Enough is enough!

Readers of a sensitive or liberal disposition should read no further.  This won’t be to your liking.

I have asked before, on these pages, when is enough, enough?  How many Europeans (or Americans for that matter) must die under the knife, bomb or gun of radical Islam before the quiescent politicians decide that they must finally protect the host population – their electorate – and the host culture? 

The following apply particularly to the United Kingdom, the country with which I am most familiar but could equally be adapted and adopted for other Western nations.  The will likely be seen as anti-Muslim and some might call them racist or even Nazi.  Since Islam isn’t a ‘race’ that charge would be grossly inaccurate and calling everyone with whom you disagree, a Nazi shows only a blind ignorance of what Nazism was about.  This piece also cannot be considered as a ‘hate crime’, since all it advocates is that Muslims - refugees and immigrants and indigenous – comply with the same laws that are applied to others.

In the UK, there are said to be around 3,000 individuals that are under terror watch.  That is these individuals have been identified by the security services as being somewhat active and a potential danger to UK society.  It is not clear how many of this 3,000 are returning ‘jihadis’ of which there are estimated to be around 500 in number. 

Let’s say the total number of people that represent a security threat to Britain are around 3,500.  I would propose that internment camps be established, guarded by the military, and these people interred.  The initial term of internment to be between 3-5-10 years depending upon the weight of evidence, however such evidence has been obtained – illegal wiretaps, informers, etc.,   The term to be decided by a panel of judges. 

Yes, that’s right.  Britain should establish and house its very own Guantanamo. 

OK, so those liberals that have read this far are now foaming at the mouth.  However, it is crystal clear that the security services have neither the manpower numbers nor the ethnic mix of manpower to enable them to adequately monitor the threat posed by these potentially dangerous individuals.  We need these people off of our streets.  I accept that some innocents may be swept up as part of this but believe that the greater good is served by taking these people out of circulation.   Yes, in some respects we must suspend some of our cherished civil liberties, for a time, to preserve them.  Those that seek the overthrow of our societies are no civil libertarians!

Allied to the above measure, the families of those individuals would, where possible, be deported to their home countries.  That is, if the spouse was not born in Britain, then they and their children would be sent to their home country.  Those that were born in Britain would be allowed to remain but would be ineligible to receive any state benefits.  Not receive any – so no free housing, no welfare, no child benefit, no working tax credit, no free NHS – nothing.

Talking of state benefits, they should be withdrawn, with no right of appeal, from any family where a child has been found to have been subjected to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).   Again, in such cases, where one of the parents was non-UK born, then the family to be deported.  No right of appeal.  FGM is a barbaric custom which adds to the subjugation of women and has no place in civilised society (or indeed in any society).  I would go one step further and require that all girls in the UK, under the age of 16, undergo a medical examination, every two years and those who have suffered FGM be thus identified.

I am not a lawyer but to me it seems to be bordering on treason to want to overthrow the legal system of the United Kingdom and replace this with the completely alien, Sharia Law.  Therefore, I believe that the promotion of such a law should, if not already a crime, be made so.  The UK legal system has evolved over more than a thousand years and is widely respected (and often emulated) around the world.  We need to retain this system and importantly under no circumstances allow any kind of parallel system to be present or have any standing in the UK.  Yes, I know that UK law is largely liberal and much of what I am proposing goes against the deeply ingrained traditions but desperate times call for desperate measures.

I don’t know about you but the overly public displays by Muslims of their religion also need to cease.  So, no more blocking of streets while people kneel and pray.  There are more than sufficient numbers of mosques.  So, no more calls to prayer.  The minarets should be silenced.  To me these speak of an arrogant demonstration of a ‘holier than thou’ domination of areas. 

On the subject of overly public displays, I do not find the hijab objectionable but the full burqa and the niqab should be banned as they hide so much that one wouldn’t know if the hidden individual is a woman or a man nor if the person was a wanted individual.

Speaking of mosques, do not allow the building of a single new mosque – not one.  In the West, we have a tolerance towards Islam which is not in any way reciprocated in countries like Saudi Arabia.  There is not one single Christian church in Saudi Arabia, indeed one is not even allowed to bring a bible into the country!

Sticking with Islamic ‘customs’ – just as we cannot allow Sharia Law to be practised in the UK, neither can we allow polygamy.  Our custom in the UK is one marriage and our law is one marriage and that must apply equally, to all.

Going back to benefits - and this to apply to all – any benefits paid to be restricted to four children.

Again, applying to all immigrants and refugees – any conviction for a crime of violence, for rape, for trafficking, for drugs or child sex offences would result in automatic deportation for the perpetrator and his/her immediate family upon completion of prison sentence. 

Staying with immigrants and refugees, any employer that utilises an illegal immigrant or refugee should be fined £100,000 per illegal employee and serve a minimum 6-month prison sentence.

