The Political Thread

[Tjm86]

Sorry but the idea that the 'working class' are sub normal / mongrels is probably half the reason that we are in this mess.  Just because they made a decision based on insanely poor information does not make them/us the culprits in this.  The information provided by the media, the guidance provided by the political parties, the campaigning quality of the in / out camps is of an insanely poor quality.

If nothing else comes out of this then I sincerely hope that we once and for all deal with the quality of political 'leadership' in this country.  At present they are absolutely feckin useless.  Blair once said that history would judge him.  What judgement will the present crowd get?

[Eric Plumrose]

Will Boris have the balls to invoke Article 50?

Won't matter either way. Come November 2020 he'll be POTUS elect.

[Banners]

Suggestion here is that Boris is screwed and the Brexiters have actually lost.

[JOE SOAP]

It's a perfect shite-storm; the incumbents are damned if they do, damned if they don't hit the nuclear button.

[ZenArcade]

These guys will tear each other to shreds....what a shower of utter fucking scum. Z

[Trout]

I'm regretting leaving you idiots unsupervised. I left the UK three years ago and already you've broken it completely.

Can you tell me in detail how you did that and how I convince my wife?

It's a long story which involves lots of paperwork.

[Steve Green]

Benn sacked by Corbyn, half the shadow cabinet resigned or set to.

[The Legendary Shark]

In my opinion, as you know, the basic "culprit" is statism and statists. It is the illegitimate coercive power employed by some human beings to bend other human beings to their will for whatever reason that is the core problem.

Statism relies on the fact that some human beings have more rights and responsibilities than others and on the illusion that the rights and responsibilities utilised by the few originate with the many. Yet this is patently untrue. I do not have the right or responsibility to demand money (tax) my neighbours, no matter how humanitarian my plans for that stolen money might be, under threat of violence - kidnapping, incarceration, confiscation of possessions. Yet the state assumes these rights and responsibilities as a matter of course, heedless of the misery and hardship left in their wake. Statists claim the right and responsibility to tax comes from the people, the voters, but how can it? How can one human being pass on something unreal to another human being? Taxation is just the obvious example demonstrating the mindset of the whole statist cult.

It is not only the politicians to be blamed for society's ills, they are victims too. Give any person rights and powers beyond the normal and they will use them in whatever way they see fit. So would anyone. You might be a fan of Jeremy Corbyn but, even if he gets elected to Prime Minister, he will still steal money from the people to fund his agenda. Anyone who cannot or will not pay will be crushed by the apparatus of the state.

The average statist is, at heart, a decent person but a wilfully ignorant one. A person who would not crush their neighbours for money to fund their own lives or projects but is happy to see the state crush their neighbours for them. A person who would not extort money from their neighbours to buy food, shelter or medicine yet is happy to accept state benefits comprising money extorted from those same neighbours by the state.

It is irrational.

The politicians' wages come from stolen money. Their expenses come from stolen money. Their trappings, furnishings and buildings are paid for with stolen money. They are thieves, pure and simple, yet statists set these thieves apart from others, even venerate and ennoble them. Even the highwayman gives his victims a choice - "your money or your life." The statist demands your money and your life. The highwayman, his work done, allows you to go on your way. The statist follows you home and keeps on robbing you in perpetuity, from cradle to grave. The highwayman issues his commands only when he's robbing you, the statist's commands follow you around always, from cradle to grave.

The statist is the problem. It was the statist who allowed Jesus Christ to be nailed to the cross, the statist who cheered wildly at Hitler's rallies, the statist who allowed untold thousands to end up in Stalin's gulags, the statist who made possible the genocides of aborigional peoples around the world, the statist who flung millions of armed men against one another in two world wars, the statist who caused two cities to be nuked, the statist who cheered in the seats of the Colosseum as the Christians were thrown to the lions - the statists who constructed the EU and now want to pull it apart. And those who agree cheer and those who disagree grumble a bit, shrug their shoulders and say, "that's just the way things are - the state has the right to do anything it wants."

Bullshit, say I. The state has no more rights than you or I have.

If you want to buy something from France or Germany or Holland, just buy it. You don't need  statists to tell you what you can and can't buy and to take a cut of your transaction to fund their interference. If you want to hire a Syrian or a German or a Venezuelan, just hire them.  You don't need  statists to tell you who you can and can't hire and to take a cut of your profits to fund their interference. If you want to be part of the wider European community of human beings, just be one. If you don't, don't. It's your choice and yours alone; it's not Dave's choice or Jeremy's or Nigel's or Boris's - even though you may or may not respect their advice - it's yours.

All the rights and responsibilities do not belong to the state, they belong to you. You must use them wisely, for the state, plainly, cannot.

[TordelBack]

I love your writing Sharky, it's passionate and eloquent, and so much of it touches on truths. But ultimately your argument  rests on the idea that populations lack the ability to consent. 

I consent to be taxed, I consent to delegate the spending of that revenue, I consent to others having an equal say in who is delegated. Not because I believe in the superior right of the state, and most particularly I abhor the nation state, or because I fear its coercive powers, but because I believe the complexities of human life are best addressed through a degree of centralised management of resources - be that at street, town, island, continent or global level. Some problems require a bigger brief than me and my neighbours can or wish to handle, and for that reason I consent to my absolute liberty being curtailed, in pursuit of the common good.

