China’s future and ours; lessons from Covid-19?

 

For the last 40 years or so, China’s financial, business, political and cultural effect on our world has been a disaster.

A disaster both  for the Chinese themselves and for most of us.

This is a real live pangolin, I have to say I thought it was a toy at first! The Chinese pangolin and the Sunda pangolin, are the most endangered of all the pangolin species and valued for their meat & assumed medicinal properties.

The corona virus is just the latest of many diseases produced by China’s cultural attitudes to selling “fresh” food and the hugely increased exports from China over the last 40 years..

SARS and MERS are almost forgotten but they were both created in the same way and the lessons have NOT been learned..

Fresh, wriggling and fluttering food is sold all over China in open market conditions that would make most of us, in the west, feel ill.

The cruelty to live creatures, let alone the insanitary practices employed, are the root cause of the Covid 19 (Corona virus).

The source of Covid 19 is most probably the pangolin, a live one is pictured just above.

Read all about this endangered animal here. Pangolin scales are sold illegally all over China to solve erectile dysfunction and almost every other disease known to the average Chinese mind.

However, diseases are not the only exported problem from China.

We, in the West, have been ensnared by the extraordinary expansion of a greedy totalitarian regime which exhibits the very worst aspects of capitalism. But most of us do seem to like their iPhones 😉

Chinese expansion is a disaster in the making that has been blitheringly obvious, to me and many others, for years.

Here are just some of the real problems stated, yet again, in plain simple English.

The disaster for China:-

  1. China’s own rivers have been largely destroyed by pollution driven by mindless industrial expansion by former communists latterly converted to capitalism.
    • I have written about this before, several times, here in 2014 and here again in 2015.
    • The Yellow river (now orange with pink and green tinges by the way) has not met the sea since 1972.
    • The Yangtze is even more polluted than the Yellow River but still just manage to reach the sea but not for much longer.
  2. China’s totalitarian communist party has effectively destroyed freedom of speech by incarcerating anyone who dares to criticise the ‘party’.
    • China does this more than any other country in the world.
    • Here I include such countries as North Korea, the United Arab Emirates, Dubai and Scotland (just joking Nicola 😉 )
    • Deng Xiaoping was the chap in charge when China decided to murder hundreds protesters in Tienanmen Square in 1989. Thousands more protesters were injured for asking for more freedom and democracy.
    • We in the West hardly mentioned it at all. News of those atrocities committed by the Communist Party are still suppressed in China even today.
  3. The traditional family unit in China was also destroyed by Deng Xiaoping in the 1980’s. He decided to follow Margaret Thatcher’s disastrous deregulated, debt fulled economic growth model and Covid-19, Mers and Sars are the result.
    • Parents of young children were and still are separated for months at a time by having to move from their villages to the new super cities.

The disaster for the world:-

  1. China’s debt fuelled expansionist disaster has yet to hit the world financial markets and when it does, the current stock market drops will seem quite benign.
    • There are hundreds of cities the size of Birmingham built since the 1990’s but most are empty
      • see here
      • and here in a Youtube video from Australian journalists
      • and many others; just search for Chinese ghost cities and you will see what I mean
  2. Chinese culture and weird, to us at least, medicinal beliefs have caused many rare species all over the world to be placed on the globally endangered list. The prices that the Chinese are prepared to pay for tiger’s testicles, pangolin scales etc. have funded worldwide illegal poaching on a huge scale.
  3. China has financed many airports over the world, most of which are yet to be used by anyone other than the Chinese military.
    • Several examples spring to mind, the main one being …
      • Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport, the second-largest in Sri Lanka, is designed to handle a million passengers per year. It currently receives about a dozen passengers per day. Read all about here in the New York Times magazine; a fascinating but scary analysis of China’s long game of global domination.
  4. Dear Boris “Why do you think that Huawei’s price for installing our new 5G network infrastructure is so very cheap?”
    • Please read my previous blog article written just before your daft decision was made.

A final question to consider, “Is unfettered globalisation a good thing for homo sapiens?“

Our leaders’ decisions are mostly bonkers, why?

