Saturday, 26 May 2012

EU - democracy sinking

Just to let anyone who’s interested know that I’m still here (bought a new camera and am enjoying the sun)

A couple of things that I’ve picked up on the EU scene – David Martin MEP, who wishes nation state civil servants to appear before “ European Parliament committees of inquiry” and the European Parliament’s wish to establish a Financial Transaction Tax.

Both of the above proposals are being suggested despite there being no democratic mandate for either.

The first thing to say is that the establishment of “committees of inquiry” was formally approved with the signing of the Lisbon Treaty; 3 million Irish people were allowed to vote on the treaty out of a European Union population of 498 million.

99% plus never had a say!

The second thing to note is that David Martin was one of two Scottish Labour MEPs who achieved, between them, 229,853 votes out of an electorate of 3,853,173.

94% of the Scottish people never voted for the two Labour candidates!
(As many times as I check that I still can not bring myself to believe it)

On the subject of a Financial Transaction Tax – well, the turnout for the 2009 EU election was 43%.

When the European parliament voted to impose a FTT on business, which will inevitably be passed down to the austerity-ridden people of Europe, 57% of the EU electorate weren’t even present.

Fantastic this “representative democracy” – isn’t it?



After all that, a couple of nice calming pictures of Burrator reservoir to the north of Plymouth - as can be seen, the drought has really taken hold down in the South West.
(I don't think Lord Snowdon has anything to worry about photography wise)







Tuesday, 15 May 2012

Leaving the EU - the forces against us.


It’s oh so easy to become very depressed when confronted by the below comments posted on EU Referendum’s forum in reply to the conjecture on a referendum for continuing membership of the European Union  – when we see that the enemy is before us, around us, and mostly, behind us, ready to stab we, the British people, in the back.

All that we ordinary humble people can do is to keep highlighting what a bunch of vermin we have ruling over us – at national and European Union level.

I’ve been over to Ranty’s to explain why I vote – but when confronted by the comments below I am tempted to withdraw from the voting process all together.


Every day that passes increases my hatred for the whole stinking cabal - Labour, LibDem, Conservative, and EU parasites alike. The more I think about the undemocratic mess we're in the more powerless I feel.


As Boiling Frog posts – “we need a movement”.


We also need a way of saying “NO” – we need to stop as much money as we can going to our government and the European Union.

Here are those comments left on the EU Referendum blog, concise and totally realistic; read it and realize how hopelessly imprisoned we are:


                It’s unnecessary

We went into the EEC in 1973 without a referendum, so we should come out without one (none of the party manifestos at the 1970 general election promised entry)

                It won’t go the way you might think

Not long before the 1975 referendum on continued EEC membership, opinion polls showed – as they do now – that people were 2-1 in favour of leaving. But when it came down to it only 21 per cent of the electorate voted to leave and, out of all those who actually voted, over 66 per cent voted to stay in. The result today would be the same and we'd again be cemented into the EU for the foreseeable future. 
 

                You cannot hope to win without at least some mainstream political support

In 1975, Harold Wilson, the PM, and Margaret Thatcher, the new Tory leader, as well as the four surviving Tory ex-PMs campaigned for us to stay in. All party leaders would do so again today. 


                Unlike in 1975, no one in Cabinet supports withdrawal

Before that vote, several Cabinet ministers campaigned for Britain to be independent – and it still didn’t help. Today, none of them would. 
 

                And you won’t get support from much of the press

On the day of the 1975 poll, one newspaper’s headline warned of the aftermath of voting to leave the EEC: “A day in the life of Siege Britain: no coffee, wine, beans or bananas till further notice.” Perhaps surprisingly, that was the Daily Mail. It hasn’t changed its tune as much as you might hope. Its leader column on 14 March 2011 said: “The Mail doesn’t support a wholesale withdrawal from the EU.” Nor does the Telegraph. Only the much less influential Express does. If you can’t count on the Mail, your campaign is missing a key ally, one that would be as important as any of the three oldest parties – and none of those is on your side. 


                Or the BBC


Do you trust “Auntie” to cover both sides of the debate equally and fairly on all three of its media platforms? 
 

                Big business would support the other side


It long ago understood that it needs the EU’s permission for various activities and it also twigged that it can more easily absorb all the absurd regulations, which destroy smaller rivals.
The electronics firm Intel, for example, gave hundreds of thousands of euros to the Irish “yes to Lisbon” campaign. Ryanair even flew a EU commissioner around the republic to campaign before the vote.
After the 1975 referendum – when the yes side outspent the no side nine times over, as it would today – the yes side’s treasurer said: “Money rolled in. 
The banks and the big industrial companies put in very large sums of money.” They would do so again. 


                Propaganda from the EU would be torrential


In the unlikely event of a vote, the EU would pump out one-sided bumf.
Buckets of shiny pamphlets from Commission president Mr Barroso would spill through everyone’s door.
A 16-page “information” supplement prepared by the Commission accompanied every Irish newspaper five days before the country’s 2009 Lisbon poll. (It had been funded by the very people it sought to influence and the EU was anyway acting illegally.
Then under the Nice Treaty, the EU was a child of its signatory nations and it could not tell them or their peoples what to do regarding international treaties.
It was illegal pester power, but the EU is above rules.)

