OH WHAT A TANGLED WEB WE WEAVE, WHEN IN A FAITH WE CHOOSE TO BELIEVE

ANJEM CHOUDHARY, the Wolfie Smith of Islamic fundamentalism, has had his latest organisation, Muslims Against the Crusades, banned by the Home Secretary. Of course, he will quickly make up a new name and continue to burn poppies on Remembrance Sunday; while the nation (or hopefully, most of it at least)  are remembering the sacrifices that our service men and women have made on our behalf.

            Choudhary is an attention seeker who has called for the assassination of the Pope, branded Christmas as an evil celebration, and suggested that Muslims will have more children and take over Britain. This latter observation is not too far from the truth considering the 250,000 abortions undertaken annually in this country.

            Under our current set up, there is only one thing to do to stop this man’s self-publicist impulses, and that would be to give him a place on the next series of Big Brother. All he craves is his 15 minutes of fame. If he really had any genuine sympathy for the Muslim cause he has spent most of his life pursuing, he would have done  what many British Muslims have already done, and departed these shores for Pakistan to be trained to fight in Afghanistan.

            But the martyrdom many Muslim’s seem to thirst for by fighting the infidel, does not appeal to  Anjem Choudhary. No, his niche is coming up with the most offensive slogans he is capable of, and then garnering the maximum publicity from them. Like some copy writer in an ad agency his equivalent to, ‘Go to work on an egg’, is  ' … Hell for Heroes’, the title of a demonstration that he and his small band of cowardly  mujahedeen planned in opposition to our presence in Afghanistan.

            Well, at least we have a presence in Afghanistan, while Anjem Choudhary, it seems, wishes to stay as far away from the place as he can. Taking on NATO is not for our role playing martyr. Not for him the vagaries of  the sniper’s bullet; not for him the nightly sweats, wondering whether a drone has targeted him as he drives from A to B in some part of northern Pakistan.

            Choudhary not only insults the sacrifices of those he sees as the enemies of Islam; he also affronts the sacrifices  made by his own kind who have martyred themselves for the cause that he can only support at a comfortable distance, in a country where he is free to speak his mind and test this freedom to its limits; and when the patience of the country has worn thin, he still remains free.

           

CHOUDHARY’S  CONTRIBUTION to the struggle entails no real sacrifice. His martyrdom entails not death but only publicity. Publicity designed to outrage the British public. But if for one moment he thought that, as happens in the Muslim world, his offending behaviour would lead to his real martyrdom, then he would be more selective over his choice of words.

            Choudhary represents the exhibitionist coward. He knows that he cannot be taken from the streets and tortured as many Libyans and Egyptians were before the Arab Spring. He knows that he will face at worse, a comfortable cell in an open prison somewhere in England where he will enjoy all the facilities of a British seaside guest house circa 1960.

            Not for him the fear of looking up to the sky in half expectation of an American drone discharging its munitions in his direction. No, for Choudhary, it is the simple life. He and his little band of brothers prefer to stand on street corners hurling abuse, knowing they will be protected from public’s anger by the British police; while harvesting the publicity that his little acts of petulance are guaranteed to cause.

            The worst thing we can do is to give this seeker of media hype what he craves; we should treat him with the satire he deserves, instead of taking him as seriously as he wishes us to. He is an embarrassment to his own cause, and would willingly accept a Big Brother contract if he could no longer get our attention .

           

           

           

            

Obama, Sarkozy and Netanyahu – I know who the real statesman is

NOT FOR THE FIRST TIME have senior politicians left the microphone running after it should have been turned off. Gordon Brown was overheard by the media describing a Labour voter as a bigot during the 2010 General Election campaign; and now presidents’ Obama and Sarkozy have been heard making disparaging remarks about the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the recent G20 meeting in Cannes.

            Sarkozy called Netanyahu a liar, which is power for course for the diminutive Frenchman. But for president Obama to agree with Sarkozy is another matter. The brief comments they made were as follows, according to the journalists who overheard them:

Sarkozy: ‘I can’t stand him anymore, he’s a liar’.

