Farage meltdown

Confession time.  No way did I think Nigel Farage would inflict so much damage on himself so quickly after such a high profile improvement in his party’s fortunes.

His badly thought out appearance in Scotland was bad enough.  Requiring a police escort away from protesters was humiliating.  But what has followed – his ill-tempered name calling and undignified petulance in putting the phone down during an radio interview when walked into confirming the somewhat  embarrassing fact UKIP has no elected members north of the border, suggests the shine is coming off the blessed Nigel incredibly quickly.

UKIP insiders are all too well aware of Farage’s ignorant refusal to brook any challenge or opposition to his views.  But Farage’s demonstration of his inability to rise above the abuse he experienced on the street and defuse its sting won’t play well with voters, who are entitled to expect potential leaders to deal with such things in a gracious and magnanimous way.

I honestly pity Farage’s press adviser.  I am certain in my own mind that Farage would have been told how to handle this incident and respond assuredly to the unpleasant and seemingly intimidating experience, but refused to take the advice on board.  He could have told the media that seeing those Scottish protesters enjoying their freedom of speech was a welcome sight because such freedom is essential in a democracy – and that the political class increasingly censors people and the deeper we are integrated in the EU the less democratic this country becomes.  He could have added that while he strongly refutes and disagrees with their arguments and accusations he defends their right to express them and he would respond fully and openly to their claims.

Instead we have seen a senior politician engaging in pathetic namecalling that would be considered immature on a playground.  Far from being the bloke one would he happy to have a pint with, I would now be more concerned he would smash some glasses and kick some tables over if he hears something he doesn’t like.

Farage, as predicted, has just done some damage to UKIP and its credibility.  That party deserves better.

Labour and Lib Dems ask: What do you think this is, a democracy?

It has long been argued that Labour, and to a lesser extent the Lib Dems, have been waging a class war in this country.  The evidence of this is clear.  The political class has declared war on the class most simply defined as ‘everyone else’.

The defiant refusal of Labour and Lib Dems to support a referendum on our continued membership of the European Union, is the most serious and pressing political story of our time.  It has far reaching implications for the democratic process.  Yet the media, for reasons we understand all too well, is ignoring the most obvious questions this issue poses.  Where has a single BBC, Sky or ITV news journalist asked Ed Miliband or Nick Clegg:

‘Why are you refusing to let the British people decide if this country should be part of the EU?’

This position goes beyond arrogance.  It is the continuation of a nothing less than a coup d’etat.  The British people have never been asked for their permission to consign the independence of the United Kingdom to the dustbin.  They have never been asked if they consent to more than 75% of the laws and regulations by which they are bound to be created by alien bodies overseas.  They have never been asked to approve the wholesale export of billions of tax pounds to Brussels to be spent in the way special interests and other nations see fit.  They have never been asked if they want our borders torn down to enable millions of foreign nationals to set up home here and take advantage of benefits and infrastructure to which they have never contributed a penny of funding.

It is this way because the political class does not want to know or hear the answer.  When the wishes of the people are ignored and even suppressed this country cannot be called a democracy.

Even when some tiny vestiges of democracy are permitted by the establishment, such as the requirement put on local authorities to hold a local referendum if they want to increase council tax by more than 2%, the response is a desperate and aggressive campaign by the politicians and bureaucrats to eradicate that need to ask permission to tax people more.  They want our money to fund what is of interest to them, such as first division civil service salaries for senior bureaucrats, index linked pensions far more generous than anything in the private sector, and hugely expensive rafts of sustainability related positions and campaigns to service an repressive and controlling agenda set down by UN bodies and the EU, which have never been put to or approved by the electorate.

This is why we see the Labour, Lib Dem and not a few Tory members of the Local Government Association, a kind of cross-party self interest ‘union’ for councils, demanding the right to extract as much as they like from local taxpayers without the need to get our permission or approval.  They have done this is such a stunningly brazen and transparent manner because the local authorities consider themselves to be above challenge, untouchable by ordinary people.  They believe they should be able to do what they like and feel they can.

Democracy in this country is a myth.  Being allowed – increasingly pressured – to vote every 4-5 years is not democracy.  What marks a democracy is the control the people have over their representatives and public servants between elections.  We have none, because this is not a functioning democracy.  The British people are not permitted to decide how this country is run or by whom.  Every election cycle is characterised by pledges to ‘change’ yet the only changes are the faces of the grubbing parasites that infest our town halls, county council chambers and parliament.  No matter who people vote for the outcome is a continuation of the same agenda handed down from supranational bodies.  The wishes of the people are trampled upon, scoffed at and ultimately ignored by those who like to tell us they know best.

Increasing numbers of people are seeing that voting in elections is meaningless.   They are increasingly rejecting the political process.  Tellingly the political class is becoming nervous about this because they know the lower the percentage gets, the weaker their claims of systemic and personal legitimacy will be.

That is why we see their ideological allies in ‘think tanks’ coming up with ideas such as compelling 18-23 year olds by law to vote in the first general election that takes place after they attain the age of majority, or face a fine.  Other ideas include making voting compulsory for all, or moving voting to the weekend in the hope of increasing turnout.  All these ideas have one objective in mind – preserving the legitimacy of the political class.

Participating in the process gives it legitimacy.  As long as people continue to vote they are validating the political class and enabling it to continue eroding our democracy while continually reducing accountability.  It’s not enough to want to vote the current lot out by voting an identikit lot in.  It plays into the hands of the parasites and maintains the illusion of democracy.

To achieve genuine democracy – and thus take back for ourselves the power to address the vital issues that are before us instead of dancing to the political class’ tune – we need a different approach.  We need to educate and inform people and show them how we can take back power and eject the parasites.  The strategy for doing this is being developed.  More to follow in due course…

Different day, same old handwringing

It has become so common that people on the taxpayer funded gravy train public payroll abuse the system to enrich themselves financially, the stories reaching mainstream media about the grubbing, self serving behaviour no longer shock, and rarely do they elicit sufficient public anger to generate a campaign designed to remove the said parasite from office.

