ANOTHER VOICE

Lessons to be learned from the Russian Liberal Democrats

AUBERON WAUGH

Of all the panicky insults thrown at the first democratic leader to emerge in Russia since the dawn of democracy, V. Zhiri- novsky — that he is a fascist, a neo-imperi- alist, a warmonger — the oddest is surely that he has no right to call his party by the same name as has been adopted by the remnants of our own Liberal Party. Those of us who have been living under the plastic heel of Mr 'Paddy' Pantsdown's oafish bully-boys in Somerset ever since they cap- tured Taunton's County Hall will puzzle most.

Some of their activities have broken into the national press: their childish harass- ment of the Quantock Staghounds by the assertion of long-eroded property rights on a few acres of open ground in the Quan- tocks which they have no business to own; their vicious attempt to impose a gypsies' camping site on the villagers of Middlezoy, near Taunton. When Middlezoy rose up against them under the leadership of a vil- lage Hampden called Nobby Turner, he was met by 'a hysterical diatribe from the Liberal representative, Councillor Tom Dommett, 29, full of incomprehensible racial innuendo:

If people break the law they should be dealt with fairly and impartially by the law whether they be New Age travellers, gypsies, Roma- nies, Yids, Nig-Nogs, Ities, Pakis, unem- ployed, Nobby Turner etc.

Like some of Mr Zhirinovsky's wilder state- ments, this letter obviously requires inter- pretation. Mr Turner feels it may refer to the fact that his first wife was Jewish and his son has married an Egyptian. Under pressure, Councillor Dommett, 29, apolo- gised for the letter, saying cryptically, 'I believe some are capable of a different interpretation to my intentions.'

I do not see that it matters much what he intended to say. Councillor Dommett, 29, is a fair specimen of the ignorant, illiterate riff-raff clinging to Mr Pantsdown's shirt- tails in the classless revolution. The most odious aspect to the Liberal Democrat Reign of Nausea in Somerset has been the torrent of patronising advice pouring out of County Hall, urging us to have a good time over the festive season and drive safely. This was relayed from loudspeakers all over the town, like political exhortations in Slovakia, and forced many shoppers to avoid Taunton altogether.

There is no reason to suppose that the

Russian Liberal Democrats under Vladimir Zhirinovsky would be anything like as bad as this. In the first place, they are almost certainly better educated. In the second, they do not represent a cheeky-chappie gesture within a temporary political vacu- um so much as the inchoate yearnings of a nation which has been denied any true expression of its feelings throughout histo- ry. Within the cacophony of bellicose, nationalist, populist and racist noises issu- ing from Mr Zhirinovsky's mouth, it is not always easy for a foreigner to be certain which are intended as jokes and which rep- resent a major element in the democratic aspirations of the newly consulted Russian people; but I would suggest that a little common sense might be brought to bear.

Russian jokes cannot be so very different from our own. When Zhirinovsky threatens to nuke Latvia, for instance, unless Latvia returns to the Russian fold, that is plainly a joke. Polly Toynbee may not see it, but we are not yet a nation of Polly Toynbees, nor are we yet led by Polly Toynbees. We shall become the laughing-stock of the world if we are. If there were the faintest element of seriousness in any of this, the Ukraine would scarcely be prepared to renounce its nuclear armoury.

It may be hard for us to adjust to the idea of a world leader with a sense of humour, but I would suggest it might be worth our while to make the effort. Perhaps Zhiri- novsky is an unscrupulous demagogue and potential mass murderer like Hitler, as the Toynbees would have us believe, although I think this unlikely. Hitler was not famous for his sense of humour. But even if he is a bad man, what is important about him is that he is an expression of democratic choice. The most significant refrain in what this Russian voice is saying, through the bombast and badinage, the frustration and anger, is its rejection of an American future. With all the pride of the destitute, the Russians who support him are saying they do not want what America has to offer.

If I am right, his is the first European voice since de Gaulle to suggest that the main purpose to life is not to make every- one richer. There are greater pleasures than hamburgers, finer values than those imposed by democracy in a mass market. If Europe is not to follow America down the hamburger path to a society where the pro- duction of trashy films for the mass market is the second biggest industry, we, too, must think again.

I have long argued that Britain and Europe no longer have anything to gain from acceptance of American leadership.

We can never be equal trading partners, and we will always, in the final reckoning, lose out. It was depressing to discover that the cancellation of Michael Jackson's world tour on behalf of Pepsi-Cola will cost Lloyd's of London another £40 million. When will the insurance market learn not to do business with the United States? Its legal system is as hopeless as its President. We can be friends, but not partners.

The idea of an alternative future to the American one may require a greater cultur- al and intellectual adjustment than we are capable of making. Could it be that the enrichment of the working class (as a nec- essary means of enriching ourselves) was a great mistake, our whole notion of progress has been wrong, that the greatest human happiness is to be found in a stratified, comparatively unaffluent society, bound together by national pride and a common religion?

It would be absurd to talk of Russian leadership of such a Europe, since Russia will be in no position to lead anyone for a very long time, but it is not absurd to talk of a partnership with Russia. Just as we have much to learn from Russia, so the Russians have one or two things to learn from us. When Mr Zhirinovsky talks of Russian sol- diers washing their boots in the Indian

Ocean, we, who spent some time in those parts, can advise that the pleasures of such an activity are not so great as might be sup- posed. posed. And it will certainly do the soldiers' boots no good at all.