UPDATE
Depressingly, the BNP have won a seat in Yorkshire and Hmberside. Just had ten minutes of Nick Griffin on Sky News. I must say I thought Chris Bryant was very sharp in cutting through the claptrap with his question about who is allowed to join the BNP – people who, according to Griffin, “You look, you know” are “indigenous British”.
I thought William Hague spoke well against the BNP too. Except for this. Every single word Griffin said about upholding our indigenous traditions and Christian culture, and the threat of alien traditions. could have been said by the polish Law and Justice party which the Conservatives are joining in a new far right group, leaving the centre right EPP. In fact their Polish allies flaunt racism more than Griffin. I can’t understand why Hague expresses a decent horror of the British far right, but wants to ally with their European counterparts. (Happily the Tories new far right allies in Poland lost badly tonight).
Great news from Scotland – the SNP are romping away with it. Extraordinary news from Wales – the Tories got most votes. In Wales – that’s not something I thought I would ever see.
Electoral Fraud Alert 3
Following the election results on the BBC and Sky. One very interesting development. While there is a national swing against Labour of about 9%, in Leicester there is a very suspicious anomaly – a swing to Labour of about 6%, according to the BBC.
Now Leicester is exactly one of those places where New Labour carry out concentrated postal vote farming among a patriarchal South Asian community. I spoke there during the 2005 campaign in support of Yvonne Ridley, and spoke to people who had witnessed the same postal vote abuses we saw from New Labour in Blackburn.
I strongly suspect that it will prove that in Leicester the percentage of votes cast by post was extraordinarily high. If anyone has a connection to one of the parties in Leicester, maybe you can get that percentage tonight
See:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/05/electoral_fraud.html
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/06/new_labour_post.html#comments
We may well see several small but populous urban areas where New Labour buck the trend against them, and I confidently predict that these will directly correlate to South Asian communities plus an unusually high percentage of people voting by post.
At least they don’t use Diebold electronic voting machines.
I like to wind up Americans about the merits of a piece of paper and a pencil.
It leaves a hard trace.
Anyone technically competent can bend an electronic vote.
So – I don’t think The UK elections were bent – with the possible exceptions that Craig mentions with Postal voting (which even if real is miniscule with regards to the result)
But what is the Result
I want the details from the UK
Sure I love the Spanish and The Greeks – but I want to know how we voted in England
I am quite happy for the Scots, Welsh and Irish to have their Independence
But I am English and Want Independence for My Country
Its Called DEMOCRACY
Small and Local Is Beautiful
I Don’t Want Our Local Community To Have Any Control Over What Happens In a Village Thousands Of Miles Away
Sure I might want to meet people in their village 3,000 miles way and make friends with them
But what they do with regards to how they Cook – is up to them. If they want to cook me I might complain.
Otherwise – it is up to them how they want to run their lives
And I always welcome them to my home
And sometimes they come and see my local culture and hospitality and meet some of our friends
Its really funny when no one speaks the same language and we communicate by signs, hugs, cuddles and a bit of French, Spanish or German whilst the Music plays
Tony
Hi Craig,
This is certainly one of those cases of “electorate” voting in line with the esteem they hold their respective political party at. ie it is not the one voter one vote, but one voter, and oodles of vote, just like the Blackadder episode;
http://tinyurl.com/n5z8eg
This bucking of the trend seems to be in line with the other trend of putting any banana republic to shame.
The SNP are doing exceptionally well up here Craig. It appears to be a 2:1 against labour in Dundee.
Of course they’ve yet to prove themselves to be of any benefit to the people of Dundee, but it’s early days.
Ang – a Voice Unheard Speaks In The Internet Wilderness
No one even left a comment on Her blog
But what She writes is Wonderful
http://thinkorbeeaten.blogspot.com/
Sunday, May 10, 2009
It’s Something Else Entirely
The Difference Between Leadership and Domination
It is commonplace to refer to our dearly elected as leaders. But are they leaders? Who or what do they lead? Using the word in the strict sense of going first while everyone else follows, our elected officialdom consistently takes the country in the wrong direction; away from where the people who live and work here, by vast majority, want to go.
That is not leadership. It is something else entirely.
I think it’s important to define leadership and understand its purpose. I have some strong ideas on leadership and what a leader is. I offer them to you for your perusal and consideration. If you find that you agree with my take on what a leader is and what they are supposed to do, then you can decide for yourself what our dearly elected in Washington D.C. are actually up to. You may come to the same conclusion that I have, that they are not by any stretch “leaders”.
