There is an old saying around here which goes "Among tinkers no one owns the purse".I first heard it used many years ago ,long before the prohibitionist and health Taliban destroyed the pubs of Ireland and put them to the sword,when six of us used meet every Friday evening for a few pints ,a smoke and a good chat.God be with the days.
Even then one or more of us might be shy in the money department ,while others might be carrying extra,having had a good week or whatever.Once the situation revealed itself,the lad going well covered the lad under pressure and everybody got the same amount of gargle ,no questions asked.
This was the custom among the travelling fraternity ,another institution our secular society has tried to put to the sword by enacting the petty laws barring camping by the roadside. Our lawmakers and their acoloyties would prefer the sight of ragworth and hogweed to humans.
Maybe the sense of community (which the E.U. has perhaps consciously dropped from its title )made such Christian values pertinent.Tinkers have a great sense of family and boozing buddies are broadly similar.
Certainly I never remember anyone talking of sub prime loan repayments or moral hazard in the context of the tinkers purse.
Everybody trusted everybody else to be honest and the attitude was that it was good to help out a neighbour and friend in hard times without undue investigation and without guarantees of institutional austerity and the levy of penal interest on the guy who was temporarily under pressure.
If a community of countries are mutually bound by common objectives there are no reasons why the "Tinkers Purse " principle cannot apply,Unless of course one wants to totally dominate the other and punish and humiliate it if it falls on hard times.
If it comes to that stage then the logical and honourable thing to do is to dissolve that Union ,not humiliate the the fella experiencing hard times by instituting permanent austerity on him,getting him to surrender even more sovereignty and to agree to be fined if he goes broke again.
Now Noona's remarks about not being pavilion members of the EU,being at the heart of it (Do ye take us for full ejits) and his sneering reference to a buddy under pressure ,Greece,as only being capable of contributing feta cheese to the cause ,displays a mindset which would never,ever allow him to even comprehend the rational of the tinkers purse.Nor to be a drinking buddy of mine.
Now to the Rat story.
Many years ago ago a mill owner was so plagued with rats that he could barely survive, such was the amount of grain they ate or destroyed.Cats ,terriers ,traps ,poison made no difference.The day was saved by a mountain man who trapped a dozen rats,and put them alive into an aerated barrel,without food or water.He returned in three weeks to find one sleek rat alive.This rat,the most cunning,fearsome ,vicious and determined of them all had killed and devoured the rest.
Let loose in the mill he soon cleared all rodents out ,as they soon got the message that he had developed a taste for rat flesh.Soon his influence spread to all the neighbouring mills.
You get the message?
Vote No says I.
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