There is one theme in common between the very different Brexit and Trump campaigns. Both drew strength from the growing hostility to global government, global treaties, neo con military interventions. Both challenged the arrogant assumption of superior wisdom and moral right adopted by a gilded elite flitting between the large corporations, quangos and governments of the advanced countries, claiming they know best and should be allowed to get on with it unchallenged.
In the case of the UK there was a strong feeling that a largely unaccountable use of power by the EU institutions was not what electors want. We accept that national governments make mistakes and may annoy us, but they are mistakes we can criticise and do something about . They are governments we can persuade to change or politicians we can remove from office if they stubbornly persist in doing the wrong things. We have little power or influence to change EU taxes , budgets and laws, and find that the rigid Treaty based legalistic approach makes normal democracy impossible. This is even more true for Euro members as Greece and its chosen government, Syriza discovered.
We remember the litany of disasters the so called experts and elites have visited upon us – their Exchange Rate Mechanism recession, their Banking crash slump, their Euro with running crises attached, their dear and intermittent energy which often produces more carbon dioxide overall, not less. On both sides of the Atlantic politicians struggle to explain why lower incomes remain depressed and why so many jobs have been exported abroad.
In the USA there was a feeling that their Washington elites – of both major parties – have embedded too much in global treaties too. They felt their trade and global warming treaties did not take into account the need for more and better paid jobs at home, and the important role cheaper energy plays in industrial renaissance. In both countries there was an anger about the elite idea that we in the west know best how Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other Middle Eastern states should be governed, and have a moral duty to bomb their cities and train rebel groups in those countries to effect violent change.
The gilded elite lacks awareness of its own moral insensitivity. Why did Mrs Clinton think it a good idea to spend valuable campaign and air time in the last week fraternising with rich celebrities, rather than making it her business to see what she could do for out of work steelworkers or middle income Americans facing huge health insurance premium hikes from Obamacare? Why did she think it right to organise a large fireworks celebration of her victory before she was secure in that aim? Why did she not see that the big money she raised from corporates for her campaign posed presentational problems and would not guarantee victory just because she had more cash to spend than her rival?
There are so many examples of the elite rewarding itself too generously from public funds, living on donations from companies whilst claiming they have bought no influence, and meeting in private gatherings where the corporate financiers of it all can rub shoulders with the political leaders. If the governments do not deliver what people want, voters get suspicious of these methods.
Mr Trump’s slogan “Drain the swamp of Washington” resonated. It will be interesting to see if he can do it. A good start would be tough limits on how much a candidate can spend in an election, just as we rightly have here for individual constituency campaigns.
November 13, 2016
Good blog above. Clear and true.
November 13, 2016
Seconded!
November 13, 2016
JR, good blog but your. Log is in contrast to actions by your own party and you srtill fail to say why your party whipped a vote to have Vaz elected to the Justice Select Committee etc ed
I answered this on a previous response
November 14, 2016
No, you ducked the question with a lame reply. Again, this goes to the heart of your quote drain the swamp in Washington. This applies to Westminster where we were promised change and the substandard behaviour continues with frequent occurrence.
November 14, 2016
you srtill fail to say why your party whipped a vote to have Vaz elected to the Justice Select Committee etc
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Because the MPs who are compromised are often the ones who get promoted.
November 14, 2016
Yes.Powerful, hard-hitting and spot on.
November 13, 2016
Much truth in all the above.
Essentially the only control on the elite, corruption, crony capitalism, corrupt lobbying and dodgy “consultancies” is the democratically elected politicians. This as they have to answer to the electorate. Unfortunately they fail hugely in this as so many are in on the racket that largely is government. Look at long lists of many MPs and others “interests” – Things such as green consultancies, the arms industries, “charities”, Unions and the likes.
No one else in government has any interest in making government, the legal system or any part of government more efficient or fair to the productive sector. This is why government is so bloated, so inept and so incompetent. Nearly all of government is mainly parasitic. It grows as big at it can but without quite killing of the productive host it leaches.
An election every five years, for a least bad option of an MP, or an EU referendum every 40+ years (one likely to be ignored anyway it seems anyway) is like trying a drive a car by being allowed to say one word to the driver once every five years. An MP anyway is more responsive to party than electorate as without the party he is not likely to retain his seat.
November 13, 2016
Hopefully Obama will do a good trade deal with the UK & quickly (near the front of the queue). He should make it conditional in T May also getting real on energy, withdrawing from the Paris agreement and repealing the appallingly damaging Climate Change Act.
Mind you he will have lots of resistance from the many greencrap vested interests at home. The land owners, bio fuel farmers, wind and solar equipment producers and all those academic “experts” doing research. The ones whose computer predictions have been so very wide of the mark. A perfect crony capitalism industry built on absurd exaggerations and another daft fake green religion.
November 13, 2016
Er, i think you mean Trump?!
November 13, 2016
Good blog. Why did the Tory party not sack Cameron? Did he ever keep his word?
November 13, 2016
Did he ever keep his word?
Well they made squatting illegal, but only for residential property. Why just residential?
But with his Cast Iron, at heart a low tax conservative, repaying the debt, an MP recall system, withdrawing from the ECHR, the £1M IHT threshold promise, net migration to the tens of thousands, his priority in three letters the N…H….S….., staying on after the Brexit vote, issuing the section 50 notice the next day, running sound finances and a solid currency, the bonfire of red tape ……… It was all lies, lies and more lies.
As they old saying goes, how do you tell if a political leader is lying? Well his (or her) lips are moving.
November 13, 2016
I see it is reported (via Farage I assume) that Trump has not got much confidence in T May (nor do I given HS2 & Hinkley). Also that Farage has suggested Trump moves Churchill back to his previous home in the White House. I think he will very sensibly do so (though doubtless he will put a larger one of himself next to it).
If T May gives the go ahead to any of the bonkers “Lagoons” in Wales it will be beyond doubt that either she is innumerate, daft as a brush & infected with the greencrap religion or B:- She is relying on the advice of people who are innumerate and daft (or they just do not give a damn about pissing tax payers money down the drain and robbing energy users).
Either way she will clearly be unfit for the job she holds is they get the go ahead.
November 13, 2016
Do you mean Trump?
November 13, 2016
Obama and trade deal with UK??? Surely you mean Trump.
November 14, 2016
The political landscape has changed. I did not vote UKIP and Farage was starting to annoy me but we must think of the country first and must bring Farage onboard as he gets on so well with Trump.
November 13, 2016
A good summary JR. But there is still little evidence that Theresa May is about to grasp the nettle and introduce the radical reforms we need. The decisions on Hinkley Point, HS2 and Heathrow reflect an intractable clinging to the status quo. We are at a point in our history when bold and original decisions are required. The opportunities are limitless. Does the Prime Minister have the vision, the courage and the leadership to take them ?
November 13, 2016
HS2 and Hinkley are clearly absurd decisions. It is hard to see how any sentient, unbiased and numerate person could possibly think otherwise. But T May and P Hammond do – it seems.
Then again the NHS, as currently structured, is bonkers too.
November 13, 2016
I do not see Mrs May as a radical reformer at all. I see her as someone who, like a cat, watches very carefully to make sure it is all safe, then pounces if it is still possible. That is exactly what she did over the referendum. I hope it is what she is going to do over Global Warming and Brexit too.
November 13, 2016
A fence sitter, in other words ?
November 14, 2016
A fence sitter, in other words ?
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Mrs May says whatever is expedient at the time and due to a sycophantic media gets away with it. She was the perfect choice for the Remain camp after Brexit.
If I turn out to be wrong I will apologize profusely.
November 13, 2016
@Mike Stallard
I hope it is what she is going to do over Global Warming
Hoping your are not holding your breath on that one!! The scam lives on & on & on
November 13, 2016
I hope that too but I expect to be disappointed. She cannot even see that HS2 is bonkers.
November 13, 2016
Excellent question, Excalibur. I am convinced that the answer s no. Mrs May is a manager or administrator. Her ideal outcome of her unnecessarily protracted and risky negotiations with the EU would be an exact implementation of the referendum result: UK still 48% in the EU.
