I am aware of the following tribute sites:
http://davidarselindsay.blogspot.com
http://davidlindsaywatch.blogspot.com
http://socialists-against-lindsay.blogspot.com
Are there any more?
Meanwhile, my own other blog is http://davidaslindsay.livejournal.com
Political prisoner, activist, journalist, hymn-writer, emerging thinktanker, aspiring novelist, "tribal elder", 2019 parliamentary candidate for North West Durham, Shadow Leader of the Opposition, "Speedboat", "The Cockroach", eagerly awaiting the second (or possibly third) attempt to murder me.
Tuesday, 29 August 2006
The Real Pro-Americans and The Real Anti-Americans
No, I am not anti-American. Rather, those who hold the views expressed here are the real pro-Americans, imploring Americans to consider that their government has no constitutional authority to maintain an overseas empire, that they themselves cannot afford to pay for it to do so, and that its attempts to do so at their expense are putting them in far greater danger than would otherwise be the case. Those who cheer on this empire-building at other people's expense, financially and otherwise, are false friends. They are the real anti-Americans.
Britain's Three New Classes
Today’s mass immigration is nothing less than the importation of a new working class. Their English is limited to commands. They can be deported. And having no emotional attachment to any part of this country, they can be moved around at will.
Meanwhile, the new middle class is made up of people employed at public expense to do as little as possible. If anything, they watch other people working as doctors and nurses, as teachers and lecturers, collecting taxes and paying out benefits. These are jobs at which they themselves have very often failed.
But, as state employees, even this new middle class is subject to the new ruling class of party-political apparatchiki and their media associates. These are adept at presenting themselves as “Middle England”, as “regular guys”. They are not. Nor are they the winners of any sort of open competition. And nor are they a democratising force.
But they accrue to themselves all cultural and political power by pretending that they started out ordinary and have simply worked very hard to get where they are. It is insisted that anyone might do this. Therefore, to have failed to enter this closed circle is presented as a personal moral failure.
Thus, the old working class, the old middle class and the old upper class are considered offensive in their very existence. So our new rulers have replaced the old working class by importing a new and utterly compliant one. They have replaced the old middle class with hired help. And they have replaced the old upper class with themselves.
The old classes were networks for mutual support, social responsibility, and civility. But no political party is now remotely interested in any of them. So they can just be replaced in this way, leaving us an ever-more selfish, irresponsible and uncivil society.
Meanwhile, the new middle class is made up of people employed at public expense to do as little as possible. If anything, they watch other people working as doctors and nurses, as teachers and lecturers, collecting taxes and paying out benefits. These are jobs at which they themselves have very often failed.
But, as state employees, even this new middle class is subject to the new ruling class of party-political apparatchiki and their media associates. These are adept at presenting themselves as “Middle England”, as “regular guys”. They are not. Nor are they the winners of any sort of open competition. And nor are they a democratising force.
But they accrue to themselves all cultural and political power by pretending that they started out ordinary and have simply worked very hard to get where they are. It is insisted that anyone might do this. Therefore, to have failed to enter this closed circle is presented as a personal moral failure.
Thus, the old working class, the old middle class and the old upper class are considered offensive in their very existence. So our new rulers have replaced the old working class by importing a new and utterly compliant one. They have replaced the old middle class with hired help. And they have replaced the old upper class with themselves.
The old classes were networks for mutual support, social responsibility, and civility. But no political party is now remotely interested in any of them. So they can just be replaced in this way, leaving us an ever-more selfish, irresponsible and uncivil society.
Party Funding
What is so horribly wrong with a political party's being funded by the trade unions? Everyone knows who they are, and that they are mass membership organisations made up of people living, working and paying taxes in this country. Rather that than funding by a handful of multimillionaires whose identities we are not always permitted to know. Surely they cannot be the same people in all three cases?
And rather the unions than state funding. The metropolitan elite that is Britain's real ruling class, through some commission or similar body responsible for allocating such funding, would be able to determine, even more than at present, what may be discussed and by whom.
Instead, each MP who takes his or her seat should be given a tax-free allowance of a fixed sum of money, publicly transferable to the registered political party of that MP's choice, conditional upon matching funding by resolution of a membership organisation. The name of that organisation would then appear in brackets on the ballot paper after the party designation next to that MP's name. Party spending should accordingly be limited to twice the number of MPs, multiplied by the amount of this allowance.
