The Continuation Of Failure
The conference season in this country was, as fully expected, entirely predictable. Politicians from all parties rose to the stage in turn to feign concern and tell of the need for ‘hope’, ‘optimism’ and of course that old favourite, ‘change’.
Yet, despite an entire lack of real substance emanating from any of the party conference halls, the career-minded journalists and media groupies still blindly held court at the politician’s feet, seemingly hanging on every word that was uttered as if it were something of great importance.
Sadly, and as has become abundantly clear within these past few years, we in Britain no longer live in a democracy, but have in fact entered a post-democratic era where the façade of elections and freedom remains cunningly intact but their true attainability has long since been stripped away.
The Conservative conference in Birmingham this week confirmed yet again that we no longer have an effective opposition in this country, with David Cameron pledging to persist with the majority of Labour’s failing policies with only a few minor alterations.
And even if the Conservative party was actually attempting to be radically different to the current Labour administration (which the party leadership have no intention of doing, nor the liberal media any intention of allowing) and then also managed to win the next election (which is not actually as likely as is currently made out), then they would still only be in office, not in power.
For we in this country do not, for the most part, run our own affairs or elect those that actually govern us. Over decades our power of self rule has been frittered away by politicians from all parties who have cared more about themselves than the future of the British citizenry.
Our lives are now ever increasingly governed by corrupt, undemocratic European institutions and an unaccountable and stifling domestic bureaucracy - and, for the moment at least, there is very little we can do to extract ourselves from this mess.
Your Comments:
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On the plus side, at least it ain’t snowing.
With a bit of thought, there are still opportunities to confound the intent of the collectivists at a local level. Preventing the councils from taking money out of city economies is a good starting point.
It sounds like you need to make a decision as to whether you can achieve your philosophical objectives under the banner of one of the major parties, or whether you need to put up your own flag.
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If by ‘confound the intent of the collectivists at a local level’ you mean through local councils, then you are sadly wasting your time in my humble opinion.
There is no real power or for that matter sufficient degree of democracy left in local government in this country to allow any realistic countering of either the ‘collectivists’ you allude to or the EU government that as we know has jurisdiction over an increasing proportion of our daily lives.
In fact, it must be said that local government is no longer ‘government’ anymore, but ‘administration’ in which democratically elected representatives are confined to the margins and act as quite willing scapegoats for unaccountable town hall bureaucrats. This happened when local government was reorganised and ‘reformed’ in 1973 and vast powers were taken away from councillors and given to chief executives and other managerial bureaucrats.
What we now have is local administration, where the vast majority of decisions and work of local councils is carried out by the bureaucracy with little input from councillors. Furthermore, our Westminster administration (and latterly our EU Government) have extended the centralisation of decision making to such an extent that local councillors are left fiddling with numbers in budgets – and that is about it.
What’s more, how exactly in your opinion, James, are we meant to confound the ‘collectivists’ when firstly there is no power at local level to do so and secondly no point since what small things could be achieved are automatically undone higher up the chain of command?
For example, yesterday our Chancellor Alistair Darling spent £50bn of our money on bailing out the banking system in a part-nationalisation plan. Curiously this happened the day after an emergency meeting of the finance ministers from the 27 EU member states? Coincidence? I think not. The EU shows its hand once again by allowing member states to break its own rules on the allocation of state aid. Had the EU not sanctioned the breaking of its own rules, such measures could not have been implemented by Darling and our Westminster administration.
It should also be pointed out that David Cameron, and thus the Conservative party have agreed with this state of affairs and have pledged to actively help the government in achieving its aims of nationalisation by not putting up any opposition. Do you think that is right?
Also, I would hardly say that asking for an effective opposition in Britain and leaving the European Union are merely ‘philosophical objectives’. They are in fact pretty practical, essential objectives really – you know, living in a democracy, being able to vote those in power out of office, having an alternative point of view put across etc.
As for putting up my own ‘flag’ – what would be the point, unless of course it was a white one? With the Conservative party still in existence and the tribal voting nature of people towards the established political parties set to continue for the foreseeable future – in our society no upstart conservative or right-wing party could gain political traction in Britain, however admirable their aims.
As such, I made a decision about achieving my ‘objectives’ under a party banner, as you so put it, some time ago which I explained at great length in a comments section on my website back in May. I will continue to campaign for those candidates that I believe represent my political views within the Conservative party - but that is the extent of my support until the party changes to reflect actual conservative views.