Her focus is almost exclusively on sliding seemlessly into a new entanglement with the EU. Why she thinks it can be done in two years when the world record for a mere trade deal with the EU is 7 years is beyond me. So why is she trying?
What is needed is a quick and clean break to give certainty to businesses and individuals and is achievable under Article 50 in a matter of months because a narrow agenda is easier to agree and Article 50 requires EU agreement only by QMV. By contrast Mrs May’s agenda is broad, difficult to agree and will require unanimity in the EU.
The clean break should be followed by a period of independent development of both the EU and UK. Only when the direction of travel is clear should Britain consider any further entanglement with the EU.
November 13, 2016
What a superb article from start to finish, best I have read so far this morning (by a long way).
November 13, 2016
@ NA
Second that
November 13, 2016
It is only 6.29 on a Sunday! How many have you read?
November 15, 2016
Maybe the newspaper person had brought a full set of all the Sunday press before 6am, and with speed-reading it obviously is possible. Or not?
Do not mock people of good will, keen to participate in this brilliant blog.
November 13, 2016
We do indeed remember the litany of disasters the so called experts and elites have visited upon us. Those you mention and countless others. Indeed almost every time they intervene in the market.
The over taxing cars and trucks while subsidising trains and buses – why. The near monopolies of the dire NHS, dentistry, schools, universities and the likes. Achieved by taking your money off you and only giving you a little bit back but only if you use these poorly run monopolies. Thus killing competition. The absurd complexity of taxation, employment laws, misguided health and safety and countless other area.
The unfair competition from social housing, the restrictions in supply of housing due to OTT planning and building controls, the augmenting of the feckless.
The pointless & damaging wars (on a lie or indeed otherwise). The absurd Uber ruling recently.
The list is endless. There is a good book:- The Blunders of Our Governments Hardcover – by Anthony King listing many others.
November 13, 2016
Also the absurd waste of money on the hugely expensive (per passenger mile) UK tram systems, the Millennium dome fiasco, the white elephant (use once for a couple of weeks) Olympic buildings, most defence procurement, PV, the Millenium BUG department we had, the joke wind, PV and electric car subsidies …..
November 13, 2016
LL. I fear you would live in a crazy mixed-up world.
You have to accept that currently many jobs are located in city centres so how on earth would you propose getting people to work in London, Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield plus many others without trains and trams. Whilst their cost might be excessive you have to offset this against the chaos and resultant costs of getting millions of cars and thousands of buses to these city centres every weekday.
The Olympics may have cost a fortune but at least it put the UK at the centre of the world’s attention and gave pleasure to millions of people. To put a price on pleasure is impossible as many would pay a lot to see Man City play Man Utd or Arsenal play Spurs but I would be happy to see them in full or even just highlights on TV and would balk at paying to see them at the ground.
I couldn’t or wouldn’t want to demolish all of your arguments, but some just don’t seem to make sense.
November 13, 2016
LL, interesting that you quote this book as it reports how many bad or even plainly ridiculous decisions were taken by various governments following advices from quangos in which the private sector was heavily involved. So “public bad private good” might be as informative as “two legs bad four legs good” or “people good/bad experts bad/good”.
November 13, 2016
Indeed well what do the quangos car about value for money? It is not their money not they who get the value. All they want is fees, jobs, pensions, complexity and grand projects.
November 13, 2016
Lifelogic
I am really going to miss your comments over the next 14 days. They have a certain style about them which nearly always generates a chuckle
November 13, 2016
So Juncker must “teach” Trump the value of the EU. Especially enraged about the idea we may escape being put at the back of the que as punishment they are plotting other ways to stifle our escape. I do hope we are plotting countermeasures.
November 13, 2016
I wonder why (it is being reported that) the government is considering whether to argue in the Supreme Court that parliament may be able to force us to withdraw from article 50 at some future date?
It is almost as if we have a whole department somewhere devising more wriggle room to avoid ever having to leave the EU. I believe Farage’s view here that this could get very nasty indeed if the electorate completely lose faith in their Westminster representatives.
The House of Lords is already a lost cause,
November 13, 2016
The UK Parliament is the supreme legal authority within the UK and so there is no doubt that it could act to force the UK government to rescind the Article 50 notice. However it is not the supreme legal authority outside the UK and so it could not force the governments of the other EU member states to swallow the revocation of the notice by the UK government. Clearly the more time and trouble that has already been taken up in withdrawal negotiations the less willing those governments will be to just let the UK change its mind and stay in on the same terms as at present. Article 50 has no provision giving the withdrawing member state the right to change its mind and unilaterally rescind its notice, and while it’s also true that the article does not expressly prohibit that happening it’s difficult to see how all the other EU governments would agree to it without demanding some price in return, for example that the UK would not just stay in the EU on its existing terms but would agree to surrender all its treaty opt-outs.
November 13, 2016
Art.50 is a one-way exit. Which is fine by me. Although Section 5 does contain a note to Article 49, which about joining or, perhaps in this case, rejoining the ‘Stupid Club’.
November 13, 2016
It could change its mind in time though and rejoin.
November 13, 2016
I hope the govt does not try this tactic or I fear there will be trouble.
November 13, 2016
As the court action by the rich cabal was launched four days after the referendum, how did they know the next PM was going to trigger A50 without Parliament?
November 14, 2016
Now that is a good point Rose.
November 14, 2016
Because the government had already made that clear during the passage of the Act for the referendum and then afterwards as well, for example when they asked both Houses to pass the resolution setting the date for the referendum.
November 13, 2016
@matthu
The House of Lords is already a lost cause,
Should have had a massive reorganisation years ago.
November 14, 2016
House of Lords is NOT ”a lost cause” but we have to make it one. No previous “‘Administration” yet has had the balls to even attempt it but in years to come when we have dumped Scotland off into independence, bundled N.I off to join Eire, Wales to decide what they want to do with themselves leaving us, England, with an English Parliament then we will have no need for this unelected rabble of cling-ons. We will find a better, less top heavy and more accountable way to conduct our ”checks & balances”‘
November 13, 2016
Is remainer T May (who assured the public that we had control of our borders in the EU through Schengen to try to trick us into a remain vote – just how stupid does she think voters are) really up to the job of plotting a proper exit?
She cannot even make sensible decision on HS2, Hinkley, gender pay reporting, workers on boards or all the greencrap subsidies. She has lots of dire, lefty, greencrap ministers all over the place & yet several very competent people languish on the back benches.
November 13, 2016
How do you know all this?
November 13, 2016
How do we know? By googling. For instance reading about the very expensive tidal lagoon cost- much more than the £92.50 agreed for the Hinkley Point nuke- we read that the strike price agreed for one of the huge windfarms to be built in the middle of the North Sea is to be subsidised at £147/kWh and that the chairman of the foreign owned consortium building it is an ex Decc minister and the previous chairman was a lord, now chairing the committee advising the government. While the ex Decc chap is advising HMG about the lagoon, and for good measure is employed by another firm that wants to lay a cable all the way to Iceland.
Another click reveals that the Holland has put their North Sea windfarm out to tender and obtained a price half that which we will be paying. If we do manage to escape the EU, we also have to make sure that the civil servants and pro EU ministers do not just carry on as before. https://www.government.nl/latest/news/2016/07/05/netherlands-offshore-wind-farm-borssele-cheapest-world-wide
November 13, 2016
Did Cameron (or people from Cameron’s dire government) come up with Obama’s “back of the queue” threat wording. I suspect they did, I doubt Obama would have said it without at least a nod from the UK government. All part of their appalling bias, the sloped pitch he arranged and project fear.
Yet the BBC keeps going on about the lies on the bus. Clearly not a lie at all, just the gross figure, as was freely admitted by the leave supporters at the time.
November 13, 2016
I recall that when Obama made his ‘back of the queue’ comment, our Prime Minister, David Cameron, stood by his side, nodding approvingly. Obama got a lot of stick for advising us not to leave the EU, but it was obvious that he had been invited to come to the UK and give his opinion. A similar thing happened when Hollande made his ‘there will be consequences’ speech.
