The ThunderDragon

It’s still totalitarianism!

Harry Barnes, ex-Labour MP, who yesterday earned the ire of Freeborn John, Matt Wardman, and myself for his inconsistencies in his Normblog profile.

Effectively, he advocates Totalitarian Socialism [read my post yesterday for the background].

Today, he has kindly responded to us, saying that

For (if I had the influence provided in Norm’s questions), I would naturally pursue and then sustain my objectives by entirely democratic and anti-totalitarian methods.

Even if I am thought of as being foolish and wrongheaded, at least I have been entirely consistent. Consistently wrong possibly, but never ever inconsistent.

Totalitarian measures achieved through democratic methods are still totalitarian!

Freeborn John’s comment on Harry’s reply sums it up:

It depends what you understand totalitarianism to be. Here are three mainstream definitions:

Wikipedia: “Totalitarianism is a term employed by some political scientists, especially those in the field of comparative politics, to describe modern regimes in which the state regulates nearly every aspect of public and private behavior.”

Webster’s: ” 1 : centralized control by an autocratic authority 2 : the political concept that the citizen should be totally subject to an absolute state authority ”

Encarta: “Totalitarianism, in political science, system of government and ideology in which all social, political, economic, intellectual, cultural, and spiritual activities are subordinated to the purposes of the rulers of a state.”

Your first two proposals fit these definitions, I’m afraid. You lay claim to control of the totality of my being, especially with respect to the transport proposal. It makes no difference that you say you want to achieve totalitarianism by democratic means.

Precisely.

To ban private transport is a totalitarian measure; it infriges on civil liberties - my right to freedom of movement is massively impaired, and subordinated to the routes and times that the state has decreed that I may travel. This is true whether or not it has been “democratically agreed” that private transport should be banned.

Harry Barnes is inconsistent. He claims to oppose totalitarianism, despite having proposed a totalitarian motion just a breath or two previously.

This debate in the end boils down to this: Harry is either

• stupid,
• senile, or
• practising doublethink.

Or, of course, all [or a combination] of the above.

As Freeborn John says: “some totalitarians dislike being called totalitarian. That’s too bad.”

Via a speechless Matt Wardman, I’ve come across this week’s Normblog profile of ex-Labour MP Harry Barnes. Just read his answers to these questions:

What is your favourite piece of political wisdom?

> ‘Democratic Socialism… is based on the conviction that free men can use free institutions to solve the social and economic problems of the day, if they are given a chance to do so.’ From Nye Bevan’s In Place Of Fear. His terminology was also meant to cover women.

If you could effect one major policy change in the governing of your country, what would it be?

> To limit the use of private transport to emergency services, with public transport being publicly owned and freely available, whilst planning for the huge economic and social consequences which would follow.

What would you do with the UN?

> Restructure it to run world-wide military and financial controls.

What do you consider to be the main threat to the future peace and security of the world?

> A wide range of totalitarian dogmas.

Yes. Now read it again.

He actually said that he would make private transport illegal for everyone except emergency services and to give all military and finacial controls to the UN… and then said that he considered the “main threat to the peace and security of the world” is “a wide range of totalitarian dogmas”, without even a hint of irony. If what he is proposing isn’t a totalitarian dogma, I’ll eat my hat*.

You can’t believe in outlawing private transport and in opposing totalitarianism. Only the former - which makes you a totalitarian - or the latter. the Harry must be either thick or senile. Or both.

Rather than having any belief in democratic socialism, Harry Barnes actually has a belief in totalitarian socialism. Just like Gordon Brown.

* I don’t wear a hat.

At first I though that John Hutton might be the man behind the revolt, but now it seems more likely that James Purnell is the man who wants to be PM.

When asked, Purnell refused to condemn the rebel MPs and said:

I think it would be ridiculous to pretend that you can’t complain when you’re worried.

I mean, I’m worried that we’re 20 points behind*. I’m not going to condemn people or question their motives. [But] I don’t agree with what they did.

So he doesn’t “agree” with them. But he won’t say they’re wrong. He’s hardly fully supporting Brown then, is he?

Is it Purnell who is behind this revolt? After all, he is one of only two who are actually liked, and thus stands a good likelihood of doing well in any leadership election.

