JUST when you fear the assembly election campaign is looking a bit dull, Jimbo Allister and Arise Sir Jeffrey inject fun by sharing a platform with the sort of people you would step smartly away from at a bus stop.
Cue hilarious pics of the pair at the Lurgan anti-protocol rally, trying desperately to hide the poster of Doug Beattie wearing a noose, then having to stand, looking awkward, as speaker Roy Ferguson, a former TUV candidate, called the Military Cross-winning Ulster Unionist leader, a "traitor and a Lundy".
This was followed by a speech from the latest loony US import, Pastor Rusty Thomas (you couldn't make it up). Last seen in a Stetson, protesting outside Craigavon Hospital which he described as "the gates of hell", he also once said feminism brought "the curse of God on your nation". Is that a banjo I hear?
Then came more larks, this time from Jim Wells who quit the DUP ahead of the posse, and announced his support for the TUV candidate in South Down.
Erstwhile leader Arlene Foster then took to Twitter to accuse Wells and his chum, Poots, of misogyny, saying neither accepted her leadership because she was a woman.
You might wonder when Mrs Foster first challenged misogyny in the party she was a member of for 20-odd years. Despite saying it was no longer the party she had joined, she's now supporting its South Down candidate, Diane Forsythe. That's the same Diane Forsythe who quit, citing misogyny, during the brief Poots reign before rejoining under Donaldson, that well-known feminist.
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IT didn't take long for Dishy Rishi to become Fishy Rishi, as news emerged of his wife's non-payment of taxes thanks to her 'non-dom' status, then his own possession of a US green card, even while he was Chancellor.
Then Sajid Javid fessed up that he too had non-dom status in his banking days, claimed because his bus driver dad was born in Pakistan.
All perfectly legal of course - not tax evasion, but tax avoidance, which has always been the preserve of the haves, rather than the have-nots.
The ludicrous Jacob Rees-Mogg, dubbed the Honourable Member for the 18th century, who also has shedloads of dosh, rushed to defend Sunak. He complained, via Twitter, that the Chancellor's wife was an independent woman whose money was her own business.
Oh yeah? Have you ever tried that one when claiming benefits? Funny how rules only apply to the little people. The rich and entitled get into power and make the rules on taxation to benefit themselves and people like them while stupid people keep voting them back in. Same with Covid rules and partying.
It's almost comic how out of touch people like Sunak are. He even had to borrow a staffer's cheap Kia to pose for pics filling up at a petrol station, not his own pricey motor. And when he was asked if he knew the price of a loaf, he said he didn't because his family all ate different types of bread.
Let them eat sourdough, eh Rishi?
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I don't often shout "Yes" in agreement when listening to a certain morning radio show. But earlier this week, a retired doctor phoned in to express his bafflement that ambulance crews didn't quickly drop off patients to emergency departments before rushing off to attend to another call.
He worked during the height of the Troubles in the 1970s and said casualty departments then were often packed, but ambulance crews were in and out and there was no hanging about with their patients.
I was in the emergency department from time to time with my elderly mum and was amazed to see as many as four or five separate ambulance crews waiting in the over-crowded corridors alongside the patients they had delivered.
It surely can't be beyond the abilities of even a hard-pressed service to dedicate a triage nurse or doctor to deal with those patients brought in by ambulance and free up the crews who have brought them there.
There can't be any worse trauma for a person than waiting for hours for an ambulance to arrive to an injured or dying loved one, only to be told there'll be further delays.
The health service doesn't need any more reviews or recommendations, it needs action. The only thing that seems to have changed over the years is the name of the problem area - first Casualty, then A&E, now ED. ER is probably round the corner.