I felt ashamed of our Government for inviting leaders of other countries to give their opinion on such an important issue, which was for the British people to decide.
November 13, 2016
Were you equally appalled when Farage started lecturing Americans?
November 14, 2016
No. Obama set the precedent.
November 14, 2016
Obama, Hollande, his unelected expert Macron, the Australian and Canadian PMs- in fact anyone Eural could ask told us to remain. Macron even said we would be ‘completely killed’, not even half. So when Farage gets on well with the next president of the USA, after supporting him, some of us are pleased he got even.
November 13, 2016
Funny how they allowed foreigners to tell us what to decide regarding the EU but, could not allow the English, Welsh or Northern Irish the same right.
November 13, 2016
Cameron also stood by Hollande making threats to our nation. JR needs to add this to his thoughts on this blog. Who in their right mind would vote for a traitor like Cameron? Hollande has made furthe threats since, when do we get a politician to stand up for the UK? E only one I have heard is Farage! The Tories smeared him and are being investigated for election breaches to make sure he did not get elected. Why is this not in JR’s musings as it is central to people’s feeelings about Politicians at Westminster. Very soon the public will require radical action to be taken against the Lords to curb their number and make them serve a useful purpose to the taxpayer!
November 13, 2016
Cheshire Girl
Yes it was strange Cameron thought advice from a foreign dignitary would impress. Like bringing grandfather into the argument to set the children straight. I believe Mr Cameron likes Chinese food. He should have cut down on it. you can get too much of a good thing. Actually Obama hadn’t got the look of my grandfather, either of them.
November 14, 2016
Indeed were the words back of the queue agreed in advance or even perhaps written by Cameron and Osborne’s lets slope the pitch PR gang?
November 13, 2016
The political missionaries, who wish to save us from ourselves, have begun closing down our communications network by lobbying advertisers to stop doing business with the Brexit press. Lego has stopped working with the Daily Mail. This sort of thing will increase. Then there are the new privacy laws to satisfy the celebrity missionaries of Hacked Off.
Clearly these missionaries understand the power of choking the press of its funding. They are at war with us.
Why don’t our side understand how powerful – and how easy – a move it would be to choke off the appallingly biased BBC ?
November 13, 2016
A toy manufacturer has said it has listened to parents and grandparents over concerns that the Daily Mail has villainized ‘child’ migrants.
Really.
I thought grandparents were the ones responsible for Brexit, the housing crisis and the hospitals crisis. (Though they can’t be blamed for the schools crisis too.)
November 13, 2016
This grand parent will not be buying Lego for Christmas ,birthdays or ever again .
What sort of business is it that politicizes children’s toys ?
One run by people who care not for upsetting customers and facing the possibility of a reduced turnover .Muppetts.
November 13, 2016
Pity they did not ask the parents and children in northern towns their views. I would imagine it would have solicited a different response.
November 14, 2016
We can also not go to Legoland now that it has joined the EU and become its ally in subverting Brexit.
November 13, 2016
In American usage it’s normally “line”, not “queue”, so Obama should have been praised for his mastery of colloquial British English.
November 13, 2016
I’m very proud of knowing the meaning of sidewalk. It is so illogical compared with our word for it.
November 14, 2016
It would be silly to suggest that Mr Cameron and Mr Obama had not had serious private discussion about the possibility of Brexit, mirroring each other’s vernacular.
November 14, 2016
Our word ‘pavement’ means paved road and so is not logical, as not exclusive. The word ‘footpath’ is better but does not only apply to the sides of roads. The word ‘sidewalk’ is, therefore, more logical. Do they teach logic at law school? Judging from recent events, very badly.
November 13, 2016
I think it was established the “back of the queue” line came from Team Cameron not least because the word “queue” is not used in American English.
November 14, 2016
Did Cameron (or people from Cameron’s dire government) come up with Obama’s “back of the queue” threat wording. I suspect they did
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Cameron and the Left seem to WANT foreign powers to threaten us and think it good strategy, while Osborne and co think if we surrender in advance to all foreign powers (i.e China and France) then they wont need to invade us in the future.
.
November 13, 2016
Trump must be terrified of Juncker ?. At least Boris hasn’t gone running to the little EU huddle to discuss the US election. But no doubt we’re contributing towards said huddle.
Leave. Now.
November 13, 2016
Or asked people to demonstrate outside the US Embassy.
Why do our current crop of politicians so determined to embarrass us ?
November 13, 2016
And it seems that today the Sunday Times is intentionally trying to help those foreign powers to work against our national interests by revealing supposedly confidential UK government plans under the trouble-making front-page headline:
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/britains-plan-to-tame-trump-3qcb8vfql
“Britain’s plan to tame Trump”
November 13, 2016
This only makes our ambassador look more stupid and arrogant, I feel.
I think the “approach” described above is already history, and there are indications that Theresa May will “adapt” if the leaked parts of her forthcoming speech are anything to go by.
The successful politicians are the ones who have the courage, wisdom and intelligence to adapt to changing circumstances quickly, and to see the opportunities in the change they are presented with. Needless to say, the best people to deal with the new situation should be appointed/worked with, and past animosities/prejudices abandoned pdq. The meeting between Nigel Farage and President elect Trump was highly significant, and all that it implies will have to be “embraced” by the UK government.
November 13, 2016
The USA will not be led by anyone in the UK.
November 13, 2016
Hopefully President Trump will realise that the majority of British people do not think as those who write The Times, The Standard, The Guardian…
Am I the only one to think that Trump could make a great President ?
November 14, 2016
Hopefully President Trump will realise that the majority of British people do not think
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We need to bypass the trendy posturing Lefties like Theresa May and get a delegation of proper small government Conservatives together to go meet Trump and apologise profusely for our media and last PM.
Trump could really help us out big time if we think this through carefully but Theresa May must be sidelined.
November 14, 2016
No, you are not. I agree. Besides anything else, he is a problem solver and will get things done. However, he will dispense with a lot of the nonsense on the way e.g. the red tape, bureaucracy, and non scientifically based legislation on global warming. I think he does not tolerate out of date and ill informed interpretations of the Syrian conflict. That, I think, has already been demonstrated by his willingness to work with Putin. He has a far better understanding of the Syrian situation than Obama, and David Cameron, and probably Theresa May (from the noises that are coming out of government). At least we will not be going into WW3, which seemed to be what Clinton was moving towards. That is the greatest achievement so far.
November 15, 2016
Anonymous: “Am I the only one to think that Trump could make a great President ?”
Then there are two of us.
November 13, 2016
The other problem they have is “group think” and “fashion”. Politicians and government seem unable to ever change direction, even when almost everyone can see how stupid their decision was. Thus until they finally fall off the cliff.
The ERM and EURO are good examples.
CO2 atmospheric concentrations have increased and yet there is no significant warming at all for 18 years and not that much in the last hundred years. Yet nearly all the politicians and so called “experts” still swallow the climate alarmism agenda while wasting billion. Their computer predictions have been proved to be bogus drivel so why do they still trust them.
Huge bias in research funding and appalling bias on the BBC on this issue too.
Trump is at least sound in this area. Rather a shame that T May and most MPs clearly are not.
November 13, 2016
I hope that Trump knows a bit more than LifeLogic does. The last but one El Nino was in 1995 and the “flat” global temperature was indeed over 18 years, ie till 2013. But we are in 2016, and there was an El Nino in 2015, dissipating in the first months of ’16. And I don’t doubt that someone with a scientific mind as acute as LL’s will have failed to notice that the global temperature in this last EL Nino was higher than in the previous one.
Or are all surface temperature measurements hijacked by the Chinese?
November 13, 2016
The decisions on Hinkley Point
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This will never happen, a future UK anti-globalist government will stop it.
November 13, 2016
… and reactivate the Corn Laws?
November 13, 2016
and meeting in private gatherings where the corporate financiers of it all can rub shoulders with the political leaders.
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So we need to let the political elite know that we are not happy about Bilderberg gatherings etc. Alteast at Davos the media are present and there is some transparency. BBC staff defend Bilderberg meetings so someone needs to tell them, NO, NO, NO.