 

Reading the news, since the 12th December election, has been quite illuminating but equally depressing.

Dominic Cummings isn’t as daft as he looks and I hope Boris is actually listening to him – he speaks sense.

I’m not talking about global warming, plastic waste pollution or the ever increasing ability of our politicians to “take responsibility” by just saying the words but remaining in place.

I’m talking about the ridiculous decisions being taken, about to be taken, not taken or avoided by those whose job it is to make competent decisions.

Many of the decision making processes used by our clever political and educational leadership elite are simply bonkers.

The decisions made as a result of theses bonkers processes produce long term errors that will be hugely costly to correct; that is, if they ever are or can be.

Here are ‘6 of the worst’, but there are so many more it is quite worrying.

 

  1. Why allowing Huawei into our G5 networks is bonkers

    • Huawei is so closely controlled by Xi Jinping’s bonkers totalitarian Chinese state that any decision by our government to let them anywhere near our proposed 5g infrastructure is just bonkers silly.
    • I realise Donald Trump is an ignoramus and largely bonkers, but in the case of Huawei he is quite right!
    • Let’s hope Boris is using silence on this point to get a good trade deal with the USA.
    • Boris could then quietly agree to drop Huawei at the last minute and work with the USA to build our own 5g system.
    • OK, it may arrive one to two years later than Huawei’s system, but we would be in control and the money is spent in the UK & Britain. Obvs! Simples!.
    • Final point; China is actually ahead of the West in developing Quantum computer technology; implying truly unbreakable encryption.
      • we should send some of our students over there to nick their technology … 😉
        • My point here is that the Chinese have been pinching our secrets for years just by paying student fees for their spies to become embedded in our best research laboratories.

  2. Why male to female Trans people demanding to use female loos is bonkers

    • A female Oxford history Don has been “no-platformed” because of her stated disagreement to male trans users demanding to use female loos. This is the latest example of academic liberal academic nonsense rapidly destroying freedom of speech in our universities.
    • Those supporting trans people are simply bonkers.
    • Why?
      • My answer is based on common sense as opposed to recent but growing liberal ideology, which appears to be the new “PC”.
        • If you have still have a penis then you use male loo.
        • If you have a vagina then you use the female loo.
        • If you have both sets of genitalia there are so few of you that I don’t really see a problem – use either.
        • Most of “wee the people” do not mind.

  3. Why HS2 is bonkers

    • HS2 will make journeys to and from London faster to some cities in the north of England.
    • It is that link which is being done first.
    • This is bonkers, here’s why.
    • It makes most sense to the dysfunctional HS2 Ltd management who are earning ludicrous sums of money for making bonkers decisions.
      • They need the first tranche of profits to be made South of Birmingham because that is easier. Because that is where they have been looking first being Londoncentric money men.
    • In order to actually create the much proclaimed northern powerhouse you have to make northern east west journeys easier first!
    • Simply doing the southern part first just makes the whole thing London centric which misses the point entirely.
    • Here is where the main problem is and where the main benefit should be felt first..
      • Connect Liverpool to Sheffield etc.
      • Listen to those in York and on Humberside. Get them connected first with better rail links.
    • This complete cock-up is being made because those influencing the decision are going to make most of the money, completely missing the real reason for improving our railway connections.
    • The most laughable reason, stated last week, for going ahead with HS2, is that “we have spent so much money on preparations so far we can’t stop now” .
    • Well, most of that cost is land purchase, so just sell it back! Simples!
    • Finally, the cost overruns are out of control; HS2 Ltd directors are just making bonkers money for crass decision making.
    • We need to scrap HS2 Ltd, sell off the land for forestry and agriculture.
    • Then we can start again by putting the railroad, trains and time tabling all back together in one new corporation.
    • I don’t really mind if it is run by private enterprise or nationalised BUT it all needs to be together! Obvs.
    • We could even call it British Rail … 😉