Obama: ‘You may be sick of him, [ Netanyahu] but me, I have to deal with him every day.’ 

            As any British politician knows; to be insulted by a cheese eating surrender monkey means very little in the scheme of things. But when it comes to an American president representing a country which has been, and still is Israel’s greatest ally, then it cannot be so easily dismissed. Especially as president Obama has been less than sound on Israel; and as such, his brief comment on the Israeli prime minister seems to confirm to his critics his innate dislike of Israel and its right to exist.

            There have been those on the Right-wing fringes of Republican politics who have even questioned his Christian faith and dared suggest Muslim sympathies, if not roots. As extreme as these accusations are; I do not believe Obama has much sympathy for Israel, and has the Palestinian plight uppermost in his thoughts and feelings when it comes to the Middle East: and if he does not show this sympathy openly through his actions it is because he wants to become a two-term Democrat.

            Which is why he will need the American Jewish vote, if the polls are to be believed; as he seeks a second term in 2012. His popularity is at an all time low and he cannot afford to offend any minority; especially one with so much clout within American culture.

            The Jewish imprint on American culture cannot be underestimated. Their contribution to their nation becoming the most powerful, is equal to, and even surpasses many other minority contributions towards such an endeavour. The Jews have done great things for America; they are by nature entrepreneurial and as a consequence have mastered great wealth, and in doing so have employed may thousands of  American people, and helped build their country.

            But prejudice has stalked them for centuries throughout the Diaspora. Seen as money grabbing misers and conspirators involved in every bedevilment that inflicted itself upon, in particular, failing European economies in the East; they fell victims of programs and, eventually, to the death camps.

            Now we see in its infancy, such bigotry on display amongst those young and naive protesters on Wall Street. Anti-Semitism grows out of economic devastation. When blame is to be apportioned, then historically, the Jews have been blessed with the honorarium of scapegoat.

           

I FIND IT DISTURBING THAT president Obama should express himself in such a manner as he did with Sarkozy. If  George Bush Junior had uttered those same words, Netanyahu would have probably just smiled and shrugged his shoulders. For he would have known that George Bush would have meant it as a personal comment; from a man who stands full square behind Israel, but who disliked him individually.

            But with Obama, it is another matter. Benjamin Netanyahu will interpret Obama’s remark to Sarkozy as a vindication of the Republican Right’s criticism of Obama’s questionable loyalty toward the state of Israel. He will take seriously Obama’s remarks privately; but will brush them aside publically.

            Benjamin Netanyahu, is probably the only modern international politician worthy of the title, statesman. Neither Sarkozy or Obama can match Netanyahu’s  record in terms of fighting for their own countries; or boast Netanyahu’s military record in defending his country. The Israeli prime minister has done daring deeds on behalf of his sapling nation, just as his many predecessors have done before him; and such endeavour, deserves more from Sarkozy and Obama - especially as neither of them can boast of his record on behalf of the nations they serve.

            The state of Israel must at all cost be protected and preserved. If we in the West fail in our obligation to the Jewish state, then we will pay the penalty for our betrayal. If we allow once more the return of the Jewish people to the Diaspora, to yet again bear the brunt  of any economic failure in whatever country they are forced to settle in, then their misery will continue.

            But this will never happen because Israel’s fate is now our own fate. Israel will defend itself to the last including, in extremis, with its own nuclear capability. The Jews will never again become wholly dependent upon the Diaspora for their existence  as they now believe Obama seemingly wishes them to become, after his latest  remark.

           

             

           

             

            

AFTER THE EURO – THE NEXT GREAT THREAT

Time-lines here are crucial. Indeed, if you look back over the history of the diplomatic battles with Iran, timelines seem to be almost infinitely flexible’.

Jonathan Marcus Diplomatic and defence correspondent, BBC News

FOR DAYS NOW there has been talk of a military strike against Iran’s nuclear capability. The Israeli press have been dominated by the possibility, made credible by the presence of a senior British military officer in Israel, and the appearance of Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, in London; as well as an anti-Iranian public statement by the UK.

