A fork in the road: British unity, or civil disorder? (Revised version)

Is Britain approaching a 1776 moment? Or is it more like 1789?

Again and again, on talk radio phone-ins and bear-garden TV shows like Question Time, ordinary people are rudely challenging elected representatives to carry out the result of the 2016 EU Membership Referendum. The latter often seem struggling to contain their fury at such impertinence, as though a scullery maid or horse groom had dared to speak out of turn to His Lordship.

We are moving past consideration of the EU, which is financially and politically doomed (or perhaps its citizens are) whether we remain or leave. The issue has become - for some it always has been - the legitimacy of power itself. And not merely the power of the EU, but the validity of the British Parliament.

Wars, civil wars and revolutions have been fought about this for centuries.

Boston, August 1775: George Washington's army is besieging the British, and the General has learned that captured American officers are being lumped in with other ranks. His protest is rebuffed by General Gage, who says that he does not recognise any rank not derived from the King. On the 19th, Washington replies:

"You affect, Sir, to despise all rank not derived from the same source with your own. I cannot conceive any more honorable that that which flows from the uncorrupted choice of a brave and free people - the purest source and original fountain of all power."

This, from a man brought up in the aristocratic world of the eighteenth century, predates by five months the publication of Paine's bomb-burst pamphlet "Common Sense" (10 January 1776; 150,000 sales among a population of only two million colonists.) Together with the outrageous torching by the British of Norfolk, Virginia on New Year's Day, America had both provocation and a philosophical theory of power to underpin her resistance.

"History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes," said Mark Twain...

The growing recession hitting our country, Europe and the world will provide a similar societal stress - some say this is part of an inevitable historical cycle related to credit, debt and collapse. Once that happens, all it needs is for a radical theoretical debate on power and governance to light the flame.

Revolutions don't happen overnight. They are not spontaneous: masses need organising and leading. So it won't happen after the Brexit deadline in March (or is that to be May?) But if the sovereignty issue is not settled sensitively - it was arrogance and brutality that lost the thirteen colonies - the pamphleteering will begin.

If the balloon goes up, it won't be a colonial revolt; it will be more like a revolutionary civil war, which is far worse because it is much harder to make a lasting peace. There are many fault lines in our society ready to crack open. Even the major political parties have begun to split.

This calamity is avoidable.

Britain nearly had a conflagration in 1789. The philosopher Richard Price, a friend of Paine, gave a French Revolution-inspired speech  "A Discourse on the Love of Our Country", looking at the fundamentals of politics and, like Paine, rooting power in the people. The reception was enthusiastic (a term with distinct connotations of danger, in those days.)

The State was alive to the danger, and acted. Certain gentlemen came to advise Price on his future conduct. Edmund Burke began to compose a justification for the British Constitution in rebuttal. 1789 marked the last time a woman was burned at the stake (in London, for coining.) Radical groups such as the London Corresponding Society were infiltrated by government agents and ultimately suppressed; yet even with the brakes on, the vehicle of power was pushed inch by inch towards electoral reform and democratisation.

Now, Parliament, Whitehall and other well-mounted elements of society are trying to welch on the evolutionary compact with the common people. The latter are divided - votes are divisive, the key to peace is to accept them as decisive - but those with access to power and the media have worked hard to jemmy the cracks wider. The process of re-radicalisation has started, and this time the State seems either unconscious of the peril, or (like George III) sure of its ability to patronise and repress.

Burke articulated a pragmatic scheme for the Parliamentary government we now have, a balance between the royal Executive and popular representation, and between constituency representation and mere delegation. This circumvented the bloody conflict of first principles that played itself out on the other side of the Channel.

But he was addressing the problem of how we govern ourselves, not whether we should be able to govern ourselves at all; even pragmatism has its limits. And on this latter issue, the people - firmly assured by their representatives that this vote would be decisive - made their determination. The task of their representatives was then to carry it through, while closing the divisions among the people as they went forward. They have failed on both counts. The issue has then turned from UK versus EU, to people - a confused, disunited, squabbling people - versus Parliament itself.

If the solution to the threat of revolution in Britain as France burned was to fashion its own sustainable form of democracy, then to discard democracy is to wind the clock back to pre-revolutionary days. And then the clock will start forward again, towards fresh crisis and already-failed solutions.

I'm more worried about the Government than about Shamima Begum

"One day, they’ll decide YOU’RE not British", says Peter Hitchens today, and he's absolutely right (see second section here: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-6738589/PETER-HITCHENS-need-genuinely-new-political-party-not-rabble-rebranded-Blairites.html)

"... it is cheap, crowd-pleasing mob politics [...] What you allow to be done to others will eventually be done to you too [...] Those who think they are leading mobs always end up discovering that they are, in fact, being chased by them."