  4. Why potential Labour leaders are still bonkers

    • Actually I can’t tell you why the main leadership contenders are so blinkered in their continued support of the Corbyn legacy.
    • The main contenders are either ex-remainers or Trotskyists. All are bonkers and in complete denial of their recent election disaster.
    • I watched Emily Thornbury in last Thursday’s Questiontime. She was told quite clearly that she was deluded and bonkers by one panel member and several in the audience.
    • That’s what happens when you believe your own hype and only listen to others who are as deluded as yourself.
    • The winner is being announced on April 1st…;-)
    • Labour: RIP

  5. Why the EU and Macron in particular are bonkers

    • President Macron of France wants 25 years of free access to the UK’s fishing waters or he won’t play.
    • This is the EU’s opening salvo in the coming trade negotiations.
    • My answer, to quote Maggie Thatcher, is “No, No and no.”
    • The EU has missed the main fact which is that we don’t have to listen to their bonkers announcements any more.
    • Hurrah!

  6. What programs are the BBC planning to cut to save cash?

    • Celebrity nonsense on BBC 1, 2 and 3? Nope.
    • Celebrity Antique road show? Nope
    • The One Show? Nope
    • Victoria Derbyshire current affairs? Yup
    • Newsnight? Yup
    • Shorter Today on Radio 4? Yup
    • The 50% of their megalithic website that nobody uses? Nope
      • BONKERS

 

General election Q & A – Happy Maastricht ;-)

 

Yippeee! Another general election 😉 the third since the five year fixed term parliament act came into err “force” in 2011.

Your Christmas General Election quiz starts here. Just 10 questions to answer.

There may be prizes (Ed: I doubt it …)

The biggest question left for me is “does this Boris Johnson’s exit deal actually give us freedom from the EU?”.

My current understanding is that it still ties us into EU rules (for some years) and we continue to pay the EU £billions. £39 billion?

I don’t know yet, even having read the bill, it is still unclear to me. No deal is still the option if we get to 31st January 2020 without agreeing ‘the deal’.

That means that probably “no deal” is almost certainly the best result for the United Kingdom of Great Britain in the long term.

Why? Because it removes politicians from the mix 😉 and after the last 3 years of irritating and pointless fluff I think most of us can raise a glass to that!

Businesses will have issues, of course, and things will not be as favourable as they currently are.

BUT, the simple fact is this, European businesses will still want to sell us their stuff in return for us selling them our stuff; that was always the case.

OK then here is your quiz.

A unified defence policy is one of the main aims of the EU, introduced on page 3 of the Maastricht Treaty signed by John Major in 1992.

Q1) Can you imagine twenty seven (Ed: 26?) countries agreeing on a united stance against Russia when Germany so heavily relies on Russia for gas?

Most commentators think that the eventual creation of a united European army could never be met.

So then, if your answer is no (Ed: Obvs! (Sorry about him, but he’s been getting out a bit more lately)) then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party on 12th December 2019.

Just one of many examples of how Maastricht is just potty; to put it mildly. More examples follow.

But, before we go on to more questions, I must share two videos from Margaret Thatcher; they are both just over one minute and well worth a listen.

As many of you will know, she is not my favourite politician but here she speaks with a clarity that should make any remainer stop in their tracks.

In one minute twenty seconds Margaret Thatcher calmly explains why the Maastricht Treaty will take the EU in a direction that the UK should not follow.

This was just before she was ousted as PM by her personal “night of the long knives”.

Q2) Do you want our foreign policy to be decided in Brussels by the next version of Herman Von Rompuy? (Ed: Who he? Me: Look it up)

That was another main aim for the EU introduced in the Maastricht Treaty of 1992. (Page 4)

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q3) Do you really want 70 trucks to continue to move the EU parliament from Brussels to Strasbourg each month?

This at an annual cost of 114 million Euros (at 2014 prices). The MEPs + staff + cooks & bottle washers stay there for four days and they all come back to Brussels again.

The Strasbourg EU parliament building. This is used for 4 days a month then deserted for the next 27. ;-(  It only cost €470 million to build. What a bargain!

