High life
Yellow fellows
Taki
If this is democracy, I'm Marlene Diet- rich. Last week the House of Commons voted overwhelmingly to lower the age of consent for homosexuals to 16, easily over- coming objections from religious leaders. Polls, however, had overwhelmingly indi- cated that the electorate was against it. So what did Tony Blair, William Hague and 336 MPs do? They said, screw the people, we know better and, while we're at it, tell the Church to go to hell too.
Now, I have always known that politi- cians see taxpayers as a bunch of schmucks, but this is ridiculous. It confirms my low opinion of democracy, which is on a par with honour in Hollywood. In another con- text, Tony Blair, Scotland's version of the Draft Dodger, talks about having the national interest at heart. It's all moon- shine, as they say in Arkansas. Blair and the yellow fellows who voted to lower the age of consent are scared of the poofter lobby, no ifs or buts about it. Screw the people, let's just keep Peter Tatchell off our backs, is what they're thinking.
Pinochet and Maggie — both enlight- ened leaders who saved their countries would never have done it. Monkeys to the organ-grinders of pressure groups like Blair would and did. The associate editor of The Spectator, Si& Simon, whom I have never met, recently wrote an article in the Daily Telegraph titled 'Stop knocking politicians'. His main point was that the majority of MPs are honest, principled and hard work- ing. What bull! I know of very few MPs who would act out of principle alone. Most of them vote and act out of fear. There are almost no Enochs left, certainly not in the Labour party.
So, a vociferous and unrepresentative minority has forced Parliament to pass a law against the country's wishes. So what else is new? Those against country sports are in the minority, but because of PC they've got the yellow fellows on the run. Ditto with the single currency. Everyone and their cousin know that the majority of Brits wish to keep the pound. To hell with them, says M. Brown. Like a modern Mus- solini seeking glory, he is determined to lock England into a Europe of high social costs and a bureaucracy that makes Nigeria look like Switzerland. The arrogance of this common little man is amazing. Incidentally, he has his mouthpieces send Lords Marsh and Hanson and other extremely successful businessmen to hell because the successful ones don't wish to sacrifice the strongest currency in Europe for a dream that may turn out to be a wet one at best. This is the kind of democracy practised for years by Enver Hoxha in Albania.
And on the sidelines, watching interest rates rise and the middle classes being whip-sawed, is that malevolent Figaro, Roy Jenkins, plotting electoral reform that will ensure those who like to redistribute wealth will stay in power for ever and ever. His secret weapon: proportional represen- tation, a ticket to Italian politics and politi- cal blackmail by extremists, but one Roy boy is for. After all, put a wig on him and Jenkins could pass for a Borgia acolyte.
Mind you, Roy boy believes in what he's doing. He has risen through life, like most of his kind, via politics, not by taking his chances in the market place. Economic reality is what stopped him from taxing the haves at 100 per cent. He may be consid- ered a traitor to socialism by the Beast of Bolsover, but he is only a realist. He won't slaughter the cash cow as long as she keeps producing the cash.
I don't know why, call it instinct if you like, but I prefer the Bolsover Beast to Jenkins. His lordship undermined such basic institutions as the family and law enforcement and lowered the standards of decency, all in the guise of liberalism dur- ing the ghastly Sixties. Now he is out to undermine the only chance people have to throw the bums out every five years. Good for you, Roy. Screw the schmucks, they deserve everything they get.
And now the really bad news. An ad in the Daily Telegraph alerted me to the kind of government we have. The St Dunstan's charity is one that cares for blind ex-ser- vicemen and women. It is appealing for funds because it relies entirely on public generosity. St Dunstan's, you see, has recently been turned down for government and National Lottery funding. And why not? Blind ex-servicemen and women are not exactly a powerful group, plus they are hardly likely to vote. No member of the government has ever served in the military. So why not screw them?
The only thing the surviving veterans may be thankful for, when Blair allocates our resources in an electorally advanta- geous way, is that their blindness — for all its horror — will spare them the sight of the so-called 'works of art' that nowadays get the government nod.
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