Polemic: Un-patriotic? The last refuge of a scoundrel

Polemic: Un-patriotic? The last refuge of a scoundrel

Un-patriotic? The last refuge of a scoundrel

patriot

1.

a person who loves, supports, and defends his or her country and its interests with devotion.

WHAT PARTY leader best fits the above definition of a patriot - Clegg, Cameron, Milliband, or Farage? Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, would choose the three main party leaders of course; but the public I believe; even if they disagree with him, would choose Farage.

            

            Mr Hunt has slammed Nigel Farage as unpatriotic; which of course is the very antithesis of what Mr Farage represents. You could describe someone who believes in European federalism as unpatriotic; you can also describe someone who believes in uncontrolled immigration which causes monumental problems for the indigenous people, with respect to the NHS, housing, and education, as unpatriotic: you can describe someone who cuts our military spending but insists on ring-fencing oversees aid, as unpatriotic.

            

            But to accuse, as Mr Hunt does, someone who is anti-federalist, who believes in the survival of the nation state, national sovereignty, national survival, and the supremacy of the nation's laws over all others, as un-patriotic, is simply implausible, naive, and ignorant. Having a Rolls Royce brain does not stop someone acting foolishly or saying stupid things and Mr Hunt is a prime example.

            

            The Conservative Party has long since abandoned the values that made them patriotic. When Margaret Thatcher took her departure from politics; slowly but visibly, the Tory Party eviscerated any idea of "outdated" patriotism in the era of the European Union.

            

             The Tory Party had started to become the party of Europe under Ted Heath, who signed the first treaty that would lead to Maastricht, and Lisbon, which Cameron promised he would never sign, unless, that is, Brown were to accept Cameron's nod and a wink, which he did, and signed it before Cameron came to  power.

            

              The true patriots inside the Tory Party, the euro-sceptic MPs, were treated by their own party leadership in the same way Ukip is now being treated. They were seen as clowns and idiots …swivel- eyed fanatics, and loons, not to be taken seriously. But they were, and still are patriots; despite their feeble natures.

HUNT'S NAME CALLING, is a sign of panic among the political elite. Over the past week, and ever since last year's local election results; Ukip has been targeted by the liberal establishment. By which I mean the three main parties, whose conjoined motto (I am sorry, I know no Latin) should be, "We are all social democrats now".

            

             Along with the printed media, who, despite their party loyalties, have united to destroy Farage; we have the BBC weighing in, using its news channel as the mouthpiece for the liberal hegemony. Despite the yearly £3.5 billion in taxes harvested by the BBC; they still smugly insist that their liberal agenda should dominate the airways not only in news , science (global warming), but also in politics and the arts: leaving the many thousands (or even millions?) of us who have nothing in common with such an agenda left having to pay our £145 licence fee on fear of imprisonment… how liberal is that?

            

             Yet all these charges of racism regarding Ukip's posters (we are promised more will appear this week), and Nigel Farage's supposed dalliances with his secretary, and his supposed (it is all supposition), but unproven expenses scandal - as well as the media showing almost every picture they use of Mr Farage, sees him propping up a bar with a pint in one hand and a cigarette in the other: yet none of this has dented Ukip's popularity.

            

             This should tell the Metropolitan elite something. But I am afraid the London bubble under which they live and incestuously socialise around the dinner table, leaves them sublimely ignorant of what the country north of Reading actually thinks. Simply because they care little about what the country outside of London thinks.          

IT IS FAR TOO SOON TO SAY, and such a long way to go. But could it be that a new party is forming (like a nebula in part of our galaxy) that challenges the established triplets, that seek this country's decline within a federal Europe. After all, the Labour Party when it started had its closet communists, just as Ukip has its closet racists. But all Ukip can do, is what Labour did when they proscribed members of the British Communist Party from joining the Labour Party. But as a member of the British Communist Party in the early 1970s; I knew locally of members of the Labour party joining the Communist Party and attending branch meetings - one of whom was a Labour councillor and trade union representative.

            

             All new political parties (as was once the Labour Party) have an embryonic stage, which if Ukip proves triumphant in the European elections, it will have passed; and it will only be the first past the post system that prevents their accession to the green benches in parliament.

JEREMY HUNT, angered by Ukip's advance in the latest opinion poll, which puts his party in third place for the European election, and Ukip in first at 31%, acted irrationally with his comments. For, in the light of day, he could never stand them up. Farage is a patriot par excellence; and, unlike the modern "Tory" party, does not feel shame or embarrassment by being described as such.

            

             Ukip is a seedling that seeks to bloom like Labour once did (in a general election), but can only do so in order to beat the first past the post system if the people (particularly the Tory and Labour core vote) put their trust in it. I am not naive. That age (I am now 64) has long since passed me ; and I have no loyalty to Ukip. I am not a member; but it must, in time, if the party lives up to my expectation, become one of the three main parties replacing the Liberal Democrats, whose main purpose is for this nation to become nothing more than a province within a federal Europe.