It suggests people have conceded defeat and reluctantly suppress their disgust at the political class and the well-fed bureaucracy, then, believing that little can be done or that it will be too time consuming or focus the unwelcome attention of the state upon them, focus on other things – like that evening’s TV schedule.

Another example of this can be found in the Mail today where it is reported the Tory Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley, Anthony Stansfeld, nominated an ‘office’ location near his home as a detour destination from where he could claim mileage to the force’s Headquarters to which he would not be entitled if he simply drove there from home.  The comments section contains the usual handwringing indignation and disgust, but nothing beyond that.  Although one comment does stand out because its author gets what needs to happen:

Well if we the British people keep throwing our arms up in the air and say “OMG that is terrible, BUT WHAT CAN WE DO” We simply must unite and demand action be taken, we must collectively grievance issues with Councillors and demand that questions be answered not brushed under the carpet. I am not sure if Britain has always been so corrupt and I was blind to it or have things become so bad that I can no longer fail to notice it. I know one thing divided we are conquered but united we are strong. IT IS TIME TO BECOME STRONG.

- Beam MeUp, Cheshire, United Kingdom, 11/5/2013 23:06

Perhaps the thing holding people back is the sense of powerlessness in the face of the huge parasitic establishment that shields the likes of Stansfeld from proper accountability.  Perhaps it is largely to do with not knowing where on earth to target their campaign in order to remove a grubbing parasite like Stansfeld, because the lines of control and power are not clear to people – and that is intentional on the part of the various authorities.

There are some people I like and respect who believe what is needed is an effective template, developed from apparently successful local campaigns – and ‘flashmob’ national campaigns such as the Fuel Protests – that can be dusted off and rolled out nationally for people to deploy.  Sadly there is a major problem with this.  It doesn’t take into account what exactly the final outcomes of such protests were.

All too often, having been apparently successful in achieving their intial demands after raising thousands of pounds for legal representation and exhausted their physical and emotional capital during a draining protest, the powers that be go away and quietly redefine the rules to overcome the objection – resulting in eventual defeat for people power.  Look at any number of previous targeted protests from recent years and you will find many of the things they stood against have subsequently found their way into being, or are in the process of being pushed through using alternative mechanisms.  The Fuel Protests are a good example as they appeared to gain concessions from the government, but most people do not know the campaign was stamped on in ruthless fashion by Blair’s government when the protest’s leaders were told they would be deprived of their livelihoods through confiscation of their vehicles if they did not bring the protest to an end.  Fuel duty continued to rise and despite sabre rattling no follow up protest took shape.

This is why the answer lies not in improving the organisation and coordination of protests, but in changing the rules of the whole game by taking back power from those who are supposed to be our servants.

Why focus attention and waste energy on challenging power time and again when a carefully developed, thought through, concerted grassroots campaign to take power back would remove the capacity of the establishment to impose on the people that which they oppose?  Not for nothing is the web domain www.peoplepower.co.uk devoted to a local authority energy scheme rather than the promotion of democracy.  Even the image above is being used by ‘Conservative Future’ – a group devoted to furthering the aims of the same Conservative Party that is doing all it can to deny the people their say about how this country is governed.   The establishment has no interest in addressing our interests. So we must take back the power we have allowed to be taken from us.

Over the coming months the Harrogate Agenda will continue to take shape as the foundations are put in place to enable people, who agree with the six core demands that have been developed and want to see democracy – people power – hold sway in this country, to learn where power resides, and how change can be brought about by challenging it and rebalancing the relationship between the state and the people in the people’s favour.

Nigel Lawson awakens from his long Euroslumber

Okay. Let’s… I tell you what, let’s forget the fact that you’re coming a little late to the party and embrace the fact that you showed up at all.

That line from the West Wing is my message to Nigel Lawson today. I’ve always had something of a crush on Nigella Lawson, and I’m now starting to become fond of her old man too (not in that way).  First he speak sense on climate change, now he is speaking sense on the UK’s membership of the EU.

Setting aside the fact Lord Lawson’s u-turn on the EU is akin to him declaring that, in spite of the warnings and raft of evidence that was available to him, he is thoroughly disappointed that his expensively acquired tulips bulbs did not blossom into the beautiful roses he was convinced he would get, he makes the powerful point that any changes David Cameron might be able to secure from the EU will be equally as inconsequential as the crumbs from the table hailed by Harold Wilson as the outcome of a successful renegotiation with ‘Europe’ in the 1970s.

After years of delusion and self deception, it has finally dawned on Lord Lawson that the EU is a purpose-built bureaucratic construct, with the sole objective of drawing power to itself and eroding the sovereignty of nation states to the point they cease to exist in anything but name.  That aim has never changed, it’s just that Nigel is now saying he can see it for what it is and rightly concludes the UK should have no part in it.

However, what is disappointing is that there is no mention in his comments to suggest Lord Lawson acknowledges the fundamental problem with the EU is that it is anti-democratic by design.  Its very reason for being is to subvert and replace democracy, because allowing the people to determine for themselves what they want would result in the EU’s collapse, which would not suit the corporatist interests it serves.

So Nigel Lawson has correctly identified the remedy, even if it is still not clear to him what the ailment is.  It’s progress of sorts.

Now we just hope more people will listen to this political heavyweight and see through Cameron’s pathetic charade of a loosely defined ‘re-negotiation’ before he declares success and recommends the UK stays part of the EU, regardless of how little control over our own affairs he repatriates from Brussels.

And the scales begin to fall from their eyes…

There is a problem with the people at the top of our political parties. They just don’t listen. They don’t listen to ordinary people or our concerns. The European Union referendum is a good example. David Cameron says he’ll have a referendum, but no-one believes a word he says. I don’t believe a word he says, and I’m a lifelong Conservative.