November 13, 2016
The Guardian covered the 2014 meeting of Bilderbugers well. Madame Reding was there, the EU commissioner who told us that the British people were ill equipped to make a decision about the EU. Now we have the Lord on their Brexit committee on the steering committee. How they find time to be chairmen of multinationals too is a tribute to their abilities.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/30/bilderberg-copenhagen-2014-osborne-mandelson-balls
November 13, 2016
I confess to knowing very little about Bilderberg gatherings. It is the meetings we do not hear about which may be a worry. They probably need a secluded private meeting for playing Bingo, dominoes and the like. Can’t be seen doing such things.They are too important. Ed Balls has attended I hear. Perhaps a spot of hokey cokey then followed by a pie and pea supper ( chipshop mushy peas of course ) with lashings of mint sauce.
They are all doomed of course of they took his economic advice.
November 14, 2016
.They are too important. Ed Balls has attended I hear. P
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He was spotted sneaking in a side gate, trying to avoid the media, apparently.
November 13, 2016
and meeting in private gatherings where the corporate financiers of it all can rub shoulders with the political leaders.
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John, I have heard Andrew ONeil on the Daily Politics say the EXACT opposite to what you have just said about Bilderberg meetings. He said “there is nothing wrong with the political elite having private meetings with the top business, media and corporate financiers and in fact it is useful”. THAT IS WHAT HE SAID. A few years ago when the subject came up on his show. Another BBC News presenter echoed exactly the same sentiments. So clearly this is a directive coming from their bosses who themselves are controlled by?…..
We cannot stop the powerful meeting the powerful in private but what we can do is socially condition the political elite to believe it is unacceptable. At the moment the media (BBC) is trying to socially condition us that it IS acceptable.
By the way, when was the last time you attended?
Reply I have never been to a Bilder meeting
November 13, 2016
Nothing wrong in big money men meeting in private. What is wrong is when politicians like George Osborne, when Chancellor attend. He was our servant and so we should be entitled to know what was said while he was there.
The suspicion that there are deals done and power bought and sold in back rooms which the great unwashed are not allowed to know about is totally wrong. Same applies to the lobbyists infesting parliament. They should be chucked out and if they want access to an MP or Minister, do what the rest of us do and write in and get the same non answer. There is too much power broking going on in our system and MP’s or Ministers doing deals privately should be jailed, just like the ‘Cash for questions’ one of a few years ago..
November 13, 2016
I just googled “John Redwood Bilderberg” and found you were one of few MPs who had already tackled Ken Clarke about this. So thank you and well done. Clarke tried to joke his way out of it, implying the group had overrated influence yet last year I watched him say that the steering committee had decided to promote Rory Stuart MP via their media contacts and we should look out for him as a possible future PM (other MPs chuckled), I as not laughing. At the time Rory was sitting on the fence as far as the EU referendum is concerned. but came out for Remain in the end.
He is still young, lets see how is career progresses.
“10 Downing Street have published the “Government guests” and “senior media guests” that have been entertained at Chequers by David Cameron since he became Prime Minister. Inevitably the fact that Rebekah Brooks was the only person to be entertained twice and that Andy Coulson was a guest in March has got the tongues wagging.
The list reveals plenty of other material for the Kremlinologists looking to understand Cameron’s plans. Rory Stewart MP is, for example, the only member of the Class of 2010 to have been a guest. Does this confirm his status as one destined for great things”
Source: http://conservativehome.blogs.com/gazette/2011/07/why-is-rory-stewart-the-only-new-mp-to-be-invited-to-chequers-does-the-fact-that-grant-shapps-has-be.html
November 13, 2016
Go to a bookies and have £10 on Rory Stewart becoming future leader of the Tory party.
November 13, 2016
Thanks for the tip, however don’t you think RS attending Bilderberg in 2011 might ruin his chances with the readers of this blog?
November 14, 2016
Florence of Belgravia as PM?Can’t see it myself!
November 13, 2016
Clarke tried to joke his way out of it, implying the group had overrated influence
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Not overrated, that it was well balanced between pro EU and anti EU members LOL (utter rubbish Ken).
November 13, 2016
Dan Hodges describes the gilded elite as ‘liberal missionaries’ and goes on to say of the ‘disasterous’ and mistaken decisions of the people to vote Brexit and vote Trump:
“On this side of the Atlantic, the political missionaries are also preparing to do the Lord’s work. The people must again be saved from themselves.”
I think I shall use ‘liberal missionaries’ henceforth. It really does sum it up.
November 14, 2016
Why?proto-fascist is a much better description.
November 13, 2016
A superb blog John!
In my opinion Mrs Clinton is the most ethically challenged politician in my lifetime and I’m hopeful that a new Attorney General will overturn the ridiculous decision not to prosecute her over the email scandal and clear breaches of US national security.
If Mrs Clinton is pardoned by President Obama before he leaves office, it will confirm much of which law-abiding Americans already know and seal his legacy as the worst US president since World War II.
November 13, 2016
“…it will confirm much of WHAT law-abiding Americans….”
November 13, 2016
She can only be pardoned for Federal Offences. State Offenses she can still be prosecuted for. Either way, she is finished.
November 13, 2016
Mrs May is culpable. She insulted Mr Trump and by doing so showed that her allegiance was not to the sentiments you expressed. She delayed her congratulations when he won. She dithered.
She is seeing the payback. Mr Farage is getting top billing. She is sidelined and qite rightly too. When she does get there she will be seen as second fiddle.
She has lost the initiative again. She is not the type of leader we need.
November 13, 2016
I agree.
November 13, 2016
This is a failure by the incumbents to understand that the zeitgeist is changing.
They will be resistant to it, of course, which would be a mistake. Those of us who tried to warn them many times over many years were ignored.
The backlash against Political Correctness has started and it will not stop until it is gone. People are willing to put their countries on the line to be rid of it.
November 13, 2016
“…the rigid Treaty based legalistic approach makes normal democracy impossible.”
Well, it’s only rigid when they think that strict adherence to the treaties and laws will help advance the project; on the other hand it can be extremely flexible if that it seen as necessary to defend or advance the project, with treaty provisions and laws being bent and broken and of course the democratic will of citizens set aside despite the notional commitment to democracy.
If their approach was consistently rigid then they would not now be threatening the UK with trade sanctions for its temerity in deciding to withdraw from the eurofederalist geopolitical project, making use of an exit provision that they decided they wanted to include in the treaties.
Instead they would be looking at the EU treaty articles which commit the EU and all its member states to developing friendly and co-operative relations with their neighbours outside the EU (Article 8 TEU) and progressively removing barriers to international trade (Articles 3 and 21 TEU, and preamble to, and Articles 32 and 206 in, the TFEU).
They certainly would not be threatening to recreate barriers to trade with the UK where at present there are none, having been abolished through the EEC/EC/EU treaties.
Nor would they be planning to disregard wider “international law” prohibiting the use of economic sanctions for purely political purposes, trying to bully other sovereign countries into submission, contrary to a rule laid down within the UN which they claim to respect (Articles 3, 21, 42 TEU, and preamble to, and Article 208 in, the TFEU).
The EU runs according to the principle enunciated by the Italian politician Giolitti:
“Per i nemici le leggi si applicano, per gli amici si interpretano.”
“Laws are applied to enemies, but only interpreted as regards friends.”
November 13, 2016
John, I am pleased you feel this way and thank you for a very coherent and true article. Of course the Conservatives in the UK are not immune from accusations of being political elites, although clearing out the Eton old boys club was a smart move on behalf of Theresa May, but the days when politicians fall out of University having studied PPE and then embark on a career in politics and then presume to “govern” people who are working damn hard day in day out in the reality they create has to come to an end.
I also think that people like Farage should not be dismissed as some kind of political Chav and if Theresa May had some political nous she would not dismiss Farage as a “bridge” to Trump but would welcome him with open arms and ask him to join (as an advisor) the Brexit team. Afterall had Farage not put his political and career neck on the line over the last 20 years, we would not have been able to free ourselves from Europe, and people like your good self would still be wondering in the wilderness outnumbered by those pork barrelling and being paid off by Brussels.
