Reply to: The Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

[zeitghost]

One Reich, One folk, One Tone...

The one single solitary reassurance is that the New Lie Thousand Year Reich will last as long as all Thousand Year Reichs: 13 years on average.

Stone me, I was right.

[Fungus]

Whatever you think of Blair, he has the "charisma" to get voters to vote for him (particularly women). I doubt that the dour Brown will have the same appeal, especially when faced with fresh-faced Cameron. And don't forget that Cameron has his own marketing guru and is no slouch in the charm stakes.
Sometimes we analyze things too far and make no allowances for the shallowness of the electorate.

The shallowness of the electorate is exactly what I was thinking about. Blair had charisma as 'we' thought he was sincere. But I would say that he is now soiled goods with a distinct whiff about him. I think you're right about Brown, but I think it needs time for people to see that. After all in many people's eyes he is the Miracle Chancellor who has delivered continuous growth and high employment (you mentioned how shallow people are).

[sasguru]

I wish you were right but I very much doubt it. Blair may well be looking rather tawdry and dog eared, but look at how Ministers are passing blame onto Blair, in the knowledge that he is to leave. Once gone, Brown will market New Lier as fresh and exciting and free of the Blair sleaze. And the electors will believe him.

You only have to look at how New Lier recovered in the past from periods when the polls were against them. They are skilled at media management.

The only hope for the Tories is to dislodge Blair, so that Brown can have a chance to screw up big time, which I think he will. I reckon he does not have the skill to hold together the New Lier reptile as he's too pompous and unbending, and in consequence dissent will break out.

Just my opinion and time will decide who is right.

Whatever you think of Blair, he has the "charisma" to get voters to vote for him (particularly women). I doubt that the dour Brown will have the same appeal, especially when faced with fresh-faced Cameron. And don't forget that Cameron has his own marketing guru and is no slouch in the charm stakes.
Sometimes we analyze things too far and make no allowances for the shallowness of the electorate.

[expat]

One Reich, One folk, One Tone...

The one single solitary reassurance is that the New Lie Thousand Year Reich will last as long as all Thousand Year Reichs: 13 years on average.

"The third reich will last a thousand years" - Hitler, June 1934.

"...so that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth should last a thousand years..." - Churchill, June 1940.

So when in March 1975 Ian Smith promised no black majority rule in Rhodesia, "not in a thousand years", we knew the end was near.

"a thousand days to prepare for the next thousand years" - Blair, 1997
You're doomed, me old son!

[Fungus]

Oh come on guys, anyone would think Labour have engineered a coup d'etat the way you're going on.... In reality they are in their death throes (albeit prolonged). They are highly unlikely to win the next election. My problem is will the Tories be any better or have they watered down their principles (chief among which used to be the idea of "small government")?

I wish you were right but I very much doubt it. Blair may well be looking rather tawdry and dog eared, but look at how Ministers are passing blame onto Blair, in the knowledge that he is to leave. Once gone, Brown will market New Lier as fresh and exciting and free of the Blair sleaze. And the electors will believe him.

You only have to look at how New Lier recovered in the past from periods when the polls were against them. They are skilled at media management.

The only hope for the Tories is to dislodge Blair, so that Brown can have a chance to screw up big time, which I think he will. I reckon he does not have the skill to hold together the New Lier reptile as he's too pompous and unbending, and in consequence dissent will break out.

Just my opinion and time will decide who is right.

[zathras]

Oh come on guys, anyone would think Labour have engineered a coup d'etat the way you're going on.... In reality they are in their death throes (albeit prolonged). They are highly unlikely to win the next election. My problem is will the Tories be any better or have they watered down their principles (chief among which used to be the idea of "small government")?

Have a quick look at some of the activities of new Labour and they very well might have.

• Civil Contingencies Bill (our 'Patriot Act')
• RIP Act
• Gradual Politicisation of the Civil Service, including political advisors being appointed control of Civil Servents
• A weakening of Cabinet Government
• Highest use of secondary legislation in any modern government
• Highest use of the Parliamentary Act to get through ill thought out acts
• Weakening of Habeus Corpus with the extention of days held in custody from 7 days to 28 (a four fold increase)
• Stated desire to reduce the use of Juries in trials
• Politicisation of the Judiciary by the creation of the Department of Constitutional Affairs and bringing them into that.
• Numerous attempts to reduce free speech
• Legislation and Regulary Reform Bill aka The Abolition of Parliament Act

Even if their intention is honourable they have so weakened the traditional checks and balances of the British Constitution that they very well might have.

