President Lannister and other despots

You would think we know better in 2017.

On one side of the world we have Kim Jong-un standing before the massed ranks of his army and press-ganged “supporters”, squealing delightedly as his armaments are paraded past.

Koreans, both North and South rattling their nuclear sabres.

On the other side of the world we witness a bombastic, mysogynist, racist in charge of the world’s most powerful military, unable to remember which country he is launching missiles against and authorising the use of his biggest non-nuclear toy, whilst his family slowly infiltrate the corridors of power (cue Joffrey?).

Hear me roar!

I find it difficult to decide which I find more deplorable.

I genuinely thought those days were over.

Admittedly the last 30 years have seen a catalogue of errors by the Western super-powers in the way that they have handled events in the Middle East, accounting for the awful terrorist events that haunt us to this day.

We look back at the Bush/Blair legacy and have every right to be fearful of politicians manipulated by military and business interests.

But we seem to be heading backwards – military parades belong to Cold War Russia and the failure of communism. A puppet in The White House is for a TV box-set, not real life?

Season finale Homeland tonight. At least that’s fiction – and yet the twists and turns appear more believable than watching the news.

I find it all disturbing.

Is winter coming?