Quote of the week...

"I think that Harriet Harman should run the country. Not THIS country. Some country where there is a possibility of a bloody military coup and she is violently dispatched to be watched on youtube."

Political Dissuasion agrees.

Sometimes racial stereotyping is unavoidable...

Sometimes the material just writes its self...

THE BITCH IS BACK

No, I am not referring to myself as "the bitch".

I am of course talking about the female Labour MP - who wakes up every morning, reaches down to her crotch, has a rummage about, finds she still has no testicles, then decides that this must be the only reason why she isn't/won't be Prime Minister - Harriet Harman.

I've recently given up swearing, so this is the toughest post I'll ever write. As you may or may not know, Harman (aka Harperson) is my least favourite living object on earth. Wayne Rooney? Nope. Nettles? Nope. Joseph Fritzel? Not even close!

Harriet Harman, to quote Edwina Currie, is "on a different planet" and "mad, that is now clear". I've posted before about this crazy lunatic, here and here for example, but yet again, I just have to sit at my keyboard and give my red mist a voice.

Any form of positive discrimination is just a bad idea. It makes one group look pathetic (like the guy who only got the job because his dad owns the business) and makes the other group resentful. Do this in a business and you do not for a happy workplace make...do this UK wide and between the sexes (i.e. 100% of the population) and you're asking for a revolution that needs not occur and is a war against ghosts.

Women and men have the same opportunities in business, politics, sport...pretty much every area of British society. To insist upon having the two top jobs fenced in to the 'one man, one woman' split is so far removed from a) democracy and b) anything that can resemble an intelligent executive structure.

In politics, in the top jobs, I think we can all agree we want 'the best person for the job'. Well, seeing as the best people were smart enough to avoid parliamentary politics, we'll settle for the best MPs for the jobs. To then add another layer of filtering from the ability-criteria, that we must also have a crotch-check, is nothing more than gesture politics.

Would a woman be better than a man at running a Government, a bank or big organisation? No.Would a man be better than a woman? No. There's no such debate, that is what I find hilarious. There is no widespread (or even thinly-spread) field of discussion in society about a lack of rights or opportunities for women. There are no claims from inside or outside organisations that the recession was because of the hairy sacks containing sperm generators being attached to members of the boards.

Not once over the last few years (yes, she's been harping on about this for that long), have I heard her applaud, or acknowledge Thatcher being PM. Thatcher, the woman MP elected three times? Ring any belles? If she at least mentioned Thatcher in all of this, I might, just might, think she was doing this for some (albeit obscure) greater good that she thought worth fighting for. But her failure to even draw on Thatcher's achievements highlights, to many readers, that this isn't a "men/women in society" debate, it's a "Harriet/other leadership candidates in the Labour Party" debate.

And in her claims and belief that she is sticking up for the sisterhood...
Harman is picking a fight with the political ghosts of yesteryear. As in Edwina Currie's Times article, if Harman thinks she is representing woman by (in the loosest meaning of the word) "tackling" this issue, ask the women of the UK what they want a deputy PM, whatever their gender, to be focussing on? It's not this.

The state of UK politics - goodbye

Dear Parliament,

I've given up. I have finally lost all hope for a politics I believe in. This country we live in now, is a shadow of what it believes itself to be.

Every country is shaped in it's identity by those people that make the laws and control the money.

And the people in the UK with that power, with a very few exceptions, are a corrupt, morally empty, unashamed collaboration of moral terrorists. We could, and probably will, wail on about the MPs' expenses scandal. But there is no point. Fairness, decency, honesty, integrity - these are characteristics of our MPs that have now been stretched beyond repair and although it is not broken, it's shape will never be the same.

How any MP, party leader or party member could disagree that people like Jim Devine should be sacked is beyond me and most reasonable people. That he is not even expelled from the party does not even merit a response as it should not be the case. The fact that these people get to continue in their jobs, on what I regard as a significant salary receiving an equally significant pension, simply cannot be justified...but justify it Parliament does. This is one example which could easily fit into the bracket of almost every other party.

Safety in numbers, fraud en masse. If only one MP was found to have been "on the fiddle", every other MP, every party, would be clamouring to find a way for him to be removed form his post. There is no doubt he/she would not have lasted more than a month. So when the charges are there, for all to see, against half of parliament, it makes no sense to anyone that resignations are not as regular as daylight.

The back-scratching of politics has long upset many people, but even the "mother of all scandals in the mother of all democracies" is not enough to change the system, the culture of being above everyone and everything else. Not just on expenses.

Political parties are falsifying this country. MPs will vote against what they believe in, simply to please the party. How can an MP have any sense of integrity when he/she is elected (as an MP, NOT as a member of a political party) to vote on various issues, and he/she is knowingly voting for policies and initiatives that he/she thinks are detrimental to the nation? They are voting for things that they think are wrong but claim they act in their constituents' best interests. That nobody else in the blogospehere or political world seem to see the irony, juxtaposition or hypocrisy of any of this is startling.
The fact that nobody cares is what upsets me the most.