Recently, MEPs voted to grant themselves the “right to participate in such campaigns as long as the subject of the referendum has a direct link with issues concerning the European Union”.
So people might also receive communications from the president of the European Parliament as well as hundreds of MEPs. 

Perhaps even the EU’s (and your) overall president, Herman Van Rompuy, might send you one of his haikus urging you to do the right thing. 


When voters have been lied to by people and organisations that they fund – the BBC, the European Commission, hordes of rent-seeking MEPs, the Church (an unholy number of bishops in the House of Lords voted for Lisbon), Her Majesty’s Government and Loyal Opposition, their newspaper, famous charities – no one should be surprised when the impressionable opt for EU membership. It’s happened before. 
 

                If the Lib Dems have ever offered it, you should be suspicious of it

Between 2007 and 2009, the Lib Dems were touting an in-out referendum.
Nick Clegg even walked out of the Commons when the Speaker wouldn’t grant him one.
But when Labour MP Ian Davidson proposed a two-question referendum – one on Lisbon, the other in-out – Clegg realized that his bluff had been called and whipped his MPs to abstain.
He calculated that people would probably vote to remain in the EU out of fear – but certainly would not endorse Lisbon, which he, a former Commission official and MEP, wanted to be passed. 


Later, the House of Lords rejected a proposal for an in-out vote tabled by Ukip’s Lord Pearson. The Lib Dem peers abstained. 
They said that they did not want to “give succor” to eurosceptics and that they wanted an in-out referendum only from a “pro-European stance”. 
 
 
                If pro-EU MPs such as Keith Vaz want it, you should be suspicious of it


The ferociously europhile former “Europe” minister, who was once suspended from the Commons, supports an in-out referendum. 


                Referendums tend to reinforce the status quo and so people vote to carry on as they are

People opt for the known over the unknown, “to keep a-hold of nurse/ for fear of finding something worse” in Belloc’s poem.
The result in 1975 declared that we should remain in the EEC. It was a “passive” vote; the country was not voting to join – nor, unfortunately, to leave – which would have been an “active” vote.
The Danish no to Maastricht in 1992, the Irish no to Nice in 2001, the Danish and Swedish no to adopting the euro, the French and Dutch no to the Constitution in 2005, and the Irish no to Lisbon were votes against change.
A vote on UK membership would probably result in yet another vote against change, as in 1975 (and in 2011 regarding AV)
 
 
                Even if Britain voted out, it might be made to vote again


Remember the countries that were forced to go back to the polling booth after their bouts of false consciousness: Denmark (1993 for Maastricht) and Ireland (2002 for Nice; 2009 for Lisbon)?
Can you be certain that you wouldn’t be made to vote again until you came up with the right answer? 
 

                The turkeys will not let us vote for Christmas


For us to get a referendum, our MPs would first have to vote to give us one, as they did in 1975 (and for the AV vote).
If they’re prepared to do that, they might as well vote to repeal the European Communities Act; they know that that’s the wish of most of those calling for a poll. But they won’t do either. David Cameron has often said he wouldn’t introduce the legislation necessary to activate a poll. On that you can trust him.
 
 
                The good news: there is a kind of referendum coming up


You can vote to leave the EU.
There will soon be a general election (long before there’s ever a referendum).
If you want to leave the EU, don’t vote for anyone who wants to keep you in.
If over half the MPs elected want the UK to be free, we will be free. 


It’s tempting – for reasons of tribalism or because “the others haven’t got a chance” – to vote for the three oldest parties. But doing so means that the most important questions – the economy, the health service, immigration, our energy supply, how we treat the environment and how we trade with the developing world – will more and more be answered by people in Belgium whom one cannot elect or eject.
A vote for any of the "Big 3" is ultimately a vote to disenfranchise oneself, even if it feels seemingly rational to vote to remove the villain of the day (Major/Brown/Cameron etc).




Friday, 11 May 2012

Advertising Standards Authority - PC state thugs



I don’t usually jump into the murky waters of political correctness but an issue has cropped up today that illustrates all too clearly the near-fascist hold that the PC industry has on us all.

The person who is responsible for running the blog of the long expired Archbishop Cranmer has received “formal documentation and threatening notices” regarding an advertisement he has been running on his blog (I include the advertisement above out of pure cussedness)

The advertisement is in support of heterosexual marriage and has been produced by an organization known as Coalition for Marriage, C4M.

I have no particular horse in this race but when the Advertising Standards Authority choose to pick on the little guy instead of going for the bigger target of the C4M – well, it pees me off no end. 

But this is the state of affairs that we find ourselves in when we believe that nobody, anywhere or at any time, should be “offended”.

Well, I’m offended – I’m pissed off, blood-boilingly offended.
What the hell happened to free speech in this country!

I despise bullies and the PC state thugs are the biggest bullies on the block.

The aims of the ASA:


The ASA is the UK's independent regulator of advertising across all media, now including marketing on websites. We work to ensure ads are legal, decent, honest and truthful by applying the Advertising Codes.