The trade unions are the obvious contenders, but the National Farmers' Union and the Federation of Small Businesses would also be welcome contributors to the electoral process in this way. The Confederation of British Industry or the Institute of Directors might also give it a go, just to see if anyone voted for its candidates.
And rather the unions than state funding. The metropolitan elite that is Britain's real ruling class, through some commission or similar body responsible for allocating such funding, would be able to determine, even more than at present, what may be discussed and by whom.
Instead, each MP who takes his or her seat should be given a tax-free allowance of a fixed sum of money, publicly transferable to the registered political party of that MP's choice, conditional upon matching funding by resolution of a membership organisation. The name of that organisation would then appear in brackets on the ballot paper after the party designation next to that MP's name. Party spending should accordingly be limited to twice the number of MPs, multiplied by the amount of this allowance.
The trade unions are the obvious contenders, but the National Farmers' Union and the Federation of Small Businesses would also be welcome contributors to the electoral process in this way. The Confederation of British Industry or the Institute of Directors might also give it a go, just to see if anyone voted for its candidates.
On Growing Poorer
Have we grown richer as a result of the “free” market? On the contrary we have grown poorer. Only a generation ago, a single manual wage provided the wage-earner, his wife and their several children with a quality of life unimaginable even on two professional salaries today. This impoverishment has been so rapid and so extreme that most people, including almost all politicians and commentators, simply refuse to acknowledge that it has happened. But it has indeed happened. And it is still going on.
Because We're Worth It?
On the idea of me as a workers’ MP on a worker’s wage, David Lindsay Watch writes:
“Damn right. It would be outrageous for David Lindsay to receive the real rate of pay for a serious politician. Not as outrageous as David Lindsay being an MP at all, but still a national disgrace. He has overvalued himself at national average earnings.”
This has really shaken me. Am I prepared to appear to assent to this vile sentiment by being such an MP, or should I just say “Sod you!”, and damn well claim the full salary as a sign to everyone who shares some or all of my views that those views are valid, and as a sign to everyone who voted for me that their votes are worth as much as anyone else’s? My email address is davidaslindsay@hotmail.com
“Damn right. It would be outrageous for David Lindsay to receive the real rate of pay for a serious politician. Not as outrageous as David Lindsay being an MP at all, but still a national disgrace. He has overvalued himself at national average earnings.”
This has really shaken me. Am I prepared to appear to assent to this vile sentiment by being such an MP, or should I just say “Sod you!”, and damn well claim the full salary as a sign to everyone who shares some or all of my views that those views are valid, and as a sign to everyone who voted for me that their votes are worth as much as anyone else’s? My email address is davidaslindsay@hotmail.com
The Real Islamic Threat to Europe
Of course there is an Islamic threat to Europe, but it is the threat that people disgusted with the complete collapse of all moral standards in the personal, social and economic spheres, and left helpless by the closely connected, almost total loss of collective cultural memory, will convert to Islam in droves. The first signs of this are already upon us, closely resembling the early stages of the past Islamisation of various other parts of the world.
We should be worrying about that, the real Islamic threat: we should be restoring our personal, social and economic moral standards by rediscovering our collective cultural memory. Unless, that is, we want rich men to be allowed to have four wives (and to make a point of it, as a status symbol), we want women to go around shrouded and flapping about like giant bats, we want to cut off thieves' hands, and so on.
Look at the mosques full of disaffected young men in Afro-Caribbean areas, and at the flourishing Student Islamic Societies full of white, middle-class, deep-thinking, and often female seekers after something more than our own dominant decadence and hedonism. And who can blame them? Grinding poverty, chronic ill health with nothing really done about it even though our society could easily afford to do something, collapsing educational standards, war after war after war, further money to be wasted on obscene nuclear weapons, drugs, drunkenness (I'm no teetotaller, but that's not the same thing at all), sexual promiscuity, pornography in newsagents (they're made to have it by the distributors), a nation of gambling addicts, and on, and on, and on. All these things (and many, many more) are obviously connected.