            

             Ukip, at the moment, speaks for the British people; even for many of those who, out of life-long loyalty to the main parties will continue to vote for them. Nigel Farage speaks for the indigenous population - a constituency that the three main parties have ignored in their seeding and cultivation of the ideology of Multiculturalism.

                       

           

           

             

           

UKIP ARE launching a £1.5 million poster campaign for the European elections. The money comes from the millionaire Paul Sykes, one time Tory supporter and provider; so let us have no nudge-nudge wink-wink references to his personal wealth from the Tory Daily Mail; who are even touting for quotes from Labour MPs to do Nigel Farage and Ukip down.

            

            There is a grand journalistic alliance between Tory, Liberal, and Labour supporting papers and media, to finish Farage off. Ideological enemies are uniting to disparage Ukip's assault on the three main party's social democratic ideology.

           

             We have even returned to the old use of an old favourite by Ukip's enemies - 'racist'; and according to Dan Hodges writing in the Daily Telegraph, not only racist, but worse than the BNP. This reincarnation of the term 'racist', an old favourite used against anyone who opposed the Labour Party unleashing of mass migration from Europe in 2008, has been, in a Frankenstein sense, re-created.

            

              Now the political class is running scared, and so scare stories must be created to make people scared. They have tried insinuating that Farage is a drunk, an adulterer, and a fraudster. All attempts have failed. So it has now come full circle and that old favourite of the liberal elite has reared its head once more.

            

              They have charged Farage with racism because of one of the posters. I have seen the posters published in the press; and the only one which, I assume has lead to charges of racism is the one which has a pointed finger with message "26 million people in Europe are looking for work. And whose are they after?" Well does this question merit the racist response?

            

              This is a message that many ordinary British people will understand - even those who, out of party loyalty, will vote for the three main parties on May 22^nd. This question is not racist, it is a question millions of ordinary people know the answer to but are afraid of being branded racist for answering it outside of their homes or the public house.

            

               To pretend that the massive influx of migration, whether from within or from without Europe, has no bearing on the wages of the indigenous population, is tantamount to burying ones head in the sand. Which I am afraid, for domestic political reasons, and tribal survival, the press and the three main political parties are guilty of: and in the few weeks left leading up to the European elections, do not be surprised if Nigel Farage is being insinuated as paedophile by the allied press and media.

            

              We are becoming an overcrowded island. It has nothing to do with racism; although our complacent elite wish to portray it as such. The Daily Mail does not accuse Ukip of racism, but goes out of its way to give much comment to those who do, in the hope of damaging Ukip's chances, and in the hope of improving David Cameron's.

THE OTHER POSTERS, like the one which asks, 'Who really runs this country?' has a Union flag with its centre set alight to reveal the European flag beneath and spreading to eventually eliminate the union flag. This is not racist either; but the truth. This country is being drawn ever closer to European political and monetary union.

            

             Ever more of our laws are being questioned by the superior (in the hierarchical sense) judicial bodies in Europe. Bodies which we have to obey because our political parties have signed away our sovereignty - is this racism?

            

            Another poster shows a British worker wearing the safety gear that protects him in  his job - yellow safety helmet and a yellow fluorescent sleeveless vest. He is pictured sitting on the pavement with his back up against the wall. In front of him sits a cup. He is seeking contributions from the public, like some busker. The slogan reads 'EU policy at work. British workers are hit hard by unlimited cheap labour' - is this racist?

ALL UKIP are trying to do is warn the people of this country that their ruling elite are set upon this nation becoming part of a United States of Europe. It has nothing to do with race, but culture and numbers. Numbers which have already made their impact on our schools, housing, the NHS, and welfare. It is about numbers not 'foreigners'.

            

            Our business community welcome the avalanche; for it offers them the chance to pay wages lower than even the minimum wage; our liberal middle classes welcome this invasion for the same reason -  cheap domestic cleaners and household servants.

            

            Ukip are not racist. Rather the liberal elite are, along with many businessmen, in the market for cheap labour; and it seems that, in reality, it is all they care about: and anyone who opposes them are the racists. This is no longer about party, for the three main ones are basically the same . I have a test for the British press. How many of their journalists have hired a domestic worker from outside of this country? How many BBC workers have done the same?

            

            Dan Hodges's racist charges and Fascist comparisons with the BNP made against Ukip, diminishes him as a journalist who wishes his opinions to be taken seriously. He is the Telegraphs token Lefty who the paper thinks it needs to employ for the sake of journalistic equilibrium. His piece however, is the work of a blatherskite.

            

            Nigel Farage is certainly getting under the skin of all the main parties and their hangers on - especially the political journalists, who have an unhealthy relationship - if not a dependency - on the main parties. They are like those little fish who follow the sharks around the ocean finding sustenance by riding on and nibbling their backs. It is a symbiotic relationship which the lobby journalists in particular would not like to see disturbed in any way.

