The Shameful Visit of The Saudi's

It is disgraceful that the Labour government, with Conservative acquiescence, is parading the Saudi monarch around on a state visit. The Saudi regime is a corrupt, misogynistic, fanatical dictatorship. There is no freedom of thought or conscience or religion. It's monarch should have no place here. I applaud Vince cable's boycotting of the whole event.

To be a woman in Saudi Arabia is to live under the boot of one of the most oppressive systems on earth. Women are denied even their basic humanity. They have no rights. They cannot go out alone in public, they cannot drive, they cannot learn. They are caged like birds and savagely beaten if they object. Saudi Arabia's preachers encourage this, and it's state condones it- though they are not separate but are the same thing.

This is a state which has even raped and tortured British citizens. It has made no apology and no restitution, yet because they have oil we allow them to mock justice and cravenly play to their every whim, as in the BAE corruption enquiry. That is not an ally, it is an exploiter.

Saudi Arabia is a medeival state that tolerates only one culture, one ruler and one religion. It shares no value or goal with multi-cultural, pluralist Britain.

Finally, we need to realise that when you shake the hand of them all. By meeting like this with King Abdullah, Gordon Brown has lost any moral authority he has in dealings with Zimbabwe or Sudan.

This state visit makes fools of us all.

Ming Quits

Well, he has done it. Ming has just resigned. I wish him the best, I'm glad he has finally done it and I hope he can become shadow foreign secretary as soon as possible. Now lets make sure the next 2 months are not too bad and that the successor is leader for a decade.

Simon 'Loyalty' Hughes

Well, Simon Hughes is at it again and once more he has ensured that the only media coverage about the Lib Dem's is questioning Ming's leadership. But there is a problem. He is right.

Ming's leadership and mistakes, for whatever the reason, have become the story and that cannot be allowed to happen. Inside the Campbell Bunker, instead of simply reacting to Simon Hughes with fury (which he does indeed deserve) should take a long hard look at their man and decide whether Ming will ever truly be able to turn round the bad opinion polls and the bad media coverage. My feeling is that he can't and he should resign, now, with a minimum of fuss.

And as for Simon Hughes washing our dirty laundry in public, he needs to strongly consider his position, his conduct and his likely future.

Time for an Election...

Well, Yellow Saturday has given us two important things: an overdue sullying of Brown's reputation, and a reprieve for the Lib Dems. Because lets face it, we were not going to have good results on the 1st of November. I feel that we would have lost some seats, maybe 8 or so.

Now that we have breathing space, its time for us to do a brave and distasteful thing and pressure Ming to step down. Not because he is incompetent, not because he is old but because of the very simple fact that he fails to embody the radical, liberal, dynamic presence that Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy exhibited in different ways and that we need to get ahead and fight for our corner and our policies in this 21st century, media driven political atmosphere.

Ming's mantra has always been the maximum number of votes, the maximum number of seats. In order to serve that mantra best, sadly he has to go.

Gordon Brown loses on points to Cameron

David Cameron failed to knock out Brown at PMQ's today, but his allegation's of moral cowardice certainly stick. Meanwhile Ming asked a good and concise question, which recieved (of course) a deceitful and incorrect answer. I should add that Vince Cable was as ever exemplary yesterday during the pre-budget debate.

However, Cameron still looks like the braying arch-Tory he really is, and for all his clever words I doubt if he will really be all that popular when the election finally comes, whilst Gordon Brown looks utterly stupid by failing to go to the country. He is either a coward who doesn't want to submit to the people's view, or he has no control over his advisors and spin doctors. Neither of these is an appealing prospect. It's looking like its going to be a tough 2 years, folks.

Stop Press: Bush Evil Selfish Bastard

Not exactly news, but the announcement that the President of Evil will veto the Child Health Care Bill in America that would extend health care to 10 MILLION kids is further proof, if it were needed, that Bush is a ranting ultra right wing idealogue who cares only for the approval of his corporate masters.

For pity's sake, nearly half the Republicans in the Senate voted for it! Jan 2oth, 2009 can't come soon enough. Bring on President Obama!

Damn Stupid

That's the CWU, by the way. Yes indeed, the Communication Workers Union, the Stalinist trade union that's intent on living in the 1970's has once again gone on strike over pay. There is no quicker way to destroy forever the Royal Mail and quicken the decline of their union and the TUC than to deliberately sabotage it in this way. The Royal Mail is struggling desperately to carve out a role for itself in the 21st century, whilst the CWU seem to think that a bloated mail service can survive on junkmail, old grannies and Christmas cards. Meanwhile, businesses are voting with their feet and leaving royal mail for FedEx and the like.

And even more importantly, the strike means I wont get my amazon packages for literally weeks! Aargh!

Cameron's Speech

I know it was yesterday, but I thought I'd give my thoughts on the Tory Leaders ramblings.

There was a lot of talk about the market and freedom, and privatising education and the welfare system. The City Academy system is avery good and liberal idea, but in Dave's speech there was no talk of regulation or limits. What he wants to do is to create a hotch-potch mess of a system, where there is no consistency and no space for anything other than academic performance. Just throwing education open to wind leaves you with the poorest children suffering in order to satisfy the whims and prejudice's of middle class parents.

A big alarm bell rings over his proposals to Americanize our welfare system. There is no nation more ghastly or anti-liberal in all Western Democracy than the US of A, and to privatise a welfare system creates a huge wage slave workforce, bent double in under paid, menial jobs that they cannot quit or refuse, devaluing them as people and individuals. It breaks apart families and would return us to a Victorian world of servants and masters.