            But the most convincing clue as to the West’s intension comes with the release of a report by the UN’s nuclear watchdog – the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is expected to confirm the intension of Iran to produce a nuclear weapon. It will suggest that Iran is now on the brink of such a development.

            What this means is, is that diplomacy has proved useless and further sanctions will prove equally so. The president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has taken all of this talk seriously and issued bellicose statements defying Israel, America and Britain to do their worst, promising, in return, an overwhelming military response against Israel.

            There is no doubt in my mind that Iran is endeavouring to create a nuclear capability in a part of the world where such a weapon’s omnipotence would be respected, if the West’s suspicions and intelligent guesses proved accurate.

            If Iran can successfully threaten and chastise her Western enemies and create doubt and fear among their leaders to such an extent that they are left fighting among themselves over what action to take in response to this new Iranian power, then Iran will continue to gain the increasing respect from the Arab Muslim world. But not only this, she will also reach further afield and gain the respect and support among all of those Muslim peoples who blame the West for all of their misfortunes, including droughts and monsoons.

            Ahmadinejad sees the West as  the late Chairman Mao saw the West. He believes  the West are paper tigers roaring endlessly but doing nothing; only posturing and threatening him with sanctions. By using rhetoric as the only source of threat against him, the Iranian president feels personally, as he should, as omnipotent as he feels his ownership of a nuclear capability makes his nation.

            To have allowed such a devastating military capability to be created, and then for it to be placed in the deadly hands of religious fanatics headed by  Iran’s Mullahs; and to have done so without any challenge apart from empty rhetorical threats and various sanctions; the dubious success of which, those imposing them are all too well aware.

           

IF ISRAEL IS FORCED TO go it alone in order to protect her people from the nightmare of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s hand on the nuclear button; then, through sheer necessity, the Jewish state will have to go it alone. Ahmadinejad  has let his feelings toward Israel be known on an almost daily basis. He, like Hamas, wishes the state of Israel not to exist; and he would not hesitate to destroy the Jewish state had he the means to do so. Now it seems, that if the leeks about the contents of  the IAEA report are true; he does have, or is soon to have, such a means.

            We in the West have passed resolution after resolution and issued warning after warning, throughout Iran’s journey toward nuclear statehood. Iran rightly judged that the West would do nothing of any practical effect to deter her in her ambition. Indeed, the West even reigned in Israel when she hoped to halt Iran’s ambitions in their tracks, as she had done when Syria tried to become a nuclear power.

            The West has allowed an unstable leadership of theologians in Iran to develop the ultimate military weapon with only a pointed finger waved in response.

            Iran’s ambitions should have been nipped in the bud before a time was reached when Iran had a responsive capability. The West, but most notably America’s leaders, have badly let their country’s closest ally down. Prevarication became an art form among Western leaders when it came to Iran; so much so that we are living with a far greater threat now than we had much earlier, when we could have sent five or six jets to bomb what would have been a project in its infancy.

           

IRAN NEEDS TO BE STOPPED. But it should be a Western coalition preferably without any direct Israeli involvement that does the deed. The days of prevarication are coming to an end as far as the West and Iran are concerned. Israel would, as she did at the time of the first Iraq War, stand to one side and allow her allies to do what is needed in all of our interests. If Israel has to go it alone then the aftermath for the West will be traumatic. Not only the Arab world but the Islamic world as a whole will be up in arms: and whatever terrorist threat we may have now, will be nothing compared to what will follow a successful Israeli raid on Iran’s nuclear capability.

        Imagine this if you will. We have 15 million Muslims living in Europe. In the UK over two million Muslims have been given UK citizenship. If Israel is left alone to deal successfully with the greatest threat to her country’s survival, then there will be no Synagogue left safe. Anti-Semitism will flourish once more and make the need for a Jewish homeland even more compelling than Hitler once made it. The Left, because of the Palestinian situation are teetering on the brink of Anti-Semitism, without any Israeli action driving them over the edge.