            

             Farage will still have good European election; and I will tell those journalists why. They could discover that Farage was responsible for 9/11, but it would not make any difference. Those who support Ukip and are turning to them are fed up with the current political- media set-up. They loath the obfuscation, corruption, and mendacity of the political class and the bottom feeders of the lobby system.

             

           

            

Blair is finally right - well almost

''We have to elevate the issue of religious extremism to the top of the agenda,'' Tony Blair

TONY BLAIR is no more my favourite politician than was Margaret Thatcher to Arthur Scargill. But I hope that if someone whom I care little for says something I agree with, I will not be churlish and disagree with him just for the sake of it.

            

             Today Mr Blair gave a 45 minute talk on what he sees as the greatest threat to the world today - Islamism: and I am forced through conviction to agree with him. He believes the West has been side-tracked by the stand-off in the Ukraine, and we must unite with Russia and China to take on a far more important threat to peace in the world than the events in the Ukraine.

            

            Once more I agree. But we must pause and digress a little. The European union, which Mr Blair has, or had, ambitions to become president of, began this confrontation. Because of the Napoleonic ambitions of Brussels, the EU began to entice the Ukraine into, first of all a trading alliance; leading eventually to full membership of the EU.

            

            Now the West knows full well that Russia has a legitimate geopolitical interest in how events in the Ukraine unfold; an interest the EU ignored, when they sought the seduction of the Ukraine. The country lies on Russia's borders, and Russia sees Europe and Nato as a threat. It was a conflict manufactured in Brussels. It was a confrontation that could have waited, until Putin left power. There was no hurry; the EU has enough problems on its hands because of the economic crises caused by the euro. Empire building could have been put on hold, until the political and economic climate proved more fortuitous regarding such a seducement.

NOW BACK TO BLAIR'S speech. In terms of global foreign policy Islamic fundamentalism should be at the top of the international agenda. But because of our interventions in Afghanistan; and the defeat we suffered at the hands of an ill-equipped and motley band of peasants still living in the middle ages; our politicians bury their heads in the sand when someone like Blair correctly provides the correct perspective on foreign policy. They fear another Afghanistan and stick their fingers in each other's ears when talk of any prospective military confrontation is spoken off.

            

             Blair's most important comment was on the need to form alliances against Islamism. These alliances should, as Blair said, encompass Russia and China, both of whom have their own interest in seeking the demise Islamism. To take on Islamism the West will need Russia and China on side.

            

             The West, the East, and the Far East would make a formidable triumphret. Churchill warned of the threat from Nazi Germany, and was shot down by the appeasers. He suffered ridicule in the House of Commons, from those tired by conflict following the appalling loses suffered in the First World War; it was understandable but not forgivable following the course of history.

            

              I doubt if Blair had a Churchillian moment when he looked at the world and perceived what the greatest threat to world peace was. But today we heard a speech given by a true statesman whatever his many failings as a prime minister.

            

             His warnings will no doubt be ignored by politicians within all parties and journalists, who, for political or personal reasons despise the man. Blair was the Shallow Hal when it came to the spin-doctoring that everyone seems to believe he invented. But we are all entitled to get one thing right in our lives and Blair's attack on Islamism is his.

THE ADVANCE of Islamic fundamentalism is not confined to the Middle East. Europe is the home to 15 million Muslims. The UK has 2.5 million. Last week we heard that there is believed to be 400 British Muslims fighting in Syria. This is a guesstimate, it could be 4,000. But when they return, they will have been professionally trained, not by military instructors, but by experience.

            

            We are told they face arrest upon return; and weak-kneed appeals have gone out to parents, wives and even children to stitch-up anyone in their family who seeks to become a Syrian Jihadist. But considering how our politicians and public institutions have been fearful of upsetting all ethnic minorities by their decision making; I doubt this is nothing more than just another announcement announced to settle the nerves of the indigenous population.

           

            Enoch Powell used the words 'upper hand' to describe what he saw as an influx of migrants, whose numbers would increase to a level whereby they would assert themselves over the indigenous people. I quote Powell, not because I agree with all of his views; but the ones I do believe, as is the case with Tony Blair, I support.

            

            Blair makes reference to Birmingham and the current controversy of the teaching methods of certain Muslims, to warn people of what comes next, when cities like Birmingham, and northern cities like Bradford with large Muslim populations have the confidence to strike out in the coming decades.

WHERE I DISAGREE profoundly with Blair is on his insistence that Islamic fundamentalism is a minority pursuit. What is a minority pursuit within Islam, resides among  those who genuinely believe in democracy. Islam is still tied to its medieval past. Its attitude to women, which encompasses Female Genital Mutilation, arranged marriages and honour killings: along with the pursuit of white indigenous young girls (Rochdale and Oxford), which they believe are free to be raped under Islam as infidels.

