Friday 16 May 2008

Quote of the day

" It is not in the nature of politics that the best men should be elected. The best men do not want to govern their fellow men."

George E. MacDonald



" Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct."

Thomas Jefferson


Is it time to shrink the state to more manageable proportions?

The Telegraph asks an interesting question today “Who is the 'right leader' for our hard times”? Sparked by Broon’s waffle about providing the right leaderhip.

Even more adventurously they ask: “Do we need a politician running Britain at all”?

Maybe the question they should really be asking is: “Do we need anyone running Britain at all”?

Personally I am not really sure I want much so-called leadership at all. Belgium seems to have managed well enough with no parliament recently. Could we manage mostly at a county level?

We have after all a perfectly good royal family to represent the country. The queen probably knows more about politics than any two prime ministers put together. They are certainly more in tune with practical environmentalism than the average politician.

So combine the Royal family with a parliament that has responsibility for maintaining the legal system, the armed forces and the currency. Claw back every last parliamentary privilege and power ceded to the unelected EU commission.

Have a watchdog to police MPs propriety and finances. Make it impeachable to renague on election promises. These people should be the servants of the Nation, not it’s patrician ruling class.

Given that we have had a millennium’s worth of very, very, bad legislation in the last decade let's make it as difficult as possible for them to ever pass any new legislation again. Without at least 75% in favour.

The state should be kept very firmly away from telling the citizen what to do.

Let local democracy, take care of all the other details.

Works for me…