Please do what you can to get May to think again. Farage represents a large constituency of support in the UK, he also holds UKIP supporters in a trance – if you ignore, sideline or exclude him, like the elites who just “haven’t got it” all Theresa will be doing is adding more fuel to a very angry fire of voter resentment.
I also think that the Conservative Government should also start to develop totally fresh thinking. We have been beaten down by Europe and May herself humiliated and sidelined at the last European Meeting. May needs to grasp the olive branch from Trump and start to re-imagine Britain’s place in the world. She can do this by working to create the new Atlantic partnership with Canada; USA; and Mexico and then look to add to this and build the long hoped for ANGLOSPHERE of trading nations; bringing in New Zealand and Australia.
I think the British people would feel much more comfortable having a trading bloc of brothers; sisters and cousins, rather than being put at risk by the not so tender mercies of the German/Franco firing squad which is what we face if we continue to plough a poverty stricken furrow in Europe.
We have for far too long, realised that the European project was a way of draining our cash and our resolve, and as the two protagonists Germany and France have wanted it all their own way….let them have it. They can deal with the mess that is the EU; they never listened, they never accommodated commonsense so let them manage what comes next.
Please do what you can to get Theresa to meet with Farage and also to get the Anglosphere concept which I know is a keen idea of Newt Gingrich (I have friends of his with whom I have spoken of this over many years).
The Conservatives need to be pooling ideas and getting people who can contribute to come together and use all the talents. Maybe you could even organise an evening at Westminster where people who have something to contribute can come and put forward a five minute presentation to get things moving?
Thanks for keeping the light of democracy glowing, but the Conservatives need to be lighting a bonfire not a candle!!
November 13, 2016
I doubt Mr Redwood carries much influence with Mrs May, regrettably. He’s not on the front bench and this convinces me more than anything that we should be doubtful about Brexit.
The good news is the Trump win itself. We Brexiters will feel much kinship with our cousins over the water and are feeling far more confident of our decision to vote Leave. Dare one say it but even if a second EU referendum were to take place tomorrow I would expect a 70:30% turnout in favour of Brexit.
This is because 70:30 approximates with people I know who dislike the EU, alas many of whom voted Remain out of fear – particularly at what President Obama said.
I think Remain would be utterly UTTERLY stuffed in a second referendum, though we still should not have one.
November 13, 2016
Chairman May is poorly advised. One of her advisors Tweeted some disparaging remarks about the future POTUS before the election. Wiser heads would have kept their mouths shut.
The best political quote of 2016 goes to, Nigel Farage who, upon his triumphant return to the EU parliament gave what could be said his victory speech.
He said;
Isn’t it funny ? When I came here seventeen years ago, and I said I, that I wanted to lead a campaign to get Britain to leave the European Union. You all laughed at me ! Well I have to say, you’re not laughing now are you ?
November 13, 2016
It seems that the result of Mrs May’s Conservative government totally and disgracefully dismissing Nigel Farage has resulted in his becoming truly a renegade and angry anti-establishment loose cannon. He could have been a most useful and constructive ally to her government. She has created in him a dangerous enemy and all of us will probably now have to live with the consequences of a much poorer deal with the EU than could be achieved with him being firmly placed in the Brexit team.
November 13, 2016
Christine
Couldn’t agree more with your sentiments about Farage. He is the working mans politician and is more in touch with the working class than many of our elite politicians from all sides. As you say, he has the respect of thousands of voters in the UK and obviously Trump. Mrs May could do a lot worse than Farage on her team and nobody has the interest of Britain at heart than he. It doesn’t matter what people that don’t like him think, we would not have had this referendum without his relentless campaigning. The man is a hero in my book.
November 16, 2016
I, too, couldn’t agree more with you, Christine and fedupsoutherner.
November 13, 2016
JR
I have never voted Conservative, and I certainly don’t share all of your views. However, I agreed with today’s piece from beginning to end. Thank you.
By the way, please could you explain it to the many colleagues you have in Parliament who “don’t get it”.
November 13, 2016
Indeed Dr Redwood, what a sound comment this is.
There is room for a bit of humility from the ‘elites’ at this point. There must be millions of people doing their jobs professionally with better results than so many politicians ‘deliver’. It is not only the poor and the ignorant who are fed up with stupid decisions defying common sense, especially on ‘climate change’ when cheap energy would obviously help everybody.
A bit of respect for the taxpayers who pay their salaries would not go amiss either, among highly paid state employees. The term ‘Civil Servant’ deserves a revival.
November 13, 2016
Wait a minute!!! Has this site suddenly taken a lurch to the left. Your post JR, could be the Op-Ed in the Socialist Worker! You were one of the prime advisors to the Thatcher / Reagan and later, Clinton, corporate globalisation master plan.
Your lot invented the “four freedoms” of laissez faire neo-liberalism (not the EU version that most of your commenters confuse with socialism). De-regulate; incorporate; privatise and austeritise (when the results of the first three blow-up, like in 2008).
Confusion abounds, I am not sure where this site now sits on the political compass? You are supposed to be right-wing authoritarian, supported by groups of white voters, especially those without a post secondary /college education. Are you going to jump ship? Has Nigel called?
PS. This Brexit thing is all getting a bit silly now, but it will make a great Python film to rival The Life of Brian.
November 13, 2016
The Four Freedoms were formed when countries like the UK, Germany, France, the BeNeLux and Scandinavian countries all had similar economies that were doing well and there was no pressures felt. Fast forward to today and you have a large number of countries in the EU who are very poor and decades of Communism has left them no further forward than they were after the second world war. Into this comes the Euro and all the problems plus, certain practices of governments and bankers to exasperate the problems of what is already, even in the good day, a bad idea – the EU.
November 13, 2016
Would you believe it! The little people prey for a Messiah to lead them to the promised land and, two turn up at the same time. Donald in the USA and Nigel in the UK.
Two Messiahs, dedicated to releasing the little people from the shackles of transnational (globalised) corporations with their profit maximising, mega, free trade agreements; supplied to those corporations, by their very own electedand captured by the 1% elite, politicians! 😉
November 13, 2016
Acorn – You do not get it. You do not get what has happened.
Dan Hodges in the Mail on Sunday gets it.
Political, media and celebrity missionaries have assumed control of the western world. They take the Blairist ‘third’ way; a curious mixture of Leftism and capitalism – for our own good and at no expense to themselves, of course.
We must be protected from our own decision to choose Brexit/Trump etc.
Dr Redwood now sees this.
November 13, 2016
As a blatant example of ‘the elite’ taking care of themselves, Bill Clinton introduced an Act early in his first term, imposing a 5yr ban on politicians who had left office becoming lobbyists. Months before the end of President Clinton’s second term, the Act was overturned.
Hmmm…..
November 13, 2016
Good morning.
Great post.
In a word – Socialism.
In two words – Corporate Socialism
If you are going to have to deal with World Government, you can start we the UN.
Boy is the EU miffed. The last thing they needed was a pro-UK POTUS. To paraphrase someone from history;
November 14, 2016
YES oh YES …
The left – Brown was a good example when he was chancellor – imagine they can control inflation… that’s one of their bedrock ideas.
To do this however requires that prices are stabalised, and the biggest component of price rises is the cost of labour.
Importing ever more cheap labour is the thing that keeps wages low, while our quality of life goes down the pan!….. and that we can thank socialist policies for.
JUST IMAGINE – if we hadn’t been bombarded for years to keep family procreation to 2 children, then we would not now be in the position where we have to import workers.
It’s time failing idiotic socialist nonsense / policies were labelled as such!
November 13, 2016
On the way he has made some unfortunate remarks which have offended young American women and other democrats, but like us, the Americans want their life back.
Marine Le Penn was interviewed this am and she was reasonable in the things she was saying . She wants her French way of life back , she wants the growing Eurocrats to stop over riding the will of her peoples. What is wrong with that? We all want to regain our democratic power and our collective wishes to be respected. We fought in a couple of world wars last century and we never want it to happen again, yet as we let people in who want to solve their problems with violence the potential becomes greater.