            

             I would say this to Tony Blair. Unlike Christianity, Islam has never been put through the white heat of Reformation. Countries today which harbour such a faith have never had any kind of Enlightenment because they never had any Reformation. This is the historical flushing out process that creates a kinder church; but one which has left Islamic societies behind to continue to bask in their medievalism.

             

             Islam's attitudes and beliefs remain, in many respects, as they were in the 8^th century. Blair, like all Western politicians, are fearful of Islam. He may perceive and rationalise the threat from Islam; but attributes it to a minority in order to keep the Muslim community on board and fearful of upsetting them…just as all Western politicians tend to do. But this approach may well turn out to be the West's Achilles heel and its nemeses .

           

             Whenever there is an act of terror, the politicians dash into the television studios eager to proclaim the act had nothing to do with the vast majority of law abiding Muslim citizens. This may be true now. But as the Muslim population grows and become more assertive in cities such as Birmingham and Bradford; where over time they will effectively run these cities, then they will demand sharia.

            

              Islam and democracy are not comfortable bed fellows. Sharia (or religious law) takes precedence over parliamentary law when it comes to the way Muslims should live. We have seen honour killings and arranged marriages; we have seen female genital mutilation carried out (would you believe) on the NHS. These are Islamic practices which are part of Islamic culture; and our heavily Muslim populated northern cities will one day feel their power - and the political class will give in to it.

            

               So Tony Blair is only partly right when he calls for an alliance against Islamism (but not Islam). But it is my contention that in demographic terms, the greater the population of Muslims, that over time grows, not only in this country but throughout Europe, the more power they will have over us.

           

               In Europe there are over 15 million Muslims, and it s no good the politicians saying that 14,990,000  of them are law abiding citizens. Islam is a threat. Not Islamism, which is a convenient word that liberal opinion have manufactured to suggest that the problems of Islam in the modern world are only the fault of a minority of Muslims - thus evading charges of racism and of being  accused as hate criminals..

TONY BLAIR believes he will be vindicated by history, and he will be; but only partly so. Islam is on the march. It has defeated the West in Afghanistan and Iraq; and where the West has intervened successfully militarily - as in Libya. It has all gone to pot and Cameron and Hollande no longer refer to it.

           

               But the political commentators, and newspaper journalists, who, like myself despise the man, must take cognisance of his arguments, and debate the issue on that level alone. They must take seriously his warnings and abandon their clichéd responses such as those that they and Blair pursue, suggesting Islamism is a minority pursuit among our Islamic community.

           

           

           

            

Are we still a Christian country?

THE FORMER Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, has entered the 'are we still a Christian country?' debate which was started by David Cameron who believed our country was, and suggested a more evangelical approach by the Anglican Church would keep it so.

            

            The response came in the form of a correspondence to the Daily Telegraph, signed by an assortment 50 liberalarti, including academics, scientists, media folk, authors and luvvies, and at least one GP; all declaiming the opposite view to the prime ministers.

            

            Now the former 'Christian lite' archbishop has come out and announced that 'We are living in a post Christian Britain…' Well we are not quite there yet as a poll in today's Sunday Telegraph suggests. Fifty-six per cent of respondents believe we are  a Christian nation. The figure rises to 60 per cent among men, and 73 per cent among the over 65s

            

            More disturbingly the poll found that 48 per cent of respondents believed Christianity received less protection from the state than other faiths; and the figure rose 62 per cent among non-practising Christians.

            

             Lord Williams of Oystermouth, as he is now referred as, is partly to blame for the gradual demise of his faith. His liberal approach which even extended to the proposition that sharia law had a place within English law must have been the final straw for many worshipping Anglicans who came to see Rome as the only beacon that kept their faith alive and remained true to the Gospels.

            

             It has been a standing joke since the late 1950s' onset of liberalism in the Anglican church, that you do not have to believe in God to be a vicar or Bishop in the Church of England - but it is no longer a joke, but a reality. One of the reasons we are becoming a none Christian nation is because the Anglican church has become a none Christian Church; adapting itself to the liberal secularist agenda such as women priest, to be followed by women bishops: and embarrassed by such issues as gay marriage which the liberal church hierarchy has no objection to - but as the current Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has noted; it is beyond his power to resolve.

            

             The resolution of the gay marriage issue in the Anglican church is almost impossible. This is another reason why this country's status as a Christian country is withering on the vine. In Africa however, it is not. In Africa the Anglican community is as steadfast as ever; still believing, as Anglicans in this country once did, in the un-liberalised teachings of the Gospel.

           

              In Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, and South Africa. The Anglican community takes the biblical testimony, not unpicked by the Anglican liberals in the UK, as the main source of their faith; as once did, a few decades ago, the Church of England.

CHRISTIANITY in the Anglican Church is being destroyed from within not from without. As the Telegraph poll suggests, Christianity still flourishes in one form or another. That the fall in the numbers in congregations should be the benchmark of decline according to the signatories of the Telegraph correspondence, is irrelevant.