The only problem for him is that no leadership candidate can do anything except support Brown in public, or forever lose his chance of winning. So he has to resort to these half-truths.

Or maybe he an John Hutton are in on it together…?

* Nearer 30 points, actually…

Nick Clegg has had a “go back to your constituencies and prepare for government” moment in his Cameron-lite - no notes, wandering around the stage - conference speech today when he said:

I can tell you where we’re headed - government. (Full speech here)

Yeah. Right.

Somehow, I just can’t see the Lib Dems forming the next government. Or any government, come to that. At any point.

Especially considering the latest polls, which put the parties on the following figures:

• Conservatives: 52%
• Labour: 24%
• Lib Dems: 12%

Now that is a fantastic result for the Conservatives, and a devastating blow to the Lib Dems, especially just after their conference where one would normally expect a poll boost. However, one can’t help but almost feel sorry for the them as their entire conference has been almost entirely overshadowed by the City meltdown and the Labour MP revolution.

According to Electoral Calculus, a general election with this vote share would leave Parliament as follows:

• Conservative: 493 seats
• Labour: 121 seats
• Lib Dems: 8 seats

Of course, this isn’t likely to be the actual result of any election, as it ignores the impact of any SNP/Plaid Cymru vote in Scotland and Wales. And it relies on a uniform swing, without paying any attention to local issues.

However, what it does show is the Lib Dems are suffering. Seriously suffering. They simply cannot compete aginst Cameron at the moment, no matter what they say or do. Clegg is seen to be nothing more than Cameron-lite by the general public, and as they want to get rid of this failing Labour government, they are turning to the Opposition in their droves.

What it really comes down to is that as the Lib Dems are primarily a protest vote repository rather than a serious political party with a credible claim to being able to form a government. Which is why they are being shunned by the electorate at the moment.

When will the Lib Dems finally admit that they won’t ever form the government?

This comment, made on the Andrew Marr Show, certainly appears to suggest that this might be the case:

I am absolutely not going to condemn any of my colleagues who want that debate but I think we have to support the government and we have to support the work we are doing because it is absolutely the right direction for the country…

For goodness sake, we are 20 points behind in the opinion polls. But we have to do better and make our arguments clear and that is what we are trying to do.

He refuses to ask those MPs calling for a new leader to shut up, and at the same time points out the current political doldrums in which the Labour Party is finding itself.

Though the question still remains - is it because he wants the job, or supports someone else for it instead?

New and politics “where you are”?

The BBC mantra of news or politics “where you are” is wrong. Whenever they say that, I then get shown the London news or poltiics show. I don’t live in Lodon. I don’t work in London. I don’t have a vote in London. Yet I only ever get the London information.

It is annoying, because it simply doesn’t affect me. I live in Watford, Hertfordshire. Not London. So why would I be interested in local news and local politics that don’t affect me at all? And why can’t I get the news and politics that actually affects me, and that I can vote on?

When will the BBC sort this out?

What is it about the Lib Dems that leads them to always believe that they are about to become the second party in British politics?

Not long ago, they were claiming to be the “real opposition” to Labour as the Tories were, apparently, dying. Well, that didn’t exactly come true now, did it?

But Clegg’s at it again. Claiming that the current revolt by Labour MPs against Brown shows that we are “watching the death throes of the Labour Party”. Unfortunately not.

Labour may be fighting like a bunch of ferrets in a sack about to be thrown overboard from the ship of state, but these ferrets can swim. Modern political parties just don’t die so easily, at least not in Britain where the ties to the populace can be very deep indeed.

The late nineties didn’t signal the death throes of the Conservative Party, as shown by their current revival, and we are not witnessing the death throes of the Labour Party at the moment. The worst that will happen is a massive collapse in their support for the next few years, but they will inevitably claw some support back over time as the political seesaw swings back the other way.

However, it is the Lib Dems opportunity to make their move. They don’t have a chance of becoming the opposition or government, but they do have the chance to push their support to encompass more than just protest votes - whether they can hold on to them when Labour recovers is a different matter, however. But the Lib Dems will come under fire themselves from the Greens, who are becoming politically mature with the election of their first actual leader.