So there will be an Islamic Europe probably by 2100, and certainly by 2150, unless we turn away from our own social and economic irresponsibility, which we can only do by rediscovering the things that we had to give up in order to turn that way in the first place. Otherwise, more and more disaffected youths and deep-thinking young (often female) intellectuals will turn to Islam.
In comparable ways did many another country begin to be Islamised. Who'd have thought that present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh and much of Northern India could be Islamised? Who'd have thought that much of black Africa could be Islamised (very much an ongoing process)? Who'd have thought that Central Asia and much of western China could be Islamised? Who'd even have thought that much of the Levant could be Islamised? No one, once upon a time. But how did it happen? And how quickly?
Imagine if only the White British Muslim population (already well over sixty thousand) grew by an improbably small fifty per cent every ten years: by 2100, there would be over a million of them. Now imagine that it grew by a possibly over-large, but nevertheless much more realistic, one hundred per cent every ten years: by 2100, there would be nearly 23 million of them.
The truth is somewhere in the middle, but much closer to the latter figure than to the former given both the rapidly rising rate of conversions, and the birth rate to converts (including the all but legalised practice of polygamy: the benefit system now pays out specifically for polygamous partners). Yet that's just the White British section of British Muslims, a small minority of the total.
And then consider that the "mainstream" birth rate has now been well below replacement level for two generations, with no sign that this trend is ever going to be reversed. Comparable patterns are observable, and indeed well-documented, right across Europe. Who needs to blow up aeroplanes? Eurabia, here we come!
We can stop it. But will we?
All Muslims are missionaries, in the way that all Christians are supposed to be missionaries. And the former are proving very effective missionaries in Britain and Europe at present. They expect some White Britons and their equivalents elsewhere to convert, and that is indeed happening with some rapidity.
But mostly, like everyone else, they just expect those population groups to all but die out during the twenty-first century, leaving few people except Muslims in Western Europe, all without anyone's having needed to be either converted or killed. That, too, is well under way.
Criticising or mocking Islam would already be illegal if Hilary Armstrong hadn't mistakenly sent Tony Blair home that night. Ten years ago, would you have believed that? Or that well over sixty thousand Muslims (and rising rapidly) would be classified as White British?
Consider that rate of growth by conversion, as well as Muslims' much higher birth rate than (currently) mainstream Western Europeans', including the widespread semi-clandestine practice of polygamy. How many do you think that there will be in another ten years? Or twenty? Or thirty? Or forty? But such is in keeping with the global history of Islam.
And consider the Danish cartoon row. Did you know that there were Muslims in Denmark? There was never a Danish Empire, so where did they come from? Yet they are there, and they are certainly making their presence felt, as Muslims are throughout North-West Eurabia. Get used to it.
Or do something about it.
We should be worrying about that, the real Islamic threat: we should be restoring our personal, social and economic moral standards by rediscovering our collective cultural memory. Unless, that is, we want rich men to be allowed to have four wives (and to make a point of it, as a status symbol), we want women to go around shrouded and flapping about like giant bats, we want to cut off thieves' hands, and so on.
Look at the mosques full of disaffected young men in Afro-Caribbean areas, and at the flourishing Student Islamic Societies full of white, middle-class, deep-thinking, and often female seekers after something more than our own dominant decadence and hedonism. And who can blame them? Grinding poverty, chronic ill health with nothing really done about it even though our society could easily afford to do something, collapsing educational standards, war after war after war, further money to be wasted on obscene nuclear weapons, drugs, drunkenness (I'm no teetotaller, but that's not the same thing at all), sexual promiscuity, pornography in newsagents (they're made to have it by the distributors), a nation of gambling addicts, and on, and on, and on. All these things (and many, many more) are obviously connected.
So there will be an Islamic Europe probably by 2100, and certainly by 2150, unless we turn away from our own social and economic irresponsibility, which we can only do by rediscovering the things that we had to give up in order to turn that way in the first place. Otherwise, more and more disaffected youths and deep-thinking young (often female) intellectuals will turn to Islam.
In comparable ways did many another country begin to be Islamised. Who'd have thought that present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh and much of Northern India could be Islamised? Who'd have thought that much of black Africa could be Islamised (very much an ongoing process)? Who'd have thought that Central Asia and much of western China could be Islamised? Who'd even have thought that much of the Levant could be Islamised? No one, once upon a time. But how did it happen? And how quickly?