So says former Councillor Alexis McEvoy, writing in the Telegraph, after being defeated in the South Waterside ward of Hampshire County Council.

The question is, feeling the way she claims to, why did she continue to work for and prop up the Conservative party machine?  Perhaps in losing the council seat her paramount reason for remaining a Tory and supporting a party that had long ceased to be conservative, has now evaporated.  Too little, too late, Lexi.

It’s a bit rich of people like McEvoy to be bleating now about the Conservative leadership ditching conservative values and principles.  It’s been happening for years, which is why many principled people – and I count myself among that number – resigned from the party and walked away long ago.Perhaps the ConservativeHome narrative, propagated by Tim Montgomerie and others, that Cameron would suddenly uncloak himself to reveal his ‘inner conservative’, is responsible for so many Tories clinging to their delusional belief that Cameron was one of them and just executing a cunning strategy.

It is looking more likely that the complaint that the mainstream parties don’t listen to people’s wishes is becoming redundant. Growing numbers of people are now showing they don’t care about being listened to by this lot any more because they are not interested in being represented by these politicians.  Similarly they are no longer bothering to listen to what the mainstream parties have to say.  They’ve heard it all before.  Evidence the fact Labour’s share of the vote has failed to reach even 2005 levels.

People have seen too many crucial promises broken on a whim.  Now it seems there is a move is underway to remove the self serving charlatans from the stage, piece at a time.

Bankster racket – The Cyprus template that wasn’t a template is now a template

Remember how Cyprus was supposed to be a special case and not a template for similar wealth confiscation elsewhere in the future?  Remember how it transpired the measures taken in Cyprus had already been written into the Banking Act 2009?  Well the Banksters are getting bolder as a piece on ZeroHedge makes clear:

The CEO of Unicredit Federico Ghizzoni said yesterday that it is “acceptable to confiscate savings to save banks.” He said that the savings which are not guaranteed by any protection or insurance could be used in the future to contribute to the rescue of banks who fail and that uninsured deposits could be used in future bank failures provided global policy makers agree on a common approach.

The organised racket is very clear.  Any money we put into bank accounts is a loan to the bank.  Given that governments don’t have the money to bail out banks, which have been run into the ground while using our money to carry out poorly considered lending to borrowers who are defaulting or declaring bankruptcy, they are now treating the money lent to them by depositors as exactly what the rules say it is – theirs.  Caveat creditor.

Note the reference to having a common approach to global policy.  Global governance is the agenda at play.  The wealthy elite makes the rules and is now applying the rules to protect their financial position at the expense of anyone who is willing to risk putting their money in one of their institutions.  If the Banksters don’t get your money, then be assured the global cooperation and harmonisation gradually being developed by governments will see to it that taxation will hoover up your wealth.  No permission sought, no approval given, just the abuse of power by the political class and their establishment cronies.

It has been clear in the way governments are exchanging supposedly confidential account information between each other, under the pretext of tackling tax evasion.  But even where there is no evasion, this exchange provides vital intelligence about the holdings of individuals that can be used to inform governments about who has what, so policy can be created to target them for specific taxes and wealth confiscation – all to satisfy the bribery and spending fetishes that politicians rely on to buy votes of the net consumers at the expense of the net producers.

While politicians like to spout off about democracy and freedom, their actions are designed for a single purpose, to enslave the people who are supposed to be their masters.  Government, both supranational and national, never shrinks.  The parasite continues to expand by feeding on the people they are supposed to serve.

The only thing it doesn’t seem to have planned for is what happens when the incentives to production have been destroyed and the wealth it plunders has run out.  What will the state’s clients do when their free handouts come to an end?  Perhaps by they the planet will be so collectivised we will be scratching the land to produce food and resorting to barter as the medium of exchange.  Progress will have been reversed and the green wet-dream of ‘sustainability’ will be realised.

At what point will the sleepwalking masses wake up and put an end to it?  There is no conspiracy theory here, just conspiracy.

The Conservatives will never return to the ‘common ground’

She often comes in for a lot of stick, but Melanie Phillips often articulates the reality of a situation with supreme clarity. Consider this rhetorical contribution directed at the conservative-in-name-only in Number 10.

“Mr Cameron does not have to enter an alliance with UKIP in order to reconnect to Conservative voters. All he has to do — revolutionary thought! — is adopt Conservative policies himself.

Since the fall of Mrs Thatcher, British Conservatism has lost its way.

Mr Cameron wrote yesterday: ‘It’s not about being Left-wing or Right-wing; it’s about being where the British people are.’

Well, the British people want to get back from the EU the power to govern themselves. They want to live in a country that does not resemble an international transit camp, but where citizenship is based on a truly common culture.

They want to end ruinous and pointless green taxes, and to conserve the countryside against urban sprawl. They want armed forces that can actually defend the country and a drastic curtailment of international aid. And they want solid, unambiguous support for traditional family life.

That’s where the British people really are, Prime Minister. The problem is that you are somewhere else.”

So, sadly, are all but a tiny handful of senior Conservatives. While I wish well the genuine conservatives who in spite of everything remain in the Conservative party, my decision to resign as a Conservative Councillor and leave the party, because of the direction Cameron and his cronies were taking, has increasingly shown itself to have been completely justified.

What Phillips is saying is in her own way is what this blog has long said – the political class’ interests are wildly different from the interests of ordinary people.

The likelihood of the Conservatives rediscovering the common ground is so remote as to be negligible. The party leadership has been infested by people like Cameron, devoid of principle or belief, who want to govern for its own sake; and who think they alone should have the monopoly on decision making and therefore refuse the electorate’s wishes on a wide range of issues.

The concept of representative democracy is just that, a concept.  Something the Philosophy, Politics and Economics graduates learn under the likes of Vernon Bogdanor, before heading off into the world to maintain elected dictatorship.  Compare and contrast with the way things are done in what increasingly appears to be the last true democracy in the western world…  Until the status quo in the UK changes the politicians will never come close to sharing the common ground with the people.  Power to the people, Citizen Cam?  Not bloody likely.

