The arrogance of small nation in Europe

Of course for decades, Britain was the one and only real super power in the world. We had a sprawling empire and any of the planet's resources at our beck and call. An advantage of this domination was the ability to control any situation, in pretty much any country in the world. Over the past century, this physical status had quickly diminished. But rather arrogantly, the mental thinking that Britain still has such power has continued. We are far from what we once were and the sooner many realise this, the healthier our foreign relations will become.

The British Government's appalling handling of the current situation in Libya is only one of many examples of this arrogance. David Cameron et al really took to this very offensive plan to halt Colonel Gaddafi's attack on his people and remove him from power. Almost out of nowhere. I don't think Cameron had even mentioned Gaddafi while Prime Minister before this. Although Cameron fairly began by simply 'deploring' Gaddafi's actions,   the tirade of orders that followed was embarrassing for Britain. Most notably, in Prime Minister's Questions was Cameron's announcement that he "does not rule out the use of military assets" and that he had asked military chiefs to work on a 'no fly zone' over Libya. This is just the UK government making judgments and decisions alone. The United States nor any European nation had been consulted about such plans. Although Cameron had to play down these ideas after being rebuffed by the US, he would of very much liked to have carried them out. Britain are no longer in a position were we can dictate global diplomatic issues, we are an active part of a wider continent. Europe has to be the channel in which the UK voices its opinion, the EU has very strong ties with Libya and we should be making decisions multi-laterally and in cohesion. If we don't, we are only setting ourselves up for costly blunders. The idea of a no fly zone, I think could be effective, however, it must have American support.

The recent WikiLeaks scandal revealed what the parts of the world, notably Hillary Clinton, really thinks of Britain. It's time to stand up and get counted for the country we are today, not act alone in the corpse of the country we used to be. It's time we as a country are realistic about our standing globally, continue to lead on the things we do well but begin to cohere on things we are just not man enough for anymore.

The Referendum

Next year, probably on May 5th, the UK will once again go to the polls. Not to decide the outcome of an unwinnable election but to indeed decide how we go about such elections. The referendum to decide our voting system, which was a key factor in the coalition agreement, is supported by our default Prime Minister, but not by his secretary/deputy, Nick Clegg. I'm not sure how this is going to work. The Government as a unit is proposing this electoral change and I suppose will publicly push for it, however, it is well documented that Cameron and most of the Conservative contigent of the cabinet are against changing to the Clegg-preferred, AV system.

Voting reform: the options explained

The same questions will arise as we approach the next general election, if the coalition lasts that long, both Clegg and Cameron will campaign for their own parties whilst defending the same Government. Until the point when the cabinet have to get serious about the referendum, they will continue to use the 'It was in the Labour manifesto and now their against it' gag. This is of course true, although where the majority of Conservatives are against the switch, it is only a minority of Labour MP's who a similarly adjacent to the idea. As far as I know, all of the Labour candidates are supportive of changing the system and my view is similar but not at the same level of Nick Clegg or indeed his Yellow Tory Party.

In truth, the UK parliamentary system is archaic; leader of the Greens, Caroline Lucas recently compared it to the Brussels-based, super-contemporary, European Parliament and stated that as we are one of the most developed countries in the world, the UK should be moving with the times and modernising our system as needed. This is one of the few points I will probably ever agree with her on. This is the key. Not changing the literal way in which we elect our government but the way in which parliament runs. I believe that if the Houses of Parliament and the system its working under was actually modernised, all parties would be able to function better and get their views heard in the Chamber. This of course includes the smaller parties who are more in favour of switching our voting system, if they could interact in'direct politics' without the 'motion to solve a query about a bill which was revised in the Lords under another motion about a different bill proposed by an EDM' - that's just stupid, but's that's how it is. The UK are basing politics on the sentiment of keeping our tradition in place. We need an urgent revamp of Parliament, I think changing the voting system is the least of our worries. Direct politics, that's what we need.

The similarity of the salesman

The Politics Show with Jon Sopel, today featured a Question Time-styled audience interrogating Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg. Immediately, as Clegg's responses were heard, I felt the presence of a certain David Cameron. In the run up to the election, it has become obvious that Cameron is a salesman who lacks any real substance on policy, but never had I considered Clegg's real qualities as a leader until today. The way Clegg talks, his mannerisms, the smile, they are all strikingly similar to that of the Tory leader.

So, with both parties offering ''change'', they may be best placed to look across the opposition benches at one another and actually try to clarify what sets them a part as leaders and potential prime ministers. Well, only one thing sets them apart of course, policy. Thankfully for Labour, as the polls continue to suggest a hung parliament, the Lib Dems are still far from compromising on policy with the Conservatives; and as much as Clegg will deny it, they are much closer to the Labour Party than any other.

