Alan Johnson, his grasp of the facts and figures what it REALLY means

On this mornings Radio 4 Today programme, Alan Johnson tried to avoid the question but then stated that he thought the NI rate was “20%” the presenter had to tell him it was actually 12.8%.

So what does this tell us? That Johnson is incompetent ? I wouldnt say that, the Tories and Lib Dems will of course. For me its another reason to say that the days of party politics and Parliamentary Democracy are numbered. He didnt know (even though he is SHADOW CHANCELLOR) for the same reason that Clegg and Cable banged on about bankers bonuses in opposition, about reforms to the voting system (PR), and said they would scrap tuition fees. Its because it doesnt matter what THEY say.. People need to wake up to this fact and start thinking about what we can do about it.  They do not represent us, whichever party is in power. We should decide key issues with referenda, how can we trust these people to know best ? This system is from the Nineteenth Century, before telephones were invented even, we have been through the media age of TV and radio. In these times we can share information globally in an instant. Do you think we would have heard about MPs expenses, or Ian Tomlinson without the net ? We are now able to organise and demand truth in a way that has been impossible until now.

No one wants bloody revolution, or chaos unless they are an idiot.  We do though,need to look at the radicals of the past for inspiration and heed the words of Nelson Mandela “everything seems impossible until its done”. It may take a lifetime but we have to start somewhere to take the power back. We mustn’t put up with this sham any longer its up to us all to think about new ways of doing things, and then demand change.

A Military response to a civil issue…

Today we read in the Observer that the Government is in talks with defence firms who are working closely with UK armed forces and contemplating a “militarisation” strategy to counter the threat of civil disorder.

Talk about trying to put out a fire with petrol! This is how a “Democracy” deals with  “a very small minority” of “troublemakers” is it ? It beggars belief that the Lib Dems and Tories who for the past 13 years have taken the moral high ground over the 3000 new laws that invade our privacy and violate our freedom that New Labour introduced, who considered (rightly) that ID Cards were a step too far, are looking at unmanned spy drones and militarisation to control protests. Heres an idea for them, how about listening to the people ? How about considering that it may actually not be reasonable to expect everyone to roll over, and allow the government to say one thing in opposition and then do the exact opposite when in power ? Unfortunately for some of us none of this comes as a surprise. The party that is in power makes only superficial differences to our day to day lives.

Violence only erupts when listening stops. The person who threw a fire extinguisher from the roof (if that is what happened and it wasnt dropped) is clearly an idiot, but those who vandalised Millbank Tower were doing it out of frustration, born of trying to use the system and finding it doesnt work. The answer is to fix the system. What does peaceful protest achieve ? Its easy to say that you have a right to protest and therefore we have a democracy, but we also have a right to be heard and a right to expect those we elect to respect their promises. The right response is not to crush dissent but to treat the people with the respect they deserve in the first place.

The saddest part of this whole story, is that Labour can hardly be critical of this because they are every bit as bad. What now ? We have to look to the Green Party, and the various civil rights and freedom organisations to fight back with us I guess as not one of the 3 main parties has any morality left it seems.

The Millbank Riot

This is my first attempt at a blog, and a great deal has been said already on the subject…However I think there is an important point to make here. There are many reasons to be angry at the moment with politicians, but its vital that this current mood of dissent and anger is galvanised into a cohesive strategy.

Its not just about Tuition Fees, Housing Benefit or any of the other cuts alone, or about who pays tax and who doesnt, these are the symptoms of the disease and not the cause. Its more about the lack of democracy that politicians display time and time again. Labour are little better than this coalition, they took us into Wars that were perpetrated on the basis of lies, Blair campaigned on a ‘no sleaze ticket’, and we all know what happened. Add to this the MPs expenses scandal and the U turns in policy and you have the beginning of a big crisis in trust. Fact is, the political classes have always ruled us and hidden the truth, taken us to war and always told us that they know best. I dont think that they do though…

What needs to happen now is that we need solidarity of purpose, we need firm goals. An opportunity to force meaningful change doesnt come often. Direct action is a powerful tool and it works. We need to press on and bring this government to its knees. The Unions, and all action groups need to find a way to unite behind this and in my view the goal should be to make politicians more accountable for their promises. AV wont do this, even if it becomes a reality and lets not forget the weasel words of Clegg on reform. We need the debate to be turned around to how we can change the system to reflect what we, the electorate want. Basically a more direct democracy. I dont want to be represented by people that we cannot trust we need leaders that we elect and can get rid of when they break our trust and not in five years time…. John Pilger, Noam Chomsky and many others have for years talked about how governments and states serve international corporations rather than the people, this is true.

We now have access to more information and more opportunity to organise ourselves and change things for the better. This is a very big opportunity that we have here. Please, lets not blow it. We owe it to ourselves and future generations to fight back. Its not about Clegg, the Tories or Labour…its about truth, freedom and democracy. Right now what we have is an illusion, we do have a lot of freedom in relation to some countries thats true, but lets not allow relative freedom to make us complacent in our aims.