Why I won't be escaping to Switzerland

I was intrigued to read in The Times property section on Friday that a lady featured there was thinking of going to live in Switzerland to escape the clutches of a right-wing government.  Actually Reform's poll ratings seem to have fallen a bit after the revelations of Russian bribes and allegations about the banter that Nigel Farage used at Dulwich College.

I am actually one of the few people who has studied Swiss politics as part of their degree, although we mainly looked at the constitutional structure and decision-making processes rather than the underlying politics.   I did subsequently work with a Swiss political scientist who assured me that it was an essentially elitist country with the conscript army giving it a democratic facade.   The army is now much reduced in size.

Somehow I was not surprised to learn that a delegation of top Swiss companies such as Rolex had gone to see President Trump about the high tariffs he had imposed on their country.   They presented him with a gold bar engraved with his name and a Rolex clock.   This seems to have been helpful.

I am rather old fashioned and back in the day we called this bribery.   However, although there has been some critical comment in Switzerland, the consensus appears to be that it represents 'realistic economic diplomacy'.

It's all a bit remiscent of the Nixon 'Meltgate' scandal which became subsumed in Watergate.   AI tells me that the Nixon administration was accused of raising federal milk price supports in exchange for substantial campaign contributions from the dairy industry to Nixon's re-election campaign, The dairy industry reportedly contributed more than $200,000 in secret to the campaign.

My recollection is that the dairy lobbyists actually turned up in the Oval Office with a case full of used notes and Nixon said something on the lines of 'many come into this office and ask for things but not many show their appreciation.'   Nixon aides were then dispatched to collect the money from around the country at small airports.

To return to Switzerland, it looks like a company state to me where big international companies call the shots rather than the divided federal government.

It turns out that the attraction of Switzerland to the lady in The Times was that her father was Swiss and she holds a Swiss passport.   Meanwhile it is not on my bolt hole list.