Let this not be a generalisation, but it is true that a huge number of Brits do miss their empire. So it is understandable that someone like Ian Birrell, who is contributing editor for what is probably the lousiest newspaper anywhere in the world, the Daily Mail, should take the mickey out of the EU for having tiny, ex-colony Malta presiding over it while the Brexit conundrum process gets underway.

There are several ironies that leap out of the piece which this news hack working for what is overwhelmingly considered a rag came up with. While making his absurd point on how a minuscule former British colony is "holding Britain hostage", he forgot to mention one fact. Only weeks before, that same "ex-radio journalist" of a prime minister was officiating at the whole Commonwealth of 53 countries and two billion people while he was Chair in Office of that Ark-like relic of the old empire. For Birrell, it seems to be okay to preside over a moribund organisation like the Commonwealth, but not an economic and political entity like the EU.

It's funny that, as a former speech-writer for David Cameron, Birrell seems to have been unaware of the warm relationship Joseph Muscat had with his former boss who, in all fairness, did not think he should avoid or ignore him because this was the prime minister of a "puffed up minnow in the Med".

It is even funnier that this man's insipid comments about the size of this small, happily independent island should appear in a newspaper that, again, just a couple of days earlier had come out screaming about the UK government being ready to wage war with Spain over Gibraltar as it did in the Malvinas, sorry, Falklands! The Rock is a mere 6.7 sq. km -Gozo is 67 sq. km - with a population of just 30,000 people and a colony of rather nasty monkeys. Funnier still, Birrell referred to Joseph Muscat's anti-EU membership party-line stance 14 years ago when his own prime minister now negotiating Brexit was, less than a year ago, against leaving the EU. And, as comparisons go, his own newspaper which had spearheaded the campaign for Britain to join the EU 44 years ago is now a Brexit stalwart.

I have, at some time or another over the decades, worked for and contributed to most of the UK's national newspapers. I certainly know which of them, tabloid or not, can be and certainly are professional in their broaching of stories and issues, and those which don't give a fig as long as they have a story, more fake than not, to flog in the face of their dwindling readerships.

The more one reads such silly scribbles and, even worse, the blogs, the sadder one becomes. Why can't people like Birrell and other bile merchants debate, or argue their point of view without lies, name-calling and hatred directed towards others? That's not to say do not criticise, just to do it respectfully.

In the meantime, a new study has revealed that babies in the UK cry more than almost anywhere else in the industrialised world. Scientists are reported to have found the UK came top of an international "crying chart" for infants aged under three months. Researchers quoted data on almost 8,700 babies in different countries taking part in previous studies to find out how much babies cry in their first 12 weeks.

Can you blame the British babies? They must know what to expect from this kind of junk journalism surrounding their cots.

***

In the army now

A vacation in a foreign land

You're in the army now

 

Now you remember what the draft man said, nothing to do all day but stay in bed

You're in the army now

 

You'll be the hero of the neighbourhood, nobody knows that you've left for good

You're in the army now

 

Smiling faces as you wait to land, but once you get there no-one gives a damn

You're in the army now

 

Hand grenades flying over your head, missiles flying over your head, if you want to survive get out of bed

You're in the army now

 

Shots ring out in the dead of night, the sergeant calls 'Stand up and fight!'

You're in the army now

 

You've got your orders better shoot on sight, your finger's on the trigger but it don't seem right

You're in the army now

 

Night is falling and you just can't see, is this illusion or reality?

You're in the army now.

I couldn't resist the temptation of those lyrics from the great Status Quo song after Simon Busuttil's address to the EPP congress in Malta last month. Would it not be better if our young men and women keep choosing jobs in IT, in financial services, in tourism and so on, rather than being conscripted into a European Army to fight other people's wars?

If there should ever be a European Army, it should be for individual voluntary recruits from the 27 member states which would, of course, still retain their own national armies. There is always NATO to mobilise those which, rightly or wrongly, belong to it.

Our own tiny Army should be left to continue with the splendid job it is doing. Rescuing and assisting in the mid-sea rescue of immigrants and refugees, offering everyday national security and doing the assigned glamour jobs such as parades and guard of honour functions many of which have, inevitably, hit the mercury high as the current EU presidency by Malta continues to unfold.

***

Dotty religious

Many of us frequently discuss the quaint, often annoying way some religious people treat certain issues in Malta. We have had our holier-than-thou brigades periodically coming out of their parasitic shells when, for example, the issues of civil marriage, divorce, civil union, morning-after pill, cohabitation, and, the current flavour of the month, the teaching of Islam at Church schools, came up.

The dotty religious, however, are not restricted to this fair land and it can be even worse in different parts of the world with different religions.

Associated Press recently reported the other day that the authorities of an ultra-Jewish Orthodox city in Israel, Bnei Brak, have censored a fictional, blue-skinned animated character in the children's cartoon "The Smurfs" ("I puffi" for our children who watched it on Italian TV in the 80s) from film posters because she resembled, well, a woman.

The censors think that her gender might offend residents in the city, east of Tel Aviv, now hotly advertised as a major holiday destination, where the picture of women on advertising billboards is banned. Evidently, they don't have a Helena Dalli in their midst.

Interestingly, Smurfette, who in the new posters sports long blonde locks, a dress and high heels, was originally the only female character in an almost 100-strong cast of miniature blue forest dwellers. The new Smurfs film, "The Lost Village", hit the Israeli cinema screens last Friday.

For some more merriment, here's a picture of a surviving Smurfette, in ballerina mode, from my daughter's 80s collection. Isn't she horrendously sexy and bound to condemn you to eternal fire?