“Now you say you’re lonely You cried the long night through Well, you can cry me a river, cry me a river I cried a river over you
Now you say you’re sorry For being so untrue Well, you can cry me a river, cry me a river I cried, cried, cried a river over you”
Exhibit 1: George Eustice is unhappy with the constrains on political advertising.
Exhibit 2: Anna Soubry is a tad unhappy that: “I barely see my children, my partner gets pickled off because he doesn’t see me. I work seven days a week, 12 hours a day and I am not exaggerating. I do not have a day off,”
Nigel Farage repeats the same old complaints and jokes.
So George Eustice believes it is right that decisions about where to allow political advertising in Britain should be a matter for our own national Parliament. Why such a minor matter should bother Eustice when he is part of the body that has ceded just about every other aspect of Parliamentary duty, bothers me somewhat. In any event is it not our choice what parliamentary advertising is to be permitted, how often and how long each pack of lies should last? This entire charade of parliamedntary democracy costs us over £10million a year – and if that does not give us the right, then what does?
Anna Soubry can wail all she likes – she chose to enter politics, she accepted the promotion to ministerial rank, did she not consider the downside where her family life is concerned? Perhaps if she was not part of a political system that believes nothing can function without the finger of central government in the mix, just perhaps her workload would not be so great?
Michael White found Farage’s speech at the press gallery lunch a fascinating experience – well, attend another event where Farage is the speaker and he will hear the same grievances and jokes. The comment at the beginning of White’s piece about Farage having missed a trick is one that I and others have been making for some time – namely a lack of “gravitas”, a lack of detail about policy funding in a manifesto, which like any other, is worded in extremely loose fashion. As I wrote on 23rd March this year;
“so a question to my Ukip readers: Why has the page: “Constitution Ukip policy 2009 – How we are governed”” disappeared” (“404″ results)? Even clicking on “Manifesto” does not produce any policy about our constitution. From memory this document promised referenda on “selected” or “certain” matters (apols, can’t recall the exact wording); but selected or certain were not specified. Why will Ukip, which professes to be a Libertarian party, not adopt the principles of direct democracy – sorry, rhetorical question, because like all present political parties they wish to retain their power over we the people. Were a miracle to happen and Ukip formed a government, where the matter of our system of democracy is concerned – and the deficits contained therein, we are back to the age-old adage: plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.”
It is still noticeable by its absence – and no answer have I ever received. See what I mean about loosely-worded manifestos? Just on what “selected” or “certain” matters would Ukip allow us a referendum? Or has this policy been dropped?
Is it any wonder that we, the people, “cry rivers” over the standard of our politicians and our system of democracy? When Farage said that you can’t put a cigarette paper between the Lib/Lab/Con he omitted to include Ukip. All four parties believe in representative democracy and consequently all will continue to hound us, direct us, control us – so as I wrote above: “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.”
Klein Verzat reports that the European Commission wants to impose on farmers and gardeners in the future the use of unit seed. Old and rare species have little chance of an approval, its cultivation is punishable by law – even if it takes place in the private garden – and ends his post with the words: “Can we leave now?”. Those four words are how I feel about our political class and system of democracy. I’m fed up “crying rivers”.