            No, Iran has to be stopped and the West has to do the stopping. We have allowed Iran, just as we did Hitler’s Germany, to become a military force that poses a real threat, not only to Israel, but to Western societies as a whole.

            Think of Ahmadinejad  as another much more powerful Osama bin-Laden. If Israel is determined to embark upon such an adventure and proves successful, the Iranian leader will be able to summon monsters from the deep throughout the Muslim world; and it will be the West to whom they will be sent.

THE WEST MUST repeat what Cameron and Sarkozy did when Libya became part of the Arab Spring. In the case of Iran, they must orchestrate an alliance against Ahmadinejad throughout, not only the Western world, but also within the Muslim world; and in particular, the Arab world; and take on Iran’s nuclear capability.

            Ahmadinejad has enemies in the Arab world, but his defiance of the West only enhances his reputation among their peoples. Only when his nuclear promiscuity is destroyed will we have a safer world. But it must be an alliance of the West and whatever Arab nations can be brought on board that must do what is necessary for international stability.

            Israel, I believe, would prefer any military effort against Iran to be taken from their hands and placed into the hands of her Western allies. Israel needs no greater headache than she already has with both Hamas and Hezbollah; as well as the possible threats to Israel of the Arab Spring. If the Western politicians could manufacture enough courage to act decisively instead of looking over their backs to see whether their public approves their actions or not, then they may merit the title of statesmen.

            I do not know Israel’s intention, but the West had better. Israel, I hope, will do whatever proves needed to preserve her nationhood. Her people have suffered century’s of persecution within the Diaspora and have earned their right to return to their ancient homeland.

            Iran has been allowed to become a nuclear threat to the region by the inadequacies of  Western leadership, whose calculations are ultimately primed by the next election and their own prospects resulting from it.

            Iran has to be stopped pure and simple, and if the West, through the ambitions of their politicians, fall short of this necessity; then it is up to Israel to protect her people and her Jewish state from their future riddance, daily promised by a nuclear armed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

            Like any other nation, Israel will do whatever is in her power to do to preserve her people and their national identity. Nationhood is sacred and Israel will do whatever they feel necessary to preserve it. Our European leaders may lack any such compunction because of the European Union, but thankfully Israel still has a hold on her people’s national identity.

           

            

THE BROTHERS ARE REPRISING THE 1970s

WE ARE ALL GETTING older and hoping to spend an ever increasingly long retirement on a comfortable pension. There was a time, not so very long age, when company pension schemes in the private sector fulfilled this hope and allowed many employees to enjoy an early retirement.

            But today such private pension schemes have had to be abandoned by many employers. If their employees wish to have an addition to their basic state pension, they have to make their own arrangements without any employer contribution.

            However the public sector worker continues to enjoy a healthy retirement because of their employer’s (the taxpayers) contributions have remained intact, and have been generous. Now the government wishes to address this imbalance between the public and private sector. Because we are all living much longer and an increase in the retirement age is needed as well as an increase in employee contribution; in order to afford public sector pensions.

            This, you will not be to surprised to know, has angered the public sector unions; who are now in the process of balloting their members for strike action at the end of this month. In an attempt to avoid this the government has made concessions which they hope will appeal to the public sector workers over the heads of their unions. Chief secretary to the Treasury, Danny Alexander has said 

            ‘This week and over the next couple of weeks, we will be communicating with 2.5 million public servants across this country to explain to them what is the government is offering      

            ‘In those people’s hands is the decision about whether or not to go on strike. In those people’s hands is the influence of the unions’

            The Labour shadow foreign secretary, Douglas Alexander, agreed with his colleagues’ views on the Andrew Marr programme. There is no sane and sensible reason why there needs to be a strike over this issue of public sector pensions after (or for that matter before) the government’s compromise. This issue needs to be tackled once and for all. The previous Labour government should have tackled this question full on during its 13 year tenure in government. But as they are financed by the unions, they have foreclosed on any effective action that would upset their paymasters, whose member’s contributions provided nearly 90% of the Labour Party’s finances.