The problems with the Lib Dems is that they don’t really know where they stand. And they must get splinters in their arse from sitting on the fence so much. They need to decide where they actually sit, politically - not just spinning around and around as the mood takes them.

When the political parties agree it usually means you should look out for your wallet. - John Redwood.

Too true. The only thing political parties seem to have in common is a desire to get hold of our money.

As Conference season is very nearly upon us, it’s time to start a new mwm based on what you would say if you had a platform at any party conference. [Idea nicked from Mike Ion.]

So here goes:

Conference,

I believe that we, the Conservative Party, are once more ready to take office. Let’s be frank - for a while, we had lost it, as can sometimes happen. But now, we have developed and moved on. We have taken a look at ourselves, done our navel gazing, and then we have taken a look at modern Britain and seen how we can make it better. And we are now in the process of setting out our vision for the future, after the destruction befalling us from a decade and more of Labour mis-management.

When Labour took power in 1997, Britain was at the start of an economic upturn. Thst continued, despite the policies they pursued which has driven our economy to the edge of a precipice. Rather than spending that time developing and reforming our public services, they resorted to the tried-and-failed Labour tactic of tax-and-spend.

Last time they tried that, we had to go in and fix it. We had to reform the state and bring back economic security to the nation, because they broke it.

And it looks like we need to try and fix it all over again.

The truth is, as the Chancellor recently alluded to, is that we have been screwed by Labour. They promised much, took the money from our wage packets to pay for it, and then squandered it. Time and time again. Gordon Brown failed when he was at the Treasury and the economy survived despite him. But he took it right to the precipice, and as soon as the world economy slowed, the hollowness of his boasts about economic competence were revealed.

The country is clearly calling for us to step up our game and set out our stall with how we can fix it - and so far they seem to like what they are seeing. In every vote and in every poll, we are the clear winners. But now, the present is the time that we must lose sight of. We must not get cocky and see the next election as “ours”. Instead, we must respect that it is up to the people, the voters of this country, whether or not we are allowed to govern them for one Parliament.

Our country needs us. But it is up to us to go to them and tell them what it is we stand for - the freedom for them to spend their own money however they like, the freedom for them to do what they like in their own homes without government snooping or disapproval of them drinking more than than they say we should or smoking at all, and greater protection from criminals through putting real police on the street.

Our politics is about reform - change for the better, rather than for the sake of change. About cutting waste and providing more efficient and less polluting services. About making Britain cleaner, greener, and safer.

Thank you.

To write their own ‘pretend’ conference speech, I tag:

• Letters From A Tory
• Tony Sharp
• Nich Starling
• James Graham
• Sadie Smith
• Dave Cole
• Ordovicious
• And anyone else who wants to.

The new, “reformed”, House of Lords is “unacceptably dominated” by peers who live in London and the south-east of England, claims a report.

London has more peers than the east Midlands, West Midlands, Wales, Northern Ireland, north-east England and Yorkshire and the Humber put together…

A significant north-south divide is also apparent, with areas in the south enjoying far greater representation than those in the north.

The director of thinktank that wrote the report, the New Local Government Network, said:

It isn’t fair that our laws are being partly written without all corners of the country having a fair say. The Midlands and north of England are particularly poorly represented.

The problem with the state of our current political situation is that it isn’t equal:

• Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland have their own legislative bodies, with varying powers. But England doesn’t.
• Scotland and Wales have larger representation in the Commons than their population warrants.
• The Cabinet is dominated by MPs with Northern and Scottish constituencies. Only two Cabinet ministers have constituencies south of Watford.

Frankly, that the House of Lords is biased towards London and the South East means little. Especially if you consider the role of the Lords. They’re not representatives, they’re a check on our representatives.

Under the partial reforms, the hereditary “representative” - according to this report - Lords were removed and appointed Lords instated. They were [presumably] selected because they have specialist knowledge or experience and can as such properly critique the bills passed to them from the Commons. Not because of where they live.

Representation is about more than geography. Representatives should be equal, yes, but it’s not the be-all and end-all. When it comes to electoral influence, it must be equal across the entire country. One person = one vote = the same level of influence. But if we are slecting the best people to perform the role, where the live or where they come from must mean bugger-all.