Imagine if only the White British Muslim population (already well over sixty thousand) grew by an improbably small fifty per cent every ten years: by 2100, there would be over a million of them. Now imagine that it grew by a possibly over-large, but nevertheless much more realistic, one hundred per cent every ten years: by 2100, there would be nearly 23 million of them.
The truth is somewhere in the middle, but much closer to the latter figure than to the former given both the rapidly rising rate of conversions, and the birth rate to converts (including the all but legalised practice of polygamy: the benefit system now pays out specifically for polygamous partners). Yet that's just the White British section of British Muslims, a small minority of the total.
And then consider that the "mainstream" birth rate has now been well below replacement level for two generations, with no sign that this trend is ever going to be reversed. Comparable patterns are observable, and indeed well-documented, right across Europe. Who needs to blow up aeroplanes? Eurabia, here we come!
We can stop it. But will we?
All Muslims are missionaries, in the way that all Christians are supposed to be missionaries. And the former are proving very effective missionaries in Britain and Europe at present. They expect some White Britons and their equivalents elsewhere to convert, and that is indeed happening with some rapidity.
But mostly, like everyone else, they just expect those population groups to all but die out during the twenty-first century, leaving few people except Muslims in Western Europe, all without anyone's having needed to be either converted or killed. That, too, is well under way.
Criticising or mocking Islam would already be illegal if Hilary Armstrong hadn't mistakenly sent Tony Blair home that night. Ten years ago, would you have believed that? Or that well over sixty thousand Muslims (and rising rapidly) would be classified as White British?
Consider that rate of growth by conversion, as well as Muslims' much higher birth rate than (currently) mainstream Western Europeans', including the widespread semi-clandestine practice of polygamy. How many do you think that there will be in another ten years? Or twenty? Or thirty? Or forty? But such is in keeping with the global history of Islam.
And consider the Danish cartoon row. Did you know that there were Muslims in Denmark? There was never a Danish Empire, so where did they come from? Yet they are there, and they are certainly making their presence felt, as Muslims are throughout North-West Eurabia. Get used to it.
Or do something about it.
After Eurabia, Amerabia
America will be Islamised next. Initially, this will happen through the blacks. Again, that process is already well under way, as disaffected black youth discovers a sense of identity by reference to the Islamic kingdoms of West Africa (whose black, Muslim rulers sold those youths’ ancestors to the Arabs and the Europeans, but never mind), and as many a deep-thinking young black woman decides that being a princess of such a kingdom is preferable to being a hip-hop “bitch” or “ho”. Many in both categories, and others, are re-living Malcolm X’s journey from the Nation of Islam (which has influenced hip-hop profoundly) to mainstream Islam (which has itself influenced much of black music, notably jazz). And black popular music has enormous “crossover” appeal.
After Eurabia, Amerabia.
After Eurabia, Amerabia.
Saturday, 19 August 2006
Hypocrisy, Private Armies, and States Within States
America, Lebanon and Ireland - my article in The First Post: http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/index.php?menuID=1&subID=687
Are exams getting easier?
Are exams getting easier? Whether or not they are is certainly not the fault of the people sitting them. But exams are now designed, not to test pupils, but to test teachers and schools. This has become so important that the poor pupils, and their parents if they are at all caring or concerned, are subjected to many years of examination instead of education. From the age of seven, every year until leaving school, there is little or no teaching in the third term. There is only revision for exams, and then the exams themselves, every year.
The view is inculcated that the only reason to read or learn anything is in order to pass an exam on it and obtain some sort of certificate. This is compounded when teenagers, having finished their exams, are simply given the rest of the term off. Apparently, if there is no exam on something, then there is no point in teaching or learning anything.
The “gender gap” is brought up every year. But if television news bulletins are to be believed, boys do not pass exams because they do not sit them. Nor, apparently, do any girls who would not be considered for careers in modelling or television. The theory is bandied about that, for example, the male brain does not cope well with complete texts such as plays or novels. Most of these (without even mentioning poetry) were written by men. But anthologies of short extracts are preferred, allegedly to appeal to boys. In fact, these anthologies are preferred because they are much less like hard work to teach or examine.