€

€

€

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This stupid state of affairs has been there since the establishment of the Iron and Steel Community in 1952.

(Ed: Really didn’t know that? (Yes that move really has happened each month for the last 67 years).

67 years @ €114 million per year = € 7,638,000,000 in wasted cash – your cash 😉

For your amusement please read my source here.

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q4) Do you never, like me, want to see that piggy faced (apologies to all pigs everywhere) SNP MP bore spout the same old undemocratic bollocks nonsense again and again? He’s the one banging on and on about Scottish independence because, when he had a referendum on that, he lost. He’s the one who ignores the simple fact that Scotland is in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and is not – nor ever will be a separate country with the Euro-haggis as a currency.

Most of us, including the Scots, want Scotland to stay in the UK and do not want two more referendums on Brexit & Scottish independence which is Labour party policy.

The official result of the Scottish Independence Referendum on a turnout of 84.6% was:

Yes 1,617,989 (45%) No 2,001,926 (55%)

If you can still remember the question, and your answer is yes, then you must vote for Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party BUT not this time.

Q5) Do you want eventually to replace the pound with the Euro? Maastricht (Page 3). Currently we have an opt out that costs us dearly.

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q6) Do you really want free unregulated movement (people and capital) to continue? This also means that citizenship is regulated by the EU. Both on Page 6 of the Maastricht Treaty.

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party.

Q7) Article 104 b (page 27) prohibits the EU taking on the financial commitments of a member state; effectively prohibiting bailouts.

However, the EU has ignored that rule 12 times to the tune of €544 billion (of your money) as at 2018.

So do you want to be party to an organisation which breaks its own rules regularly and so spectacularly?

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party. (Ed: Obvs.)

Q8) Page 73 Article 188(b) is a wonderful pile of garbage. This sets up the “Court of Auditors”. Yup – the EU does its own auditing, but get this: for the last 21 years the auditors of the EU have identified serious shortcomings in in the “veracity” of the figures. The consequence of which is err nothing. Throughout the Maastricht Treaty you may read the words “Recommendations and opinions shall have no binding force.'” This applies to the auditors and therefore renders them toothless. Also applies to the European Central Bank.

So do you think that is a good way to manage your money?

If your answer is no then you have to vote for Boris Johnson’s Tory party. (Ed: Obvs.)

Q9) Page 3 creates the Euro to establish a monetary and fiscal union; ‘one currency to bind them all’.

This means that all members of the Euro have the same fiscal (tax) policy. If you think that makes sense then I suggest that you do a bit of economic analysis of each member state before bursting out with laughter. First term lecture two or three of any economics course would have put you right.

Then, if you think still that the Euro works as well for Greece as it does for Germany, then you must vote for Jeremy Corbyn or Jo Swinson.

Q10) Page 200 ensures that “1. Each Member State shall ensure that the principle of equal pay for male and female workers for equal work is applied.”

If you think that is going well, after 27 years of “member states ensuring” that it happens, then you must vote Liberal Democrat. Jo Swinson becomes our next Prime Minister. ;-o

I thought I should finish with a joke (The line just above this one just in case you missed it).

One could go on and on …but one won’t (Ed: thank you).

Conclusion

This election is just about achieving our clean departure from the EU and nothing else, despite what Corbyn is trying to say.

The least worse of our party leaders is, for me, Boris Johnson. He ain’t perfect but his time is now and he is exactly who we need to get us out of the pile of poo that is the EU.

The Maastricht Treaty, signed by John Major in 1992 is a woolly pile of legalese which converted the EEC, which was a trade union (which sort of made sense), into a political and monetary union (which makes no sense at all). Derogation is a word that means “an exemption from or relaxation of a rule or law” which is mentioned 48 times in the treaty and basically means that if a rule within the treaty is broken by a member state they are told off very firmly but their two hour lunch continues unabated.

A final point of interest:

My spell checker corrects ‘Maastricht’ into ‘Christmas’ – funny old world eh?

Happy Maastricht!