They just don’t get it

The anti-democrats

The reaction within the establishment to David Cameron’s speech pledging an in-out referendum on the EU, if he manages to remain Prime Minister after the next general election, shows how detached and contemptuous its members are.

First up we had Ed Miliband, puffing his chest out like a gooney bird in the House of Commons, declaring ‘his’ party would not allow the people to choose the way this country is governed.

It seems the socialist dogma of common ownership is limited to taking money from those who have it, to lavish in return for votes on those who want it, but don’t go out and earn it.  For Comrade Ed and his fellow travellers when it comes to common ownership of this country, only the self selecting elitists who have served their time in party youth organisations, think tanks and policy units, get to decide.

Then we had Nick Clegg chipping in with the same utterly discredited arguments he used in favour of the lunacy of the UK ditching sterling and adopting the Euro, namely that this issue will cause uncertainty for business and the economy and jobs and investment will be at risk.

Then with every man and his dog across the continent chipping in their tuppence worth, the august pages of the Barclay Brother Beano provided a platform for Fraser Nelson to opine that while David Cameron puts his faith in the people, Ed Miliband clings rigidly to belief in the state.  Fraser Nelson’s take on this issue reveals his paternalist Tory streak:

All of a sudden, “this Cameron” finds himself armed with a very powerful question to ask his opponents at election time: “We trust the people. Why don’t you?”

Trust the people? Trust them to do what? Why, to do what Cameron wants them to do of course!  It speaks volumes of the establishment that this issue is presented in terms of ‘trust’.

Democratically-minded people would not be talking about trusting the people any more than they would be declaring they would not be holding a referendum.  True democrats would be talking about letting the people decide and seeking the people’s consent. They would be talking about representing the wishes of the people.  But that doesn’t occur to the likes of Cameron, Clegg, Miliband or hacks like Nelson. These are people who belive they have a divine right to impose their wishes and dictate what will be to everyone else, and those who are their cheerleaders.  When it comes to democracy they just don’t get it.

That is why we need to be sceptical and suspicious of the motives of all members of this insular, self serving crowd.  They are not trying to serve interests, only their own.

David Cameron’s Impotent Number 10

Over at the paywalled Sunday Times there is a story that anyone who has worked within representative politics will recognise, as subscribers are told that David Cameron often learns of his policies from reading the papers and listening to the radio:

‘David Cameron’s former policy chief has revealed his “horror” at the powerlessness of Downing Street to control government decisions, admitting the prime minister often finds out about policies from the radio or newspapers — and in many cases opposes them.

‘Steve Hilton, who remains one of Cameron’s close confidants, said: “Very often you’ll wake up in the morning and hear on the radio or the news or see something in the newspapers about something the government is doing. And you think, well, hang on a second — it’s not just that we didn’t know it was happening, but we don’t even agree with it!  The government can be doing things … and we don’t agree with it? How can that be?”

‘He described how No 10 is frequently left out of the loop as important policy changes are pushed through by ‘paper-shuffling’ mandarins.”‘

This is what happens when civil servants in government departments and the various tiers of local authorities take their orders and direction not from elected politicians in Westminster or City and Town Halls, but from the various organs of our supreme government in Brussels, the EU.

This is the state of ‘democracy’ in 21st Century Britain.  The likes of Cameron cannot have complaint about this state of affairs, it is what they support and want to maintain.  So any bleating from them should be treated with the contempt it deserves.  But the British people do have cause for complaint.

What is being done by the civil service, following the instructions of a foreign entity that is answerable to one one, has not been elected and cannot be removed by this country’s voters, operating outside of democratic accountability can justly be described as a coup d’etat – albeit one the idiot politicians have facilitated by signing over huge swathes of power without understanding what that entails and without asking the permission of the people they are supposed to serve.  The Irish get it.

This is why the UK needs to become independent again by leaving the EU.

Useful idiots Big business mandarins like Richard Branson couldn’t care less about democratic legitimacy and accountability matters such as these, and certainly don’t want ordinary people to understand the consequences of EU membership for this country.  They prefer to retail scare stories about a departure from the EU threatening our economy and jobs, while deliberately ignoring the fact being part of the single market does not require this country to outsource political control by being a member of the EU.

It is not xenophobic or acting like a Little Englander to want the UK to leave the EU, rather it is an expression of the desire for democracy – people power – that the political class cannot stand and is trying to erode.  We are Better Off Out of the EU.

Desperate Deutsche delusion

Reading the German publication Spiegel is often instructive.  Today’s offering is no less illuminating for what it reveals about the perception on the continent of the EU debate here in the UK.

Spiegel makes us aware of the latest foreign political figure to deign to the UK what is best for us, German Foreign Minister, Guido Westerwelle.  Never short of a comment for the media, Westerwelle sticks to the internationally rehearsed script:

With a view to the current debate over Great Britain’s role in the EU, I would say: Germany desires a Great Britain that will remain a constructive and active partner in the EU.

As has been the case so far, the European house will also have different levels of integration, but we would like a deeper and better EU of 27, with Great Britain.

But what really stands out about the Spiegel piece is what the paper doesn’t refer to.  While it says of David Cameron that the euroskeptic (sic) wing of his Conservative Party would prefer to bolt the European Union (clearly they haven’t looked at their voting record or repeated statements about staying in the EU) at no point does Spiegel inform readers that a majority of British voters polled on the subject of an in-out referendum say they would vote for the UK to leave.  Spiegel deliberately lays the uncertainty about the UK’s future down to a section of one political party, with the subtext that if they can be seen off all will be well and the project can continue.

To view the debate through the prism of party politics in the way Spiegel is doing is a deliberate effort to portray the issue as the grumbling of a few politicians being strongly countered by a small number of vocal business leaders.  It is contemptuous in the extreme of the wishes of British voters, treating them and their views as a complete irrelevance.

