The Big Society

[babybird67]

And that's all I can do, Babybird. So if you want to accuse me of copping out from, say, giving the vote to convicts, by all means do so.

It's all any of us can do Robert. We all make a choice which accord with our conscience. I just find it surprising that someone like yourself who obviously feels so passionately that the system is corrupt (is it the system itself or just he human beings operating within it?) isn't doing more to change things than just withdrawing altogether and then blaming those of us who haven't withdrawn for being the cause of all your political woes!

You have some good ideas...why don't you stand for Parliament and see if you can start to effect a change?

[Robert]

Hi Babybird

That kind of thing has been tried before. Martin Bell was in Parliament for one term - I think he stood down after that. The truth is, the kind of change we need to see, if promoted through the conventional channels like forming a party etc etc - is the work of a lifetime. Two thirds of my lifetime have gone, and I am too selfish to devote the remainder to a probably hopeless cause.

My way of changing things - by refusing to vote - is ideally suited to British conditions. The British only wake up once every 100 years or so. After that they call out "wozzat?" and go back to sleep. I'm simply advocating that they do NOTHING. Stay indoors on polling night. Open a packet of crisps. Do the lottery numbers....whatever.

I'm not being evangelistic about it. If they want to vote, it's their business. And their funeral.

[Derrick]

Hi all
My view is that the Big Society project is nothing more than a double swindle.

It first asks people to do for nowt what most pay their rates for the local authority to do masquerading as an excuse to make poor people pay the price for the so called national debt.

But to be fair we are, after all, all in it together.

...yeah right...

Cameron and Clegg, 2 public school, Oxbridge toffs are going to make even more by promoting their old school tie buddies and retiring on lecture tour, directorship and memoir booty, just like that other Tory arsehole Blair before them.

Derrick

[Derrick]

no voters will ever trust them again. They've betrayed the students, the elderly, the vulnerable....they have shown their word means absolutely nothing and they are never, ever to be trusted. I am so glad I didn't vote for them. At least the Conservatives are open about having no social morals. The liberals are a disgrace.

Hi Babybird
I couldn't agree more with what you say.

I have never trusted the Liberal Party. As Harry Perkins said "I've tried middle of the road....got knocked down by traffic coming from both directions."

Clegg and his inner circle saw ministerial pay and limmos and filled their own boots, the turds, at the expense of any integrity or conscience.

Derrick.

[Limehouse]

Hi all
My view is that the Big Society project is nothing more than a double swindle.

It first asks people to do for nowt what most pay their rates for the local authority to do masquerading as an excuse to make poor people pay the price for the so called national debt.

But to be fair we are, after all, all in it together.

...yeah right...

Cameron and Clegg, 2 public school, Oxbridge toffs are going to make even more by promoting their old school tie buddies and retiring on lecture tour, directorship and memoir booty, just like that other Tory arsehole Blair before them.

Derrick

Not only are they making us pay AND expecting us to work for free but they are also going to (like Thatcher before them) sell of what WE own - our beautiful forests. What a bloody cheek! I am sure that if they could privatise fresh air they would.

[Limehouse]

Hi Babybird
I couldn't agree more with what you say.

I have never trusted the Liberal Party. As Harry Perkins said "I've tried middle of the road....got knocked down by traffic coming from both directions."

Clegg and his inner circle saw ministerial pay and limmos and filled their own boots, the turds, at the expense of any integrity or conscience.

Derrick.

You have to remember - historically - the Liberals were the hard-line 'ba*tar* party and the Conservatives were much softer. It was not until the rise of the real political left in the last quarter of the 19th century and the birth of the Labour Party at the start of the 20th century that the Liberals were pushed into the background because people wanted a more humane system. The Conservatives then started to get more hard-line but in reality - if you look at Thatcher's policies - she was an old-style Liberal.

Incidently - I didn't think it was possible to detest a politician as much as I detested Thatcher - but it is begining to happen.

[Stephen Thomas]

Hubris

This ridiculous political situation would never have happened if Gordon Brown hadn't been so vain and stupid. He should have called an election as soon as Laughing Boy Blair buggered off soon after promising to serve a full term and he should have said to the British public that he wouldn't possibly wish to serve as Prime Minister if he hadn't been personally elected. But no, he seems to have believed he could dazzle the UK electorate with his Caledonian charisma and got his inevitable comeuppance. And now Britain has got this wonderful coalition government which might be compared to a marriage between a hippopotamus and a chicken.

[Derrick]

What a bloody cheek! I am sure that if they could privatise fresh air they would.

Hi Julie

A great advert for reading Tressell's "The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists"

Derrick

[Robert]

I'm afraid if they privatised air we'd end up with some foreign company owning the contents of the MPs' heads.

[Limehouse]

This ridiculous political situation would never have happened if Gordon Brown hadn't been so vain and stupid. He should have called an election as soon as Laughing Boy Blair buggered off soon after promising to serve a full term and he should have said to the British public that he wouldn't possibly wish to serve as Prime Minister if he hadn't been personally elected. But no, he seems to have believed he could dazzle the UK electorate with his Caledonian charisma and got his inevitable comeuppance. And now Britain has got this wonderful coalition government which might be compared to a marriage between a hippopotamus and a chicken.

Absolutely agree 100%.

Would that hybrid be a chickopotakenus?

[Limehouse]

Hi Julie

A great advert for reading Tressell's "The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists"

Derrick

I read it some years ago and found it a bit hard going but it's still on my shelf so I'll give it another try.

[Robert]

They should market the Big Society like a hamburger. Instead of Big Mac call it the Whopper - there are plenty of whoppers being told after all.

[Chris]

That kind of thing has been tried before. Martin Bell was in Parliament for one term - I think he stood down after that.

Because he had said he would only serve for one term in Tatton he stood elsewhere in 2001 - against Eric Pickles of all people, funnily enough. He'd almost certainly have been elected then if the Lib Dems and/or Labour hadn't stood against him...

[Limehouse]

Because he had said he would only serve for one term in Tatton he stood elsewhere in 2001 - against Eric Pickles of all people, funnily enough. He'd almost certainly have been elected then if the Lib Dems and/or Labour hadn't stood against him...

Eric Pickles! He's another unmentionable.

I need a drink!

[Limehouse]

They should market the Big Society like a hamburger. Instead of Big Mac call it the Whopper - there are plenty of whoppers being told after all.

Great idea Robert. Cameron could call it 'my big fat whopper society'