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.
Friday, 1 August 2014
Disseminating
I feel very sorry for Ruma Khan.
In promoting support for the Islamist invasion of and insurrection in Syria, she was only promoting government policy.
To be fair, Cameron is far better than the last party in office, which killed 1 million people in Iraq, another few hundred thousand in Afghanistan, thousands in Kosovo, in addition to flying people to torture chambers on behalf of America (calling it "extraordinary rendition")and flying bombs to Israel in the 2006 Lebanon invasion-from British airports.
This Government pales in comparison to the last one.
Not only that, but not very many Labour MPs who voted for the Iraq war are still in the Commons and hardly any will be there after next year's Election. Even today's Leader opposed the war from outside Parliament in those days. It was a different party, a historical aberration, a thing of the past.
However, something that I have noticed is that, as my own generation starts to become politically prominent, the two main parties have managed to find a wildly disproportionate number of those who were in favour of the Iraq War.
Hardly anyone in the country was, and almost no one born in the 1970s was.
Yet anything up to half of the latter who are now Labour MPs, and almost all who are now Conservative MPs (I am open to correction, but I can think of only one exception, and he is as good as certain to lose his seat), not only were, but remain liberal interventionists to this day.
That is most unrepresentative, to put the matter no more strongly than that.
To be fair, Cameron is far better than the last party in office, which killed 1 million people in Iraq, another few hundred thousand in Afghanistan, thousands in Kosovo, in addition to flying people to torture chambers on behalf of America (calling it "extraordinary rendition")and flying bombs to Israel in the 2006 Lebanon invasion-from British airports.
ReplyDeleteThis Government pales in comparison to the last one.
When all is known, I am not sure that it will.
DeleteAnd that party did not wage the war in Iraq, which would not have passed without the votes of most of the other side.
Not only that, but not very many Labour MPs who voted for the Iraq war are still in the Commons and hardly any will be there after next year's Election. Even today's Leader opposed the war from outside Parliament in those days. It was a different party, a historical aberration, a thing of the past.
DeleteIndeed so.
DeleteHowever, something that I have noticed is that, as my own generation starts to become politically prominent, the two main parties have managed to find a wildly disproportionate number of those who were in favour of the Iraq War.
Hardly anyone in the country was, and almost no one born in the 1970s was.
Yet anything up to half of the latter who are now Labour MPs, and almost all who are now Conservative MPs (I am open to correction, but I can think of only one exception, and he is as good as certain to lose his seat), not only were, but remain liberal interventionists to this day.
That is most unrepresentative, to put the matter no more strongly than that.