A proper leader

This...this is a leader

The reason his death has stopped a world and touched so many lives, is that he was, apart from being a consumate politician, negotiator, thinker, and all the rest of that stuff, Nelson Mandela was a man with a beating heart, an understanding of the fact that we get one life, so live it, and it is astounding that when a few paltry, dutiful souls turned out to sing a few dreary hymns and see Thatcher into the ground, that our politicians can't or won't take a lesson onboard.

That's Francois Pienaar with the rugby world cup there, all 6'5” or 6'7” of him. Mandela is a big man. A big man with a real, big, human heart.

What, in contrast, do we get?

This:

Her party supported the regime that had Nelson Mandela locked up. She decried the support of lame ducks. The fact that every huge and potentially violent bloke lets a frail lady pass without stealing her handbag and beating her bloody and senseless? In the physical world, not inhabited by our politicians, that's the support of lame ducks. The start of Cup Final non-attendance. The start of a lot of rot. Rotten to the core, an evil bitch.

Then:

Tone. Son of Maggie.

South Africa win the world cup, and Nelson Mandela is on the pitch in a replica jersey, dancing with the trophy. A man.

England win the world cup, and Tone's back at home with a tight vote coming up. So he recalls his sports minister from Oz to add one to the numbers.

Being human?

Sorry, Tone (son of Mags) don't get it.

Proper sport for this suit is killing foxes and badgers and tennis.

1. Glad I'm not English.
2. You should be ashamed if you voted for any of the above other than Nelson Mandela.
3. Maybe I hang my hat too much on sport, but where else is there to hang it?

Interesting to note that while English football clubs snubbed pressure from Whitehall to have a minute's silence for Maggie's passing (and let's face it, it would've been seconds into that minute before the first chorus of Ding Dong the Witch is Dead started ringing from the terraces, see Hillsborough), while there's been a minute's applause, impeccably observed, for the life of a leader of another nation. Should tell them something.