Sounds warm and reassuring, doesn’t it?

The Advertising Standards Authority was set up to protect people from exploitation; by its actions it has shown itself to be an arm of a brutal and bullying PC state.

I have known and worked with homosexuals, and they are as embarrassed by this type of nonsense as we are angry.

I wish Archbishop Cranmer’s representatives on Earth the fortitude and strength to fight this totalitarian nonsense; if he loses, we all lose.   

Thursday, 10 May 2012

Hold the AGW - we can't afford the rooms


Oh, the shame of it all.



The European Parliament decided to cancel travel plans for the Members of the European Parliament that were going to participate in Rio+20, due to high travel expenses.
The decision was made by the coordinators of the European Environment Commission, who explained that the cost of sending deputies to Brazil would be too high, and unjustifiable in a time of crisis.


At 600 (£482) a night, I should bloody well think so.
           
What are the poor tax-paid-for parasites going to do now - Dutch MEP Gerben Jen Gerbrandy is quite desolate:


"The European Parliament is cancelling its delegation to Rio+20 because of the excessive cost. Brazil should control the prices in order to keep the conference from being a failure,"


German MEP Matthias Groote chips in:


"It's too bad that the organizers – although they're not the only ones – brought us to this point. When you want to invite the whole world, you have to treat your guests better,"


Who said colonialism was dead.

But all’s well that ends well:


Itamaraty, the Brazilian foreign ministry, has not confirmed the European Parliament's cancelation. However, the ministry's spokesperson did affirm that the absence of Members of the European Parliament would not affect the arrival of the European Union delegations or the arrival of European heads of state.


Oh, that’s all right then, the EU Politburo will get to enjoy their chance to save the planet.
Although, according to this version, Cameron and Obama will not be attending – is the Climate Change bubble about to burst.

I’ve never quite understood why thousands of people descending on a particular location, thousands of miles away, decreases CO2 – but then, I’m a common prole and we proles are not as switched on as our inbred political aristocracy or those clever young things at the World Wildlife Fund.

And it is nice to see that austerity is starting to bite in for the EU cesspit – either a few more bits of the Brussels dung heap are going to have to be lopped off or they are going to have to raid our pockets again.

Maybe Herman van Rompuy could forego his tax-paid-for holiday cars or the career nonentity, Catherine Ashton, could fly economy class instead of on privately chartered jets.
  
What could be more important than saving the planet from catastrophic global warming?





  

Tuesday, 8 May 2012

European Citizens Initiative - we want water taxed


I have posted before concerning the European Citizens Initiative.

My contention is that the ECI will be used by the EU institutions as a method of realizing its own aims; an objective will be passed down to the onside charities and NGOs, those bodies will raise an ECI that will be passed up to the EU Commission for approval, and the measure will be passed through the European parliament as being the wish of the “ordinary citizen”.

Well, Gawain Towler at England Expects brings us news of one of the first European Citizens Initiatives:


"Fraternité 2020 – Mobility. Progress. Europe" is the title of the first initiative, proposed by a committee of EU citizens living in Austria, Belgium, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, Romania and Spain.
Their stated motivation is to "enhance EU exchange programmes – like Erasmus or the European Voluntary Service – in order to contribute to a united Europe based on solidarity among citizens".


Whew – I thought they’d never get around to considering how to “enhance EU exchange programmes

Ominously though, it is turning out that the above is only a frivolous smokescreen for more nefarious Initiatives.

Some time back Richard North at EU Referendum posted concerning the EU elephants in the water – that just as our electricity and gas bills rise to enrich the Brussels parasites combat climate change, so will we EU “citizens” have taxes levied on our water to guarantee an adequate supply.

And lo and behold, up pops one of those ordinary “European Citizens” –


The European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU) is sponsoring this ECI together with a broad range of European organisations (European Anti-Poverty Network, European Environmental Bureau)


to put forward its “Initiative” -


Public sector trade unions are demanding the EU institutions to keep water and sanitation out of the internal market rules and to declare Water and sanitation as a Human Right.


Forgive any possible stupidity on my part but aren’t public sector unions meant to represent public sector workers – since when have they been responsible for our water supplies.

And, in EU parlance, once something becomes someone's "Human Right" it usually means that someone else has a "Human Duty" to pay for it.


Minus the 20% for the Brussels whores - of course!

We could never accuse the EU hierarchy of overestimating the EU “citizens” intelligence, could we; they treat us like bloody fools.

More to see:



As usual, many thanks to EU Referendum

  

Sunday, 6 May 2012

Greece - Back to the future


The below statement is from “an unemployed mathematics professor


Asked if he worries about that prospect, Thomas Nikolaou, an unemployed mathematics professor, who until now backed Pasok, said:
“This trick didn’t work now and it won’t work in the future. I voted for (the extreme right) Golden Dawn (party). I lost my job, I can’t feed my family and I have nothing else to lose. The only power I have is my vote and I will give it again to those who say no to this madness.
“All I can think of is revenge against the politicians who destroyed my life and millions of others.”


And these are the people he is voting for:



I find it depressing – and I'm no lefty, believe me!