I haven’t been able to write for the last few weeks for a variety of reasons. I don’t really want to go into the personal details, and neither do I believe in making excuses.
I’m just sorry for the lack of content.
As a result of the circumstances I’ve been having a fairly big crisis of confidence in my writing, and suffering what they call "writer’s block".
It’s not like there’s been a shortage of things to write about over the last few weeks:
There was the election of Donald Trump, which had seemed absolutely inevitable for at least the last year or so. Yes there are apparently tens of millions of people in the US who actively want their nation to be led by a corrupt and unprincipled criminal who can barely string a coherent sentence together, but the Democrats own a lot of the blame too for their arrogance and complacency.
There was the election of Kemi Badenoch as Tory party leader. It’s quite extraordinary to see the Tories pick such a shrill, unlikeable, and out-of-touch figure as their leader, after all the years of Tory blowhards endlessly portraying the left as such. If Badenoch ever makes it into power, it’ll probably be as the junior partner in a far-right Faragist coalition brought about by Keir Starmer’s unpopularity.
Which brings us to Rachel Reeves deeply disappointing budget. We desperately needed a decisive move away from the austerity economics, privatisation mania, and managed decline that have blighted the country for decades, but even with their enormous mega-majority, all Starmer’s Labour is offering is a bit of tinkering around the edges of "more of the same".
And then there’s the festering sore of Israel’s ongoing genocide against the Palestinians. It’s been well over a year, and it’s beyond clear that nobody with the power to stop it cares about the massive death toll; the war crimes; the forced displacements; the starvation tactics; the targeted assassination of medics, aid workers, and journalists; the systematic destruction of hospitals, universities, and sites of cultural and archaeological importance; or the repeated attacks on other countries in the region.
I’m sure that many people would have agreed with my analyses on all of these issues, but would I really have been bringing anything new to the table by pointing out that Trump is appalling; Badenoch is an unlikeable weirdo; Starmer and Reeves are beyond disappointing; and the Israeli atrocities are utterly depraved?
I want to do something more than just write about current affairs from a perspective that I know most of my audience will agree with, so my intention is to try to move away from day-to-day reportage a bit, and dedicate more of my writing to the kinds of broader themes and more detailed economic analyses that I used to produce in the earlier days of Another Angry Voice.
If there’s anything you’d like to see me write about in the coming weeks and months, please let me know in the comments and I’ll add your suggestions to my "to write" list.
Apologies again for taking such a prolonged break, and thank you for your continued support.
Tom (AAV)
Good to know that you are feeling better and its good to know that you are back on line, looking forward to reading about your thoughts.;
Take care.