There is an easily discerned line between leaders and tyrants. It would do us well to know the difference.
The main role of leadership is to help people get where they want to go. Leadership is specifically about individuals. It challenges individuals to think in new ways and to try to achieve things they don’t believe they can achieve. Leadership is coaching. It is guidance. It is experience and wisdom. Leadership is never about the leaders because the end goal of good leaders is to become useless; to no longer be needed by others in order to achieve their goals. Leaders empower others.
The main goal of dominators/controllers is to get people to go where they themselves want to go and do what they themselves want done. Nothing is done for the benefit of the individuals they control, in fact those being controlled give much more than they receive in return. Domination and control is all about the dominators and controllers. Individuals become irrelevant when they are controlled or dominated. Domination is undemocratic. There is rigidity in thought and action and a tendency to focus on the letter of the law as opposed to the spirit of the law. Domination and control is about hierarchy and illegitimate power over others. Dominators use others for their own ends. Dominators and controllers jobs are never done because people will always need to be controlled or they’ll be something other than what the dominators want them to be. Dominators disempower others.
Leaders don’t tell people what to do, or what to think. Leaders are not controllers, dominators or enforcers. We have different words for all those things because they are not the same things, they are different. Leadership may at times encompass certain elements of these other things but it will never be fully comprised of them, else leaders cease being leaders and become controllers, dominators or enforcers. If that happens it should be clear that leadership has nothing to do with it, and it becomes something else entirely.
Leaders are first and foremost guides. Facilitators. Enablers who help others get where they want to go. Leadership is about management, but management that is intensely people focused and very personal. Leadership is specifically about people; it is guiding people out of their own way to help them realize themselves. When it’s done right, individuals are empowered and armed to go forth and use the best of themselves to full capacity. When it’s done wrong, individuals are controlled and dominated down to being what their “leaders” demand, usually at the cost of individuality and critical thinking, as well as personal dignity, creativity, power, and choice.
There is a world of difference between domination and leadership.
Dominators/controllers do tell people what to do and what to think. They’ll have slogans and posters to reinforce required thoughts and desired opinions. Dominators confine and subordinate extraneous creativity and intellect. They are threatened by critical thought and questioning and will seek to silence these things and crush the people who do them, often quite brutally. Dissenters are minimized and ridiculed. Dissent is punished.
Dominators insist there is only one way of seeing and doing things, which is 100% unquestioningly their way. Dominators demand loyalty and do not respect individual will. Dominators demand total submission and revile anything that deters from the conformity and adherence to rules they demand.
When leaders see hidden potential they work to encourage its development. Leaders encourage critical thought and questioning, trying to expand the self-limiting thinking most people have and take it beyond the imposed mental boundaries that exist nowhere in reality but in beliefs and perceptions. Leaders say there are many ways to do things, but right ways and wrong ways and the right way is better, and they can explain why. Leaders know that no two people are alike.
Leaders who have power use it to clear immovable obstacles out of the paths of those that look to them for guidance. When those without power cannot move the boulders out of their own paths, leaders will use their legitimate power to move it for them and get them back on their desired paths. The use of power to control or dominate others, to force submission, to instill fear, to create dependence or to demand obedience is the misuse of power. Legitimate power is used to help others who are weaker. Illegitimate power is used against weaker others to benefit those who are strong. Legitimate power is not about getting your own way. Illegitimate power is only about getting your own way, often at any cost to others.
Leaders take personal and direct responsibility for their actions. Power without responsibility is tyranny, which is precisely what we have in government and much of officialdom today. An important element of legitimate power is that those who make decisions that affect others lives take full responsibility for those decisions. If mistakes are made or harm is done as a result of their actions or decisions it can be defined and corrected and steps can be taken to assist and recompense those who were harmed. Without absolute responsibility attached to power, people get hurt, often seriously and there is nothing to be done about it by law.
Legitimate power is never used to force others to serve or obey those in power. Legitimate power serves those who are unable to exact justice or instigate necessary change for themselves. Legitimate power helps people out of their myriad prisons and ruts and shows them how to use what they’ve got to become independent and strong.
