The South Shields by-election briefly threatened to be fun, when the comedian Simon Brodkin submitted nomination papers in the name of his alter ego, Lee Nelson.
"The polarization [of society] has deepened far more... we won't be able to go back to normal as easily as before," he said, adding that the June 7 elections briefly created a now-squandered opportunity for resolution.
With Obama's election, Coates briefly allowed himself to entertain the same belief.
Immediately after the election, he briefly indicated a willingness to work with Trump in certain areas.
Around the time of his election, he briefly joined a mujahideen unit fighting the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.
Before the BBC exit poll on 7 May ushered in a long period of soul-searching for Labour, the general election campaign briefly took an unexpected turn.
During the 2017 general election, Banksy briefly offered people a free print of the artwork if they voted against the Conservative party, until he was made aware that he risked being censured by the Electoral Commission.
Yields on Italian and Spanish sovereign debt, which had hit near record levels last week in the build up to the Greek election, fell briefly, but then jumped higher on ongoing fears about the health of the two economies.
Singh dismissed the challenge from the newly formed Aam Admi party (AAP), which emerged from a largely spontaneous anti-corruption movement that swept India three years ago and won sufficient seats in a recent state election to briefly take power in Delhi.