If boys really do better at final exams and girls at coursework, then we should examine everyone in both ways, and simply let the lower of the two grades be awarded.
The view is inculcated that the only reason to read or learn anything is in order to pass an exam on it and obtain some sort of certificate. This is compounded when teenagers, having finished their exams, are simply given the rest of the term off. Apparently, if there is no exam on something, then there is no point in teaching or learning anything.
The “gender gap” is brought up every year. But if television news bulletins are to be believed, boys do not pass exams because they do not sit them. Nor, apparently, do any girls who would not be considered for careers in modelling or television. The theory is bandied about that, for example, the male brain does not cope well with complete texts such as plays or novels. Most of these (without even mentioning poetry) were written by men. But anthologies of short extracts are preferred, allegedly to appeal to boys. In fact, these anthologies are preferred because they are much less like hard work to teach or examine.
If boys really do better at final exams and girls at coursework, then we should examine everyone in both ways, and simply let the lower of the two grades be awarded.
The terrorist "threat"
Have you ever gone shooting your mouth off in an Internet chat room? Or have you ever transferred money outside the formal British economy? It is for these things that several British Muslims have been arrested as suspected terrorists. They need not worry too much: of over one thousand British Muslims arrested on the same basis, only 12% have ever been charged with anything, and 80% of those have been acquitted. That leaves about two per cent of arrests leading to a conviction, and most of those for nothing to do with terrorism: once the Police go rummaging through people's lives, they can find all sorts of things.
Some of those recently arrested had been under surveillance for over a year. But then some poor soul under Pakistani interrogation alleged a plot to blow up aeroplanes. To Bush and Blair, who discussed this matter over the weekend before the arrests, it was Christmas. "Another 9/11," they must have exclaimed. Something to distract attention from Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and numerous domestic policy failures.
True to form, Blair sent in John Reid, whose own spin is that he directed the arrests. This is so scandalous that it must be true: no one would make it up against himself. The Home Secretary now brags about directing the Police to arrest people in the middle of the night! Dr Reid is very clever, and, as I can testify first-hand, an excellent after-dinner speaker. But he was a Communist Party activist deep into his adult life, well before the fall of the Soviet Union. At Stirling University, when the Communist Party ran the Students' Union (with its large cash turnover), Reid was its enforcer. As he later was for Neil Kinnock, and now is for Tony Blair.
So, yes, I am afraid. Of John Reid.
Some of those recently arrested had been under surveillance for over a year. But then some poor soul under Pakistani interrogation alleged a plot to blow up aeroplanes. To Bush and Blair, who discussed this matter over the weekend before the arrests, it was Christmas. "Another 9/11," they must have exclaimed. Something to distract attention from Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and numerous domestic policy failures.
True to form, Blair sent in John Reid, whose own spin is that he directed the arrests. This is so scandalous that it must be true: no one would make it up against himself. The Home Secretary now brags about directing the Police to arrest people in the middle of the night! Dr Reid is very clever, and, as I can testify first-hand, an excellent after-dinner speaker. But he was a Communist Party activist deep into his adult life, well before the fall of the Soviet Union. At Stirling University, when the Communist Party ran the Students' Union (with its large cash turnover), Reid was its enforcer. As he later was for Neil Kinnock, and now is for Tony Blair.
So, yes, I am afraid. Of John Reid.
Replacing the two main parties
The two main parties are doomed. We are living in their final generation. Most of their members have died, or quit, or simply stopped turning up to anything. Those who remain involved are overwhelmingly over 50, largely over 60, and not uncommonly over 70. Labour and the Conservatives will certainly be gone 20 years hence, probably 15, and possibly 10.
So who will contest elections, in place of the old parties? Parties, I hope and predict, that recognise the obvious, currently denied publicly, but not privately, by the political class.
Far from being conservative, the “free” market corrodes to nought everything that conservatives seek to conserve. Socialism, as the British Labour tradition defines it, does conserve those things against capitalism. There cannot be the decadent social libertinism of the 1960s without the decadent economic libertinism of the 1980s, or vice versa. There cannot be an unrestricted market in goods, services and capital but not in labour, i.e., people, including migrants; or vice versa. There cannot be a “free” market in goods and services generally, but not in alcohol, drugs, pornography, gambling and prostitution.