Domination/control reduces people to nothing, to powerlessness, and refuses to hear their voices. Illegitimate power separates itself from others. It isolates and exists in privacy. It is not transparent. It explains nothing. It constructs enormous self protective boundaries around itself while concurrently stripping away all protective boundaries from those they control. Dominators usually hold double standards giving all good to themselves and projecting all negatives onto those they dominate and control and those they see as threats. Illegitimate power never cleans up its own messes. It expects to be waited on hand and foot. It asserts that what it extracts from others is due and owed and those it is extracted from must give over or be punished. Disagreement is punished. Dissent is silenced. Facts are obfuscated. Truth is censored. Obedience is required.
Illegitimate power removes alternatives, coerces choices, diminishes possibilities, and in so doing corrupts justice and denies human dignity. Illegitimate power is wholly self excusing but falsely proclaims the guilt of others, even without any semblance of proof. Illegitimate power is hypocritical and brutal, deceptive and expensive, unjust and offensive. Illegitimate power is unaccountable and unreasonable. It does not bow to common sense. It is spoiled and self-obsessed. It cannot be trusted. It is cowardly and demands special treatment and special privileges that are never extended to others. It feeds on others, and it is insatiable. It will feed on others to their deaths.
Good leadership empowers people to think and act for themselves. Good leadership explains and exemplifies good ethics and moral behavior. Leaders are role models. They know they will be emulated and they seek to do and be their personal best. A good leader is not a hypocrite and does not play favorites. Leaders earn trust while controllers simply demand it.
Leaders empower others. Because leadership is very much about setting people free from things that prevent them from reaching their potential, when necessary, as it often is, leaders literally must give people “permission” to loose those bindings and become the strong capable beings they really are. By and large, people who are used to being dominated, controlled and coerced into compromised positions in order to receive a necessary benefit are unable to release themselves from externally defined and demanded boundaries. They need someone else whom they perceive as an equal to their dominators to give them permission to be free. Once that is done it can elevate people to full capacity. Once permission is embraced, further permission is no longer needed and indeed, may be passed on to others.
The goal of good leaders is to make themselves useless. When leaders are no longer needed because those who have looked to their leadership are fully empowered and capable of handling whatever comes their way, the leaders are free to go on to new challenges and do the same for a new group of people. Good leadership produces tangible, measurable results
.
Individuals who look to that leadership know they are better off, stronger, more comfortable with themselves and the world they live in. They will see things differently, meaning seeing a bigger picture. They will feel better off and will often acknowledge and appreciate the good leadership that changed their lives. Things do change for the better under the guidance of good leadership. Change for the worse comes from the lack of good leadership, not due to the presence of it.
Leaders are motivators. The best skills of leaders aren’t necessarily taught, they are human and real. Leaders understand others or at least seek to understand them. Leaders care about people. Leaders correct others without insulting or belittling them, they positively motivate others out of erroneous thinking and behavior. It requires tremendous personal commitment and involvement to be a good leader. Above all it requires selflessness.
I don’t think we see much selflessness out of Washington D.C. On the contrary. That place is a raging cesspit swimming with narcissists, thieves and liars, abusers, cronies, and dark dealers. They play to enrich themselves and we get passed the bill for all their partying.
Observing the behaviors that have become standard operating procedure in the hallowed halls of government, one should be struck by the utter lack of selflessness and true guidance and leadership there is. In fact, the few solo voices that stand up and make a case for common sense or benefiting the public instead of the private interests of those who lobby them brings on an automatic cold shoulder and an instant rejection from the corrupted herd behavior and self centered parasitic feasting on public funds and abuse of the citizenry in literally every avenue across the board that is the status quo amongst our dearly elected.
Politicians are liars first and foremost. I’m sorry if that offends anyone but it’s not a news flash. “Lying politicians” is a term that’s been with us for a very long time. We should expect politicians to be liars. They are successful because they are such compelling orators, they can sell themselves as completely believable and trustworthy because they are salesmen and that is their product. They are unequaled at saying what people want to hear. They are unrivaled at coming up with reasonable sounding excuses for consistently failing to bring home the things that people most want and need, the things that people have always wanted and needed. The perceived battle of politics is that it is so hard to bring about the needed changes that will finally, after hundreds of years, lift all people out of poverty and lead them to self sufficiency. That particular ruse has been worn threadbare after so many years of us paying through the nose and getting nothing back for it. It would not be that hard to achieve the right things but it is impossible to achieve the right things when that’s not the goal. What is consistently achieved is exactly the opposite. That’s what our elected achievers consistently achieve.