 

 

 

 

David Cameron’s hypocrisy today

 

Having just read the front page of today’s Sunday Times, I just  had to make this short comment on David Cameron’s hypocrisy and his blatant attempt at self publicity.

Just before the 2016 referendum he gave this televised promise “… I will implement the people’s decision whatever the outcome..”.

He then resigned the very next day running away from his promise and then hid for three years in his caravan writing his self congratulatory memoir.

His quote yesterday “I’m sorry I failed” should really have been “Sorry I ran away from my promise, I have no backbone!”

One of the finest Private Eye covers ever.

A completely self consumed hypocrite just like John Major and Tony Blair.

“We are all in this together.” remember that pile of poo from Cameron?

He accuses Boris Johnson of the same hypocrisy that he displayed. He should have gone to Specsavers!

Both he and Boris are made of the same clay but Boris may well have grown up a little?

Let us hope so.

PS: No I will not buy his damn memoir.

(Ed: I think think we had already got that!)

 

Politics redefined and now Trust redefined. Duck palace anyone?

 

Politics used to mean “Of the people for the people”.

Politics now means “Of the MPs and for the MPs”. And, of course, for the supporting 24/7 Westminster bubble journalism industry.

No Deal was the default position voted for by MPs in 2016! By a huge majority.

MPs then voted a further three times to make Brexit happen on March 29th 2019.

What changed? A Prime Minister brow beaten by Brussels bureaucrats because she didn’t understand what to do. Boris Johnson does.

After last night’s vote our trust in our MPs and their system is now completely destroyed.

Our trust in them, of course, had been waning since the end of the Thatcher era , hastened by the Blair years and finally lost by David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Theresa May.

This duck palace, paid for by we the people, is the image that defined the downfall of our trust in our MPs. Ten years on from the MPs’ expenses scandal which exposed just what politicians had been claiming,

The duck palace opposite sums up their view of us.

My view of them can best be represented by a sigh of disbelief.

I am sure most of us now feel as if we are on a different planet to the one resided in by most of our MPs?

They, since the 2016 referendum, thought it was all about them and the party political system of representative democracy.

But the 2016 referendum had the completely unintended consequence of energising we the British voters to take part again.

Our myopic, insulated MPs just could not believe the result! (Ed: and neither did Boris & his mate Gove 😉 )

They still don’t understand what happened.

There is a lot a talk about trust this morning but “they” are talking about trust in Westminster and in the party political system.

They are not talking about our trust in them, they don’t care about that, yet.

History will call them charlatans, disconnected, self interested bottom feeders and the slayers of the people’s democracy.

Shame on them.

Boris Johnson ain’t perfect but he is, by far, the best we have until a real grown up appears. It might even be him, I cannot see anyone else to support.

Time will tell and I can’t wait to be 5 years older and look back on this preposterous era.

I would just rather not be here now!

Go BoJo! Who are the Pro Rogues now?

 

May I try to put the childish, irrelevant “furious backlash“, as reported today by the BrBC (British remoaning Broadcasting Corporation), into some logical context?

A view from Winston Churchill – he never envisaged that we would be a part of a political union

You may have guessed that I am for leaving the EU by now 😉

The remainers have been told effectively to shut by Boris.

Hurrah for him!

This is why: our MPs are simply ignoring the wishes of the British people.

In 2016 the people were asked by our government to make the decision, for the government, to either leave the EU or to remain.

This simple question was easy to answer.

More people voted in that referendum than had voted in any general election since had Noah floated across the Straights of Hormuz.

Those of us who voted to to leave won, or so we thought.

Back in 2016 we didn’t know or care about about “a deal”. We just assumed our politicians had the job of competently removing us from the pile of poo that is the EU.

Back in 2016 we had never heard about the Customs Union. We didn’t know the implications of a deal or no deal.

Back in 2016 we didn’t even think or care about the Irish border complexities. Our dear competent politicians would sort that out.

Back in 2016 we just assumed that the politicians would calmly and competently remove us from the disastrous future created by Maastricht in 1987.