            

             What matters is that so many people still see this as a Christian country and themselves as Christians despite the weakness of the Anglican hierarchy. If I believed in God, I would avoid the modern Anglican Church at all costs. But I would still pray; and this is the test. Prayer is the true test of faith. Not the Sunday appearances in church. It is when the life of a loved one is imperilled, either through illness or war; that many a none believer or lapsed Christian has turned to God. When a loved one lies in a coma for months on end, and the authority of the medical profession left unable to determine when or if the patient would awake. Then prayer seems like the best bet - even, maybe, for some of those signatories.

            

             The Anglican Church may die in the UK, but it will have been brought about through its own folly. Nevertheless it will continue to flourish on the African continent. Lord Rowan Williams' claim that this country is a post-Christian one is a misnomer; in the sense that his view of Christianity revolves only around the Anglican Church in the UK.

            

             Catholicism, on the other hand, as well as the dozens of Protestant communions, that exist in this country and around the world suggests (they are particularly strong in America) is that Christianity is flourishing globally. But it's the UK Anglican variation that may be in decline.

           

             Lord Williams, whilst archbishop of Canterbury has never defended the biblical faith but only tried to accommodate secularism with it; as he tried to do with Islam and sharia law. He, more than any single individual, has helped bring about what he refers to as the 'post-Christian age' in the UK.

            

             Having a high intelligent quota as Lord Williams undoubtedly does: does not immunise him against stupidity. He is a scholar of Dostoevsky, who, along with Dickens, represent the two major authors of the 19^th century. But he must know Dostoevsky would never have tolerated what he would have regarded as the apostate views of Christianity, represented by the modern Anglican Church. What would today be regarded as bigotry was part of the literal faith of the Bible when Dostoevsky was alive.

            

             I truly believe that Lord Williams faces comparison with Prince Mushkin, the naive simpleton created by Dostoevsky, and the anti-hero of his novel - The Idiot. Mushkin represents modern liberal degeneracy, as does the noble Lord. Dostoevsky was a conservative; which meant a traditionalist. He created Mushkin as a well meaning simpleton who managed to mesmerise.

            

             Lord Williams has returned to academia, where he should have stayed. For he did little good entering the limelight of the public stage as Archbishop of Canterbury. All he managed to do was to further weaken his church, and allow the advancement of the moral-nihilism that is secularism.

War, and the conjoined immorality of the EU and Russia

TYPHOON FIGHTER'S were scrambled yesterday as a Russian Tupolev-95 bomber (known as the Bear) flew into British airspace. The Tupolev-95 is an ancient aircraft, and would have been no match for the Typhoons.

            

            But in an excellent and informative article by Andrew Critchlow in today's Daily Telegraph he writes: "Although the sight of Britain’s most sophisticated fighter jet shadowing the ageing Russian Tupolev-95 – a dinosaur from the Cold War – gives the reassuring impression that we have a military edge over Moscow, this image could not be further from the truth."

            

            The Russian military could advance into Ukraine and beyond if it wished and there would be very little Europe and Nato could do to prevent it short of a nuclear confrontation. Russia has a vast military capability. Not all its weaponry is modern, but it outnumbers anything Europe and the UK can put together. The age of the weapons being used is not important if you have an overwhelming advantage in numbers.

            

             Putin is set to spend over £400 billion on his nation's defence over the next decade, and has promised a professional, better paid army. All this while European nations including our own are reducing our defence budgets, relying once more on the Americans to come to our rescue.

            

             However, Obama has already ruled out any direct military involvement in the Ukraine. The military weakness of Europe and Nato without America, is all too obvious to Putin. He knows, even if the West's military were capable of destroying his; the West does not share Putin's ruthlessness when it comes to armed conflict. If our troops were allowed to behave in Afghanistan as Putin allowed his to perform in Chechnya, then perhaps the Taliban might not be so cocky as they are today after driving out the West.

            

             If Europe were ever to engage with Russia militarily under Putin's watch. The politicians and generals would have to tear up the Geneva convention and allow its military to combat Russia with equal ruthlessness, as happened in the Second World War against Nazism. Today there are those who see the bombing raids undertaken by the allies on Germany as war crimes; and such naivety will undermine the extent of what would be needed to be done if ever Russia (or any other military power) broke out into Europe.

           

             When a nation invades another nation. The nation invaded has every right to do whatever is needed to oppose the invader; and the Geneva Convention, the UN, and the various international courts of human rights; as well as groups like Amnesty International… must be told to go hang.

            

              Churchill had a chilling phrase. Total War. It meant that when a nation is under threat. That nation has to do everything in its power to keep the nation free and alive; and whatever the extent of the actions taken, they have to be lived with afterwards when the nation under invasion has victory.