Leadership doesn’t give people bread it teaches them how to grow the grain and make the flour and bake the bread themselves. That is the last thing this government wants. It wants a dependent populace. It needs a dominated populace of loyalists, of non-thinking, non-questioning obedient submissive children who will swallow every lie and calmly take every abuse, theft and indignation without complaint. That is what modern patriotism amounts to. Blindness, deafness and dumbness. Servility. Cheer leading for your side even though you always lose and they always win at your expense.
Dominators have the skill to get inside people’s minds and make them feel good about being abused, make them believe that sometimes governments have to lie to get “the job done”, and all other manners and styles of making people look at something but see it as something else. That’s not leadership. That’s not even moral. It’s very scary stuff. It’s also status quo.
I’ve wondered a lot lately why so many people want to be dominated, because they do. The people of our country, inclusive of both the left and right, in a very sweeping general sense, seem to me to represent a division between those who prefer leadership and those who want to be dominated. At first glance it may seem that there is no common ground here so this rent in the populace can never be mended. If you look again though, there is still a firm bit of common ground.
That common ground is the desire to do right and be right. It is inherent in most of us I believe, that we want to do the right things. If we stop and think about what we do, we can always ask ourselves, regardless of the specifics of any given situation or moment, is this the right thing or the wrong thing for me to do? We can do that whether we prefer to be individual thinkers or followers of a dominant personality. Right and wrong still exists no matter what we believe.
Identifying what is right is half the battle. Rejecting what is wrong is the other half. And therein lies the ultimate continuing struggle, the battle that is within every one of us and always has been and always will be. Shall we do right or shall we do wrong? Which will we choose and why? If our appetites over rule our desire to be better human beings we will dismiss what is needed for what is wanted. We will behave badly, immorally, to others in order to satisfy our wants and egos, our selfishness and greed, our racism, narcissism, aggression, and desire for revenge. We will take sides as if life was a team sport and lose our own dignity and purpose. We will dilute ourselves down to a common mind and seek to meld ourselves into the team logos we root for and tell ourselves we are right when we’ve never honestly stopped to think about whether that’s true or false. Right becomes something that is asserted, something that we can contrive or define ourselves, and that’s simply not possible. Right is right and wrong is wrong already. It is very much a natural law, just like gravity is a natural law. You can’t defy gravity, and you can’t sell wrong as right for too long. When we embrace officially provided definitions of right and wrong instead of locating the truth of what is right or wrong for ourselves, we will without fail be led to wrong that is called right. The consequences of that cannot be escaped. Or denied. We live in a time when the consequences of many decades of lies have empowered thousands upon thousands of team sport motivated non-thinking status quo promoting gas bags to gorge their own appetites to public detriment and poison our environment to near collapse and our public morality into a clueless decomposing corpse.
We are war mongers and hypocrites from the top down. Motivated by personal gain, incapable of respecting others, demanding loyalty and obedience. When we see something we want we take it by force, even when force is not necessary. We behave like giant scary infants who think of nothing but themselves, and don’t grasp the concept of tomorrow or of cause and effect. Like infants we are totally self obsessed and self centered, expecting everyone to see to our every whim and want and do it now. And when we don’t get what we want we have destructive tantrums and seek vengeance. We want to teach lessons to those who don’t instantly give us our every demand.
The people who set the direction of this country don’t have a clue what leadership is. I’m not even convinced they’re adults sometimes. I wouldn’t bet that they retain concepts in their heads of right and wrong. Indeed, in the cesspool of big government, reality is what they say it is. They’ve said so in their own words.
Surely anyone with a functional brain knows that we don’t decide reality, it is what it is regardless of us. Ignoring truths is not the same as solving problems. Pretending things are okay when they’re not is a rigged contest of selling lies to get more for ourselves.
Can compassion win out over greed? Can respect and tolerance take the place of ignorance and violence? With good leadership it certainly could be that way. With good leadership we could go about anywhere and achieve limitless possibilities. I have to conclude that what we have passing as leadership for this country is in fact the exact opposite of leadership. It is anti-leadership. It is un-American. It is against individual power and dignity, and demands submissive obedience. It extracts more than it gives back. That which is us is being systemically minimized and disempowered while that which is them is being enlarged and hyper empowered, defying common sense and in blatant contradiction to their stated reasons for being there in those positions.