           

THE PUBLIC SECTOR unions have been itching for a fight with this government from the day it was elected to office; and nothing will deter them in their ambition. Even if this government met every dot and comma of their demands, the unions would conjure up some excuse to continue with their action.

            The  unions are governed not by their member’s interests – if so they would accept the compromise offer by Danny Alexander. They cannot hope for a better deal and, I suspect, their members know this and see no reason why they should be left destitute at Christmas, because of their leader’s prejudices.

            The government has made a compromise that is perceived from all quarters, including the Labour Party as a, if not generous, then fair compromise considering the pressure on the public finances. But the unions are baying once more for Tory blood, and they will once more use their members as a means to an end; as they did in the 1970s.

            The public sector union bosses are recalcitrant Marxists who nevertheless live like the wealthy they  loathe because of their salaries and pension provisions: all of which would compare well with many of the company directors they profess to despise.

            It should be a cause for celebration that we are living and are able to work longer than our parents did before us. Modern diet and medical science has increased our life expectancy.       The retirement age was set 65 when the welfare state became operable after the Second World War. Since then modern scientific medicine and a healthy diet has helped us live longer. It has nothing to do with Tory prejudices, as the unions would like their members to believe, but to do with advances in our survival rates, and the ability of the tax payer to carry on subsidising pensions that they, working in the private sector, can only dream of.

            The union bosses and their activists have been looking forward to the forthcoming series of strikes as much as they have Christmas itself, and are determined to enjoy them however generous the government becomes.

            The government compromise has effectively put the ball back in the union’s court as far as any wish for public sympathy is concerned – although I doubt that, with this lot in charge of the unions, public sympathy matters little. But the union’s membership does care how their action is perceived and may begin to think the government’s compromise, the best outcome available to them.

AS FAR AS THE union’s various leaders are concerned, the forthcoming strikes are political in all but name, and their members are a means to a very nasty political end – getting rid of an elected government. It is a tried and tested tactic that emerged in the late 1960s and evolved throughout the 1970s, usually against a Tory government, but not exclusively. For both Harold Wilson and James Callaghan, were perceived by the more Left-wing unions as being on the Right of the Labour Party and therefore class traitors; which made them legitimate targets.

            It was not until the 1980s that the unions were neutralised by reforms to the law made by Margaret Thatcher; reforms of the kind that outlawed secondary picketing and sympathy strikes. After her reforms, the unions, for fear of the enormous financial penalties they faced, began to see sense The unions were taught a bitter lesson, but one which had to be given for the country’s sake.

            We cannot go back to those days. They almost brought the country to its knees: we were called the sick man of Europe. Bodies went unburied and our streets became infested by weeks of uncollected refuse. We worked a four day week and suffered power cuts on a daily basis. The term, third world country, was proving a popular description for what was occurring.

            The public sector workers have to adjust themselves to a new reality and learn to live with it. If you were to win and have every one of your demands acceded to by the government, then it would be some other part of the public sector that would have to bear the cost. Those who work in the public sector are financed through general taxation; it is as simple as that, and what may turn out to be a victory for them, will come at a cost to those working in private sector, who have long since seen their company pension schemes abandoned.

           

           

           

           

           

GEORGE LIVES WITH FISHES

You come from an island, so maybe you don’t understand the subtleties  of European construction’

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President snapping at a BBC reporter at the G20

GEORGE  PAPANDREOU announced that he was going to give his people a voice in how their country’s history was to take its next vital step. It was the right thing to do and the brave thing to do. He offered his people the chance to decide for themselves, by referendum, whether they should stay with the austerity imposed on them by France and Germany, or declare for bankruptcy.

            At a time of such a crisis as that now experienced by Greece, it is surely right that, in any democracy, the people should determine their future. If they can longer be given this opportunity then Greece would be better off under the notorious colonels that governed their country post-war.

            But Mr Papandreou was summoned to Cannes to meet his Godfathers, Messer’s Merkle and Sarkozy. When the meeting ended, so did the possibility of a referendum. Mr Papandreou returned to announce its demise.