            

              Why so many people, outside of Metropolitan London, in this country admire Putin is not because they have any innate sympathy for his cause. But because he is acting like a strong leader. While in Europe, including the UK, we are led by what Mao-tse-Tung once described as 'paper tigers'.

           

               It is no good name calling, or barraging your enemy with rhetoric, as our prime minister and his foreign secretary does. Such sophistry on the world stage only adds to the embarrassment of the British people who know that there is little else we can do.

            

              Our military is in no shape to do anything to harm Putin. It has been allowed to wither on the vine through defence cuts; while the billions taken from this nations defenses have been re-directed to the international aid budget, which has, would you believe, been ring fenced?

THIS COUNTRY'S politicians have always left this country militarily weak in a crises. The defence budget has always been the first port of call whenever our politicians, having fucked up the economy, seek to make cutbacks.

            

             If, and it is a big if, Putin rallies his country to stand against whatever economic sanctions the West are capable of making; then Europe is in deep trouble. The Russian people have always been survivors, and the enticements of capitalism have not existed long enough, or extended far enough into the Russian population to turn all of them into consumers that would sell themselves to the devil if they could own a piece of plastic.

           

             It will all come down to Putin in the end. I think that the Russians can absorb economic sanctions because they will then see, not only the Ukraine; but the West as their enemy. When the Russian people are threatened with starvation by outside forces, then, like the people of London during the Blitz, they will stiffen their spines: and have proven themselves capable of much inexhaustible suffering to save their homeland under the Nazi invasion which many Ukrainians partook in on the side of Hitler. Which is why millions of Ukrainians were rounded up and sent to Siberia by Stalin after the war to die; and why the ethnic Russians in the east of Ukraine stand full square behind Russia.

            

             The Russian people are used to suffering, whether under the Tsars or Communism. I hope they manage to resist the West's sanctions. I believe in the nation state, as does Putin; but the European Union seeks its abandonment among its member countries. Which I think is why there is sympathy for Putin. He stand up for the nation state. Whereas in the EU, they believe it and democracy, to be an anachronism.

            

             More and more people are beginning to understand what is meant by a European federal union; and they are not happy with the prospect. These people admire Putin, not for his views, or ambitions to make Russia great once again. But simply because he stands irrevocably in the continuance of the nation state. While Brussels seeks to turn once great nations into mere provinces, internally divided into regions.

            

             Putin stands above Western leaders - not morally - although when it comes to corruption it would be a close call to make. Another close call morally, would be the ambitions of Putin the EU.

           

             Putin, if we are to believe the West. Seeks to re-establish the old Soviet Empire, or what Putin would call, a greater Russia. While in Europe the Brussels political elite are seeking the Napoleonisation of the continent - or a greater Europe.

            Even the way both of the parties go about this presents us with yet another close call, morally speaking. Putin will use force to get what he wants; while in Europe the abandonment of democracy is the preferred method of advancement.

           

            In the EU referendums can be made to be re-taken until nations, like Ireland, 'get it right'. Elected leaders can be dismissed and be replaced by technocrats as we saw in Italy and Greece during the euro crises.

            In the UK, the people are being denied a say on the future of their nation. UK politicians have signed away parts of our sovereignty - some 50% of our laws come directly from Brussels and take precedence over those enacted by our own elected parliament.

            

            We in the UK are denied an in/out referendum - at least those living in countries Putin has his sights set on, can fight back. We in the UK can do no such thing.

            

             So when it comes to the Ukraine, and Putin's intention toward it; the picture is not so black and white as the West, but particularly Europe, would want its citizens to believe. There are swaths of grey of different hues between the moral positions of the two combatants; and the people of the UK at least, fully understand this.  

           

           

           

           

           

           

           

            

Blair is finally right - well almost

''We have to elevate the issue of religious extremism to the top of the agenda,'' Tony Blair

TONY BLAIR is no more my favourite politician than was Margaret Thatcher to Arthur Scargill. But I hope that if someone whom I care little for says something I agree with, I will not be churlish and disagree with him for the sake of it.

            

             Today Mr Blair gave a 45 minute talk on what he sees as the greatest threat to the world today - Islamism: and I am forced through conviction to agree with him. He believes the West has been side-tracked by the stand-off in the Ukraine, and we must unite with Russia and China to take on a far more important threat to peace in the world than the events in the Ukraine.

            

             Once more I agree. But we must pause and digress a little. The European union, which Mr Blair has, or had, ambitions to become president of, began this confrontation. Because of the Napoleonic ambitions of Brussels, the EU began to entice the Ukraine into, first of all a trading alliance; leading eventually to full membership of the EU.

            

            Now the West knows full well that Russia has a legitimate geopolitical interest in how events in the Ukraine unfold; an interest the EU ignored, when they sought its seduction of the Ukraine. The country lies on Russia's borders, and Russia sees Europe and Nato as a threat. It was a conflict manufactured in Brussels. It was a confrontation that could have waited, until Putin left power. There was no hurry; the EU has enough problems on its hands because of the economic crises caused by the euro. Empire building could have been put on hold, until the political and economic climate proved more fortuitous regarding such a seduction.