We now work for them. On their terms. Our wants and needs don’t matter. They want our money and demand our compliance. If they say starve we’re supposed to lay down and starve. When bankers predate us to death, they tell us to lay down and die. When police drive Army tanks down our city streets, electrocute us with “compliance” devices, snap our necks in holding cells and beat us to death, they tell us that is protecting us and to lay down and take it. I see a pattern here. To those at the top there is one answer for everything. Death.
If you are poor, die.
If you are sick and can’t afford medicine or a doctor, then die.
If you need an education but can’t purchase it, die.
If you need help, die.
If you are weak, die.
So that I can be happy and prosperous, you must die.
That’s not leadership. But it’s what they’re giving us and telling us to love it.
Ultimately, leadership is service. It is unselfish. It is never about the leader or serving the leader but about the leader skillfully, effectively showing those who follow him the way to get where they want to go. Leaders don’t have to be cuddly or warm and fuzzy but they must be moral and ethical and fair. They must be generous people who do care about every person under their responsible leadership and they must honestly desire to give each of those people something of real value that will make them stronger people, equipped with knowledge and philosophies that will carry on the good foundational values the leader possesses and lives by. Leading by example is the real thing. “Do what I say but not what I do” is not valid, at least not in adult settings and certainly never in political settings. Leaders are not superiors and whatever authority they have should be given them out of respect and voluntarily. Leaders operate from respect and really good leaders make everything they do and everywhere they go better somehow. People honestly love good leaders and learn a great deal from them that empowers them and makes their own personal lives better.
With that in mind, how close do you think our dearly elected, or our whole system for that matter, measures up? Not so good, huh? That leaves an obvious question to ask. If our elected officials aren’t really leaders, then what the hell are they and what are they doing and why? What do we have here? If it’s not all about us, and it’s not, then why would we want it? It’s supposed to be there for us, it’s supposed to be us. It only exists because we’re here. The way they’re doing it they’ve made clear that the first priority is covering their own asses and generously taking care of themselves. We rarely enter the picture and every time we do all hell breaks loose. Just asking for what’s rightfully ours brings on a balls out cat fight. Clearly the status quo likes things the way they are and they’ll defend it with all they’ve got; and they have way more than we have. Why shouldn’t they like it. The way it’s set up is that they benefit and we pay for it and get as little as they can get away with giving us back for it.
The shame of the congress giving itself magnificent raises and lifetime benefits while at the same time excusing themselves from raising the minimum wage year after year after year frames the truth of this picture. Food stamps for the hungry are hyped as the dishonest ploy of lazy, immoral people who want something for nothing; while corporate welfare in the hundreds of billions of dollars to the most profitable wealthy corporations in the world is not a ploy of lazy, dishonest, immoral people who want something for nothing by the truckload; that’s good. Sure it is. If you’re the corporation. If you’re anyone else it’s a blatant breathtaking rip off.
Which in essence, at least in my humble opinion, is exactly what our hulking, expensive, closed circle of privately owned and operated for profit government has become, a rip off. That’s not nearly as much of a news flash as it used to be but I doubt anyone’s made the case with as much to back it up as I just did from the perspective of an ordinary person. Let’s stop slathering our dearly elected with unearned compliments that only serve to further spread the myth that what they do is actually “leadership”. It’s not. It’s something else entirely.
When are we going to hear the Environmentalist argument for electronic voting: all that waste of paper.
When this surfaces I’ll know people have completely lost the plot.
Part of what’s going on in Leicester is that it’s in the East Midlands where Robert Kilroy-Silk ran for UKIP last time and was really popular – he’s not there this time, so UKIP are down a bit there.
You have to remind yourself that Griffin is the best – the very best – that they’ve got. So pandering to Nazis isn’t an option.
“We only allow whites to be members so we can use the anti-racism act when employers want to sack staff for being members.” Dobber.
“the SNP are romping away with it”
They will soon be getting some more large Big Business donations…Me thinks.
Does this mean ‘curry sauce’ will be dropped off Harry Ramsden’s menu?
Crystal nacht and battered cod.
A couple of years ago we went to the Cambridge Rock Festival
The Guys From The BNP were easy to spot cos they had a Tent made out of Union Jacks.
Actually the camping was Really Weird – like No other Festival we have been to before.
Its like the entire thing was controlled by Jobsworths mainly recruited from the local US Airbase – who spoke in an American accent – despite having been born in England
I said to the Fascist who took our food away cooking on a tiny little BBQ – why are you speaking in an American Accent?