When your elected representatives are voting in favour of something they think is a bad idea, in complete opposition to what they do believe, there is no way this can be justified.

The people of this country do not hold the power, the parties do.

And to keep their members happy, dodgy rules and laws and promises are made to sweeten the members and MPs.

Next the parties will be, without recompense, strolling down the road to state funding for political parties - state-sponsored moral terrorism ripping a vaccuum through this country's future for many years to come.

Our Parliament and it's members have been exposed for what they are. Political parties have proven to us that they are not about decency, honesty or 'for the people'...they reward internal loyalty more than honourable characteritics.

But when you do what you think is wrong because the bigger boys told you to, then you are part of a system not fit to look in the mirror.

Some wonder why people don't vote. I don't. I know that no matter how I vote, it won't make a difference. I know that the corruption will continue, the self-interest will always maintain a murky presence and decisions will not always be made for the right reasons. I know that when criminals are deciding their own fate, and morally devoid groups are those making the rules there is no point in having hope.

I know that this country is not what it believes itself to be and, even during a time as blatantly scandal-ridden as this, change will never be significant enough to better this country.

PD

A tax on phones?...Good idea

Every landline, according to new plans just announced, will be taxed to the tune of £6 each year to help pay for the expansion of high-speed internet, in particular across rural areas.

In the current political temperature, adding a new tax onto anything is never going to result in anything other than a negative headline and reaction. But this is not a bad policy.

For the equivalent of 50p a month, we can, as a nation, help invest in what for some will be a vital and welcome tool which we all have come to expect as standard. Gordon compared it to being as important as electricity and running water, which is over-egging and already over-egged pudding, but the internet should not be out of reach (literally, or otherwise) for any UK citizen.

Taxes are going to have to rise. Cuts are going to have to be made. While this scheme will not fund the whole project of getting every corner of the UK 'connected', it is not a significant amount to pay. Some may argue that if you choose to live in the countryside, you choose the lifestyle and the limitations that come with it and presently, good internet access is about as scarce as a bus in some of these remote areas. Without wanting to sound like an Oxfam fundraising chugger, "for less than one pound a month, you could give these ruralites the chance to watch porn", it is not too much to ask. It is also, a tax you can opt out of. Nowadays, few of my friends even have a landline - we all use mobiles. If you don't want to pay the tax, you always have the option of opting out. A blind rise in income tax to cover the various extras that will need to be funded would have been a much more contentious (and arguably, unfair) way of addressing such matters. Instead, 'you pay for what you enjoy' forms of temporary taxation make you appreciate why you're paying the extra.

It's like the complaining that goes on about Jonathan Ross's salary. If you asked the millions of people who arrange their Friday schedule to watch his show, if they would mind paying an extra 50p per week on top of the TV licence to fund his wages...you'd more than make your money back on his salary because he is worth that extra money...people will pay because they know quality when they see it.

Would you pay an extra 50p per month to have a landline? The majority of people would say yes.

This is a policy that will invest a lot of money (admittedly, not enough to do the whole job) in bringing more oppportunities to the rural dwellers of our fair land.
Think of the benefit for farmers and local produce makers. They will be offered opportunites never before available to them. Think of the resources that would be a touch away to school kids in rural schools, that was not available before.

This is the point of the policy, and to be honest, this is the point of taxes in general. It's a good policy with the right aims. People will slam it for a number of reasons, mainly kicking a man when he's down, but headline's over 50p per month? Pah!

Cuts, cuts, everywhere...

I know Gordo's had a damn good week, but can we all just stop the lies? Please?

We've just borrowed a hefty amount of money, spending it on some good things, some bad things. But in order to repay our debts, we will, at some stage, have to cut spending. We all know that it has to happen, that there are going to have to be some 'lean times'.

So let's not have Labour saying "Look, the Tories are going to cut", and Tories, let's not have you saying "we wouldn't", because any political party that doesn't see spending 'restraint' as a necessity in the near future doesn't deserve the responsibility. Yes it would be nice if the new Government could come in and announce this new spending plan, and that new record investment, but having pissed all our money away, like my toe nails, things will need cutting soon.

Instead, we are left with more abysmal politics justifying why nobody in the real world gives a shit about what is said and done in the world of politics.

Gordon Brown - THE DESTRUCTOR!

First, he forced Tony Blair out of a job. One.

Now he's caused Neil Kinnock to lose his job. Two.
Owing to his wife's new responsibilities, word has it that Neil Kinnock will step down as Chairman of the British Council, as it would create a conflict of interest for dear Glynis (just had this confirmed that early July is his end date).

Margaret Beckett, who, previously in an 'acting' role of Leader, has also just left her housing brief behind, not to mention that Brown dropped her before...three.

I am a fan of conspiracy theories, but would it be stretching it to suggest he had anything to do with John Smith's death? Four?

Michael Foot must be s****ing himself.