These things are obvious, as the new parties will admit. Already, Polly Toynbee admits that unrestricted immigration is bad for the poor, while Melanie Phillips admits that privatisation has been disastrous for the utilities. Common sense is breaking out all over. Neil Clark and Peter Hitchens will yet have their day (except on capital punishment, I trust).
One new party will be conservative precisely by being Socialist, and Socialist precisely in order to be conservative. It will seek to limit immigration in order to limit foreign goods, services and capital; and vice versa. The other will support a socio-economic free-for-all, though without any freedom for great swathes of the population.
I know which one I’ll be in. How about you?
So who will contest elections, in place of the old parties? Parties, I hope and predict, that recognise the obvious, currently denied publicly, but not privately, by the political class.
Far from being conservative, the “free” market corrodes to nought everything that conservatives seek to conserve. Socialism, as the British Labour tradition defines it, does conserve those things against capitalism. There cannot be the decadent social libertinism of the 1960s without the decadent economic libertinism of the 1980s, or vice versa. There cannot be an unrestricted market in goods, services and capital but not in labour, i.e., people, including migrants; or vice versa. There cannot be a “free” market in goods and services generally, but not in alcohol, drugs, pornography, gambling and prostitution.
These things are obvious, as the new parties will admit. Already, Polly Toynbee admits that unrestricted immigration is bad for the poor, while Melanie Phillips admits that privatisation has been disastrous for the utilities. Common sense is breaking out all over. Neil Clark and Peter Hitchens will yet have their day (except on capital punishment, I trust).
One new party will be conservative precisely by being Socialist, and Socialist precisely in order to be conservative. It will seek to limit immigration in order to limit foreign goods, services and capital; and vice versa. The other will support a socio-economic free-for-all, though without any freedom for great swathes of the population.
I know which one I’ll be in. How about you?
How the lunatics took over the asylum
The lunatics have often taken over the asylum. In the 1960s, they promoted wholesale social irresponsibility. With utter perversity, this was declared to be “the Left”. In the 1980s, such principles were extended to economics. Those principles’ own internal logic compelled this. And anyway, the teenagers of the 1960s came of age economically in the 1980s.
The mass movement that had safeguarded conservative values against capitalism, by including everyone in communitarian structures, had been supplanted by the small but noisy campaign for sex and drugs. And then the mass movement that had constantly reminded everyone why capitalism at least needed to be tempered, and why communitarian structures were necessary, was also supplanted. This time, the small but noisy campaign was for sex and drugs to be available on the “free” market, operating without reference to social, cultural or political considerations. With utter perversity, this was declared to be “the Right”.
If the State has no business regulating sex or drugs, then it has no business regulating anything else; or vice versa. The logic is impeccable, and the consequences are devastating for any economy, any society, any culture, and any body politic.
Today, “the Left” is presented as having “won” the social “battles”, and “the Right” as having “won” the economic “battles”. This model is so fragile that the slightest dissent from it at home or abroad is denounced in the most hysterical terms and suppressed with utter ruthlessness. Yet every detail of our constitution must be altered to conform to it. Indeed, it is deemed to be so self-evident that must now be imposed on the rest of the world, even by force of arms. The hippies always did believe in the inherent superiority and finality of their views. It is just that they now control weapons and armed forces with which to impose them. So they do.
Thus, for the third time since the Second World War, the lunatics have taken over the asylum. When and how will we sane people take it back?
The mass movement that had safeguarded conservative values against capitalism, by including everyone in communitarian structures, had been supplanted by the small but noisy campaign for sex and drugs. And then the mass movement that had constantly reminded everyone why capitalism at least needed to be tempered, and why communitarian structures were necessary, was also supplanted. This time, the small but noisy campaign was for sex and drugs to be available on the “free” market, operating without reference to social, cultural or political considerations. With utter perversity, this was declared to be “the Right”.
If the State has no business regulating sex or drugs, then it has no business regulating anything else; or vice versa. The logic is impeccable, and the consequences are devastating for any economy, any society, any culture, and any body politic.
