Grumbling doctors and magic witches

There is a doctor call Dr Grumble who has a blog in the UK. He used to grumble most days, but now he mainly grumbles at weekends, although today is a Monday and he’s grumbling to himself between patients at his outpatient clinic.

Mostly during the weekdays he reads rather than grumbles.

Often his grumbles are really words of wisdom.

Much of the material he reads is very interesting and he directs us to it at the side of his blog.

POLITICIANS SHOULD STICK TO EATING CHOCOLATE INSTEAD OF THREATENING TO TAX IT AND LEAVE THE MAGIC TO WITCHES.

Today The Witch Doctor has picked up on an article which shows what happens when those other than witches dabble in magic.

It is an essay rather than an article so it takes a little while to read. Best read it when you are sitting comfortable by the fireside with a nice cup of hot chocolate before you go to bed tonight.

Here are some extracts to whet your chocolate appetite.

“From time to time in human history there occur events of a truly seismic significance, events that mark a turning point between one epoch and the next, when one orthodoxy is overthrown and another takes its place. The significance of these events is rarely apparent as they unfold: it becomes clear only in retrospect, when observed from the commanding heights of history. By such time it is often too late to act to shape the course of such events and their effects on the day-to-day working lives of men and women and the families they support.

There is a sense that we are now living through just such a time: barely a decade into the new millennium, barely 20 years since the end of the Cold War and barely 30 years since the triumph of neo-liberalism – that particular brand of free-market fundamentalism, extreme capitalism and excessive greed which became the economic orthodoxy of our time.”

Here’s the bit where politicians think they know something about magic.

“Ideally, the role of governments is simply to enforce contracts and protect the allocation of property rights. All other economic functions should be left to what Reagan called “the magic of the market”.

The Market is not covered in The Book of Spells.

Do The Stupid Humankind not realise that, My Black Cat?