Back in 2016 we did not know why we were being ruled Herman Von Rompuy, or who he was. We did not know, or care, who the President of the EU was, or why there were 4 other parts of the EU that made the whole thing completely undemocratic, by design!

There were many other things about the EU that we did not know about either, we did not care. We just wanted out!

It had nothing to with economics or most of the argument we later heard ad nauseam from the remainers who could not accept that they had lost the most direct form democratic of vote we have.

The following describe my reasons for leaving the EU.

The EU:-

  • was in 1975 an trade union (we had a referendum to decide that). The EU became a political union in in 1987 (Maastricht: no referendum on that!)
  • is undemocratic by design, more so after Maastricht,
  • is faceless (go on, tell me who Herman Von Rompuy is?),
  • is financially incompetent,
  • has disregarded failed audit reports for over 20 years,
  • is intent on creating a federal European state ruled from Belgium (Maastricht),
  • is intent of creating a European Army (Maastricht),
  • is intent on supporting global business to the detriment of the people’s benefit,
  • is run (until last month) by a corporate tax avoidance specialist; Jean Claude Juncker
  • is designed to support Germany first, France second and everybody else third (the Euro created by Maastricht),
  • has created agricultural subsidies that make no sense unless you are French or German

Finally a few words from Daniel Hannan MEP. A touch of humour to cheer you all up!

 

 

 

Independence day?

 

Here is Pat Condell, a man even grumpier than me  – eight minutes of well argued grumpiness explaining why he, and I, voted to leave the EU and why we must vote for an Independent Candidate in the next election. Discuss 😉

My reply to Nigel Huddlestone’s response.

 

Nigel’s response to my letter is just underneath my response to his response.

Dear Mr Huddlestone

Thank you for responding. I hope to change your mind eventually because we really have no real alternative.

However, once again you miss my point entirely.

The very existence of “faith” (i.e. irrational) schools is divisive and it has to be up to government to force the change.

Government seems set on actively, but blindly, promoting a path of societal division and is ignoring its duty to keep us all safe.

Current government action is largely pointless and your “active promotion” is worthless and ignored.

We already see the first results of this in Birmingham and so many other places.

However, I realise that you fear lost votes; I can see no other reason for your inaction.

Yours in despair, yet with a modicum of hope in Boris and Brexit by 31st October.

Fingers crossed

Derek Ruskin

On 29/07/2019 10:43, HUDDLESTON, Nigel wrote:
Dear Mr Ruskin
Thank you for contacting me about secularism.
I appreciate the concerns of the UK’s secular community, particularly regarding extremism in schools and the importance of free speech for both religious and non-religious people. Please let me assure you that I remain committed to working towards a society in which all citizens, regardless of whatever their individual beliefs are, can live together fairly and cohesively.
During inspections, Ofsted inspectors ask questions that probe whether pupils are prepared for the next stage in their education and life in modern Britain, using age-appropriate questions to check children’s understanding and tolerance of different lifestyles.
All schools are now expected to “actively promote” British values, which were defined in 2011 as democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, and mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs. Teaching respect for other people, even if you do not agree with them or their way of life, is a fundamental part of preparation for life in Britain, and a principle all schools should be able to support.
On the issue of Anglican schools, I can understand why some secular families might not wish to send their children to faith schools. However, many families of all denominations and none remain keen to send their children to faith schools. As such, I welcome the Government’s wide ranging education reforms which are raising school standards across the country, and allow parents, both secular and religious, greater choice of good schools in which to educate their children.
Thank you again for taking the time to contact me.
Kind regards
Nigel
Nigel Huddleston MP
Member of Parliament for Mid Worcestershire
Vice Chairman of the Conservative Party
cid:image001.png@01D0A2D2.8E574420

Dear Nigel Huddleston MP we urgently need secular democracy

 

My letter sent to our local MP sent today

Dear Nigel Huddleston MP

I have written to you before about faith schools and their very existence which cause many obvious divisions in society.

Parliament still actively encourages this rapidly developing calamity by funding and encouraging ever more faith schools – but why?