NOW BACK TO BLAIR'S speech. In terms of global foreign policy Islamic fundamentalism should be at the top of the international agenda. But because of our interventions in Afghanistan; and the defeat we suffered at the hands of an ill-equipped and motley band of peasants still living in the middle ages; our politicians bury their heads in the sand when someone like Blair correctly provides the correct perspective on foreign policy. They fear another Afghanistan and stick their fingers in each other's ears when talk of any prospective military confrontation is spoken off.

            

            Blair's most important comment was on the need to form alliances against Islamism. These alliances should, as Blair said, encompass Russia and China, both of whom have their own interest in seeing the demise Islamism. To take on Islamism the West will need Russia and China on side.

            

            The West, the East, and the Far East would make a formidable triumphret. Churchill warned of the threat from Nazi Germany, and was shot down by the appeasers. He suffered ridicule in the House of Commons, from those tired by conflict following the appalling loses suffered in the First World War; it was understandable but not forgivable following the course of history.

            

I doubt if Blair had a Churchillian moment when he looked at the world and perceived what the greatest threat to world peace was. But today we heard a speech given by a true statesman whatever his many failings as a prime minister.

           
           His warnings will no doubt be ignored by politicians within all parties who for political or personal reasons despise the man. Blair was the Shallow Hal when it came to the spin-doctoring that everyone seems to believe he invented. But we are all entitled to get one thing right in our lives and Blair's attack on Islamism is his.

THE ADVANCE of Islamic fundamentalism is not confined to the Middle East. Europe is the home to 15 million Muslims. The UK has 2.5 million. Last week we heard that there is believed to be 400 British Muslims fighting in Syria. This is a guesstimate, it could be 4,000. But when they return, they will have been professionally trained, not by instructors, but by experience.

            
            We are told they face arrest upon return. But considering how our politicians and public institutions have been fearful of upsetting all ethnic minorities by their decision making; I doubt this is nothing more than just another announcement announced to settle the nerves of the indigenous population.

           
             Enoch Powell used the words 'upper hand' to describe what he saw as an influx of migrants, whose numbers would increase to a level whereby they would assert themselves over the indigenous people. I quote Powell, not because I agree with all of his views; but the ones I do believe, as is the case with Tony Blair, I support.

           
             Blair makes reference to Birmingham and the current controversy of the teaching methods of certain Muslims, to warn people of what comes next, when cities like Birmingham, and northern cities like Bradford with large Muslim populations have the confidence to strike out in the coming decades.

WHERE I DISAGREE profoundly with Blair is on his insistence that Islamic fundamentalism is a minority pursuit. What is a minority pursuit within Islam, resides among  those who genuinely believe in democracy. Islam is still tied to its medieval past. Its attitude to women, which encompasses Female Genital Mutilation, arranged marriages and honour killings: along with the pursuit of white indigenous young girls (Rochdale and Oxford), which they believe are free to be raped under Islam as infidels.

           
             I would say this to Tony Blair. Unlike Christianity, Islam has never been put through the white heat of Reformation. Countries today which harbour such a faith have never had any kind of Enlightenment because they never had any Reformation. This is the flushing out that creates a kinder church, but one which has left Islamic societies behind to suffer medievalism .

             
            Islam's attitudes and beliefs remain, in many respects, as they were in the 8^th century. Blair, like all Western politicians, are fearful of Islam. He may perceive and rationalise the threat from Islam; but attributes it to a minority in order to keep the Muslim community on board and fearful of upsetting them…just as all Western politicians tend to do. But this will  may turn out to be, if it is pursued, the West's nemeses.

           

            

The avuncular Leviathan that preyed on young boys

WHAT IS IT ABOUT ROCHDALE? Its 95,796 residents have had to put up with a lot of bad publicity in recent years; and it continues today by the revisiting of an old sore.

            

              The town was in the headlines in 2012 when a gang of Asians groomed then abused and raped vulnerable young girls. Despite 83 formal attempts by health workers between 2004 and 2010, to warn of what was occurring, Rochdale Borough Council, social services, and the local police, remained unconcerned or cynical - fear of upsetting the Muslim sensibilities both locally and nationally appears to have played its part in the various indifference to what was going on among the various agencies.

            

             It was indifference of another kind that let the people of Rochdale down in the 1970s.  This time mouths remained tightly shut because of a powerful local individual, and national treasure.

            

             The morbidly obese local MP Cyril Smith indulged his perversions on children living at the 50 bed Knowl View residential home for children with learning difficulties. The 29 stone Liberal MP became a pal of Jimmy Savile, after the latter invited onto his Clunk Click show on the BBC; thus a friendship was born.