Spiegel is deluding itself and the German people if it thinks marginalising the views of the British people in this way will cancel them out.  As this arrogance continues so will British attitudes harden.  After all these years our continental cousins still do not understand the culture of the British people.

But the Spiegel piece is useful as a classic example of the EU modus operandii.  The EU is a creature of and for the political elite.  The people and their wishes do not matter.  The establishment thinks it knows best and it acts in its own interest.  The media on both sides of the channel knows its interest lays in cosying up to the establishment for precious ‘access’ and a share of ‘exclusives’ as a reward for the sycophancy.

What all this tells us is that grassroots pressure outside of party politics, and setting aside the untrustworthy / incompetent / unreliable parties and their empty pledges, is the way to force this issue.  The one weakness political parties have is the need to attract support.  Without support their mandate evaporates and their legitimacy is called into question.  It’s the only real leverage the electorate has.  If the parties lack support they are forced to change to try to attract it.  This is why the EU strives to reduce accountability to voters and have all parties offering the same outlook.  Cutting the parties out of the loop will ultimately neuter the EU approach.

Open letter to Philip Gordon, US Assistant Secretary for European Affairs

Dear Mr Gordon,

I read with interest the following comment you made on behalf of the Government of the United States of America, in your capacity as US Assistant Secretary for European Affairs, regarding the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union:

We have a growing relationship with the EU as an institution, which has an increasing voice in the world, and we want to see a strong British voice in that EU. That is in America’s interests. We welcome an outward-looking EU with Britain in it.

This comes as no surprise as it reflects the thinking of other senior members of the Obama administration, who have previously opined that the United Kingdom should remain a member of the EU.

The President of the United States is considered by many to be the leader of the free world, and the United States itself considered to be a beacon of democracy.  So it is profoundly disappointing to see the United States administration endorsing and encouraging something that is fundamentally undemocratic.  I would like to ask you the following questions.

• Would it be acceptable to you and your fellow United States citizens that over 70% of the laws and regulations they were forced to comply with across all 50 states were created by a supranational government comprising layers of complex political and judicial structures, mostly unelected and unaccountable, and made up of delegates from not only the US, but Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Belize, El Salvador, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela and Peru?

• Would it be acceptable to you, your fellow United States citizens and members of the Senate and House of Representatives that they were routinely handed diktats from the various bodies that make up the supranational government and were bound by law to implement the directives or be fined or dragged into a supranational court operating an alien form of judicial code and process?  Further, that Congress was denied the ability to draft, and the President sign into law, other legislation of national interest whenever the supranational decided it was not appropriate?

• Would it be acceptable to you, your fellow United States citizens and the Justices of the Supreme Court that decisions made by the bench, the highest court in your land, could be appealed to a supranational court overseas with the hearing presided over by foreign judges and if overruled the Supreme Court would have to accept that as a binding ruling?

If these scenarios do not sound very democratic or judicious to you and your fellow Americans it is because they are not.  Intentionally and by design.  But this is the reality of the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union and its associated bodies and institutions.  UK membership of the EU has entailed a substantial loss of power from our democratically elected Parliament as it has been quietly and steadily transferred to unelected and unaccountable bodies abroad – all done without the people of the UK being asked to give their consent for it to happen.

While it may be in the geopolitical interest of the Government of the United States for the United Kingdom to remain a member of the European Union, opinion polls show this anti-democratic situation is opposed by a majority of British citizens.  Membership of the EU dilutes the voice of the United Kingdom.  Seats on various world bodies held by the UK have been given up so the EU can supposedly represent the competing and disparate interests of 27 countries in a wholly unsatisfactory fudge that frequently fails to serve British interests.

I am sure you will recognise the obvious contradiction in the position of the United States, on one hand calling for Syria’s regime to heed the wishes of the Syrian people, while on the other calling for the government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to maintain membership of the EU, despite the wishes of the British people.  I am sure you will also recognise the obvious contradiction of the United States urging countries around the world to embrace democracy, while urging the United Kingdom to maintain its place in political and judicial structures that replace representative democracy with control by unelected and unaccountable aliens who are drawn from a pool of self-selecting career politicians and civil servants.

Would such a situation be an acceptable settlement in the United States?  I think we both know the answer to that is categorically ‘no’.

No one who believes in democracy – people power – would endorse and encourage a continuation of this anti-democratic situation for the United Kingdom.  That is what this issue is about.  So, Mr Gordon, please do not presume to meddle in our affairs and wish on us that which you would aggressively oppose for yourself.

Yours sincerely,

Autonomous Mind

A ‘New Politics’ is emerging that rejects the political class

One key element of the Harrogate Agenda is that the movement does not have a defined ‘leader’ and rejects the idea of morphing itself into a political party.

Part of the thinking is that the focus remains on the aims of the movement, allowing every supporter of those aims to have the autonomy to organise meetings and events and support the campaign in a way that suits them.

In this way internal intrigues are thus diminished and autocrats are prevented from seizing the direction of the movement and diverting the energies of supporters to activities that suit a different agenda. It is a reflection of the dwindling trust in political parties among ordinary people.

This shift has accelerated as politics has become ‘professionalised’ to the extent where future party figures are groomed from a young age in party youth sections, read politics and economics at college and then work in think-tanks and policy institutes before being streamed into party candidate selection. Real world experience and a productive employment history is noticeable by its absence among this political class.

With this in mind we notice that another non-aligned, organic, grassroots movement has similarly rejected the idea of electing a leader or forming a political party, while still recognising the need for a government.

Regardless of the cause this movement is pursuing, this is yet another striking example of the rapidly changing approach to politics and campaigning that deliberately marginalises the political parties and strives to keeps them and their influence at arms length.

We are seeing the advent of a new politics, one that operates in a way that encourages people power instead of seeing that stripped away by the political class which hijacks and plunders each passing bandwagon.

People are increasingly joining such campaigns because they have a great deal more confidence that grassroots movements won’t be saddled with the party political baggage and the selfish motivations of power seekers who use politics as a route to personal enrichment and seek reward from the self selecting establishment they inevitably service.