November 13, 2016
Marine Le Pen provided much food for thought in an interview a few months ago with a BBC journalist on Hard Talk. He threw the kitchen sink at her, and guess who won. I think this interview provides in a nutshell the stance/beliefs of Marine Le Pen, and displays the utter contempt of the liberal media (however, I have to admit that by the end of the interview there was a sheepish and rather grudging smile from the interviewer – he knew he had been beaten, roundly, and in a very charming way).
November 14, 2016
I saw that interview (with Stephen Sackur,scourge of right wingers everywhere)-she was on top form,better than her more subdued performance on Marr this Sunday.
Wasn’t Marr’s extended advance liberal grovel for interviewing her just plain excruciating?
There’s also a wonderful hostile HARDtalk interview with the Russian ambassador to the EU from a few months back where the latter bluntly says you can’t isolate us,can’t ignore us and we don’t care what you think about us.That one didn’t end with a smile!
November 14, 2016
I saw that interview. Very impressive and she certainly got the better of the interviewer.
I wonder if she speaks English ? I suspect she does but makes a point of only using French in public on principle.
Even though France would benefit from leaving the Euro in the short/medium term. her protectionist economic policies would be a disaster for France in the longer term but I suspect the inevitable devaluation against Germany will work for enough time to get her re-elected for a second term.
It might even work for a longer with a progressively devaluing currency enabling French workers to remain broadly competitive despite their 35 hour working week and long holidays.
November 13, 2016
margaret, you ask “What is wrong with that?” You are asking what is wrong with democracy. The EU believes everything is wrong with democracy because it can exist only in a nation state and the Eu is wholly and utterly convinced that the root of all evil in the world today lies in the nation state. indeed it has emblazoned this belief in a plaque at the visitors entrance to the EU Parliament.
The EU’s answer is technocratic and bureaucratic government in which only suitably qualified people may contribute to government policies. The EU is the only supra-national government in the world and remains, despite its evident failures and lack of any evidence of there being any form of government superior to national democracy, that it is the only means of assuring world peace and prosperity in the future.
That is the official EU answer to your question. The EU is wrong.
November 13, 2016
Nature pulls some cruel trick and one of them is to use it’s force to turn democracies into dictatorships. The peoples resistance to that is prodigious and democracies flourish not decay. Times do come when resistance is weakened by an event(s) and misguided humans who act out of greed and/or self interest and it does turn into decay.
Western democracies have arrived at a point that democracy is under attack. Events and subsequent human behaviour have combined. The French revolution and two world wars in the main have given rise to the dominance of socialist and progressive thinking. Aiming to right many wrongs which it did. From innocuous beginning these left wing movements did not become a welcome addition to our societies but ones determined to dominate them.
Helped by humans other prodigious attribute the creation of wealth by creating a free market capitalist system. It appears it is too prodigious as we have become decadent. Therefore we no longer have the same will that made us a successful democracy to fight forces who wish to take it away from us. At least we did not, and authoritarian and monopoly craving groups have claimed much of it. So much that rule by a one party and big business oligarchy are on the threshold of becoming a reality.
Hopefully not too late the populace have woken up to the danger and are fighting back. The arrogance and self seeking agendas of the anti democracy groups has turned many against them. Brexit, Trump and the rise of populist parties are examples of that. They are of course not going to give up without a fight as we can tell from what we see on our streets, in our courts, their malevolent rhetoric and their obstructiveness.
November 13, 2016
The left are very conservative, they dislike change, in the UK they hark back half a century to a supposed golden age of state control. In the USA they choose an establishment candidate funded by vested interests with stale policy ideas. The candidate they should have chosen to take on Trump on his own populist terms was Bernie Sanders but they believed he was “unelectable” when actually in the current climate he wasn’t.
November 13, 2016
If Sanders is electable then so is Corbyn and that’s a frightening thought. But I think you’re quite wrong.
November 13, 2016
Sanders would have won. Thank goodness they didn’t field him.
Trump is the rocket the celebrigentsia need and is good for Brexit Britain.
November 13, 2016
I came to the conclusion that our political classes were so keen to sign up to all these international treaties , disenfranchise the electorate , and so limit what they can do, was because many of them aren’t there to’change the world’, they aren’t driven by a political value , they are there for the job, the career, and so if they can can remove the chance of being caught on the wrong side of politics by signing away our sovereignty, then their career might have a longer lifespan.
November 13, 2016
+1
And it why I believe that a Three Line Whip will be what is needed and that we will win it. I do not believe that many MP’s, except in the Lib-Dems of course, are as committed to the EU as some might think.
November 13, 2016
Sort of jobs for the boys
November 13, 2016
It so happens that the piss easy job of impoverishing the people who elected you comes with the virtuous role of global missionary:
– Reduce people’s wealth (c0nsumption) ? Saving the environment !
– Cause social chaos (mass immigration) ? Rescuing the third world !
Neither the leading politicians nor the supporting celebrities endure the effects of this, of course – hence Brexit, hence Trump.
Gary Lineker might argue that he should be allowed to opine despite having been a footballer but it would help causes he purports to believe in if he kept his mouth shut. Keep Twittering, Gary !
November 13, 2016
Another thought with regard to globalisation … in our world, with communications such as they are – do Ricardo’s comparative advantages exist anymore? I’m beginning to think not and further, to think that labour arbitrage and ‘green’ energy costs are the means of creating faux comparative advantages between countries.
As is everyone else yet they most probably wouldn’t express it in the same manner.
November 13, 2016
Normal folk rarely get the elite as an entity in their cross-hairs. They see the odd celebrity in real life. Ah but the media delight in the fall from grace of a notable. Then out come tales of years of depravity and seamy life of these persons with exquisite education and supreme intelligence….moving in wealthy circles beyond the ken. Accepted in those groupings in the full knowledge of their low life.
It’s an odd thing but in UKIP branches from time to time, sat on the sidelines, even in a dark corner, there was some businessman or other who was known to one or two leading members only. Taken for granted he was piling money in somehow. But never taking an active part in meetings or ever appearing on TV. It was like brushing up against an underworld about which we suspected existed but hoped against hope did not. Your heart sank as you realised UKIP was just another would-be elite riding on the backs of normal folks’ prayers.
Fortunately the UKIP elite has been rumbled, finished bar TV appearances on a Question Time growing ever dottier. They can go altercation on some foreign field that is forever foreign.
November 13, 2016
Mission accomplished rather than rumbled, I’d say.
There’s was not to get us out of the EU but to have our people *given the opportunity* to get out of the EU.
November 13, 2016
Their’s
November 13, 2016
Reading todays papers we have Clegg and Farron plus assorted Tories openly talking of derailing Brexit.
The proles must be returned to their box as the narrative is unwinding.
Haven’t these people learned anything over the past few months.
Trump seems to be exposing the climate change con for what it is. A corporate scam egged on by governments to bankrupt the voters.
Let’s hope he follows through.
Mandleson and his post democratic age. I think not
November 13, 2016
The Trump result – like the Brexit referendum , has rocked the political establishment to the core . I expect the momentum to spread across Europe and bring its bureaucracy down . Politicians once they are in office can disregard the roots from whence they came ; more often than not their ego takes over projecting them into a world of their own . Voters are always the ultimate key issue and must retain the right to correct the establishment . As it stands the House of Lords does not fulfil a democratic function and ,for this reason alone should cease .
We know that “outside” influences can bias the position politicians take – the presence of lobbying groups and professional organisations are testimony to that . It is when financial “gifts” are involved with these influences that the scene becomes dirty and inexcusable . Much tougher controls ought to be in place to stop anything of this nature happening . Equally using any political office to enhance personal lifestyle and enjoyment is a waste of public money and should also be subject to better control .
The mood here , in Europe and across the world is for change . National identity and core values are of more influence now than forever before . Established practices have to be re-designed to accommodate these changes and show to the voters that they do matter the most .
November 13, 2016
Is being a MP makes one part of the elite? Discuss in 500 words.
November 13, 2016
Only if he knows someone important
November 13, 2016
The elite tries very hard to make that happen, I suggest! After all, the incentives from Brussels are many.
November 14, 2016
No in most cases it makes you a hireling of the elite.MPs are too far down the foodchain of globalism these days.
