In the somewhat drawn out discussion that started an aeon ago with Jeremy Clarkson’s bank account, Urko quotes C S Lewis:
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
It’s an oft-quoted statement that has a truth about it. The cynical disregard by the bureaucracy of individual needs is epitomised by people such as Harding. Still, Neil’s response is typically warped:
Urko: So CS Lewis would prefer Saddam to Blair? Just like his argument for the existence of God, he is talking out of his proverbials.
Er, no, C S Lewis was observing human nature and very well observed it is too. However, two can play the twisting statements about to make an absurd strawman. How about this?
So Neil, you accept then, that Blair was a tyrant…