Here is a really funny sketch from Armstrong and Millar. Anyone who has spent hours on flights for their business or employer will relate to this little sketch. A nice dig at high powered business folk who spend their work hours presenting other colleague's work.

This video is a brief compilation of the final Blackadder series which was set in World War I. Although at one level it is very amusing, I guess, as is so often with humour, it is funny because it is only a relatively thin parody of the utter stupid strategy that the British ruling army class employed in World War I.

After living in the UK for just over 30 years, I have come to the conclusion that one of the ways the British cope with their corrupt politicians is by laughing at them. Although this method helps makes coping with the worst excesses of the British class system bearable, I wonder if it might inadvertently stifle true political progress in the UK? Certainly Boris Johnson is one of the most terrible, lying corrupt Prime Ministers Britain has had for well over a century. Yet so much of his appeal to the voting public is he was able to play the fool and make people laugh. Although I enjoy British humour very much, I do hope that one day the Brits come to realise that the amount of corruption in their political system probably rivals some of archetypal African nations to which so many Brits feel superior in relation to their "mother of all Parliaments".

So I'll be frank. The UK is being ruled by the worst government for many generations. With triple digit inflation in the energy sector, which is unique to the UK, a government that is doing nothing to address it but is instead focussed on a right wing beauty pageant between a female clone of Johnson (Liz Truss); who, like Johnson, can't be bothered to do the hard work of her position but unlike Johnson can't wing it in interviews so comes across even more incompetent than he did and her adversary who appears to be a little more grounded in reality although given that both he and Truss must appeal to a tiny minority of ultra right-wing Tory voters, must attempt to outdo Truss in economic insanity.

Until recently Australia also had a very right-wing government who were subject to the Youtube comedy channel Juice media. Juice Media create the concept of "an honest government ad" where they mimic an official government campaign ad but share with the electorate what they their policies are really designed to do to enrich them and their donor mates while impoverishing the average person that votes for them. Being Australian, the ads are full of strong language which for me sort of acts as strong smelling salts designed to shock us out of our political apathy and get us motivated to be more careful about which party we cast our votes for.

In this video, Juice Media turn their attention and ire on the UK Conservative party creating a video with lots of very colourful language. However, they also made a PG version suitable for websites like this one so here is the version with all the swearing bleeped but you will get the idea. If you do not live in the UK and wonder whether our government could really be this bad the simple answer is: "Yes it really is this bad in the UK at the moment".

So staying with the two Ronnies for another week this sketch seems strangely appropriate given death is on everyone's mind given the sad passing of the Queen. This sketch also has quite a dark tinge to it now given the dreadful reality of one of Britain's most infamous mass murderers Harold Shipman. It is ironic to think when this sketch was made, he had probably already started murdering the many victims. As I said in my introduction to this collection, we live in a dark world where comedy gives us a powerful respite from the reality of our present existence.

This particular Youtube clip is not embedable so you can only watch it directly on Youtube by clicking here

So last week I posted a compilation of sketches by Armstrong and Miller which captured the sometimes strange dynamics that occur in "high powered" workplaces full of alpha male (and sometimes female) middle managers and their underlings all vying for patronage from their boss. The Armstrong and Miller show often ran the same sketch each week developing it little by little each time. If you want to see how the striding man character developed during their comedy series then look at last week's post

The sketch below is the final instalment of the Striding Man and I guess the moral of the story is no matter how successful you are inside your workplace, there is always a chance it could all come crashing down in a moment. I guess this even applies to CEOs who can find themselves fired by their boards. Having said that, I think most CEOs know that even if they get fired they will walk away with a gigantic severance payment and into another CEO role in another large company such is the old boys revolving network that seems to exist at that level.

So Philomena Cunk aka (Diane Morgan) is a bit of an acquired taste. The concept of the character is that of someone with very little education producing a documentary. The series covers many varied topics including history, science, philosophy, music and politics. In this particular episode, she explores the computer and the history of its development. Part of her USP is to ask experts in the field rather basic questions which sometimes can almost seem profound in their simplicity (or stupidity) although of course, in this context, it is for comedic effect. In some ways, it reminds me of the ancient philosopher Socrates who was said to upset the learned men of his time by constantly asking why. The harsh reality, of course, is that by constantly asking "why" one is led to what is known as the infinite regress where we all are forced to the limits of human knowledge and left with that uncomfortable realisation that none of us really understand at all the strange reality in which we happen to find ourselves.