Times are a changing.

Cameron listens again. Democracy alive and well. Pigs fly past upstairs window.

Cameron: UK has a ‘moral obligation’ to help world’s poor – David Cameron has defended Britain’s £11bn foreign aid bill saying the UK Government has a “moral obligation” to help to the world’s poorest people.
- Telegraph

Ignored UK People: Cameron, as this country’s Prime Minister, and the rest of the moronic political class have a ‘moral obligation’ to help the UK’s poor – David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband have no defence for their shared action and cravenly skirt around the fact the government is sending £11bn of our money overseas without our permission while vulnerable people on these shores go without heat, food and shelter despite having contributed something to this country.
- Random snippets from hardpressed Britain

This is an example of what ‘Bullshit’ Brucie Anderson would describe as people only having a vague idea as to who Cameron is or what he stands for.  On Planet Brucie, politics, apparently abhorring a vacuum, often fills it with a four-letter word – Eton.

So there we have it.  Proof from Mr Anderson – for his noble word is all we need – the reason so many of us cannot stand Cameron is because of his privileged upbringing and education.  Clearly is it nothing to do with the nakedly obvious fact he is an obnoxious, arrogant and ignorant moron who treats the people of this country with undisguised contempt; just so he can satisfy his gargantuan ego by posturing on the world stage as a man of virtue as he doles out our scarce cash to people whose kleptocratic governments prefer to spend their money on space programmes and arms procurement rather than health, education as assistance for their vulnerable.

In Britain the views and wishes of the people do not matter. The political class does what it wants. Like dogs returning to their vomit, millions of Britons keep going back to the polling stations to vote for more of the same in a variety of colours and flavours. And the establishment have the gall to call this ‘democracy’.

It’s not our money now, it’s the government’s

On yesterday’s Andrew Marr show, Danny Alexander, who has been fuelling an ill-informed and wholly unjustified campaign against Starbucks, Amazon and Google, said:

At a time of austerity, everyone has an obligation to to play by the tax rules.

Absolutely! And playing by the tax rules is exactly what those three multinational companies have been doing.  Otherwise they would already be in court facing charges of tax evasion with HMRC being the key witness for the prosecution.

But of course, the spiteful Alexander already knows this.  That’s why he is using weasel words to incite anger among the have nots who don’t know the difference, furthering the ongoing blackmail to extort money from the companies the UK exchequer is not legally entitled to.  He knows these companies are following the rules, he just doesn’t like the fact the rules mean the government can’t get its hands on the companies’ cash because they prefer to be based in countries that charge lower rates than the UK.

As a number of governments look into how they can get hold of even more of the money individuals and companies have, Alexander and his ilk are exploring how they can enforce the same tax rate which they can then increase as they see fit knowing there will be no option for the people and businesses other than to pay up.  This is a form of armed robbery, the proceeds of which are to be used to bail out the governments for their disgraceful waste and refusal to live within their means.

The proposed actions are not only anti-c0mpetitive, they effectively mark the creation of economic imprisonment.  Our supposed servants are devising measures to take full ownership of our property and our money.  Where is the grassroots protest movement campaigning to fight this outrageous affront to personal freedom?  We already have no control over how government uses the money taken in tax, and slowly government is trying to stop us from deciding how we use our money by taking more and more of it from us.

When in the name of all things holy will people wake up and see what is happening?  The political class is out of control. The rules of the game have changed.  People need to take the power back.

Cameron demonstrates his contempt for people power yet again

According to the Barclay Brother Beano, Cast Iron Dave is set to announce that residents’ rights to mount legal challenges to controversial development projects will be severely restricted.

Having been briefed on what is coming, the Torygraph’s James Kirkup goes on to explain:

‘Mr Cameron will argue that the rules are being abused to frustrate economically vital developments and will say a “massive growth industry” of seeking judicial reviews of planning decisions has been fuelled by solicitors and campaign groups.

‘Many applicants are guilty of “time-wasting” and bringing “hopeless cases” simply to waste developers’ time, the Prime Minister will say. He will outline a number of changes the Government wants to make, including shortening the three-month time limit on applying for a review.

‘Charges for an application will rise “so people think twice about time-wasting.” The number of possible appeals against decisions will also be cut from four to two.’

The Boiling Frog hasn’t wasted any time showing up Cameron’s forthcoming comments for what they are… yet another flip flop from a Prime Minister without a single principled bone in his body.  There is another more serious issue here concerning the widening gulf between the pledges politicians make to the people in order to try to win an election, and the reality once they have taken office.  Consider these quotes and compare them with what Kirkup says Cameron plans to say:

We have a coherent programme to fix our broken politics and drag our democracy into the post-bureaucratic age. It involves a massive, sweeping, radical redistribution of power – from the political elite to the man and woman in the street.

[...] Conservatives start with an instinctive desire to give people more power and control over their lives.
- David Cameron, ‘Giving power back to the people’ speech on 25 June 2009

and

You can see the nature of the change we want in the phrase itself…

…literally going from a bureaucratic world, where the old methods like regulation, laws and diktats allow elites in Westminster to control other people’s lives…

…to a post-bureaucratic world, where instead of government telling people what to do or forcing them to do it…

…people themselves have far more power and control over their lives…

…and where we achieve change by trying to influence people by going with the grain of human nature.

So it’s about giving power to people.

And it’s about showing an understanding of people, in how we make policy and design government and public services.
- David Cameron, ‘From central power to people power’ speech on 22 February 2010

Cameron can do this and is doing this because of the complete absence of accountability to the electorate. None of the talk of people power ever results in the political class handing back any of the power they have snatched.

The more that power is centralised the less democratic the country becomes. While Cameron talks a good game on people power, the core of his being is authoritarian and paternalist, always striving to marginalise the views of the very people he and his ilk are supposed to listen to and represent.  This has to stop.  Real change is required and the developing grassroots Harrogate Agenda campaign is working to achieve it.

