way up the stairs from the
bay onto the domain.
'You ever heard
of the speaker's corner?'
'A little, not
a lot.'
'Well see that
over there under the Moreton Bay fig tree, the pedestal thing. Well, that is a
monument of a sort to the soapbox orators, it's there because this is what is
known as speakers corner.'
'You don't
say.' John's pace lifted, Mick relieved that maybe, just maybe he'd piqued his
interest. It had been a while since the
two had caught-up, and his mate of old seemed to have gone into himself just a
little too much.
Mick continued
'Yep apparently started around 1878, not sure if it is still going, it may be
but what used to happen was the sprinklers would come out were and went on
about a few different things. You'd have some religious types offset by some
atheists, then there were the communists, liberalists that sort.'
John was upon
the podium now, if that is what you could call it. Actually, on thought, it was
more like a pulpit. Not so much a bully pulpit, but a pauper's pulpit.
'This is great,
get a load of this, the plaque here says that due to the Sunday closure laws,
this area was quite busy with people as the gallery and gardens where open when
the pubs where not.'
Mick had nailed
it, now just to sit back and see what he rabbitted on about today. He pulled
his small three-legged hiking seat out of his bag and moved over beneath the
Moreton bay tree. Pulled out a couple of
plastic cups, poured some red wine into them, and passed one to John, still on
the pulpit before he sat down. 'Why don't you give it a go.'
John stood,
therefore, a moment or two and glanced about.
It was a pleasant enough day for late may, actually unusually warm.
People were wandering across to domain to and from the art gallery, there was
only Mick under the cool of the tree with him.
He looked
towards his friend, it was nice to be out, a few casual beers. And now
this. Why not, maybe he'd enjoy.
'See here good
sir, may your afternoon entertainment begin if you dare offer me your ear for a
few minutes.'
Mick lifted his
glass before leaning forward and resting his elbow's on his knees. This will be interesting.
'See here good
sir, let's talk about some current affairs.
What the hell is going on in America, how in gods name do they get
themselves into this predicament. They've got a president that is striving to
form a dictatorship, to dismantle his countries own democracy.
Aided by an attorney general who is a monarchist who does not believe in the three tensions
of the American government: The Presidency, Congress and the judicial system.
Then, of
course, there are the media, God help me the media. Trump! Trump can call Pelosi the speaker of
the house, second in succession to the presidency if God helps us something
happened to him as sick. He can retweet doctored videos to make her look sick.
Yet when Pelosi
herself says he, the presidency needs his friends, family and or cabinet to
intervene for his own safety and the safety of the country, the media get all
uppity that she is not respecting the office of the president.
It's insane,
it's as if to call someone out for bad behaviour is seen to be biased where the lousy act itself is not called out by the media for fear of being called
lefties, socialists, or enemies of the people.'
He was on off
and running. Mick watched as John paused to take a sip of his wine, and to look
at the small crowd of people standing about under the shade in groups of two or
three, one or two individuals standing alone.
An old fella, in his early sixties, yelled out 'That's their job you daft bugger.'
'Their job,
what's their job? To try and play bloody arbiter. Their job, my good friend, and I do thank you
for asking is to report fairly and squarely on it all. Some say they are the fourth state, that is
fourth to the president, Congress and the judiciary. Not to be a judge, but to me more like a
commentator.
You don't see
the commentators at footy games calling the shots, do you? They try to call out what is going on to
report on it, to discuss creating an open discourse. No good sir they are not
the judges.
Nor are they
the enemy of the state as the president would have you believe. They're a bit
confused is all.
Ok, so let me
get back to their president and the Republican Party. Everyone likes to make
our he is dumb, look at his tweets they say, he can't spell, his grammar is
crap, it doesn't make sense, and he lies. His dumb they say.
Yet this dumb
ass continued to chip away and disparage their democracy every single day, and
he is getting away with it. Why?
Because as much
as the Democrats can't work out how to play his game, how to shut him up. Look at 'em, there are now 24 democratic
candidates for president to the Republicans two, one of them being the
president. This, my friends seem to be
the fundamental difference between the republicans and the democrats.'
The crowd now
was around a dozen people, two or three had sat down on the ground to listen
and chat amongst themselves. John was near empty on the wine, so Mick stood up,
filled his glass and swapped with his mate before sitting down again.
The same old
guy who called out before had sat on the casing of a nearby flood light,
obviously use to light up the Moreton bay tree in all of its majesty. 'Why the
hell are you rabbitting on about America mate, we're Australians.'
'Well my good
friend, again, you have a good question, if you indulge me a little longer, I
believe I may get there. So you've all
these Democrats, then you've got a Congress that doesn't know whether to
impeach their president or not; meanwhile every day he gets more and bolder.
Last week he
declared that his attorney general has the right to get any intelligence he
wants from any of the agencies and declassify it. He has also told this same
fellow to start to investigate Joe Biden, and no doubt others democratic
nominees with the intent of defaming his political opposition.
His Republican
Party buddies in Congress are not doing anything about it, they are bowing to
his desires. It is incredible.
Now there is
real evidence out there that says Trump has committed crimes, He has even been
mentioned in the criminal case that got his own personal lawyer sent to jail.
Then there is
the Russia stuff. It's because of the Russians.'
Two police
officers had joined the crowd now, both quite relaxed just walking the beat,
not overly worried about what was going on. John greeted them with a nod.
——
Going to finish
there. I am playing catch-up on a story a day.
This. Was going to be an attempt at one of 'Micks Rants' in line with
the writing prompt 'Write A Story Featuring an Assembly or Crowd Scene'.
I also wanted work with the idea of the writer's corner - https://speakerscorner.org.au/the-history-of-speakers-corner/
More of Mick’s rants at -
2019
2018
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