He said because I went to American Schools in England
So after he had taken our food away – I said – well what are we going to eat now?
He got his rule book out – it said – No Barbeques allowed – so he took our food away in a Fire Blanket
The BNP were much easier to wind up
The English American didn’t seem to realise that we were camping in the same field for 4 days.
There was Absolutely No Escape From My Wife and I (We are Both From Lancashire) Completely Taking The Piss Out Of Him.
With Regards To The BNP when they ran out of Cigarettes and were on The Scrounge
I said – well you couldn’t possibly want one of these
And I showed him the Cigarette Packet And The Arabic Writing
The BNP and The Yanks are Pussies
We just make people laugh
Right Wing, Left Wing, Muslims, Jews, Christians and Atheists
My Wife will get under your skin and bring you back to Your Reality as if You are Two Years Old
O.K. We have Not Yet Faced a Firing Squad
But we have Travelled and Continue To Do So
We only got a hard time at the Cambridge Rock Festival
The Bands Were Brilliant So We Didn’t Complain
Everyone Else Across The World Have Been Great To Us.
The Poorest Are The Nicest and Most Giving.
Tony
The big news of this election is that it’s looking like a Tory landslide of unbelievable proportions in England come the General Election, followed smartly by a cliffhanger vote on the exit of Scotland from the United Kingdom.
Keep up the good work on exposing electoral fraud.
I think you are a bit harsh on the Tories. The real disgrace is a European parliamentary system that offers them the choice of the devil or the deep blue sea – either consorting with federalists or consorting with some dubious types of a different kind.
Strategist,
I’m working class from Oldham.
I could only even think about voting Tory if Chloe Grows Her Hair
http://www.chloesmith.org.uk/
I Mean FFS
Yes – I Saw Her Obliterate The Female Competition on MORE4NEWS
I Thought You Tories Were Really Quick At Getting Her Out So Fast And Onto The Channel4 News within hours of the decision ( maybe you knew in advance )
But Craig Murray Is Going To Spank Her
(On The Bottom)
Tony
Craig,
What is propelling you to persist in this insulting noisy nonsense about Poles and Poland?
Are you really saying that nearly 30% of Polish voters supported in the EP elections a party which ‘flaunts racism’ more than the BNP?
Is this what you are selling to a bemused public as the skilled political analysis of a former Ambassador?
Embarrassing.
Charles
Region by region results
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/elections/euro/09/html/ukregion_999999.stm
Regrettably I an beginning to think that there might just be a developing need for comment moderation. Time will tell.
Alternatively, to quote H.L Mencken: “Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.
Well the people have voted and some have done so for the BNP. Live with it chums! That is Democracy or does that only work when you hand wringing Liberals only get the result you want? That is Hypocrisy!
The big story here is that Labour the ruling party have come in third place after UKIP! Viva la Revolution ! The rabble peasants have revolted! Bring on a General Election. Bring it on Now!
http://thinkorbeeaten.blogspot.com/
Yes Tony, really brilliant and profoundly educational article.
The real story is the percentage for all the parties and if this were a PR system used for Westminster.
CONS 28 PC
UKIP 17 PC
LABOUR 15 PC
LIB DEMS 14 PC
OTHERS 24 PC
A far better peoples parliament….
And Someone thinks that the ‘revolution’ will produce change. The neo Liberal Conservatives will cut and cut at the remnants of the welfare state until we won’t know what’s hit us.
Sorry forgotgot to add the points..but you get the picture……….
I’m quite chuffed with the BNP vote – it shows movement.
Also Craig, there are bigger fish to fry than whether a few Poles are racist, homophobic ageists etc – the EU is taking over and if it means sitting with some freaks whoi question that domination rather than chaps who take their £2 million a year for not showing up – well, you get the drift.
You chaps want everything exactly the way you want it. That’s like a toddler.
@dodoze – I hope we don’t get comment moderation here, but I can see the need for it…
… @tony_opmoc, I think I might have mentioned it before, and I hope you didn’t think I was being unduly negative towards you. But your comments are getting unwieldy and are usually veering totally off-topic, and tend to me more a series of random thoughts about what happened to you and your wife, rather than sticking firmly on topic. It’s quite distracting… although I am just a visitor here, like everyone else, could I ask you keep comments relevant and brief?