Harrogate Agenda live blog

Connectivity permitting, on this post we will be blogging live from the second Harrogate Agenda meeting taking place today in Leamington Spa. Updates also via Twitter. If you want to tweet about today’s meeting please use the hashtag #HarrogateAgenda

Live blog

1725 Reflecting on the meeting today the group has achieved a great deal in a short space of time. But no one is under any illusions, the positive vision of achieving a truly democratic country will be years in the making. A lot of work will need to be done to help people understand the concept and envisage a future where ordinary folk decide this country’s direction rather than the politicians. This is a worthwhile movement that has no interest in appealing to cheap ‘celebrity’ endorsement or dictating what others must do. This is about changing the UK for the better and bringing about a settlement that results in genuine localised people power and the neutering of the establishment. We will continue carrying the message and hoping more people will join in the journey to transform the UK for the better.

1558 The meeting concludes after a check for any other business.  We have ratified the 6 Demands, discussed the campaign’s organisation structure, explored the Harrogate Agenda’s strategic approach and looked at the mechanism for withdrawal from the EU in a way that secures the interests of Britain’s business and ability to export our goods to our neighbours in a way that is legal in the EU and protected by WTO agreements.

1507 The fine details of how UKIP’s EU withdrawal plan would prevent our ability to export to the remaining EU member states are discussed, demonstrating how EU law would stop imports from the UK. The answer is to keep all EU law in place upon withdrawal and slowly establish trade agreements to preserve a single market via the EEA, before treaties enable laws to be repealed.

1423 Leaving the EU is not the aim of the Harrogate Agenda. However delivery of the Harrogate Agenda would make membership of the EU incompatible with democratic people power in a localised form.

1415 An excellent lunch is now over and Richard states to somewhat surprised attendees: “I do not want to leave the EU…… if all it means is handing power from one bunch of unaccountable morons in Brussels to another groups of unaccountable morons in Westminster.” It makes no sense to focus all energies on exiting the EU unless there is something that serves the interest of the people to move to. Without real democracy and a positive vision of the future first it would be out of the frying pan and into the fire.

1259 Andy rounds off with the most defining strategic part of our campaign, using the words of John Lennon:

When it gets down to having to use violence then you are playing the system’s game. The establishment will irritate you – pull your beard, flick your face – to make you fight. Because once they’ve got you violent then they know how to handle you. The only thing they don’t know how to handle is non-violence and humour.

1245 Andy is now giving the group an insight into strategy concerning social movements. Again this all lends itself to a campaign to advance ideas that will bring about people power and true democratic control, correcting the inverted relationship between master and servant. People will hold the power, but it won’t happen with a directive approach or top down cascade of what the people should do with their power.

1223 Success with our efforts will be when our ideas are absorbed into the public consciousness and accepted generally as the way this country should work. That will put pressure on the politicians as the people demand power and actively work to take it back. It may take many years but it will be done away from the establishment, without celebrity endorsement faux glamour. Ideas and the reasonableness of our vision are king.

1215 A fascinating insight from Richard about how the success of the Harrogate Agenda in the future can be measured by the extent to which the people in the room have been forgotten. This is not an electoral campaign, it is a campaign of ideas for people to recognise, identify with and push forward. Lessons from the way other campaigns have flounderehare well learned and being applied to this effort to democracy real democracy.

1150 A quick coffee break and now refreshed the attendees are back in the room and the agenda item for discussion is the group’s organisation and structure.

1121 The pamphlet being prepared about what we are looking to achieve is the foundation of our push for democracy. It isn’t a stand alone document. Social media, public meetings, specific campaigns,  our thinking and actions via those and other mediums will be founded in our demands and the principles we embody. The document will be a reference point. Our efforts will be far more interactive and high profile.

1102 Discussion explores concerns about what achieving the 6 Demands means for the constitutional settlement in the UK. Answer in the room from Tony is that the 6 Demands only take back power and give it to the people. The Harrogate Agenda is not dictatorial. The people will decide what to do with the power taken back from the establishment.

1045 The demand for a directly elected Prime Minister is provoking excellent debate in the room. Would having a directly elected PM unleash a bigger beast than we have now? This concern is addressed by a focus on more local ‘bottom up power’ meaning the PM would have a different set of responsibilities than now.

1000 The delegates have arrived and coffee is flowing. The mood in the room is upbeat and there is an air of anticipation and a real sense that we can achieve something significant.

Harrogate Agenda – round 2 in Leamington Spa.

When addressing matters of supreme importance and concern timing is everything.  So it is that with the crisis in politics in this country being given centre stage, and in the wake of the spectacle of nearly 9 in 10 voters rejecting the scraps from the establishment’s table that invited them to choose Police and Crime Commissioners from a roster of party hacks and sharp elbowed former coppers, the next stage in the construction of the Harrogate Agenda takes place in Leamington Spa at the Woodland Grange, from where I hope to provide a live blog here and updates on Twitter here.  The timing could not be better in focussing minds on the job in hand.

As Richard explains on his blog, what we are trying to do is re-make the link between power and responsibility.  Those who have to suffer the consequences of them, should be those who make the final decisions.  ‘They’ are always the people.  That is real democracy, not the sham of being handed a vote that grants us Hobson’s choice by providing candidates who all think the same way and who, once elected, do as they please and are unaccountable until we are given the choice to replace them with a political clone who will continue with the establishment’s agenda.

After a successful planning meeting in Harrogate (that I was unable to attend through illness), the next in the series of development meetings on the Harrogate Agenda takes place today in Leamington.  At this meeting the attendees will finalise the six demands that form a positive alternative vision for real change and true democracy.  Thereafter the formal structures will be put in place along with the plans to promote and progress them, leading up to a mass public meeting next year.