Today, “the Left” is presented as having “won” the social “battles”, and “the Right” as having “won” the economic “battles”. This model is so fragile that the slightest dissent from it at home or abroad is denounced in the most hysterical terms and suppressed with utter ruthlessness. Yet every detail of our constitution must be altered to conform to it. Indeed, it is deemed to be so self-evident that must now be imposed on the rest of the world, even by force of arms. The hippies always did believe in the inherent superiority and finality of their views. It is just that they now control weapons and armed forces with which to impose them. So they do.
Thus, for the third time since the Second World War, the lunatics have taken over the asylum. When and how will we sane people take it back?
No need for a second chamber
We do not need a second chamber at all in a non-federal state. It lets MPs off the hook when it comes to scrutinising legislation and holding the Government to account. The incorporation of minor parties and Crossbenchers can be achieved within a unitary Parliament with both (it would have to be both) an American-style committee system and an Australian-style caucus system. Here is how.
There would be five hundred constituency MPs, elected by First Past The Post. At the same time, everyone would have two further votes, with Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the English regions as the electoral areas. Those regions would be redrawn so that none of Yorkshire was in the North East or the North West, and none of Lincolnshire was in Yorkshire.
On one ballot paper would be party candidates. On the other would be candidates who were forbidden to be party members. On each ballot paper, we would vote for one candidate by means of an X. The top six in the first case, and the top four in the second, would be declared elected: a total of 120, giving 620 MPs in all. There would not be a BNP member among them, thanks to the Greens, the UK Independence Party, and either Respect (problematical, but manageable) or Socialist Labour (just the Old Labour Left). But there would always be 48 Independents: the Crossbench MPs.
Meanwhile, in the course of each Parliament, each constituency or regional party would submit a shortlist of two potential candidates to a binding ballot of every voter in the constituency or region. Likewise, each national party would submit a shortlist of two potential Leaders to a binding ballot of every voter in the United Kingdom. The next party to have a Leadership Election should take the lead on this.
There would be five hundred constituency MPs, elected by First Past The Post. At the same time, everyone would have two further votes, with Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the English regions as the electoral areas. Those regions would be redrawn so that none of Yorkshire was in the North East or the North West, and none of Lincolnshire was in Yorkshire.
On one ballot paper would be party candidates. On the other would be candidates who were forbidden to be party members. On each ballot paper, we would vote for one candidate by means of an X. The top six in the first case, and the top four in the second, would be declared elected: a total of 120, giving 620 MPs in all. There would not be a BNP member among them, thanks to the Greens, the UK Independence Party, and either Respect (problematical, but manageable) or Socialist Labour (just the Old Labour Left). But there would always be 48 Independents: the Crossbench MPs.
Meanwhile, in the course of each Parliament, each constituency or regional party would submit a shortlist of two potential candidates to a binding ballot of every voter in the constituency or region. Likewise, each national party would submit a shortlist of two potential Leaders to a binding ballot of every voter in the United Kingdom. The next party to have a Leadership Election should take the lead on this.
Britain's special relationship with Canada
Britain has a special relationship across the North Atlantic. It is with Canada.
The descendants of the United Empire Loyalists are to the Commonwealth as the Palestinians are to the Arabs. Like the Palestinians, they even keep the keys and the title deeds to their ancestors’ confiscated properties.
Huge numbers of Canadians are of Scottish descent. So are huge numbers of Americans, but all the fuss there is made of a ridiculous pseudo-Irishness.
Although Canada was undoubtedly an independent country, she fought in both World Wars from the start. She did not wait for Germany to encourage a third country to attack her several years into the First. Nor did she wait for Germany to declare war on her, and to attack her shipping, several years into the Second.
As one of the 16 Commonwealth Realms, including Britain, independent Canada retains the monarchy. Any of them can abolish it (as many others have done), or change her own Law of Succession. Canada freely chooses not to, just as Britain does. She cherishes her ties to us and to our other 14 sisters. Likewise, we cherish our ties to her and to our other 14 sisters. Or, at least, we should.
Canada’s was a social democracy constructed in order to defend the best conservative values against capitalism, just like ours. Most of her people still want this, just like ours. Yet she currently has a neoconservative government, just like ours. And it engages in scaremongering in order to curtail liberty, just like ours.
