The Next Question

Dick Puddlecote has yet another glorious rant - as only he can - this time on the useless, self-centred apology for a government that presently imposes itself on the people. Commenting on the fact that there is only one policy that our government is following and that is a fourth term and in so doing, as Dick so rightly says, "this weasel administration merely look for ways of gerrymandering the electoral process to their own advantage. Ways to cheat, ways to misdirect, ways to place a quango barrier between them and the public, ways to gain votes in any snidey way they possibly can without actually listening to voters."

Where this humble blogger would take issue with one of so much greater renown in the blogosphere is that DP stopped, in writing his rant, too soon. Because we are not talking just of Labour, but also the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, as were they to find themselves in a similar situation to Labour both the other two parties would behave exactly the same. And therein, presently, lies the problem with politics in this country, in that party is always placed above country and it is up to us, the electorate, to change it.

The need of the electorate to effect the required change presents yet another problem which is whether said electorate can tear itself away from burning questions such as whether the right nonentity won the X-Factor, the latest happenings in Eastenders or Coronation Street and other such inconsequential non-matters of the day. Day after day I listen to people who seem devoid of any understanding of what is happening to this great country of ours, who show not the slightest interest in how we are governed; the fact that we now elect MPs to do what exactly; the fact we blindly follow the dicktats of unelected quangos and other non-governmental bodies, set up by politicians, which tell us how we are to act, think and speak. Oh, people will complain - and then off they go and put their crosses in the blue, red or yellow boxes on the ballot paper.

We live in a world where anomolies exist - ridiculous anomolies whereby the BBC would not dare to broadcast a programme in which someone from Pakistan was referred to as a Paki, yet will broadcast a song by George Formby about a Chinaman called Mr. Woo, working during the war as a 'black-out warden', which contains a verse stating 'beware the chink in your window because you will find another one at your door'.

We live in a world where politicians, come election time, publish something called a manifesto setting out various promises - any one of which gives them carte-blanche to do whatever the hell they like. We accept that politicians are elected to govern us when, as one commenter said on another post of mine, they are in fact elected to administer the workings of our country - not act as a dictator.

Come the general election, we the people need to stop and really think about which of the candidates standing for election to become an MP do accept that they are the servants of the people; that they are no different to the electorate and therefore are not entitled to a lifestyle that most of the electorate can only dream about; that they must at all times put country above party, that we have the right to decide how we are to live our lives - to say, do and think as we wish; to decide, locally, what schools we may have to send our children to; to decide what level of law and order we wish to accept and above all to decide which of them truly believes in the idea we should be a self-governing nation.

One can only hope that when the time does come for people to cast their vote that they will do so with great care and forethought, bearing in mind the centuries of strife that have allowed them that privilege.