I apologise for stating some of the obvious there, but I found it quite amazing how Cameron and Clegg can be so close yet so far apart. The leader debates will highlight this once again, on personality, Cameron and Clegg may come out on top, but on policy and substance, Gordon Brown has it in the bag.

UK, US close their embassies in Yemen

Full story on NPR

A bold and decisive move is how I would describe this action against the recent revelations of terrorism in Yemen. Gordon Brown has clearly, already taken the leading stance out of all the major world leaders on how to deal with the Yemen threat. It is clear to see that the government of Yemen have very little control of what is happening. All westerners should be glad that this hazard has been confronted in the aftermath of the 'Detroit Bomber' case and not when a recent major attack has been successful.

Gordon Brown's decision to host a meeting on the Yemen threat, later this month in London, is another sign of his expert statesmanship and ability to lead the world on the big issues that face us. Personally, I can't even begin to imagine David Cameron and a Conservative government taking such definitive and bold movement on these matters. Again, I hope, for the sake of the UK's global reputation, that the Conservative's take no part in our next Government.

David Cameron, stop lying.

"A year for change" is what the banners behind David Cameron exclaimed as he made his very tired sounding New Year's speech today. That's a lie in a nutshell, to be completely honest with you.

Everything the Conservatives propose only echo the nightmare of the Eighties. The Tories may have switched logos and leaders but every piece of rubbish that's spills out of David Cameron's gutter for a mouth sounds like something brewed up at Eton only designed to favour the privileged. ITV2's recent show 'Trinity', which portrayed the gallivants of the Dandelion Club, reminds me so much of the opposition front bench. These are people who have grown up without having to worry about financial or education problems. These are people who have had it on a plate. Not like the majority of the country who are experiencing, in some cases, the most hellish financial circumstances.

To the electorate, please don't let these jumped up, arrogant, rich Etonians into power...

My new syndromic views

As you may have noticved I have,as promised, renamed my Blog. The Syndrome, as I'm suer you'll agree is a lot better. And, it allows me to use the word 'syndromic' alot more! It effectively means 'diseased', on second thoughts, perhaps I won't use it that much...

....so has the 'fightback' promised at the Labour Party Conference begun? Well, with the excellent by-election results from Glasgow North East, I think it has. It was going to be a safe seat anyway, but Labour's candidate Willie Bain still won it by quite some majority with 59.9% of the vote, a majority of 8,111.

Also, the Daily Mirror have today published a Labour advert that shows the gruesome twosome of David Cameron and George Osborne sporting hairstyles similar to those of the X Factor twins, John and Edward. But the tagline warns: "You won't be laughing if they win." I think that's genius, certainly a sign of positive fightback.

It will be interesting to see the next polls when they are published....

The election is emerging on the horizon...

As Parliament is recess, nothing has really happened. Newsreaders persist on claiming what a slow news month it is with nothing to talk about but a 11 year old girl crashing her grandfather's car off of a cliff. With all this quiet, it gets you predicting how the start of the parliamnetary year will begin. Not just a new parliamentary year but an election year, by this time next year, parliament could be in recess with a certain David Cameron in charge of Britain (God forbid). But you never know, there could be a very drastic change in fortune for Labour, and Gordon Brown could win his first elected term in the top job. But in the words of Mr Obama himself, we need change and we need it fast. We need some fresh impetus for Labour and for British politics. A fresh impetus to get the public back an interested in the workings and goings on of Parliament, and that certainly does not mean electing a Conservative government. Enthusiasm is something Westminster has been lacking since the election of 1997. I am sure Gordon Brown can deliver given the chance, but to do this he must use the talents of David and Ed Miliband, Peter Mandelson and Andy Burnham, the first and the latter of those names, I feel, are the future of Labour, maybe even the future Prime Ministers of Britain. Election 2010 will be an interesting one, certainly for the younger generation who only vaguely remember the 1997 election when there was a change in government, from that you can probably tell I expect a change in premier as much as I hope against it.

A Facebook Conversation...

I began this blog a couple of hours after the resignation of James Purnell. When that story broke I had BBC News on in the background whilst trying to defend Gordon Brown's leadership of the Labour Party. I thought for my first post I could show you all that converstation to just give an idea of how passionate I am about Politics and the Labour Party for that matter.

The Conversation:
(I have censored the names of the people in the conversation as they may not wish to have their names published in my blog.

Ash Giles is thinking poor Gordon...Bugger Blears!