The usual suspects, a grab for power over the media, and a fetish for our tax pounds

In themselves the articles barely scratch the surface of what is going on behind the scenes, in the shadows where movers and shakers who are virtually unknown to the general public are exerting staggering influence and control over the direction of this country, its politics and its civil service and state broadcaster.

Three articles in the Daily Mail today do however shine a dull light on the ‘usual suspects’ who are known to a small band of folk who try to explain these powerseeker ‘wheels within wheels’ on their blogs and who are often derided as conspiracy theorists for their trouble. It is worth taking a few minutes to read the articles just to get a top surface idea of who’s who in this de facto coup of Britain’s public life. Article 1 | Article 2 | Article 3.

The names that have been published, interwoven and incestuous as they are between a cabal of well funded trusts, think tanks, ‘educational’ and campaigning bodies, do now enable a large number of people who usually ignore these things to get a small taste of what is going on in the background.

• Common Purpose
• Ofcom
• Media Standards Trust
• Hacked Off
• Demos
• Social Market Foundation
• The Leveson Inquiry
• Bureau of Investigative Journalism
• Esmee Fairbairn Foundation
• Pearson Foundation

And there’s more besides.  All of them entwined and staffed by ex-Labour, BBC and Guardian political animals bent on subverting what remains of our democratic structures and shackling Britain in socialist handcuffs, spreading their creed throughout the media, civil service, the police and business.

While the Mail pieces focus on charitable monies, these organisations also benefit from public cash, both directly, and indirectly through fees, to fund their activities.  And all without so much as a ‘by your leave’ sought from the taxpayer.

Small wonder the focus of the campaigns of these groups has been to crush the Murdoch media empire, attack the Conservative party and its prominent supporters and look to reshape the public landscape in the image of their political ideology – all without a single reference back to the supposedly democratic process or a mandate from a single voter in a ballot box.

Fellow bloggers, please read the articles, get curious, dig deeper, identify more parts of the spider’s web and crowdsource them into public view.  It’s the difference blogging can make.

Wind power – missing when needed, harmful where produced

It’s another chilly day across the UK with temperatures not getting above 8C/46F.  Being a weekend the demand for power from business is reduced, however the demand for power from residential customers who are at home rather than work, is higher.

So what is wind power contributing to our energy mix right now?

3.3% of our energy generation is currently being satisfied by the thousands of wind turbines installed at huge cost and made feasible by billions of pounds of direct taxpayer subsidy and feed in tariffs that increase our energy bills.

The inescapable fact is when the wind doesn’t blow, the turbines produce no energy.  We could have 500,000 turbines across the country, scarring our landscape and decimating our disposable income, and our energy needs will not be satisifed unless the wind blows.  That’s why we pay even more money for conventional power stations to ‘back up’ wind power, which only the utterly deluded could ever consider to be capable of providing our baseload energy generation.

Added to this we now have a report in the Barclay Brother Beano by Andrew Gilligan of the first full peer-reviewed scientific study of the problem of wind farm noise causing “clear and significant” damage to people’s sleep and mental health.

The more that people look in detail at the flaws of wind power, the more ridiculous government (both EU and national) policy looks.  We are at the point when people must robustly question just why the political class is pursuing this direction, in spite of the rapidly growing body of evidence showing how wasteful, ineffective and damaging wind turbines are.  Elsewhere in the Beano, their diamond in the rough – Christopher Booker – believes the consensus on wind power is cracking.  But much as I respect Booker that is not an assessment I share.

There has to be a reason why the wind agenda has advanced this far; and as the public interest is clearly not being served (spiralling cost and negative health impacts) one can only conclude the interest of the political class is being put first.  Regardless of the comments of John Hayes, they are not going to give that up while they retain the ability to spend our money as they see fit. As Gilligan says in his article about the effects of wind farm noise, the EU will shortly begin work on a new directive which may impose a binding target for further renewable energy, mostly wind, on the UK, to be met by 2030.  It is inconceivable this would see a reduction in wind turbine proliferation or the staggering amounts of our money doled out by governments to opportunist subsidy farmers.

Those who should be servants are again treating those who are supposed to be masters with contempt, while picking their pockets.  In a democracy this could be stamped upon by people power.  But as more people are at last realising we don’t live in a democracy.

Another £16m of our tax pounds abused

Much of what is said and done in Parliament by the political class doesn’t get reported because the media doesn’t find it sexy or controversial enough to form a sensational story.

But there are always snippets of information that, if they were given more exposure, have the potential to make people realise the British government doesn’t work in the interest of the British people.  This question and written answer published this week is one such example:

Chi Onwurah:To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps she is taking to help improve local government in sub-Saharan Africa.

Lynne Featherstone: In 2010-11 DFID worked on decentralisation and subnational government in 12 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, spending a total of £16,279,000 through its bilateral programme. This support includes strengthening departments of regional and local government, regional and local authorities and their national associations. DFID has also supported peer to peer learning mechanisms, through the Commonwealth Local Government Forum which has achieved good results in several African countries.

The obvious point to raise here is, how come so much taxpayers’ money is being spent on ‘improving’ local government in sub-Saharan Africa when the UK needs to get its own house in order for local government to be effective, efficient and a servant of the people rather than their master?

Is it not ironic the British government wants to tell other countries how their local government should be and throw our money at realising that vision, while our local government is a functionary branch of central government?  Here local government is only good for soaking up more of our money in fees and charges to service its own existence while delivering ‘services’ for which we pay ever more and get ever less.  Here local government is administered by a core of unaccountable and overpaid bureaucrats whose target is to restrict our rights and freedoms while carrying out the wishes of the EU overlord, regardless of what elected Members decree.

Perhaps that is the vision our well-heeled mandarins have for the people of sub-Saharan Africa.  Perhaps our money is being spent in this way to ensure the structures there are just right for future supranational control by an unaccountable authority that takes its steer from the equally unaccountable UN and the various bodies operating beyond democratic control, who impose their will on the rest of us regardless of what we want – made possible through our taxes.  He who controls the money and how it’s spent…

Referism anyone?