            What happened when he appeared before the Grand Inquisition is, if the press are to be believed, starting to come to light. We are told that the Greek prime minister was threatened with being denied any future bailout cash by the German Chancellor, and was also told that his country would face EU expulsion for ten years. After which, we are told, the Greek opposition were contacted in order to find a way of withdrawing  support from Papandreou.

            Such is the character of the European family our own home-grown Europhiles wish us to join. If those European leaders gathered at the G20 meeting in Cannes, did indeed make any kind of contact with the Greek opposition in order to get rid of what was after all their country’s elected  prime minister, then it is no exaggeration to level the charge against Brussels of fermenting a coup in Greece.

            Mr Papandreou has been made to look like a Neville Chamberlain figure by his country’s European masters. He offered his people a say in their future, but it was not to be: he is of course no hero; he, like all Greece’s politicians have conspired in the creation of their nation’s predicament. They have lied about their country’s finances in order to secure membership of the euro - but then the deception should have been discovered at the time; which it probably was, but  ignored by European idealism which rubber stamped Greece’s membership.

            Indeed, the EU as a whole  has little to boast about regarding any country’s finances the EU’s signing off of  accounts. Their own accounts have not been signed off  by the auditors for several years. Corruption is rife in Europe and Greece is not the sole transgressor.

WHAT I WOULD LIKE to see, is a return to the old Europe. A Europe of free trade where the people of Europe can prosper without the overweening presence of a Brussels bureaucratic oversight that supervises and pronounces upon each every aspect of our lives;  a European super state that diminishes the individual’s ability to flourish by the ravenous use of regulation that stifles enterprise - the very mechanism needed to bring wealth to the ordinary citizens of the continent of Europe.

            The European project was a terrible mistake; a mistake based upon a noble premise of ridding the continent of Europe of future internal wars that had for centuries occupied the continent; but all it will do is create new fissures to replace the ancient ones with same consequences for the continent.

            History in the making rarely impacts on the busy everyday lives of the people. It is only when they look back over their lives that a clear picture emerges of just how much the many changes of just five or six decades has moved their world forward.

            But then sudden events of great significance concentrate their minds and make them feel a part of history for the first time. Both of the world wars were such events; and now I believe we are in the midst of an equally cataclysmic period of European history. A period which will be effect the lives of all of us.

            The backdrop is the European debt crises and the unfolding drama will divide Europe and the nations within it. Rather than a continent of ‘solidarity’ and concord, as the founding fathers and their decedents wanted; a two tier, two speed Europe, will emerge from the political divisions that the debt crises is causing. The 17 euro members will form the core of the Union, while the 10 nations outside of the euro zone will become satellites, having, through Qualified Majority Voting (QMV) to obey the core members.

            Latter this week a report will be published by Open Europe which will describe how, through the Lisbon Treaty we have given this inner core the power through QMV to effectively overrule our parliament. We will no longer hold our veto…and Gordon Brown told us when he signed the treaty in December 2007, that this would be a technical adjustment not requiring a referendum.

            Once again the British people were duped on an issue involving our relationship with Europe - a piece of hoodwinking that is, in the light of the current crises, going to cost us dear in terms of our standard of living, and, if the people do not act, in terms of our sovereignty and national independence.

           

            

WELL DONE GEORGE

GEORGE PAPANDREOU, the prime minister of Greece, has caused outrage among the European political elite for having the temerity to give his people a say in their future by giving them a chance to vote on the €130 billion Greek bailout package agreed to last week among the leaders of the euro17.

            European Union politicians are not democrats, they fear the ballot box; to them it holds all of the uncertainty and horror of Pandora’s, and they will fight tooth and nail to avoid it if it is not required, other than to elect a government: and a referendum is an indulgence too far. It is bad enough that every five years they have to face the wretched people in an election, without one of their kind deliberately giving his citizens one ‘free of charge’ so to speak.