Person 1 at 07:59 on 04 June
poor gordon? why?

Ash Giles at 20:09 on 04 June
He's a good Prime Minister with a vision fo rthe future...but every one is ganging up on him! It's not all his fault!

Person 1 at 20:12 on 04 June
Errr hello.... He was the fricking chancellor for the last gazillion years..of course this is all his fault!!!

Person 2 at 20:14 on 04 June
??? good lord, ash. he had been chancellor for god knows how long, and i hadnt seen him do anything memorable - unless of course, you can name something :P i know you cant see him as all bad... well, maybe you can :/

Person 1 at 20:16 on 04 June
Here here Cody!! Although I feel sorry because he had a child that died!!!

Person 2 at 20:18 on 04 June
blimey never knew that - how long ago was it?

Ash Giles at 20:19 on 04 June
You got me started now, just ask Liam about my political rants! When Gordon was Chancellor the economy was in a boom time. During the boom time he made sure the NHS recruited 20,000 more nurses and built 30,000 new schools.Gordon Brown presided over the longest period of growth ever, creating two and a half million more jobs, and lifting 600,000 children out of poverty. Owned.

Ash Giles at 20:50 on 04 June
Gordon and his wife had a daughter in December 2001 and she died of Cystic Fibrosis in the January of 2002.

Ash Giles at 20:55 on 04 June
I tell a lie....the daughter was born prematurely and died...he also has a son who has got cystic fibrosis though :(

Person 2 at 21:09 on 04 June
hey, i didnt say he didnt do anything memorable, just not anything that i knew of. the only thing i would say about that is in a boom cycle, there wouldn't be many who couldn't have done that and more.i understand the death of a child is very hard, and not to sound cold or anything, but around about this time (7 years laer) something like that shouldnt be something to get in the way, nor an excuse for his inability to lead a country in a crisis.the final thing i find is that as good as you make him out to be, he and his entire party have been revealed as very corrupt, and while not the sole blame can be put upon him for that, if the "scandals" or whatever they are called were not revealed, it would be likely he would have allowed it to go on.again, he cant have sole blame - but he's the one spearheading the fate of the country, if he's so wonderful it shouldnt be to hard to overcome these problems.... Read more double your post size XD and i have more if you wanna discuss single points.

Person 2 at 21:10 on 04 June
woops i ran outta post space :/ all i wanted to add was; :P

Ash Giles at 22:50 on 04 June
Firstly, I think you may find that in no way has his child's death got 'in the way', Liam's mum just happened to bring it up....Secondly, it is not only the Labour Party that has been uncovered. The scandal involves MP's from both sides of the house (primarily Conservatives). I am not saying he is the best PM we have ever had but Gordon Brown has a... Read more vision for the future of Britain, he and Alistair Darling are currently leading the world out of the recession (he has advised Barack Obama on some issues), and lets face it, anybody is going to be better than having David Cameron as the Prime Minister. Tony Blair was the best Prime Minister the UK has ever seen (Yes, better than Churchill or Thatcher!), Blair was always going to be a difficult figure to follow. Tony also left Gordon with some loose strings to tie up, for example, 3,000 British troops were still in Iraq when Tony left office, all British troops have now been withdrawn. See next post>>

Ash Giles at 23:09 on 04 June
I think any leader, be it Brown, Cameron or Clegg, Obama, Sarkozy or Merkel, would laugh at you if you told them that it quote: 'shouldnt be to hard to overcome these problems'.The challenges we face are unprecedented. These are global challenges we must combat. You can't possibly only blame our government for the state of the economy because as I... Read more said this problem is not on the British stage, it is on a global stage. As a result of the 'scandals' Gordon Brown has announced complete constitutional reform which may well include an electoral reform (This could lead to the voting age being lowered to 16) and an expenses reform to enthuse trust in Parliament. Gordon Brown is not allowed to know the content of other MP's expenses to respect the privacy all MP's are entitled to. For that reason, there is no way Brown could of prevented this from happening. But he has now acted very quickly to address the issue and prevent it from happening again. Obviously, as a member of the Labour Party >

Ash Giles at 23:23 on 04 June
I will try to defend it at all times. But I am fully behind Gordon Brown, I believe he is the best person to lead the country out of this recession and into the next general election which should be in May 2010. As I write this James Purnell, the Work & Pensions Sec., has resigned. There will be a cabinet reshuffle next week and Gordon Brown and ... Read morehis new cabinet can focus on the real issues facing Britain, something David Cameron and the Conservatives are incapable of. The Conservatives lack substance and policy.A Conservative government for Britain would be a disaster.I think that post was about 3 times your last one...