“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it,” Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945)
Today’s Guardian offers a defence of his record, by the right dishonourable Tony Blair.
There is a charge, crafted by parts of the right wing and now taken up by parts of the left, that New Labour is authoritarian, in particular, that I am. We are intent on savaging British liberties, locking up those who dissent and we abhor parliamentary or other accountability.
Indeed. And why is that? Why do the left and right converge in common accord on this? Is it, perhaps, because it is true and that we value those liberties being stolen from under our noses?
The reason right wingers are keen on this is clear. New Labour has eschewed traditional forms of leftist statism.
Bollocks!
But first, the true record. This government has introduced the Human Rights Act, so that, for the first time, a citizen can challenge the power of the state solely on the basis of an infringement of human rights, and the Freedom of Information Act, the most open thing any British government has done since the Reform Acts of the 1830s. We have devolved more power than any government since the 1707 Act of Union introduced transparency into political funding and restricted the Prime Minister’s right to nominate to the House of Lords. In other words, I have given away more prime ministerial power than any predecessor for more than 100 years.
The human rights act is not a guarantee of human rights. Indeed, there are those who will argue with some justification that it is counter productive. Personally, I remain neutral, waiting to see the outcomes of test cases before I make a judgement. Devolution, frankly, has been a monumental fuck up. Scotland gets a parliament, Wales gets a quango talking shop; an extra layer of bureaucracy interfering in peoples’ affairs and England gets sidelined. As for the Lords, we get Tony’s cronies while the hereditary peers get booted out. We were promised Lords reform, I seem to recall. This certainly isn’t it. If you think the horrendous fudge we currently have is something to be proud of, you are nothing but a feckless wastrel with rather low aspirations.
As for parliament, I have spent proportionately more time answering questions than any predecessor; given more statements; am the only PM ever to agree to appear before the select committee chairs; the only one to give monthly press conferences.
Yes? So? That’s your fucking job, you mendacious mountebank. That’s what we pay you for.
What about the charge that ID cards and anti-terrorism legislation transgress basic liberties and are, as David Cameron put it, ‘unBritish’? Here, we must put a new case about liberty in the modern world. I am from the generation that I would characterise, crudely, as hard on behaviour, but soft on lifestyle, i.e. I support tough measures on crime but am totally pro gay rights. I believe in live and let live, except where your behaviour harms the freedom of others. A society with rules but without prejudices is how I might sum it up.
Oh, this is good. Really good. A new case about liberty. Liberty doesn’t need a new case – the old one was just fine. Freedom from charlatans like you who would have us all subservient to the state. “New liberty” is just another term for new slavery.
But the ‘rules’ are becoming harder to enforce. Antisocial behaviour isn’t susceptible to normal court process. Modern organised crime is really ugly, with groups, often from overseas, frequently prepared to use horrific violence. And, though I get into constant trouble for saying it, while I completely condemn IRA terrorism, I believe it was different in nature and scale from the new global Islamic terrorism we face. For me, this is not an issue of liberty but of modernity.
No, it is not, you dissembling poltroon. Organised crime has always been ugly – unless Al Capone was pretty? Or, closer to home, the east end gangs such as the Krays, were sweet boys really? Modernity is not an excuse to sweep away our freedoms – only a charlatan would believe it so. There is nothing new here that was not here before.
There is no “global terrorism”, simply the politics of fear used by illiberal politicians keen to compound their grip on power. The risk may be different in nature because the jihadists use a different modus operandus to the IRA, but we do not need to sacrifice our liberties to combat it – so doing is to hand them victory.
The question is not one of individual liberty vs the state but of which approach best guarantees most liberty for the largest number of people.
Oh, for fuck’s sake! Individual liberty is the way to guarantee liberty for the largest number of people. Are you really this utterly stupid or are we being treated to more newspeak?
It is a world of vast migration, most of it beneficial but with dangerous threats. We have unparalleled prosperity, but also the break-up of traditional community and family ties and the emergence of behaviour that was rare 50 years ago.
Bollocks! Get your history books out, you ignorant prick! Criminal behaviour has been with us since we dropped out of the trees. It will always be with us. Our “traditional” methods have evolved as the best way of dealing with it while preserving the rights and freedoms of the innocent. Oh, but you, with all your arrogance and conceit know better than hundreds of years of evolution. Oh, yes, you, Saint Tone of Blair, you know better. Well, you don’t. All you know is the fascism of state control.
Organised crime operates to incredible levels of sophistication. Organisations that support terrorism take enormous care to avoid infringing the strict letter of the law.
Yes? So? Nothing new here. These are the same people who will make a fortune forging the unforgeable identity cards and hacking into the NIR and stealing peoples’ identities.
People should be prevented from glorifying terrorism. You can say it is a breach of the right to free speech but in the real world, people get hurt when organisations encourage hatred.
Frankly, only a moron or a bare faced liar would come out with such tripe. Of course it’s an infringement of free speech and if you believe the crap you are spouting in this article, you don’t understand how free speech works. But, then, that’s no great surprise.
On ID cards, there is a host of arguments, irrespective of security, why their time has come. Most people already have a range of different cards, for workplace, bank or leisure. And, contrary to what is said, it will not be an offence not to carry one.
This pile of poppycock is almost not worth the bother of a response. Their time has indeed come. That time was 1939 – 1952. That time is past. The “host of arguments” has been thoroughly debunked. There is only one reason that a government would want to pass this bill and that reason is state control of the populace.
Finally, back to politics. The worry some people have is that the Tories have joined with the Lib Dems and that we are therefore on the wrong side of the debate.
Oh, fuck you, you asinine arsehole.
Their attitude to liberty does indicate, though, a refusal to understand the modern world. If the nature of the threat changes, so should our policies. That is not destroying our liberties, but protecting them.
No. It is you who does not understand liberty. This whole sorry pile of piffle demonstrates once more that you are utterly unfit for office. Go now and quickly, please.
This is a Sunday morning. Usually I am in a peaceful and relaxed mood on Sunday mornings. Reading this has raised my blood pressure somewhat – hence the rather less than passive style. Once I’ve taken a few deep breaths, I’ll restore normal service… 😉