            After weeks of toiling behind closed doors in constant fear of the financial markets; and eventually having to go cap in hand to the Chinese, the euro17 finally congratulated themselves on a deal that pleases the markets (in the short term at least). The supportive  FTSE, Dow, Hang Seng, etcetera …at last, the EU leaders could see light at the end of tunnel. The markets were buying the deal and Angela Merkle and Nicolas  Sarkozy could get their first night of uninterrupted sleep in weeks.

            But then, out of the blue, George announces what must now seem like an ancient curse to the Eurocrats after their experience with the Lisbon Treaty – a referendum; an unwanted intrusion by the people into affairs that are better dealt with by the new bourbons of Brussels.

            Poor old George now has to appear in the headmaster’s study to explain himself, as the markets begin to teeter once more.

            The Greek prime minister was right to do what he has done, even if it was tarnished by domestic political considerations. It is right that the Greek people should have their say on an issue that will, one way or another, keep them and future generations impoverished. The question on the ballot paper will however be suitably edited and the vote will be for the bailout package.

            But at least the Greek people will have the final word, which is as it should be in any modern democracy: or so you would think. We British, on the other hand, who boast to the world that we are the mother of all parliaments; only a week ago witnessed a debate in this ‘mother of all parliaments’ that rejected giving the British people the same right of a say in their nation’s future as George Papandreou gave his people.

            Instead what we witnessed was a desperate act of  suppression by David Cameron to defeat the debates’ motion calling for a referendum on this country’s future within Europe. Like Angela Merkle and Nicolas Sarkozy, David Cameron suffers the same cold sweats as his colleagues at the mere mention of a referendum. So he imposed a three-line whip on his back benches even though the debate’s result was never binding. This is how much of a threat  our leaders’ consider, what they deem to be an anarchic device of a referendum, to be.

TO EUROPE’S POLITICIANS a referendum is like an architect having to defer to a bricklayer. They have this vision of a Federal Europe and are determined to destroy what they perceive of as any obstacle to this apparition.

            When, as part of this journey, the EU embarked upon the European single currency, they did so driven more by idealism than common sense. Even Sarkozy now says that Greece should never have been allowed to participate – which many at the time, in the UK  at least, were telling them; but, then, perfidious Albion …?

            But it was not only Greece that should have remained outside such a project. All of southern Europe; Portugal, Spain and Italy, should never have been welcomed into such an enterprise. Such mismatched economies could never form a single currency. Only idealism - that world of pure emotion, could have transacted such a failure as we are witnessing today.

            Rather than condemning the Greek prime minister for behaving like a democrat (for whatever reason) we in this country at least, should be emulating him. When will David Cameron give his people their own say on Europe?

            Even though the European continent is in danger of, not only its own economic ruin, but also playing its part in the ruin of the Western world’s banking system, the bacillus Europhile nevertheless still believes in the historical destiny of a United States of Europe, and will continue to pursue its objective come what may.

           

           

           

           

            

THE SELFISH CHILDREN OF THE SELFISH GENERATION

LET US ASSUME THAT those protesters protesting against the capitalist system outside of St. Pauls are not their solely to enjoy themselves knowing that, unlike London’s homeless, they can vacate their tents at night and go home to a hot shower and warm bed. Let us take them as seriously as the present incumbent of  the Canterbury Archbishopric, Rowan Williams does. Let us treat them as rational beings who have it all worked out; let us assume that having diagnosed what they see as a disease -  they are somewhat blessed with a well formulated alternative.

            This ‘disease’ is the bacillus capitalism. The cure however, has never been articulated. Only slogans have been offered as a justification for their presence outside our prime residence of worship.

            What St. Pauls has done to deserve such a presence God only knows. But Rowan Williams, true to form, has sought to legitimise the gathering.

            When I challenged capitalism myself as a young man in the 1970s, I offered up the teachings of one Karl Marx as an alternative to the vagaries of the market place. This however proved an insufficient alternative in the countries that turned their backs on capitalism. Having lived in misery for decades the people eventually had to face the fact of human nature and its irredeemable character .

