To the next leader of the Labour party, a young man of integrity, "Ginger" Rooney.
In my home country, UK it was made abundantly clear at the
Downing Street (White House) gates recently that even the UK police can
sometimes make the mistake of thinking that they are above the law. As a family
friend said recently, “Nobody polices the police.” Due to our traditional
emphasis on free speech, tolerance and accountability we have always had a relatively incorrupt police service. Our
laughing stock is our celebrity culture.
Starting with Jimmy Savile the ongoing police paedophile ring
investigation is horrifying and beggars belief. It must be said however that it
is no wonder that these people apparently behaved in the manner in which they
did. The pattern by which we exhalt and then pulverise celebrity is perverse in
itself. The police are not the only ones that believe they are above the law.
Andrew Mitchel was Conservative chief whip, but the hopefuls
for the Downing Street job are becoming younger and younger. In this amoral age we must ask ourselves the perennial
question that we once asked of our leaders – “If these people are willing to act in this way towards their nearest
and dearest then how would they behave towards us, whom they do not know?” British
generic socialism should have fallen on the beach with Kinnock, but seems to
have resurfaced with the fratricidal Ed Milliband. A Post social democratic, genuine
and clearly articulated Third Way may have had a chance under Ed’s promising,
brilliant and understated brother David Milliband but after the leadership was
taken from under the latter’s nose in a typally leftist, definitevely Machiavelian
and Stalinesque manner by his underhand brother a young promising, self-effacing foreign
secretary used to addressing the United
Nations was last seen on the board of a third rate UK soccer team. The left has
always been fractuois and complicated which is generally a sign that something
is far from God.
The word Diabolo means
fractured.
The winning of the upper middle class has always been
pivotal to gaining the political leadership of working social democracies.
Aristotle noted that they weigh up and take the good from both the left and the
right, deciding if either or is going to stay on or let another philosophy have
a chance. The US copied the UK’s bi cameral system. Despite Reagan’s claims to Keep the world safe for Democracy North
American voting apathy is a result of too
much democracy - the senate is
completely elected. In the UK we must look to this as we tinker with the Lords,
and remember that thus far our bi cameral system has given us left of centre
triumphs like the NHS and Margaret Thatcher’s reforms from the right. What is dangerous now however is that like the
rest of the polity the middle class are generally narrow, historically ignorant
and often apathetic. Tony Blair’s genius was similar to that of the great Christian
writer C.S. Lewis – making complicated
things sound simple. Armed with such weapons the swinging middle class can then
be wooed.
Blair’s philosophy
was never definitively articulated. All he offered was what we needed to feel
good about ourselves at the time. In William Hague’s word’s He just sat on things. The Third Way is
now dead, extinct under UK Labour and a damp squib under Obama.
Micro finance is emphasised and much is made of the hope
that the Third World does not make our socio economic mistakes, but much closer
to home in the Former Soviet Bloc the far right is being looked to answer the
embarrassingly obvious questions that are being asked of the Occidental Social Democratic
model.
Since the “Evil Empire” collapsed our wars have become
hotter. We have fought governments and insurgents that we trained and funded
ourselves. In so doing have stretched our respective militaries to breaking
point. Blair’s transposition of traditionally right wing oratorical persuasion
was imperative to America or she risked becoming an international pariah
herself.
Current opinion polls might say otherwise but unless left
with no other option the Upper Middle class will never elect Ed Miliband. In
fact with the Labour party becoming at least unilaterally unelectable once
again the UK is probably condemned to a generation of unstable government,
absolutely defeating the purpose of our hitherto robust, sensible and
productive First Past the Post System.
The incumbent Prime Minister knows this and is completely
justified in taking his chance and calling a vote on Europe. This is called
leadership and should be applauded and not maligned.
Surprisingly for a man who was impressed by the ferocious
audaicity of the late John Smith I would rather vote for David Cameron than Ed
Milliband. Personal integrity in a politician is integral. With his EU exit
referendum proposal Cameron has at least done something with his tenure and is
offering us a plebiscite on EU membership. Britain will always be a masculine
country of legalists and does not seem to fit into the generally Latin and
therefore feminine spirit of the EU. As Scotland looks to her future in 2014 by
2020 as a country we should all at least have laid some perennial, niggling existential
banshees to rest.
As a born and bred Scotsman it was a pleasure to recently
experience the latest instalment of the Albert R. Broccoli franchise Skyfall. The film climaxes when Bond
returns to his Highland roots. We learn that the arch British hero is in fact
the product of a Franco-Scots marriage.
An acknowledgment of the current socio-political discourse?
Probably.