[Jim_Campbell]

Forgive me spamming this thread with an external link, but I've had to try and get my thoughts in some kind of order about this whole referendum mess and they're possible a bit long to dump in a lengthy screed here, so I've typed them up on a separate page on my blog, away from the comics stuff:

EU referendum thoughts.

Happy to talk about any of that stuff here, however.

[Jim_Campbell]

I love your writing Sharky, it's passionate and eloquent, and so much of it touches on truths. But ultimately your argument  rests on the idea that populations lack the ability to consent.

This is the fundamental point of disagreement with Shark and where we will never agree. He sees 'rule' but I see delegation. In fact, that same argument speaks to the fundamental flaw of referendums, TBH.

It would be possible, in this day and age, to dispense with both the Commons and the Lords entirely. Stick a dedicated Android tablet in every home, and let the public decide. On every decision. Elect an executive on a platform of policies every five years and then subject all their policy decisions to public vote.

Except that I don't want to make myself an expert on rural waterways. Or deep sea fishing. Or the finer points of widget manufacture. I don't have the time, and I don't have the energy, so what we do is pay someone else to do it on our behalf. If I (or anyone else in the electorate) can't or won't make themselves informed on a subject, then they shouldn't be making legislation on it. I'm more than happy with that principle.

Now, you could certainly argue that the current reality strays rather a long way from the principle, but my argument will always be to fix the reality, not assert a new one.

[Tjm86]

Reading that post Jim I can see where you are coming from and to be honest it bears up with my experience.  One of our Learning Support Assistants was talking about why she was voted Leave.  She is a single mother who works during the holidays as well.  She works damn hard term time as well.  She was talking about how she sometimes goes with little or no food to make sure she can afford food for the kids and new clothes.

This is 21st Century Britain.

Watching Labour implode at a time when we need a strong social democratic opposition to press home the points you make I can only despair.  This weekend is shaping up to be depressing for a whole host of reasons, not all of them related to the referendum.

[The Legendary Shark]

Tordels, Jim: I have no argument against paying people to organise the things that need organising; healthcare, waterways, railways, roads, etc. Human beings are natural organisers - it's a skill we've harnessed to great and magnificent effect over the centuries. The need for and benefits of organisation are not in question.

But organisation does not mean "my way or the highway," nor does it mean having to become an expert on everything, having a say in everything. I am more than happy to leave decisions on what kind of bandages are best to the doctors, what kind of tarmac is best to the road menders, what kind of fertilizer is best to the farmers, and to have those industries have some form of national coordinating body.

It's the coercion I reject. That's one of the two basic things I would like to see changed immediately about the state as we evolve towards a properly enlightened, state-free society and world.

Yes, vote for representatives and prime ministers, by all means and good luck to them - but do not give them the powers to steal and cheat and coerce. They must ask, not demand. In most cases, they will ask for permission to run our public services their way at election time and permission is given - but not carte blanche - by the act of election to office. If the USA invites us into another war, the most the government will be able to do is ask the armed forces to provide volunteers and then make damned sure those volunteers are properly and adequately equipped and supported.

It's time that ministers and the people decided, once and for all, what they want government to be for, what it can and cannot do.

Imagine being asked for tax instead of having it taken from you. In the shop, for the checkout operator to tot up your bill and ask, "would you like to pay tax on that?" What would you say? "Actually, no, not today - this bombing of Syria has to stop," or maybe, "yeah, I'll pay 5% because I don't agree with government plan y but the hospitals still need the funds," or "yes, I'll pay the recommended x% because I'm broadly happy with how the government's doing things," or even, "absolutely, in fact the government's doing such a good job I'm willing to pay x% over the recommended rate." The same question could be asked by your employer on pay day. That's a little extra collective work for a potentially huge collective reward.

Sure, you'll get people who'll refuse to pay when asked but that number will dwindle as our services and government improve and as social attitudes evolve. Freedom and government, seemingly mutually exclusive ideas, working hand in hand for the greater good and it doesn't need blood in the streets or politicians dangling by the posterns to achieve it. All it requires is one, tiny shift - the right to say "no" and to have that respected.

(This does, of course, depend on the second needed change - the return of money creation to public (government, if necessary - at least to begin with) hands.)

If a government has to ask you for money it's going to have to be smarter, more efficient and better organised. If it just demands money, it can do what it pleases.

I suppose the question is, do you want to be a slave to the state or a partner to it? I opt for partnership every time and will reject slavery to my last breath on this good Earth.

[Professor Bear]

Blairite sources in Labour have apparently been texting journalists telling them they're happy about the opportunities presented by the country going to utter fuckery:

"everyone is so excited, it feels like Christmas morning, maybe today is the day!"

I should be surprised, but then you have to remember that these are the people who voted not to bomb Syria, but then changed their minds so they could turn the murder of 130 people into a stick to beat their leader with while enabling a bombing campaign that's killed hundreds.

[Hawkmumbler]

I absolutely adore your confidence in humanities ability to knuckle down and get on, Sharky.

But it is highly deluded, either way.