            There have been two well tried alternatives to free-market capitalism. Nazism and Communism; and each  brought horror, devastation and panic to the last century. Communism was eventually brought to book by the overpowering ability of capitalism to out-evolve communism through its technological development -  a development that promised its innovators great wealth. By such an appeal to human nature capitalism eventually rid itself of communism.

            There has never been a viable alternative to capitalism that can both allow human nature to flourish, as well as, through its judiciary, to rein in its many excesses. Capitalism and democracy go hand in hand; without one, the other could not function. Which means that those opponents of capitalism currently encamped outside St Pauls and enjoying their publicity, have a considerable challenge to undertake. They have to explain in scholarly detail how they hope to replace a whole economic and social system with one that is immeasurably better.

            Slogans are not enough – they just announce their collective infantilism to the world. If they are to be taken as seriously by the world beyond the steps of St. Pauls Cathedral, they must do what far greater intellects than either theirs or mine have tried and failed to do. They must provide a credible and workable root and branch replacements for capitalism.

WHY THE LAST century’s many political isms failed, was because they came fully ‘worked out’ by means of the human brain. Once you start to rationalise a new economic and social order, you are doomed to fail because your first impulse is to change human nature; at first through reason, but in time this ultimately fails; then it is through compunction and the tyranny of the state. This was the lesson that the last century taught us, when ideals replaced even common sense and Marxist and fascist utopian theory took control away from capitalism and ended up with a brutal dystopian reality.

            Not that they will or even should listen to advice from me; but nevertheless those young idealists ensconced outside St Pauls should fold up their free market produced, and highly efficient tents, and take their leave of  the vicinity (as they have already made the Dean of St Pauls do), and return home to their, in many cases, middle class life styles.

            Everyone in the country now knows about them and what they are against. There is little point in continuing with their display of immature protest against an economic system that has, through its somewhat turbulent, and at times unjust evolution,  given us the modern capitalist world. A world that, if you look around it with an open mind, does not deserve to be gotten rid of; and if these protesters spent a moment disengaged from their nihilism, and gave thought to how, in every field of human activity, capitalism has worked to our ultimate benefit, then perhaps they may warm to its existence instead of wishing it away – because wishing it away is all that, in the end, they are capable of.

            The beauty of capitalism is that it was not the single idea of any single individual. As a system, it evolved and survived with or without any revolutionary input from those scholarly mechanics of  19^th and 20^th century barbarism.

            Human nature describes what we are. We are capable of the greatest acts of sacrifice, as well as the ignobility of cowardice. We are ambitious for ourselves and our families; we want more for our children than we ourselves proved able to achieve; we like to be rewarded for our endeavours, whether we are bankers, company directors or workers on the factory floor.

            We need incentives in life because by nature we are ambitious; whether it is promotion and a better standard of living or an increase in wages through an increase in our productivity. Capitalism allows all of these human impulses to work. They are good urges that drive the whole of society, that those campers outside St Pauls wish to erase.

            Human nature has been dissected over the centuries by philosophers both ancient and modern without much benefit to humanity. All we have as a species is our very nature and it is a constant battle to find some kind of equilibrium between its worst and best impulses; and capitalism does this.     While it will periodically lead us astray, our nature is also the force that has enriched our development through full democracy. It does so because it rewards achievement, and by so doing advances all aspects of our (Western) culture at every level.

            Wealth is seen as a dirty word, even amongst those members of the artistic community who have managed under capitalism to accumulate such wealth, yet still stand full square behind the St Pauls’ squatters…as liberal hypocrites!

THOSE GATHERED OUTSIDE of St Pauls are the middle class children of the selfish generation. They are the recipients of their parent’s experience. They have been told to mistrust all authority; even  authority based upon the consent of the people. In many cases, their parents and yes, their university lecturers, have motivated their anti-capitalist sentiments.

            These poor saplings that have had their growth stunted by such impressionability, have now taken up the mantle of victims. They have sought their martyrdom on the steps of St Pauls, hoping that water canon will be the final sacrifice that will inspire their nihilistic behaviour to be imitated elsewhere.

           

           

           

           

           5