As the internet has already pointed out, it could have been worse.

Children who tour Willy Wonka's chocolate factory fare miserably; they end up with ills far greater than mere disappointment. No one drowned in molten chocolate and no one was swollen into a blueberry, so all should really be forgiven at Glasgow's now world-infamous Willy Wonka Experience.

Though of course, there wasn't the chance for children to drown in cocoa because the one thing Scotland's chocolate-themed event lacked was ... chocolate.

It was faintly astonishing to watch the Sad Tale of the Two Jelly Beans go viral but can we really be so surprised? The story had everything: sad kids, broken promises, a baddie, multiple goodies, deceit, a dad threatening to ragdoll the baddie, AI scripts of nonsense and tragic quarter cups of lemonade.

It was, literally, a world of pure imagination - you had to imagine everything you'd been promised.

Glasgow went global. The Willy Wonka Experience was the third top-read story on the New York Times website. The Washington Post covered it. Rolling Stone magazine featured it.

"Families travelled to Glasgow for an event that claimed to channel the magic of 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'" trailed the NYT. "They got a couple of jelly beans."

Never before have jelly beans been synonymous with disappointment and loss. If I were the Jelly Belly Candy Company I would be suing.

Paul Connell, the actor hired to play Willy McDuff outed himself on TikTok. "The script was 15 pages of AI-generated gibberish of me just monologuing these mad things," he told his viewers.

"The bit that got me was where I had to say, ‘There is a man we don’t know his name. We know him as The Unknown. This Unknown is an evil chocolate maker who lives in the walls'."

For three straight days my Twitter/X timeline was nothing but jokes about the Willy Wonka Experience - a clear outpouring of relief at having something to laugh at - before the internet started wondering as to the whereabouts of Kate Middleton.

The palace said in January that the Princess of Wales would be out of the public eye until Easter but the public is an impatient beast and ripe for conspiracy theories so now have Kate Middleton variously off for a Brazilian butt lift, growing out a bad haircut or appearing at the Willy Wonka Experience as The Unknown.

Magnificent scenes, but all with the puce tinge of bread and circuses. For what have we as an alternative?

George Galloway, of red unitard fame, is returned to the House of Commons. Why is he there? Largely due to a lack of moral leadership from the incumbent Prime Minister.

Meanwhile, instead of taking a strong and consistent position on one of the most prominent political issues he's facing, Sir Keir Starmer has havered over calling for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

This vacuum has allowed Galloway, of all people, to assume the moral high ground because he, as is his talent, has identified the public mood, which is that an immediate ceasefire is the only correct stance, and responded to it.

Gorgeous George's success in the Rochdale by-election as the candidate for the Workers’ Party of Britain (WPB) was the result of a perfect storm of circumstances but also canny political operating. He appealed to the Muslim community with his clear position on Gaza while also making explicit overtures to a disaffected white demographic, to whom he appealed using a tried and tested array of populist talking points: Brexit, trans rights.

If one might be known by the company one keeps, Galloway was endorsed by British far-right leader Nick Griffin. Though to be fair to Galloway, it was of the damned-with-faint-praise style in that Griffin said the WPB candidate was "not perfect", but would work as the best agitator to the "rotten political elite" and their "fake news media cronies".

CATRIONA STEWART: Lindsay Hoyle is right about fear - but Islamists are not the cause

The new MP, a glorious orator with an eye for a captivating line, is operating in politics for the first time in age of viral video content. While I've seen some commentators suggest it might be best to simply ignore him, rather than elevate him to the status of media character in the style of Nigel Farage, this isn't a realistic position to take, particularly when his House of Commons quips are going to be clipped and shared on social media and there will be no escape until a General Election.

There will be no escape from a great number of things until a General Election, not least the campaigning for a General Election. Which will come first, the election or refunds for the Willy Wonka Experience? Only one of the two is guaranteed; both feel remote.

Rishi Sunak appeared at Downing Street for his Friday teatime speech just a couple of hours after speaking to the Scottish Tory party conference, a relatively upbeat affair given the travails facing their southern brothers. Upbeat in the Schadenfreude of the SNP's difficulties, that is.

"We must face down the extremists who would tear us apart," said the Prime Minister with an astonishingly straight face. Quite right too, pal. And what about your own party? Sunak clearly feels this is a decent enough attack line against Labour's failures in the Rochdale by-election that he's willing to risk the challenges of hypocrisy over the extreme views among his own MPs.

But this is merely classic Tory manoeuvring: create a bogeyman and fight it. It was the EU until Brexit failed to deliver the promised sunlit uplands; it was migrants in small boats until Sunak failed to stop the small boats. Now it's ... extremists attacking British democracy. Not perfect, any of it.

CATRIONA STEWART: Keir Starmer's Glasgow speech said more about Labour policy

What bright alternative have we, other than laughing at the outrageous misfortune of families conned by AI-generated days out and sad young actors conned into being Oompa Loompas in desolate warehouses?

Even as Labour drip-feeds its plans for government the offerings feel scant and, in some places, Tory-lite. Liz Kendall, the shadow work secretary has set the tone for young people aged 16 to 24 under a Labour government. "Under our changed Labour party, if you can work there will be no option of a life on benefits." she told the Demos think tank.

This whip-cracking, punitive framing is designed to appeal to Tory voters. We can expect more of it. We can expect more far right and far left agitating. We can expect more scaremongering.

Welcome to Britain 2024 where light relief comes in the form of the tears of children.