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Thursday 14 June 2018

Yes, we must now fight for our most basic democratic rights

It became for me noticeably clear after the Referendum. There was an agonised scream from the Guardian - "the wrong people are using Democracy". It was not just a joke. Since then, the bien-pensant metropolitian class has been doing everything it can to remove and replace our most fundamental democratic rights with various decision-making systems that they can control. You may have thought me over the top when I have warned previously that our most fundamental legal democratic safeguards - the right to associate, to free speech, to form political parties, the right of universal suffrage and of the secret ballot - are under threat. Today I commend to you without reservation Allister Heath's column in the Telegraph (£). 

Heath characterises this as a struggle between the liberal democrats - us -  against the managerialists of  'authoritarian liberalism'. And we are losing. Heath also admits that we have lost Brexit.
I prefer to call this emergent global political model “managerialism”. If you want to find some of its more vocal proponents, look no further than the pro-EU “rebel” MPs slowly but surely killing off Brexit: their contempt for real democracy is matched only by their preposterous self-regard. They are typical card-carrying authoritarian liberals, convinced that they know better than we do what is good for us. ...

Brexit is being overturned but it won an astonishing victory against a Remain side that massively outspent it....

There is huge, pent-up populist anger across the EU, and the rage of the Brexiteers when they find out they have been conned will be something else....

Britain almost broke away; but it seems that the tide of history was too strong for Theresa May’s hapless government. Still, history never ends, and supporters of liberal democracy will live to fight another day, in Britain and across the world.
Please, if you spend money on anything today, buy a copy of the Telegraph and clip Heath's article.

We must start over again. We need a party to replace both UKIP and the Conservatives, that supports fundamental libertarian and democratic values, that supports all those deserted and abandoned by the Labour Party and that isn't ashamed to learn from the Swiss how to defend popular democracy.

This fight has just started.

18 comments:

Sackerson said...

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Patronising-Bastards-Elites-Betrayed-Britain/dp/1472127366/

Sackerson said...

Agreed: this is merely Round One. It's not the tide of history, merely the usual tendency for power and money to concentrate, with associated tensions. I read an article in a postwar edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica that saw the Papacy attempt to centralise the power of the Church and created its own growing opposition among kings of nations that had begun to settle down at the periphery of Europe.

By opposing the EU empire now we may forestall some future cataclysm caused by overreach.

Dave_G said...


"Liberal Democrats"?

The media commonly refer to us as - sneeringly - Populists.

It's on the menu that may prove 'popular' in the near future are:

Protesting
Rioting
Violence (in general)
Targeting politicians
and, dare I say it, 'terrorist-like' attacks against the establishment.

The only way to prevent these events will be to deliver Brexit to the standards that people expect i.e. sever all ties, close the open borders, trade only.

I rely on gut instinct (a lot) and just 'know' that we're at a tipping point in social unrest.

Anger? Fury? Absolute effing disgust? If the politicians only went out and saw for themselves what they're stoking they be shitting themselves. And rightly so.

anon 2 said...

Dave G @ 07:03 --- The "politicians" are blind beyond anything ever known in British history!
30,000 people gathered on their doorstep last weekend, and the reaction? Nary a murmur except echoes within prison walls - as if to: "Will no one rid us of this TRoublesome TRuth?"

Apparently they're totally blindfolded and burka'd by the M&Ms.*

------
*Marxists & Mozzies.

John in Cheshire said...

Dave_G, I think/ hope you are correct, and moving Tommy Robinson to a muslim dominated jail might just be the trigger.

DeeDee99 said...

The blatant arrogance of the pro-EU Establishment is breathtaking.

They simply don't care what the British people think of them: they believe we can be insulted, our votes ignored and we can be sidelined in the running of our own country and we will do nothing about it.

I am also pretty disgusted with the Conservative Brexiteers who have allowed May to steadily erode Brexit to the point that AT BEST we will get BRINO. They haven't attempted to really fight back.

UKIP has completely trashed its brand since Farage stood down. Interestingly, he was making noises on LBC about a return to the political fray. I hope he's talking to people with money and influence who will be able to launch a new party which will get the support of the working classes Labour has abandoned.



Mr Ecks said...




Brexit isn't "lost" yet Radders.

As ever your analysis is piss-poor. Nothing personal but whatever skill set you have seeing clearly into political bullshit isn't it.

Tory trash are doing a lot of noise making but the game is far from over. The Fish Faced Cow is weak--despicably so even compared to Major who whipped the crew into line in 1994.

Anyone with the balls of even a gnat could get anything past the crawling blob of self-serving cowardice that is MPs in general and Tory MPs in particular.

Nigel Sedgwick said...

Raedwald suggests (perhaps calls for) a new political party.

However, in the AV Referendum (Alternative Vote), the Demos voted for First Past the Post (FPTP). And they voted for it by around 2:1. This is IMHO an almost insurmountable obstacle in support of two-party politics.