@Richard – “movement” is not always a good thing, and the discussion here depends on whether you accept that the BNP are in reality a fascist party or not. That is certainly my contention, and on the basis that fascism was rightly kicked out of Europe 60 years ago, it is frustrating to see such a retrograde step. Fascism in all its forms should be challenged, and the BNP are no different.
My view is that the BNP appear to have quite successfully persuaded people that they are not a racist party, but are willing to “speak bravely” about immigration. Either that, or a bunch of racists have just voted for a racist party. Either way, it is not a resounding endorsement of the intelligence of our voting public!
The BNP actually have quite a leftist economic outlook not too dissimilar from the Greens, but their social perspective is one of the most authoritarian on offer in Britain today. Perversely, BNP voters could have voted Green and got the same redistributive economic policy (“looking after the common man”) without the racist and jack-booted authoritarian mindset. Either most people don’t know that (likely) or Britain just got a whole bunch more xenophobic (quite possible too, sadly).
Charles,
If you were nt affronted continually by the racist attitudes to encountered in Poland, you have a very different sensitivity to me and all the other diplomats who served with me. But I expect you politely avoided ever discussing that kind of things.
Do I think 30% of Poles have seriously racist attitudes? Absolutely. Do I think it is worrying that we had a British Ambassador so right wing he failed to notice? Yes.
“And Someone thinks that the ‘revolution’ will produce change. The neo Liberal Conservatives will cut and cut at the remnants of the welfare state until we won’t know what’s hit us.”
http://tinyurl.com/m7cz9o
@Jon – I dunno whether they’re a fascist party or not. I have had quite a lot of contact with BNP Councillors tho – and to a man they’re quiet, ineffectual and not really interested in local politics – which is perhaps the greatest part of my disdain for them.
That said – to liken them to Nazis or Blighty to the Weimarr is nuts.
I’m a Yorkshireman and have lived here all my life having gone to Hull University and it absolutely sickens me to see what supposedly ‘lefty’ administrations have done. I’m alright – have an education, a job, a nice house etc so does that give me the right to lecture people? No chance.
I joined the Tories because Labour have soo remarkably screwed up it makes me want to puke. Until the BNP are the 3rd Party then I say bring ’em on. Let the people speak and if they want to speak ill of people – fine.
Indeed Mary, their postulations in the EU Parlaiment will endear all of Europe to their hooligan stage, just imagine Geert Wilders and Nick humming along to ‘SA marschiert, die reihen fest geschlossen’ what a vision, I must have a cuppa.
Someone should thank noLabour and its fickle supporters for failing to grasp that Europe is an important issue and should be treated as such in the media and on the stump. They could not even be bothered to announce the launch of their EU campaign on Radio 4 ‘s Today programme, what a gall and snub to voters eager to hear their policies, how much ashamed of one’s own incompetence can one become I wonder.
As for living with Nick, it will be a tumultuous affair but in the end he will have to leave after four years, If he survives and gets another term, if this anachronistic system cannot be changed to make voting less of a predicted shambles, then we soon will see smaller parties engaging with this scurge on a different level.
Someone got elected because the public is kept in the dark and dank political ineptness. If they knew how important Europe has become, they would not vote as they have done.
Labour = the walking dead.
Also, it looks like the Greens have topped the poll in Norwich by some distance. Perhaps it’s time to retrieve your hat from the ring, CM?
@Richard, of course Labour are screwed up. But your disdain for ‘lefty’ government is out-dated; in fact there has not been much that has been left-wing about the New Labour administration for ten years. They’ve supported imperialism and neo-conservatism abroad, become increasingly xenophobic, attacked the welfare state, worshipped the free market, privatisation and long-term private-sector deals etc. – I am sure I needn’t go on!
But switching support to the Tories is, in my view, crazy. Since Labour have largely stolen Tory clothes, a Tory govt would deliver more of the above, without the balance of socially liberal elements in the party to worry about the inclusivity you speak of: education, job, decent housing and so forth.
On the BNP: presently they are corrupt and disorganised, and split into factions. They are not the Nazi party, but they could move towards that; indeed I view that as the goal of some of their factions. My view is their “voluntary repatriation” policy would turn into a variant of “mandatory repatriation” if they got into power. Although it is unlikely, one cannot be complacent – their party now has a huge fund boost already thanks to this disastrous result. All the more money to spread their racist poison, which as history shows can be infectious unless an organised left is there to counter its messages.