November 13, 2016
Bernie Sanders but they believed he was “unelectable” when actually in the current climate he wasn’t.
>
Good point
November 13, 2016
Agreed. This is a cogent account of where we are today. It remains to be seen how effective the referendum will be in achieving the UK’s exit from the EU. The forces seeking to prevent it or modify beyond recognition are considerable and well organised – as the prompt action to challenge the use the royal prerogative immediately following the referendum result reveals. They will use every available device to frustrate that result.
November 13, 2016
JR: ““Drain the swamp of Washington” resonated.”
Do you think there is ‘a swamp’ in Westminster?
November 13, 2016
Wonderful post today John making very good points as usual.
Corbyn has been on Andew Marr this morning and said that being part of the single market was crucial and that he could try to prevent Article 50 if we came out. All very worrying. I wonder how we are ever going to get out. It seems like one big conspiracy between MP’s and the Lords to stop us achieving what we voted for. Don’t we live in a democracy anymore?
November 13, 2016
“The gilded elite lacks awareness of its own moral insensitivity.”
Obama and Clinton had a choice about going along with Al Gore’s Climate Change Agenda. The plight of coalminers and steel workers and of course in the terms of the USA…whole states, whole lands (“nations”) were in second place. In practical terms, they were forgotten.
Clinton should have watched and listened to to Trump at his early rallies. How 10000 sometimes raucous people stood for 6 hours waiting for him. Spent two hours with him, still standing and he was unscripted. He just talked with them . At times you could hear a pin drop as they awaited for him to say his next word…and the words were just chatty as you may exchange a word or two in a taxi-rank or bus stop. But with ten thousand people!
November 13, 2016
Yes, I agree. I often looked at president elect Trump’s twitter account and what were so revealing were the videoclips of rallies. You cannot hide large numbers, nor can you reliably.easily inflate numbers. The times when Clinton had poor attendances, which were apparently “inflated” on videoclip, were soon rumbled. Thank goodness for the internet.
November 13, 2016
Bruce Springsteen never actually worked in a factory or mine. He was unsuitable to be conscripted in the Vietnam war.
November 13, 2016
A Global government would only add another problem level. We have seen that in action with the EU when domestic governments added another government Brussels to have dominion over them. The UK has realised the error of that and have voted for Brexit. Other are beginning to question the veracity of the arrangement as well.
Globalisation on the other hand is not to be feared. That is nothing more than billions of people being freed up to interact with one another. Governments and treaties only get in the way of that by building obstacles in the way of doing it freely, wisely and efficiently. With the exception of providing a framework that defines the common relationship being established. Not what can or cannot be done but identify what the relationship is that is being established.
As long as sovereignty and the right to self determination is not compromised by allowing participant to be free to choose that which they wish to participate in and at what level globalisation will be democratic, harmony and wealth creating economically and socially. Conflicts will diminish as cooperation expands. Ideologies will lose their attractions and the collective spirit will be fostered. Making socialists and progressives happy without upsetting the right and libertarian as it will have come about naturally and not by coercion.
November 13, 2016
The Rust Belt. Fancy having something called that in your country as an accepted term.
Says much about the elite in America.
November 13, 2016
Disturbing, particularly evident in the alleged pc-speak of the Democrats is “Which way the Latinos will vote?” Which way the Afro-Americans will vote?” Which way the Ecumenicals will vote?”
I heard online ONE individual who said, it may have been on You Tube:
” I am a Latina! That is I am a female Latino. I am voting for Trump. I’m sick of Hillary Clinton saying ALL Latinas think all the same way and ALL are going to vote Democrat. Trump! Trump!Trump!”
Mr Corbyn here does not know his “working class” have Christian names and surnames. Some of them even have hyphenated names. Nasty upstarts! Bourgeois!
The Labour Party elite star in Orwell’s Animal Farm. They still don’t get it.
November 13, 2016
The worst thing I heard during the referendum from a MP (remain – Labour) was to refer to the people of the constituency she represented as; “Her voters” It is as if they, the electorate, belong to them and are there just as voting fodder. I do hope UKIP can get its act together and take votes from Labour in these areas.
November 13, 2016
Mark B
I heard something similar on TV about a personality who referred to “My audience ” ( viewers at home ) and how arrogant that was. Well they knew him,- perhaps they knew something more than the words alone suggest.He was very successful. There are few successful people except perhaps Mother Theresa that someone somewhere does not view as arrogant. Generally, very successful people generate both hate and love for themselves. Some may worship them seeing them as a saviour of sorts: others see them as people to crucify. It is an eternal theme of mankind.
Trump is fearfully.. extra-ordinarily… successful. His path to the White House actually did not exist where it existed for all his opponent nominees. PlusPlusPlus successful. “Un-believable” as he could say “unbelievable”
November 13, 2016
Farage is our man of charm and influence in washington now.
November 13, 2016
Very much so. A huge asset which should not be wasted. Bury past animosities and deal with where we are, is my advice to the anti Farage politicians in the UK.
November 14, 2016
This was the case after the referendum too. Why was he cold-shouldered then when he knew so much about Brussels and Strasbourg?
They just want to rub his nose in it but can’t find anything to rub it in. They end up sounding like pompous and petty prats – like Malcolm Rifkind this am.
Mr Farage has been very forbearing through all this hostility. Who can blame him for enjoying his moment of glory?
November 13, 2016
NA
In this connection I have just listened to Farage on TV speaking to Sky News. I must say he has a point about persons in the the Tory Party slagging off Mr Trump.
The whole perception and insults from senior British politicians across the board will most likely be the topic of study for students of politics, psychology, linguistics and mass-hysteria psychiatric study groups for quite some time. Maybe decades. It is a most bizarre and irrational aberration.Especially since his rallies provide visual and audio evidence greater than any other politician one can imagine. Hundreds of hours. Also with one particular broadcaster a full view of the audiences numbering many many thousands of all ethnic, racial groupings.
Yet these senior politicians, many, find fault when contrary evidence stares them in the face. I cannot remember such deafness such blindness except for instance a politician doing it deliberately. But they are not acting. Frankly, this is frightening for many who witness it. I understand it though; better, I have schemata for making explanation of the irrational. Worrying though, my Parliament is near full of persons debilitated and mind-blocked deciding on important matters of state, quite unaware ( literally )
November 13, 2016
It is a transparent lie to suggest there was only one theme in common between Trump and Brexit which was the sort of irrelevant constitutional guff JR is obsessed with and no-one else cares about . His new anti-Bank anti-capitalist “corridors of power” stuff is more usually heard from the equally awful Corbynites but I cannot say I am surprised With Facsism marching in the UK the US and soon France and elsewhere I think the time for trying to talk sense to ex Conservatives ……….is now past
You seem to have chosen your side Mr Redwood and if you are so deluded as to believe International Free Trade can be sold to the mob you have created then you are auseful idiot and useful is being kind
November 13, 2016
Where is “fascism marching in the UK and USA” ?
Examples please.
November 15, 2016
Steve Bannon?
November 13, 2016
Look up “fascism” and fascist some time. Then try to use the terms only where they actually apply. One day you may encounter some real fascists, but by then no one will believe your complaints.
November 13, 2016
“With Facsism marching in the UK the US and soon France …”
Idiot.
We – The People – haven’t changed what we believe in. YOU have !
Since when was common sense and common values ‘Facsism’ ?
November 13, 2016
You talk nonsense Newmania and not very nice nonsense at that.
November 13, 2016
Newmania, do you know what Fascism is?
November 13, 2016
I think you’re right that the time for talking is now past.
November 14, 2016
The nearest thing to fascism in the USA is the anti democratic movement marching and rioting in the cities to overturn the result. A bit like the remainiacs here marching on Parliament to overturn the referendum result.
November 14, 2016
Exactly Rose, the so called anti fascists are the fascists
November 13, 2016
So john how do you suggest the people put things right, you can not do it by voting for parties because they have all been taken over like the house of lords, councils, so what would you suggest to get a government and parliament that represent the people views, or just carry on as they been doing for the last 70 year.
November 13, 2016
Good article very well articulated.