In August 2016, Raedwald wrote: When we last had the option of changing our electoral process, I came out on balance for retaining FPTP for reasons that made good sense at the time - .... Not to me they didn't: but one cannot be selective about which referendum votes one views as meaningful and which as not meaningful. And Raedwald then wrote: "... I now support looking at PR again."

Just in case you're all gagging for Proportional Representation (PR, whatever that is) - again be careful what you wish for and vote for. Here's my view from the website of Charles Crawford; his view too". Charles has it under the title "Voting System Doomed"; I see it more as UK democracy suspended.

I don't see any reasonable way (for years) in overcoming the result of the AV Referendum. However, just in case we ever have an elected House of Lords or (an old favourite of mine) and/or a directly elected Executive Prime Minister, just try really really hard to be onside over using AV (or STV with 1-, 2- or even just 3-seat Lords constituencies).

Meanwhile we have what we voted for good and hard in the AV Referendum, the Labour Party leadership (through Labour MPs choice), and the most recent general election: just not the EU Referendum.

What do others suggest is the way forward - one that might actually work?

Best regards

Raedwald said...

Nigel - yes, I support forms of PR but ONLY for lower tier and less consequential democratic bodies - local authorities, Police watch committees, district councils sort of thing. I maintain FPTP is the only sane and workable system for our national Parliament.

What I actually wrote in 2016 was:-

"When we last had the option of changing our electoral process, I came out on balance for retaining FPTP for reasons that made good sense at the time - and taking the long view rather than reacting to short-term electoral injustice. If we had some form of PR now, I suspect UKIP and Corbyn-Left radicals would be elected in equal numbers, together with the existing 'soft' centre left and right parties, a handful of greens and a much reduced number of Scot Nats. It would be I think the end of one-party government and the beginning of permanent coalition."

I.e I have not changed my view. PR in Parliament wouldn't work. I have always said so.

Mr Ecks -

Please do me the kindness of reminding me which party you belong to, so if ever I am tempted to join one I could rapidly remind myself of the company that I could be in, and recover my senses.

If you don't think that our basis of democracy is threatened, I'd recommend turning the bluster knob down and diverting the charge to the cerebrum.

Nigel Sedgwick said...

Raedwald, immediately after your paragraph you quoted in full in response to my comment, you wrote:

"I can't really object to moving to unstable governments, compromise policy and the vulnerability of ministers to Parliamentary approval because it means keeping government in check. A conservative government with no parliamentary opposition to keep it in check may threaten me less than a Labour alternative, but I still don't like it. And as I don't think either Labour or the Tories can heal their internal divisions without schism, I now support looking at PR again."

This reads to me that, whilst you expect one-party government to end (and I agree that would become more likely), your opinion is now somewhat in favour (though not really liking it - and I have some sympathy there, as no voting method is ideal). First sentence: "I can't really object to moving to unstable governments, ..." And last sentence: "I now support looking at PR again." And those look to me to be concerning UK government rather than UK local authorities.

I agree with you that AV and other (IMO) less desirable forms of PR would lead (under our parliamentary system) to having coalition governments more often. However, like you, I view that as more desirable than an electoral process that acts largely against the introduction of new political parties and mostly no real strength outside the main two parties.

Do note however that many of the UK's governments have been coalitions or minority governments. This was particularly the case for significant parts of the 19th century and for the 20th century up to the start of WW2 (and the coalition then was for an entirely different and proper purpose: national government because of major war). Since WW2 there have also been several minority governments. There have also, since 1900, been several election pacts (particularly Lib-Lab pacts of 1903, 1924 and 1927) leading to governments or weakening the government formed of or around the other main party. Then there have been the Lib-Lab parliamentary pact (coalition) of 1977 and the Cameron/Clegg coalition. And don't forget that we currently have a coalition (of a sort) between the Tories and DUP. Plus currently a seriously inconvenient deficiency for the Tory government in the House of Lords. Thus minority or coalition governments are historically rather common in the UK.

The key issue against FPTP is that neither of the main parties will willingly move away from it because their votes would then risk being split (and perhaps many seats lost). This is not only even with parties largely in line with their policies: but particularly with parties largely in line with their policies. And such splitting of votes is not actually even to the advantage of the electorate - as it may well lead to a government of the other of the two main parties.

AV (etc) allows new and existing minority parties to gain traction (even if they gain no or few seats). This arises directly from the very significant additional information about voters' views that arises through the AV process.

Best regards

Oldrightie said...

The whole mess surrounding brexit is but typical of the EUSSR long game and historically successful suffocation of protest and "populism". However I shall await the final fat lady's aria and hope it isn't "ode to joy".

Dave_G said...


Some people advocate 'Britain First' as the logical successor to UKIP and I'd tend to agree if you can get past the usual knee-jerk reactions of those that object to BF having anti-Islam policies - something that MUST be addressed yet is political dynamite/poison for the advocates and useful ammunition for the media to counter attack attack with.

Then there's the Harrogate Agenda - which seems to have longer term aspirations than may be required to counter the current difficulties.

Only someone with an established track record could pull together an opposition in time to make a difference - and such a tactic may just be what it takes to make the difference.

