Here at this moment I have great news for you and the whole country. Early this morning the Yugoslav nation found its soul. A revolution has taken place in Belgrade, and the Ministers who but yesterday signed away the honour and freedom of the country are reported to be under arrest. This patriotic movement arises from the wrath of a valiant and warlike race at the betrayal of their country by the weakest of their rulers and the foul intriguers of the Axis Powers.
Now that's being a little unfair to the Irish Government - although I see absolutely nothing to suggest that they'd have acted any differently to the other governments were it not for the existence of the Irish Constitution.
The Supreme Court has ruled that any EU treaty that substantially alters the character of the Union must be approved by a constitutional amendment.
and
Any part of the constitution may be amended but only by referendum.
The EU constitution was turned down by the French and the Dutch - so it was renamed a treaty and pushed through their legislatures. Blair promised a referendum on the treaty, saw what had happened across the Channel and broke his word - a decision upheld by his successor.
"we must be far clearer in speaking up for the common ground upon which we stand - the shared British values of liberty, civic duty and fairness to all"
Where's the liberty ? Just about to be banged up without charge for six weeks, that's where. Where's Gordon Brown's civic duty? Where's the fairness ?
While I'm terribly pleased, proud of the Irish and ashamed for my own Government's cowardly refusal to consult the British people, I think we should remember what followed the Yugoslav revolution. Still, let us take what comfort we may. There's a drop of Paddy left in the kitchen cupboard. Sláinte!
"And we drank a health to old Ireland, and Paddy's green shamrock shore"
5 comments:
guessedworker @ majorityrights.com puts the spotlight on evasive arguments against 42days and the erosion of our nation states:
Literature would be produced, and party activists given the line, that the theft of our civil liberties is not something in isolation, and not accidental. It is programmatic - part of a clear re-shaping of national life. The government is creating a security state while, at the same time, creating the threats to national security which supposedly necessitate it. This it does by destroying the natural cohesion of society and, more specifically, by encouraging large Moslem communities in Britain’s towns and cities while conducting wars of aggression against Moslems in their own lands.
David Davis’ stance is all very fine and well, but it does not go far enough. It does not address the government’s real objective in assaulting our civil liberties, which is to continue the population changes in train now through to their conclusion without complications, especially violent complications, arising from any quarter.
The security state is an end to the means of replacing the English with foreign populations, and a precondition for the control of its deracinated successor.
They call it 'ultimate' interests vs. 'proximate' interests over there, and I think they're right.
Genocide is worse than imposing a change of political system - or dietary culture - right? Is your focus on the right thing Laban?
This whole episode has made me realise for the first time that what the UK needs is a constitution, like Ireland has, that prohibits the ceding of parliamentary powers without a referendum.
So far we have depended on sheer luck to maintain our democracy. Looks like our luck has now run out.
No, Hugh Oxford, we have not depended on luck.
We have depended on the fact that our statesmen and politicians were always men of honour who knew how to behave and could be trusted not to damage the institutions temporarily entrusted to their care.
That's what has changed. We now have in charge a bunch of spivs and chancers, who care little for the constitution and know nothing of history, and whose only aim is to maintain themselves in power.
As Machiavelli pointed out all those years ago, one of the best ways to maintain and extend your power is to keep the people in a state of alarm and panic all the time by inventing endless threats and worries, thereby "requiring" the exercise of ever-more-arbitrary action by the authorities.
Hence gobal warming, the Iraq war, Muslim terrorists, and so on.
Unfortunately this has co-incided with a period when the mass of the people are in even more of a state of ignorance even than their leaders, and they just don't care what goes on as long as the Footie is still on the idiot box.
Sad, sad.
"7:09 AM"
hugh - you have it in one. and that's the primary reason why my grandfather took up a rifle and went to war against the british empire.
you certainly are surviving on mere luck - lucky that you had proper statesmen in the past that respected English common law and its traditions.
but when you have a cabal that no longer respects it, then you have nothing.
it is precisely for that reason that the Irish constitution was constructed - it is meant to be *beyond* politicians, and in the control of the "people".
now whether you agree or not with it , is by the by.. but its served the Republic of Ireland very well - as exemplified by this recent vote.
The British, as a nation, would be foolish to ignore it.
also , De Valera framed the constitution so that the tyranny of the majority would never prevail - but on the other hand he established the Catholic Church in the original 1930s constitution.
so , it wasnt all peaches and sugar and utopia...
but the basics were right - pity Ireland was virtually a theocracy for about 70 years. i know - i lived through the tail end of it. i wasnt nice.
so there's pluses and minuses - and the British should take the best bits.
the biggest failing of British government, in my eyes, is that they never seem to even contemplate learning lessons from any other nation.
key example : note how the flat tax revolution in eastern europe has been completely ignored by the British media. look it up on Google - it will stagger you at how that revolution has taken over half of our continent...
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