Editorial: No sign of fireworks on hustings

The general election is being staged on the 26th of this month, so one half of the timing equation is on the mark.

For in the wake of a couple of recent "debates" between the leaders of the National and Labour parties the great ballot box day should arguably have been staged today.

Guy Fawkes Day.

Fireworks ... things of an inflammatory nature. Explosive moments.

Of course apart from that, some would say that in the wake of such verbal slugfests a fitting place to store and ignite a large amount of explosives would be in the cellars deep under Parliament.

Which is what Mr Fawkes attempted to do in London, in the year of 1605, although he wasn't alone of course.

He was one of 13 chaps who hatched a plan to make King James I of England the first man to go into orbit ... courtesy of several dozen barrels of black powder.

While Mr Fawkes came to be the man associated with that memorable moment in political history, he wasn't the one who drove it.

Robert Catesby led the conspirators, but it just happened to be Mr Fawkes who was found guarding the 36 barrels of the 17th century's version of Double Happies and Mighty Cannons.

Had it succeeded history would have been changed markedly ... very much like an unexpected election result I suppose.

We of the Kiwi isles are, apart from slabs of the UK, one of the last bastions of celebrations surrounding "Guy Fawkes night".

It's practically unknown in Australia, and at the end of the day there is a slight irony about it all.

While we used to make a "guy" and put it on the fire as if executing Mr Fawkes, we still set off tonnes of explosives ... as if celebrating the demolition of Parliament, which never happened of course.

But it was, and is, as if we wanted it to.

Mind you, that could become the case if the whole election campaign of 2011 gets really scruffy and aggressively personal.

The occasion of Guy Fawkes has been detuned through the years though, with fire bans and permits and the banning of crackers and skyrockets, and I dare say if the careless and thoughtless continue to ignite them at inappropriate times and places then the day will come that November 5 will be rendered silent ... as it actually was back in 1605.

More fireworks, however ... in 21 days.