the coronation

how will disjunctures work?

Queen Elizabeth’s sudden death five and a half months ago is fading into memory with the details of King Charles III’s May 2023 coronation coming more into focus. Based on what I have heard over the past several months, I think the new Carolinian era will be more divisive than many of us on this side of the ‘pond’ (a world where we rejected monarchy for ourselves but thank our ‘British cousins’ for providing us one to watch) realise. And no, I am not talking about the ‘Harry met Sa—I mea—Meghan’ or Wills and Cate versus the Sussexes serials, either. Britain is simply broken.

Scotland’s First Minister, the contentious Nicola Sturgeon, resigned suddenly today, closing nearly as decade as a thorn in any Westminster (English) side. Vocally a proponent of yet another Scottish referendum on withdrawing from the United Kingdom of Great Britain, she was vague about her reasons. It was noteworthy that the British Surpreme Court ruled out her suggested next independence referendum without authorisation by the Central Government, probably a major factor in her decision to leave since she had invested so much political capital in generating the optimism that vote would end the three hundred plus year formal link between Edinburgh and London. She also did not have a good beginning to the year as she knotted herself up in discussions on transgender issues. Her successor at the helm of the Scottish National Party, whomever that is, faces daunting economic problems for a nation with dwindling petroleum revenue, deteriorating infrastructure, and pent up expectations. Those last three factors seem likely to create a difficult mix ahead.

The various strikes persist across yet Prime Minister Rishi Sanak’s government seems strangely divorced from it all. Education, transportation, health, and pretty much any