It is important also that the failed policy of ‘multi-culturalism’ be abandoned.  All immigrants and refugees need to learn how to speak, read and write English.  All organisations should cease publishing documents in multiple languages – be it Urdu, Arabic, Polish or Tagalog, we should only be using the English language.

So, overall, the message is that enough is enough.  We in the West can simply no longer be our naturally tolerant selves.  We need to change.  We need to change so as to preserve our culture and society.  If we don’t change, then we will perish and become subject to and dominated by an alien religion and alien ways.  Much of the foregoing is naturally focussed on Islam and its adherents – principally because it is they that, having seen how good life is in the West, then want to change it to reflect what they have left behind. 

Think about that.  They want to come to the West because we have developed societies that are open and successful.  Then, when they get here, they want to change those societies to reflect life and conditions in unsuccessful countries like Pakistan or Syria or Somalia.  If life is so good in those countries, why not stay there?  Ever wonder why the refugees from the Middle East and Africa all flock to Europe?  Surely those from Syria could flee to Saudi Arabia or Qatar or UAE?  Saudi Arabia even  has a tent city with 100,000 air-conditioned tents!  Trouble is though, those countries have taken no refugees, not one!

If we don’t stand-up for our Western societies – which I admit are not heavenly utopias – then they will fall.  If not now, when?  How many must die in Paris Nice, Berlin, Brussels or Westminster before we say enough and start to fight back.  We need to fight back now, using our laws and legal systems and parliamentary majorities.  If we don’t, then the populists, so reviled by the media and, let’s face it, politicians, will start to take the law into their own hands.

News review November 12

Russian doping
Well, seems like the threat of a suspension and banning from the Rio Olympics has got President Putin's attention.

Putin is now scrambling to show activity - meaningful or otherwise - and that Russia is taking the issue seriously and will conduct its own investigation.

So the IAAF must keep up the pressure and pass a provisional ban - suspend Russia from all international athletics competitions for up to two years, with a review in say 6 months.  This review would see if Russia has changed at all and if it has 'cleaned-up its act' then they could participate in the Rio Olympics, if not, they can't.

Incidentally, if any Russians are reading this, it is not relevant that other nations are allowing doping.  Fact (and it is indisputable) is that Russian athletes were doping.  Fact is that the Russian state supported the suppression of the evidence and findings - they didn't just close their eyes to it, they actively supported it.

I suspect/suppose that doping is occurring in other countries.  Maybe some of those countries are also 'doing a Russia' and, as a state, supporting the suppression of investigations.  That though, in no possible way, excuses Russia.

Russia must be punished so that it and every other country, understands that such cheating will not be allowed.

Refugees
So the solution to stopping the flood of African economic migrants from invading Europe, is to bung $2 billion to their governments!  Who knew?

These are the same governments who have mis-managed hundreds of billions of aid dollars in the past and squandered part of these vast sums on grandiose projects, with suitably large transfers to Swiss accounts.

A health tip for you - don't hold your breath for this 'solution' actually achieving anything.  For a start, given the parlous state of the public finances of many (most?) of the European countries, we can expect that this will not be 'new' money but rather diverted from existing aid budgets.  Then of course, since the money won't filter down to the people of Africa, it won't achieve the desired effect.

My tip to those European leaders in Malta.  If you want to stop the flood, do two things.  End tariffs on all agricultural exports from Africa to Europe.  This will dramatically increase the benefit of staying on the farm in Africa.  Secondly, send back any and all such migrants.

So carrot and stick!

Kurds and Sinjar
Today the Kurdish Peshmerga, supported with coalition air strikes, are seeking to re-take the strategic town of Sinjar.

This is very welcome news.  This might be a precursor to the re-taking of Mosul.

What would be more welcome though, is if European nations and the US, started arming the Kurds and doing so, in a big way.  The Kurdish Peshmerga have been holding the front line against Daesh since last year, when they halted the advance of this murderous death-cult.  They have been doing this at great cost to their people and without any materiel support from the West.  The West apparently don't want to offend the Iraqi government, in Baghdad.  I have news for the West, the Kurds can be our friends, while Baghdad is moving daily evermore into the Iranian sphere of influence and control.  

I will follow my own tip though and not hold my breath.  Obama is in such thrall to the Ayatollahs in Tehran and Qom that the US won't be doing the right thing, this side of January 2017!  Europe though, can and should start arming the Kurds.  Consider that the Kurds are doing, in Kurdistan, what might otherwise be happening much nearer to Europe's own doorstep.

Cameron under impresses
Not a surprise but people have seen the 'demands' that David Cameron has sent to Britain's European Union partners, and found them severely wanting.  They just don't get us anywhere near where we need to be, in terms of a changed relationship.  Also, why start with such weak demands and have nothing to concede as part of the negotiating position?