[Lucifer Box]

If they, the New Lie, get this nasty piece of legislation in place who is to say when the next election will be?

Indeed. There has already been talk about postponing local elections "until a better system has been implemented".

Thing is, once this law is on the statute books it's too late. No government will ever surrender its power to implement primary legislation without recourse to Parliament and I don't want any government to have that ability available to it, whether labour, conservative or whoever.

To say that the current government is in its death throes and is unlikely to win the next election is probably not the case. Even the electoral commission concedes that it is almost impossible for Labour not to win given the current boundaries (in fact they could gain a smaller share of the national vote than the Tories and still have a parliamentary majority).

[threaded]

If they, the New Lie, get this nasty piece of legislation in place who is to say when the next election will be?

[sasguru]

Oh come on guys, anyone would think Labour have engineered a coup d'etat the way you're going on.... In reality they are in their death throes (albeit prolonged). They are highly unlikely to win the next election. My problem is will the Tories be any better or have they watered down their principles (chief among which used to be the idea of "small government")?

[Lucifer Box]

Here are some good quotes that I'm sure are being paraphrased and repeated at Labour Party Headquarters behind closed doors. For some minor amusement, see if you can guess who said what (some of them could have been said at the last cabinet meeting, they seem so prescient).

Answers at the bottom.

a) What good fortune for those in power that the people do not think.

b) If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.

c) Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything.

d) Fascism should rightly be called corporatism as it is a merger of state and corporate power

e) Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.

f) One of the penalities for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.


Answers:
a) Hitler
b) Goebbels
c) Stalin
d) Mussolini
e) Theodore Roosevelt
f) Plato

How sad we appear to have changed so little.

[AlfredJPruffock]

There can be only one answer: ministers want to bypass parliament and transfer authority to themselves and their officials under the cover of helping business.

Right Right you Bloody Well Right !!!

When have NL ever had any intention of helping business, they have spent years taxing them out of existence.

What a bunch of dangerous shady liars this lot are ...


Wake up Britain you are sleepwalking into Totalitarianism ...

[AlfredJPruffock]

If this legislation is to cut red tape, then why does it not have in it that it is only to be used to cut red tape.

i.e. Why does it need to enable the ability to create new prison sentences at a ministers whim?

Doublethink


The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them. ...

To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just so long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies—all this is indispensably necessary.

Even in using the word doublethink it is necessary to exercise doublethink. For by using the word one admits that one is tampering with reality; by a fresh act of doublethink one erases this knowledge; and so on indefinitely, with the lie always one leap ahead of the truth. (pages 35, 176-177)

Hope that helps !!!

[zathras]

If this legislation is to cut red tape, then why does it not have in it that it is only to be used to cut red tape.

i.e. Why does it need to enable the ability to create new prison sentences at a ministers whim?

A point which has not passed the Guardian by. Which said

This is to say little about common law, the centuries of precedents and rulings which contain so many of the historic rights of British culture. 'Oh no,' said the minister, as if talking to a child, 'ministers will give assurances; they will confine themselves to the regulations that concern business.'

If that is the case, why does the bill not say so? Why is it drafted so loosely? Why is Jim Murphy doing so much to protect its versatility? Why won't he put the safeguards in the bill from the start? There can be only one answer: ministers want to bypass parliament and transfer authority to themselves and their officials under the cover of helping business.

[threaded]

If this legislation is to cut red tape, then why does it not have in it that it is only to be used to cut red tape.

i.e. Why does it need to enable the ability to create new prison sentences at a ministers whim?

[zathras]

Are 649 pimples on humanity's @rse (MPs) really going to vote through legislation which neuters them and makes them redundant?

We can, for once, rest assured and rely on the naked-self interest and boundless greed of our MPs to ensure this bill never sees the light of day.

I wish. However, under New Labour MP's seem don't seem to like attending debates. They arrive just in time for the division to the lobbies and vote whichever way the whips told them. New Labour does not seem to have any underlying philosphy (other than keeping it's architects in power). What this means is that the MP's will vote for this abhorrent legislation because they have not thought through the consequences.

If you want proof consider the following. The legislation is to get rid of regulation. However, it has not occured to New Labour not to create the legislation in the first place.

It may be counter-intutive but this lack of proper parliamentary scrutiny alongside this bill will actually create more poor regulations, not less. That is because poorly considered legislation will be nodded through, safe in the knowledge that it can be tweeked as and when required.