The French Finance
Minister was interviewed on British TV last night. What a contrast
with our sorry politicians. How dignified, how strange to see a
politician politely and succinctly answer a direct question with a
direct and common sense answer. No avoiding the question, no
posturing.
Compare that with Sajid
Javid's appalling display on Andrew Marr's show at the weekend. He
avoided a straight answer every time, back pedalled and made excuses
for the lies and disinformation given by the Remain team. His team.
By comparison Nicola
Sturgeon, on the same programme, was surprisingly good. Mind you, she
doesn't have to play games at present, her position and the Scottish
one is pretty clear. They didn't fall for the lies and untenable
promises of the Leave campaign and they don't want to pay the price
just because we the English did. Quite right too.
Whilst we're on the
subject of politicians being interviewed on television, Ewan Davies
had a Boris supporter on Newsnight last night. Don't know who he was
and don't really care; how anyone can support such an evil,
untruthful campaign is beyond me. However Ewan Davies needs to come
down a peg or two as well. If you're going to interview someone let
them string two sentences together before you jump down their throat.
There's a difference between tough interviewing and it being all
about the interviewer. I turned off in disgust at both of them.
Stephen Crabb has
joined the Conservative Party leadership contest for the next
un-elected Prime Minister saying that people don't believe a word
politicians say. That may prove to be the only thing he's right
about. Both referendum campaigns played on people's emotions and
fears, both of them. It's little wonder then when people get
emotional, angry, sad and anxious. It's little wonder that all
respect for politicians in general gets lost in the fog of lies and
promises that can never, will never be fulfilled.
Nigel Farage is trying,
on the 100th anniversary of the ghastly Battle Of the
Somme, to tear down the great European push for unity, cooperation
and advancement. His crowing to the European Parliament was
reprehensible. There was just one thing that had a grain, just a
grain, of sense at the back of it. He accused members of never having
had a proper job. I don't know if that's true or not, in Europe.
However, getting back to the concept of respect for politicians.
I for one was hugely
impressed by Michel Sapin. We could use his kind here. One thing we
don't need is politicians who come straight out of university, having
studied only politics, where doubtless they get to see the terrible
tactics which work and go straight into the political arena with
virtually no life experience whatsoever to practice them. We laugh at a US President
who's never travelled then elect twenty somethings who've never done
a thing.
At least our young
politicians are probably motivated to do some good in the world, even
if they don't know how. It's puzzling that a private e-mail between a
wife and a husband has become public. I don't know how that happened,
but certainly Mrs Gove understands where the real power is in this
country; Murdoch's papers and the Daily Mail. Her husband may come across as
a polite and gentle man but the truth outs in the end, it's a career and
it's about him not us.
Our politicians are a
sorry bunch, especially the senior ones. I don't trust them and I
don't respect them and frankly after this debacle I doubt I ever
will. I'm no supporter of the Labour Party, yet neither do I rejoice
in its disarray. The circumstances of it do support my case that
British politicians are an arrogant self serving bunch however, on
both sides of the house.
I agree that Corbyn is
very unlikely to ever win a General Election and I think his role in
the referendum was utterly pitiful. However, it's the grass roots members of
the Labour Party who elected him and Labour Party MPs damn well ought
to respect that. If Corbyn reflects what the party stands for then
the MPs of that party, and especially those he honoured with a post
in the Shadow Cabinet, have a duty to support him.
Certainly Blair got
power, but look what he did with it. If you stand for something stand
up for it. There's nothing wrong with socialist principles, just
their blinkered incompetence with the nation's finances. Which,
barring the miracle of a Liberal resurgence leaves us with the evil,
split and manipulative Conservative Party in power for the
foreseeable.
If European politicians
are generally more in the Sapin mould then that amplifies our
mistake, because we've taken power away from European politicians,
more democratically elected than ours, and given it to the Goves, the
Johnsons, The Crabbs and the Javids.
Just to justify the
democracy point I would let it be known, voice in the wilderness though I may be, that the European Parliament
uses proportional representation, not first past the post and winner
takes all and that its not just more democratic than the Commons but
it might laugh at the Lords. The idea that un-elected civil servants
run Europe is an urban myth and another damn lie.
With many vote leavers
starting to realise that they will not see empty hospital waiting
rooms, not now, not in one year, two years, five years, that
immigration is unlikely to change in any significant way, that
reciprocal health care and all those opportunities abroad are heading
for the bin, that the young will have to live with the consequences
as vote leavers die off in droves its time for a root and branch
re-organisation of British politics and British media ownership. I'm
not saying we shouldn't have a free press, but as the Gove's have
recognised, too much power is in the hands of too few.
A referendum based on lies and false promises should not stand - it's not democracy in action.
No comments:
Post a Comment