Society has changed fundamentally in the last 60 years and I want my representative in parliament to come out in support of radical change. A secular education system is not only logical but now vital to ensure peace on our streets in the future.

Jerusalem? Berlin before 1987? Nope, Belfast today! Separating the Papists from the Provos.

If you don’t want to support the situation where children of ‘provos’ and ‘Catolics’ are told to avoid each other and where children of Muslim parents are told to shun the children of the kuffar (that’s you and me) then please take note of the following.

According to a major new study, 52% of people in Britain say they have ‘no religion’. The figure, which comes from the highly-respected British Social Attitudes survey, has risen from 48% since 2015 and 31% since 1983. The survey reveals that the British population is becoming increasingly irreligious and religiously diverse. These dramatic changes in Britain’s religion and belief landscape demand a policy response.

I am urging you to ensure that Britain’s constitutional settlement and public policies catch up with the opinions of its population. One of the most striking findings of the BSA survey is that just 1% of 18-24 year olds identify as Anglican.

This means church schools are unlikely to be an attractive, or even acceptable, option to tomorrow’s parents. This calls into question the appropriateness and sustainability of organised religion’s role in running our publicly funded schools.

Christianity is one major influence among many that has shaped our country. But the UK is now one of the most religiously diverse, and also non-religious, nations in the world.

Our political structures do not recognise this huge change. They need to evolve to make Britain a secular democracy where religion and the state are separate.

Pope Francis greeting Mugabe in Rome 7 years ago. Such a good Christian message don’t you think? What on earth is the Vatican all about?

To set out its vision for a secular Britain, the National Secular Society has published a comprehensive report, ‘Rethinking religion and belief in public life: a manifesto for change’: https://tinyurl.com/natsecsoc

This outlines constructive and specific proposals to reform the role of religion in public life.

I hope you can consider adopting these sensible and forward-thinking proposals.

The National Secular Society works towards a society in which all citizens, regardless of religious belief or lack of it, can live together fairly and cohesively. In its manifesto it considers how the state should respond to these fundamental demographic changes, particularly in our institutions and policy responses.

It sets out proposals for reforms in education, public services, institutions and public ceremonies needed to ensure fairness for all regardless of their religion or belief. It also evaluates the state of the law on human rights and freedom of expression where it concerns religion.

Please take the time to look at this report, consider its arguments, and work towards implementing these proposals for a fairer and safer society for the 21st century.

Yours sincerely

Derek Ruskin (derek@ruskinweb.co.uk)

PS: What do you get if you cross an atheist with a Jehova’s witness?

A – Someone who knocks on your door for no apparent reason.

Is democracy dead? Are you bothered? Am I?

 

There are a few simple truths at the heart of our disillusion with politics & politicians

  • No political party has dared to tell us that we can’t afford to pay for all our pensions, the NHS, social care and all those public services that we now demand “as of right”.
  • The welfare state has weakened the government’s ability to break even? It was never envisaged, back in 1947, that is was to become such a huge part of the economy. Discuss.
  • Our government has only broken even seven times in the last 110 years. (Ed: Not a lot a people know that.)
  • The depressing figures for the last 10 years are here on the government’s own statistics web site (ONS).
  • The party political system is flawed too, because it does not allow politicians to plan for long term solutions.
  • All political parties are demonstrably rubbish at financial planning.
  • It can also be argued that is our fault and that we are “in this mess” because so few of us vote.
    • (Ed: Except in the EU IN/OUT referendum!)  😉
  • The clincher for me is the simple fact that we were asked to decide the EU issue.
    • We were promised by our government that our answer would be honoured.
    • Our answer however was the wrong answer and David Cameraman ran off to hide in his posh new caravan.
    • Following on from the EU’s own answer to answers they don’t like, our politicians’ answer is to lie, ignore democracy, try to ask the same question again and talk bollocks for nigh on three years.

Are we bothered enough to do something about it?

We, the people, can’t be really be bothered to be bothered any more?