I may have missed it, but there seems no sign that Home Secretary Sajid Javid discussed the matter beforehand with the government of Bangladesh, which has not given or offered citizenship to Ms Begum and (I should imagine) is exceedingly unlikely to do so.

Decisiveness, responsiveness to public opinion? This is "populism" and it is scary to see how totalitarianism lies so close to the surface of British government and politics.

I can only think that Mr Javid is obliquely signalling his interest in the Premiership - his "appetite for power", to quote Blair in his declining phase -  as the sharks circle around Mrs May, who hung onto the leadership by promising she would go when Brexit is done.

I can only hope he fails; spectacularly; finally.

Things have that whirlwind feeling lately:

Funny film? I was scared right from the beginning.

Why I don't like Windows 10

It made me buy a new laptop because the previous software ceased to be supported (why?), yet programs with the new system (e.g. Word, Excel) load FAR more slowly.

Even Internet searches frequently come up with this sort of response, before grudgingly having another go (and these are sites I often visit):

With all the billions Bill Gates is prepared to give to charity, could he spare a few to make a product that works?

I'm glad I didn't get rid of my old laptop, as I had planned.

Peak Brexit, by Wiggiatlarge

W. lays about him - and who can blame him?

I have no idea how much mileage there is left in the Brexit farce, I suspect quite a bit more right up to and including the 29th March, assuming as always that anything at all happens, for nothing is guaranteed in this deliberately-made mess anymore.

Deliberate: how else can anyone explain coming up three years of total failure to put together anything like that which people voted for? Naturally as is the norm now, remainers claim leavers had no idea what they were voting for and they themselves of course did. Difficult to get beyond that mindset with people who blankly refuse to see what the EU has proposed for the future since we voted leave, but somehow they are OK with an EU army (we all know who vehemently denied there would ever be one) and central taxation, so they can shovel ever more money without asking to those needy Romanians, and soon to be if the EU has its way Albanians (though a large number seem to be already here running as is their wont a fair spread of criminal activities coupled with violence not seen from any other country.*)

The EU has also voiced its disapproval of any dissent about its activities and wishes to clamp down on any media that dares to disagree with it, making it a criminal act, along with further lack of of accountability on the expenses and tax-free salaries given to its overworked, sign-in-and-b*gger-off parliamentarians.

And all overseen by Germany who runs the EU as a personal fiefdom. All this is crumbling fast, Deutsche bank is on its knees and looks like a merger with the equally on-its-knees Commerzbank. All this is perfectly obvious to any who bothers to look but for some reason the remain side feel that is not enough to leave, indeed they are ever more vocal that we stay.

Now over and above all that we have a new ‘group’ formed in parliament - not a party, a group, as if they declare a party they have to declare where their funding comes from and that at the moment is a no-no; not a good start one would think for fledgling startup.

But this is not a fresh face of politics, despite endless articles in the press wetting their knickers over a new gang of four SDP, who whatever you might have thought of them carried some substance, some ideas and included people you would actually listen to, though even they (with a couple of exceptions who were outside Parliament when the SDP was formed) did not put themselves up for a by-election.

The Telegraph even went so far as to say this could be the great realignment of British politics; they must be really desperate for a headline with that rubbish.

Sadly for this new group despite the immediate blanket coverage, the only member who has emerged as a front person is the one who would undoubtedly lose her seat in a by-election. Anna Soubry has become the poster girl for all that is wrong in our Parliament, or at least a large part of it by failing to stand by the manifesto they all stood on (as with the others in her group).

Even worse than Soubry, if that were possible: Sarah Woollaston**, just days before the last election reneged on wanting to leave the EU and again the manifesto she stood on, after having spoken to her father. For someone who is a 57 year old GP that is not a very good advert for free thinking or anything else and she has steadfastly refused to engage with her constituents on that matter.

In essence, despite the media coverage and the gloss put on them, this is nowhere near the direction that British politics needs to go; it is just a group of mainly marginal seat holders who are hanging on to a few more years in the trough before oblivion. Judging by the reaction of the majority of the public (in complete contrast to the media), oblivion can’t come quick enough.

Though to be totally fair those remarks also apply to the vast majority in the HoC who have shown their true colours since the Referendum and should not be allowed anywhere near the levers of power, such is their deliberate incompetence in their attempts to subvert the Referendum result. None of them could run the proverbial whelk stall. No British politics needs a lot more than a few glory hunters including one in a suit who thinks he is Britain's answer to Barack Obama, God help us, who have no policy other than to stop Brexit.

All of this is a result of forty-years-plus of a two-party system that history shows (with one exception)  has shown little if any difference when either was in power. Because of the yah-boo nature of this and the rest-assured-we-will-be back-from-the-party-in-opposition attitude, they have grown fat and lazy, apart from the people and arrogant to degree that has revealed itself since the "wrong" result in 2016 to be like no other time in modern politics. Sadly heads on pikes along Westminster Bridge remains a dream many would salivate over but is unlikely to happen, despite many doing things that would have been treasonable in times past.