Finally, Canada’s vast resources of fuel, fresh water and other key commodities make her a coming superpower of the twenty-first century. By contrast, her southern neighbour is already in decline.
Which transatlantic special relationship matters more? Indeed, when the chips are down, which one really exists at all?
The descendants of the United Empire Loyalists are to the Commonwealth as the Palestinians are to the Arabs. Like the Palestinians, they even keep the keys and the title deeds to their ancestors’ confiscated properties.
Huge numbers of Canadians are of Scottish descent. So are huge numbers of Americans, but all the fuss there is made of a ridiculous pseudo-Irishness.
Although Canada was undoubtedly an independent country, she fought in both World Wars from the start. She did not wait for Germany to encourage a third country to attack her several years into the First. Nor did she wait for Germany to declare war on her, and to attack her shipping, several years into the Second.
As one of the 16 Commonwealth Realms, including Britain, independent Canada retains the monarchy. Any of them can abolish it (as many others have done), or change her own Law of Succession. Canada freely chooses not to, just as Britain does. She cherishes her ties to us and to our other 14 sisters. Likewise, we cherish our ties to her and to our other 14 sisters. Or, at least, we should.
Canada’s was a social democracy constructed in order to defend the best conservative values against capitalism, just like ours. Most of her people still want this, just like ours. Yet she currently has a neoconservative government, just like ours. And it engages in scaremongering in order to curtail liberty, just like ours.
Finally, Canada’s vast resources of fuel, fresh water and other key commodities make her a coming superpower of the twenty-first century. By contrast, her southern neighbour is already in decline.
Which transatlantic special relationship matters more? Indeed, when the chips are down, which one really exists at all?
Britain and Australia: the cultural cringe
There is a cultural cringe between Britain and Australia. Specifically, Britain now cringes to Australia. People remark on British teenagers who pronounce every sentence as if it were a question. But that is not the half of it.
Neighbours has been a huge cultural phenomenon in Britain. The great and the good have not noticed, because they don’t watch it. Nor do I these days. But they never did. Of course they didn’t. People like them probably don’t in Australia, either. Why would they?
For Neighbours depicts people with limited education and no culture, yet enjoying considerable affluence. They live in sizeable houses, set in grounds large enough both for a nice garden and for a swimming pool. The sun shines all the time. And they retain the close family and community ties of the British working class in the 1950s. I hope that this does not sound snobbish or condescending. It is not intended to.
All of this appealed enormously in Major’s Britain. And the rest is cultural history. We now have Chardonnay-fuelled barbecues. Some people even refer to a university as a “uni”, although my spell-check still does not recognise this word. I do not suggest that our secondary school years were redesignated Years Seven, Eight, Nine and so on in imitation of Neighbours or the then popular Home and Away. But it was certainly in accordance with the Australophile spirit of teenage life in the Major years. I know: I was there.
And now we even have politicians in suits over open-necked shirts. They look scruffy. They can’t carry it off. But if nothing else, they prove that there is no reason for Australia to become a republic. If anything, we in Britain now thrill at the thought that our Head of State is the Queen of Australia.
Neighbours has been a huge cultural phenomenon in Britain. The great and the good have not noticed, because they don’t watch it. Nor do I these days. But they never did. Of course they didn’t. People like them probably don’t in Australia, either. Why would they?
For Neighbours depicts people with limited education and no culture, yet enjoying considerable affluence. They live in sizeable houses, set in grounds large enough both for a nice garden and for a swimming pool. The sun shines all the time. And they retain the close family and community ties of the British working class in the 1950s. I hope that this does not sound snobbish or condescending. It is not intended to.
All of this appealed enormously in Major’s Britain. And the rest is cultural history. We now have Chardonnay-fuelled barbecues. Some people even refer to a university as a “uni”, although my spell-check still does not recognise this word. I do not suggest that our secondary school years were redesignated Years Seven, Eight, Nine and so on in imitation of Neighbours or the then popular Home and Away. But it was certainly in accordance with the Australophile spirit of teenage life in the Major years. I know: I was there.
And now we even have politicians in suits over open-necked shirts. They look scruffy. They can’t carry it off. But if nothing else, they prove that there is no reason for Australia to become a republic. If anything, we in Britain now thrill at the thought that our Head of State is the Queen of Australia.