It seems we are not bothered enough because:-

  • Those who are well off want to keep the status quo.
  • Those who are “just about managing” haven’t got the time to shout about it.
  • Those who really are poor have no voice and no party to speak for them.

Great Britain, and most the the West, has developed a strange form of democracy wherein the views of the majority of people can now be completely and safely ignored.

Change UK (Ed: Who they?*1) has yet to realise that their name should actually be “No Change UK” or perhaps “Love EU“. I predict a huge election failure looming for these deluded, myopic, self interested twerps, because we will be bothered to vote in the next EU election and it will be for Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party that we will vote.

Annunziate Rees-Mogg joins the Nigel Farage’s new Brexit party

Hurrah for Annunziata Rees Mogg & Ann Widdecombe and the new Brexit party.

Those who govern us don’t really need to be bothered to be competent either! Why not?

Over the last 25 years, government ministers have been quietly transferring their own valid responsibilities to Quangos (Quasi non-governmental organisations).

This avoids ministers having to give difficult answers to awkward questions when things go wrong. “It wazzn me guv, you need ask the regulator”.

Quite sickening, in my opinion, but quite accepted, normal and largely unchallenged. Because we can’t be bothered?

We the people have been frustrated, bored and ignored into submission …

… by those who love their government jobs and their desire for power more than anything else.

The reason for this is our flawed voting system and Tory & Labour parties fear of introducing proportional representation (PR).

For example, if we had PR, Nigel Farage’s UKIP would have had 46 seats in parliament in 2015!

This all started when we began to notice that whoever was in power couldn’t think in terms longer than 3 years and didn’t do much for our benefit.

So the upshot of all this is that most of us now feel that we have nobody worth voting for.

They simply refused to listen to us when we gave the wrong answer on the Brexit decision.

How did this all happen?

This  was not such an issue when there were two very distinct parties fighting for clearly different visions of government. That situation died in the 1980’s.

First we had Thatchers mad years of selling off anything the British people owned by right (our water supply, means of electricity distribution, etc. & etc.).

Her banking and financial deregulation policies lead to a debt driven growth causing the 2007 financial crisis from which we may never recover.

Those who bankrupted us were never called to account and we the people have been paying the bill ever since.

In the good old days, the Tories ruled for a few years until we spotted that they were nasty sex mad corrupt capitalists (John Major’s hypocritical years).

So we gave the Labour party a go until we spotted that they were driven by union bosses more interested in themselves than rights for the workers. (Callaghan’s useless government).

Then we had the Blair years where a religious despot so full of himself that he destroyed the Labour party by creating the second Tory party.

Then we had a few Brown years where he nailed New Labour’s coffin firmly shut.

Then we had a coalition which privatised the NHS, our forests and a few other things we didn’t notice.

Then Nick Clegg destroyed the Liberal Democrats by lying to two generations of students and by believing that the EU was better for the United Kingdom of Great Britain than was our own government.

Then for a few years more we still couldn’t bother to be bothered until we were asked, by David Cameron (Ed: Who he?), to vote either IN or OUT of the EU.

Then parliament decided that their voice should heard because they not like our answer to the question they asked us to rule on.

Well, what are you going to do about it?

Nigel Farage then came along and spoke in words that we understood and spoke about things that we actually cared about! We might not like him very much but his words connected!

It was he who forced David Cameron into giving us a referendum on membership of the EU.

We the people suddenly woke up and voted in numbers not seen for decades, but…

Then, for the last 3 years, we have been professionally ignored all over again and we have all lost the will to live.

Another truth is that most of the power now lies outside of the political process and is held by corporate entities who are bigger than most small to medium countries.

So, now it really does really matter that we can’t be bothered, because nobody we can vote for can do much about it. They aren’t really bothered either.

So there is nobody left for we the people to vote for.

Unless somebody else wakes up and err, does something about it.

Is that you?

Nah, you can’t be bothered and neither can I 😉

We get the leaders we deserve and since we can’t be bothered …

*1 Chukka Umuna, Anna Subrey & several other twerps.