Even my kids come home from school saying how bad trump is. I told my son to lookup the meaning of “group think” and have a look how politicians get into people’s pockets and look at some of the well documented allegations made against the Clintons.
November 13, 2016
Surely it is time for H.M. Government to call upon Obama’s Democratic Administration to denounce, if it has not done so already, the politically motivated violence that has reportedly been employed against Mr. Trump’s Republican supporters since the election.
November 13, 2016
Yesterday evening I saw a poster for “Save our hospital” – referring to our small community hospital. Isn’t it strange that the NHS – and other services – are cut and cut – yet a stream of virtually unemployable people (followed by their whole family ) are arriving with their hands outstretched, all expecting, and getting, everything-free lives out of the public’s taxes. These new arrivals will also be entitled to treatment from the very NHS that is being closed bit-by-bit, because of lack of money. The fact that there seems to be no budget limit/ ENDLESS supply – to pay for lives for anyone who walks in here, never to work, never to pay taxes, but all being a drain on our public purse, shows the aim of the govt.
Why do we have an endless supply of cash to throw away – -but NONE for ourselves?
What date has been quietly set for the end of England and the English?
November 13, 2016
A really interesting and measured item on ConservativeHome by Ryan Shorthouse. TG for people like him.
November 13, 2016
“In both countries there was an anger about the elite idea that we in the west know best how Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other Middle Eastern states should be governed.”
This is totally disingenuous to claim these conflicts had anything to do with an ‘elite’. Most of the ‘liberal elite’ I know were totally opposed to the war in Iraq.
In any case most of these problems were created by neo-cons, and I believe I’m right in saying you voted in favour of the Iraq war too.
If the American people think they’ve elected a pacifist into the Oval Office I think they’re in for a rude awakening!
November 13, 2016
Farage and Trump are our men for all Seasons
November 13, 2016
I would never vote for a woman who based her platform largely on the claim that it is time to have a woman at the top and who talked about the need for a woman to break through the ‘glass ceiling’. These aren’t political policies.
I would want the best person, regardless of sex and any of the other attributes which apparently demand special treatment.
Both Mrs Thatcher and Mrs May got to the top, not because they were women, but because they were considered to be the best person available at the time. This is something that Clinton didn’t understand.
November 13, 2016
“Mr Johnson is expected to fly to the US within weeks to meet with senior figures in Mr Trump’s administration and make clear that Britain believes that Mr Assad must go.”
“[Nigel Farage] told the Telegraph that the Republican’s team raised concerns about comments by Mrs May and her cabinet in the run-up to the US election.”
Good look with that, Boris, especially when it comes to explaining why patriotic Englishmen and real Americans rather than those with a genetic or vicarious attachment to a ME state would wish to create yet another failed state to add to Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya using some false and hypocritical ‘humanitarian’ justification, resulting in a further deluge of unwelcome and incompatible migrants. It is clear that the Foreign Office is infested with neocons as badly as the US State dept and will need to be drained likewise.
November 14, 2016
Very well put …
November 14, 2016
They are probably “liberal interventionists” rather than neo-cons.The difference between the liberal interventionists and the neo-cons is similar to that between a call-girl and a streetwalker.
November 13, 2016
It is very surprising that with monopoly suppliers of drugs anf healthcare packaged up and sold by monopoly suppliers (at the state level) of health insurance that premiums would mount so precipitously, almost as surprising as that mortgages sold to those who could not afford them and packaged up as investment grade securities could have the capacity to bring down the western banking system; of course, politicians are paid to expect the unexpected, especially when they themselves are the cause of the unexpected results of their actions.
November 14, 2016
Yes, and quite often these same politicians allow the worst to happen for the wrong reasons
November 13, 2016
All this falls at parties doors who are not democratic, when you vote for a party you are voting for corruption, people always moan about the leader and say what are they doing or why are they waiting, that because they are not in charge, people behind the party are in charge and people MPs are control by way promotion or the three line whip, it should not matter if all the big people who control things have meeting and lobby parliament and your MP because the people are supposes to have the last say but they don’t because the people have no control of who is going to be their MP and once elected the people have no control of what that MP votes for, only the MPs party.
That why the biggest winners at election time are none voters 34% to 41%, that because they do not like voting for corruption and people who are not under there control, none voters are biggest party.
November 13, 2016
The anti Brexit anti Trump rhetoric emanating from many sources in Britain is truly shocking and damaging. Indeed. If it continues we may well find ourselves ‘at the back of the queue’.
What on earth is wrong with:
– we want to control immigration
– we want to check Islamic extremists
– we want to eject illegal immigrants and criminals ?
Why are opponents to Brexit and Trump always lying that the plan is to stop immigration altogether ?
November 14, 2016
They have this immature mentality that tells them they are so right and correct and how could anybody dare have a different viewpoint – some of these opposers to democracy are truly dangerous, and we should stop treating them with kid gloves.
November 14, 2016
It’s the way the left operate – they take a very tiny element of some idea that has a little truth attached, spin it, add in a few whoppers to make the good guys look like nasty people, then they sell their message to their own crowd who repeat it word for word…..
November 13, 2016
Today I reached the age of 65 and, after more than forty years I remain a Conservative voter, despite Cameron and his quasi-Liberal agenda, the abysmal failure of his EU renegotiations and then the broken promises to campaign for Leave and trigger Article 50 immediately if he lost the referendum.
I think Mrs May has made a reasonably good start and it does seem we are heading rather slowly towards Brexit, although whether we escape altogether is still in doubt. Like our Host, and many regulars posting here, I sincerely hope we do.
However, isn’t it about time that Mrs May recognises the contribution Nigel Farage has made to secure the referendum and the Brexit outcome ?
As one of the best known and successful politicians in Britain and an elected representative in the European Parliament, at the very least he deserves a seat in the Lords and he can clearly make a contribution towards building relationships with the Trump Whitehouse team after the Government has made a, frankly, foolish start.
Yet Mrs May is going out of her way to put down Mr Farage at every opportunity and appears, according to press reports, to be undermining Liam Fox just for being prepared to have a conversation with the UKIP leader.
What is she afraid of ?
After the comments made by various ministers throughout the US election campaign, a degree of bridge building with the Trump administration at its formative stage is most definitely needed.
The reality is that Mr Trump will be President for at least the next four years and will be bringing a refreshing brand of straight talking to international relations, which he has started with his dealing with the failure of European countries to make a fair contribution to NATO.
A degree of squirming will ensue because Merkel and Co know only too well they have been riding on the backs of the USA, The UK and to some extent France, for far too long.
While that idiot Juncker and the leaders of most of the 27 are holding their noses and making snide comments about the next US President, our Government should be going all out to build transatlantic relationships. After the failures of the Obama years, we need to return to our traditional Mid-Atlantic position as soon as possible.
If Mr Farage can do anything to assist, his contribution should be welcomed. Symbolic it may be, but his securing the return of the Churchill bust to the Oval Office is a good start and will provide an everyday reminder to Mr Trump of what friends are for.
With difficult Brexit talks coming up, we must not underestimate the critical importance and symbolism of that potential US/UK trade deal.
November 14, 2016
One of Trump’s “drain the swamp” proposals is to introduce terms limits in Congress to remove the phenomenon of career politicians. One can only imagine the howls of outrage if that were proposed here for the Commons. It is an idea for Lords reform though.
November 14, 2016
Nicely put John…
On the subject of treaties, it has been clear for some time that our government has been signing away our rights for many years.
Some of these have been beneficial, for trade, for example, but others have tied us into dogmatic socialist principles that cannot be affected by democratic action. Quite a few of these are from the UN and other international quangos that we can barely influence.
Post BREXIT we really need to understand fully what treaties have been signed in our name, how they affect us and how they will potentially affect us in the future. If they do not meet our criteria for our desired future then we should negotiate to leave them – NOTHING IS IRREVERSIBLE.
We have to get away from the socialist notion that we should all be one unhappy family governed by an unaccountable global elite, somewhere, because as you show they do not have all the answers and are all too frequently wrong at our expense.
In future all international treaties should be the subject of a nation wide referendum.