            

              Rochdale's current MP, Liberal Democrat Simon Danczuk, along with Matthew Baker, have written an account of the period published as Smile For The Camera: The Double Life of Cyril Smith, and serialised by the Daily Mail.

            

             If Cyril had been born a 100 years earlier, his parents would have pitched a tent at some fairground and charged people to gaze upon his enormous bulk. The fairground and the tent however seemed to be the perfect metaphor for his appearances on television. He was popular, and people tuned in amazed, at first by his size but latter, after the initial fascination with weight and volume had passed, affection took over.

            

            As with Savile, Cyril Smith was popular; and with popularity comes respect from the media (It's all part of the celebrity culture). In Rochdale Smith was powerful… even untouchable; just as Savile was at the BBC. Rumours abounded about his true nature within parliament. When David Steel, the leader of the Liberal Party, heard rumours of the unnatural sexual peculiarities of Cyril Smith, his spokesman's reply was: ‘All he seems to have done is spanked a few bare bottoms.’ David Steel, who knighted Smith, has yet to comment on the current media interest in Smith.

            

            But there was another scandal of a none sexual nature that ultimately destroyed Smith's popularism, and as always it was money rather than sex that reduced Smith nationally. Smith owned 1,300 shares in Turner and Newall, a company manufacturing asbestos when the appalling dangers of the substance were becoming known. In 1981 he asked the company to formulate a speech, in which he pronounced: "The public at large are not at risk" from their product.

             

            But in 2008, long after the dangers of asbestos were known, there were calls for Smith to be stripped of his knighthood; a call that the present leader of the Liberal Democrats, rather belatedly, now endorses. At the time Smith declared that the estimated 4,000 deaths a year through asbestos was 'relatively low'.

NICK CLEGG is in denial. Denial that he ever knew what Cyril was up to either sexually or in his associations with Turner and Newall. It was long before his time and he knew nothing about both. I cannot believe that any leader of such a party with such a past, and with such an individual among its ranks, could have known nothing about it. It afflicts common reason. But such afflictions among politicians are not uncommon.

            

            Clegg must have known of Smiths reputation, as he must of known of Lloyd George's. Naivety on such a scale, if it exists in a politician, ill equips him or her for the office of leadership. Better it would have been for Clegg to have admitted to knowledge of the rumours about Smith before he became party leader.

            

             If he truly believes that he knew nothing of such activities, then he should never have been elected. His intellectual shallowness regarding his knowledge of his own party's history should never have elevated him to its leadership. All parties have warts, including the Liberal Democrats, and it is no good pretending that his party bears little resemblance to the old Liberal party that Cyril Smith was a part of.

            

             The trouble is, Clegg had praised Cyril Smith as a ‘beacon and an ‘inspiration’ on his 80th birthday in 2008, and said he was ‘deeply saddened’ at his death two years later. The Liberal Democrats were founded in 1989, and Nick Clegg uses this date to plead 'ignorance' of Cyril Smith's sadistic behaviour.

            

             I know Clegg spent many of his student years, and some his formative political years in Europe, as a tea maker to Leon Brittan in Brussels. But he must have grasped some history of the party he felt himself born to lead. It is my guess that as the Liberal Democrats were the unquestioned true believers in the great enterprise of a federal Europe; Nick jumped aboard. He had found his political niche.

            

             In truth his ignorance regarding the history of the Liberal and later the Liberal Democrat Party, was sincere. Cyril Smith would have meant as much to Clegg as the existence of UFOs. He, in all probability, knew of this monster and his reputation but never thought that through his own ambitious political passage, Smith would become an issue. 

DAVID STEEL, on the other hand, who has until now been allowed to remain silent; should be asked to give an interview. For it was he, more so than Nick Clegg, who must have been aware of Cyril Smith's sadism.

            

            Steel let the rumours flourish; as his spokesman at the time noted: ‘All he seems to have done is spanked a few bare bottoms.’ Cyril Smith was a star act for the Liberal Party. In terms of popularity he measured his own with David Steels, and was a populist asset for a party in decline.

            

            Cyril 'Jabba the Hutt' Smith was a monster that destroyed young lives and whose bestiality was allowed to continue through fear, and the cowardliness of those who spread the rumours in not coming forward. As with Savile it was the cravenness of those around him who clung like barnacles to the hull of the capital ship in the fleet.

           

            In Savile's case it was BBC programme makers, technicians and producers, as well as the press. In Smith's case it was the politicians from all parties that listened to the rumours, and remained silent…and of course, once more the (especially tabloid) press.

            

            Clegg must have known, as did much of the media at the time. I dislike Clegg; I dislike his politics and his mendacity when in his party's 2010 manifesto he supported an in/out referendum on Europe. But on this issue, Lord Steel should be the one being hounded by the Daily Mail. It was he after all who had the real insight into what was happening but still carried on using Smith's popularity to his Party's advantage.