I suspect there's a larger proportion of 'non of the above' voters that would flock to any Party that can overcome a media onslaught long enough to make a difference. The current level of discontent with Labour and Tory voters is the key to any opposition and must be utilised before either Party devises some 5-minute-wonder policy that they can renege on afterwards.

Unknown said...

Raedwald, thank you for link to Allister Heath's piece in the Telegraph. I agree, it's an important, but in some ways depressing, read.
Here's the comment I left there:

A first-rate piece, Mr Heath.


A couple of points:


Firstly, as you point out, ‘managerialism’ is inefficient. More than that though, it has no mandate. Even the most authoritarian Chinese empires depended for their existence on their mandate, albeit expressed as that of heaven. However, when things became too egregious, they forfeited their mandate, they lost power and their overthrow was often as not bloody and messy. The technocrats of the EU and their fellow travellers in the UK and elsewhere are so blinkered by their statist ideology that they simply cannot see the coming revolt from so many quarters.


Secondly, a glimmer of optimism from a perhaps unlikely source. The general election in Malaysia in May 2018 saw the removal of the unutterably corrupt kleptocrats of the Barisan National (National Front) who had been in power, supposedly immovably, since independence, over 60 years. The ‘rakyat’ (people) were disgusted with the former government's behaviour and managed - through the ballot box – to remove them in abject disgrace, many likely to face criminal charges, including the former prime minister. And several authoritarian laws are to be repealed or significantly scaled back, including the notorious catch-all Internal Security Act (ISA).


I rather think that it will take somewhat less than 60 years for the EU to lose its mandate.

Raedwald said...

Dave_G - I think that's the crux

A party can come from nowhere these days and go from 0-60 in a few weeks - everyone has learnt that lesson from Macron and En Marche! - but it needs to press the right buttons to get votes.

No party that's crudely anti-Islam will win votes - the taint of the NF, BNP, EDL and offshoots renders open racism a political failure. However, this can be finessed - the OeVP here, the local Tory party, boosted its vote by wearing some of the clothes of the far-right; a burqa ban, closing of foreign funded mosques, closed and guarded borders etc. This would also work here - in hand with a zero tolerance approach to anti-Islamic violence and intimidation.

But what's clear is that in 2022 every constituency in the land must have a choice on the ballot paper that's not Tory, Labour, LibDem, Green or UKIP, from a party led by a figure of national standing with an appeal across the centre ground and enough credibility to offer real reform.

Budgie said...

If we believe our way of doing things (our culture) is superior to theirs (and who doesn't, otherwise there's no point living it) then that is nationalist.

If you refuse to be nationalist - because, after all, it is deeply unfashionable - then the result is not some BBC/LibDem utopia where we're in the EU but the EU doesn't rule us, and where the unlimited migrants all have the same values as Hillary Benn, but the death warrant for our own culture.

Some of our establishment actively hate us, work for the demise of our culture, and have turned the heads of their many gullible minions like Anna Soubry or Jack Ketch, or the Antifa ranters who shut down the Lewisham hustings. But they really won't like what they get - probably some form of authoritarian managerialist Britistan.

Here's a preview of it from today's DT: a mother had her son taken away by social services. Why? For denying him an ice-cream and a hair cut to his liking. Add in other ingredients to taste: from Mrs May's unthinking incompetence and capitulations, to secretly moving Stephen Lennon (aka Tommy Robinson) from a mainly white British jail in Hull, to the apparently about 70% RoP dominated jail in Leicester.

Mr Ecks said...


Radders--I don't-- at present --belong to any party.

As for cerebral charge--with respect you are the one vapouring.

Tommy Robinson --an individual you dismissed with contempt after listening to the legal COC & bullshit--being placed in the way of silence-by-murder is far more an example of our fall into tyranny than the fact that the FFC just managed to get thro' the last debate. After making another of her vague fudge-sandwich promises about the MPukes getting something sometime or other.

The whole caper only proved my point about the total cowardice of Tory MP's. Exactly three of whom voted against the FFC yesterday. And one of them was likely in a cup of Dutch courage. And one third of ZaNu rebelled against Jizz and the Gang to keep faith with Brexit.

Now neither the FFC or ZaNu are heros--don't mistake my meaning. And the FFC is a wrecker for sure. But much worse is going on in this country--eg marxist shite like "hatespeech" laws enshrined in UK laws--than the fact that some numpty at the Turdgraph discovers--years if not decades late to the party--that the Global elite wants one world womiccumalobus-style tyranny.

Cry us a river.

Cull the Badgers said...

I call the enemies of our democracy Liberal Fascists. They really ought to have that title, it is accurate and reflects the seriousness of the problem. We also need to reclaim our language.

Budgie said...

Raedwald, Perhaps you could explain why you are so set against UKIP?

Yes I know that UKIP is far from perfect, but compared to the LibLabGreenCons? All parties have to accommodate a range of views, so will never exactly suit everyone. Wishful thinking for a "super" party seems inherently lazy, and appears to be a case of the perfect destroying the good.