Where do we go from here? Who knows, but it doesn’t look good at the moment. As someone said recently, ‘We are not well served’; that must be the understatement of the time we live in.
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*For corroboration, see for example the revelations in Roberto Saviano's 2006 organised-crime exposé "Gomorrah"; and the recent Guardian article on cocaine dealing in the UK

** MP for Totnes, Devon

Sajid Javid To Order Mass Deportations Of IS Supporters (spoof)

https://www.mfa.org/collections/object/the-expulsion-from-eden-illustration-to-miltons-paradise-lost-183700

Following revelations about Britain's involvement with terrorist groups in Syria*, Home Secretary Sajid Javid has ordered civil servants to prepare documentation to strip hundreds of their British citizenship and deport them.

"As soon as IS has built another enclave with Western assistance, HMG will be one of the first to recognise their sovereignty," said Mr Javid. "IS will thus be in a position to offer citizenship and issue passports to their supporters.

"We can then send the denaturalisation and deportation letters currently in preparation, to persons of interest among MI6, the Foreign Office and others including, regrettably, one or two of my colleagues in the Cabinet.

"And you thought I was only big enough to bully schoolgirls!"

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* "More recently, in its military interventions and covert operations in Syria and Libya since 2011, Britain and its supported forces have been working alongside, and often in effective collaboration with, a variety of extremist and jihadist groups, including al-Qaida’s affiliate in Syria. Indeed, the vicious Islamic State group and ideology that has recently emerged partly owes its origins and rise to the policies of Britain and its allies in the region."

- https://www.opendemocracy.net/uk/ian-sinclair/britain-s-collusion-with-radical-islam-interview-with-mark-curtis

FRIDAY MUSIC: Taimane Gardner, Ukelele Virtuosa, by JD

So I was half watching a thing on TV called "Islands of America" and having an after dinner doze when I heard some music. Opened my eyes and saw a Hawaiian lady playing the ukelele, an instrument introduced to the islands in the nineteenth century by Portuguese immigrants.

But this one sounded rather different so I sat up and watched and listened. This was an amplified version and I noticed that it had five strings as opposed to the usual four strings. The unusual arrangement of the strings can be seen clearly in the first video below. The player was Taimane Gardner and she was very good, excellent in fact.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taimane_Gardner

I love good music, wherever it comes from!















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Sackerson adds: 

This clip of Taimane is one of the "Top 10 Ukulele Moments" selected by Guitar World magazine last year:



and I didn't know about the instrument's Portuguese (and Brazilian) connections...

US Political Parties: Clowns to the Left, Jokers to the Right - by Paddington

I live in the US, where we have two barely-functioning political parties, the Grand Old Party (the Republicans) and the Democrats. We are unlikely to ever have a major third one, as the American culture strongly favours an A/B decision-making process, rather than recognizing that there is such a thing as a grey area.

Returning veterans of WWII, in both the US and UK, had had a taste of equality with the monied classes, and they wanted it to continue. The GI bill enabled many to get a good education and rise to the comfortable middle class.

That reality was reflected in the platform of the Eisenhower Republicans. It was pro-union, pro-Social Security, pro-conservation and largely anti-war. I would have been at home with that party.

However, in order to secure the Presidency, Nixon executed the 'Southern Strategy', which involved absorbing the racist Southern Democrats over Civil Rights issues. That was followed by Reagan absorbing the Social Conservatives over the issue of abortion and the teaching of evolution.

What has happened is that the party has become a very disparate set of interests, from anti-abortion, to isolationism/anti-immigration, to anti-feminism, anti-science, anti-education and so much more. The tactics are of fear and hatred. There is no part of the party which appears to follow the 'common good' parts of the Constitution to build anything, with the standard idea seeming to be that making the rich even richer will make everyone better off.

On the other hand, the Democrats look to be completely dissipated, trying to satisfy every marginal constituency, while also appeasing the very wealthy. If there is something positive to be said for them, it is that Democratic presidencies have resulted in smaller annual deficits than Republican ones. Where the GOP is anti-science on the subjects of evolution, an old Earth, climate change and several other topics, the Democrats appear not to believe in biological differences in genders, or innate intelligence, or the reality of alternative energy without nuclear power, or vaccines (although there are nuts on both side who are against the latter).

In short, neither party represents me, and the other parties are just out there, from the Natural Law party, to the Communists. There was even the case where a cult tried to poison a whole town in Oregon to gain political power.*

And that is why I call myself an orthogonal-American.

Representation of a 4-D cube (a tesseract) - at right angles to all 3 dimensions
https://interestingengineering.com/understanding-fourth-dimension-3d-perspective

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*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_Rajneeshee_bioterror_attack