I am starting to come to the conclusion that Cameron is either a Euro-skeptic or his fast heading that way!  Knowing he can't get the German-dominated EU to see the error of their ways, he is putting forward something so weak, that if he doesn't get that, then he can campaign for Brexit.

Egypt plane crash
We don't no for sure but is seems pretty likely that the Russian Metrojet airliner was brought down as a result of a bomb, probably loaded into the luggage cargo hold.

People are pointing the finger at lax security procedures at Egyptian airports.  Truth is though, that many airports are vulnerable, in my view.

At the front of airports, we have very extensive (some would say intrusive) procedures to search passengers and their cabin luggage.  Yet, the back-door is potentially left wide open.  These airports are 'manned' by hundred and sometimes thousands of workers on minimum wage.  Many of these, in Europe, are immigrant and they may well be subject to local community pressure and/or pressure back in their home country's and yet the level of security, at the back-door, seems to be quite rudimentary.

Very worrying!

          

News update November 10

IAAF and Russia doping
Lord Sebastian Coe is either being excessively polite to the Russian athletics authorities or he is not yet entirely confident that he can persuade the organisation that he now leads, the IAAF, to do the right thing.

The World Anti-Doping Association - WADA - found widespread and state-sponsored support of a programme designed to thwart efforts to root out performance enhancing and other doping, from athletics.  The crystal clear recommendation is that Russia should be banned from international athletic meetings for a period of time.  Such time would include the 2016 Rio de Janiero Olympics.  Consider that there is none of the usual 'bureacratese' about the WADA report - nothing about 'appropriate disciplinary action' or 'measures should be taken'.  WADA are clear - a ban.

Come on Lord Coe!  Send the world of sport a very clear message that doping is unacceptable and will be punished.  This might be harsh on any 'clean' Russian athletes but that's just tough.  Russia needs to suffer for its sins and so that the world of athletics knows, that the IAAF has teeth.

Global Warming
I don't subscribe to the fad of changing a subject title simply because the facts stubbornly refuse to support it!  So I won't be discussing the faddish 'Climate Change'

The BBC and no doubt all of their fellow travellers in the environmental lobby are sounding the alarm bells because the temperature figures for 2015 through to the end of September are 1.02C above the average for the period 1850 to 1900.  They try to slide in a comment about 'confusion' relating to earlier periods but we have seen, time and time again, that the Global Warming scaremongers have consistently fudged and fixed the numbers to suit their pseudo-science.  Always, always remember, these folks have monetary and career based vested interests in pushing the warnings.

The latest data is a joint effort from the UK Meteorological Office and the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.  The latter were heavily discredited, and remain so in many people's opinions, by their highly questionable behaviour in the Climate Gate scandal.

The BBC do have the good grace to admit that the so called El Nino weather phenomenon is also a contributory factor in the temperature increase but don't say whether or not this was present during the earlier time period - so we don't know if the data sets are comparing apples with apples!  Nothing new for the Global Warming industry!  

Refugees
Prepare yourself for a shock!

Sitting comfortably?  Okay, I'll begin.

It seems that a leading member of Daesh/ISIS has been discovered among the so called Syrian 'refugees'.  I know, what a shock, almost floored me.  Then I remembered that sensible commentators - you know, those that point out that most of the 'refugees' are in fact young men of military age and these far outnumber the relatively few families - the commentators have consistently predicted that Daesh would use the situation to infiltrate battle-hardened terrorists into Europe.

Don't be surprised at this story, when or more accurately if, you hear about it but do consider how many we don't know about!  It would be naive in the extreme, to suppose that these murderous maniacs have only slipped one killer in among the 'refugees'.  Especially when the extremely foolish Merkel, threw open the German border, to them all.

Incidentally, it seems that the 'refugees' are very fast wearing out their welcome - or in many cases have already worn it out - in Sweden, Austria and Germany. If Twitter chatter is to be believed, these countries are seeing significantly increased instances of rape and child molestation as well has attacks on Christians.  And that is before Daesh get themselves properly situated!  

Yemen
Just thought I would mention it.  It seems to have fallen off of the news agenda in recent months but the few available reports suggest that this Saudi/Iran proxy war is particularly bloody and, as is so often the case, civilians are the largest victim group.

Don't hear too much wailing and gnashing of teeth from Obama's White House though.  One senses that this will run and run.

Israel
You likely won't hear too much about what is going on in Israel either.

Palestinians - remember those people that 'right-on' countries have been rushing to recognise as a state - are entering Israel and then seeking to stab and kill random innocent Israeli civilians.  Old lady on a bus - stab her - in the name of peace!  Group standing at a bus stop - drive a car into them and then jump out and stab them, just to make sure they die - for peace, of course.

You will though, hear the usual Leftist bleating if Israel reacts by sealing off Gaza and the West Bank.  I am kind of surprised that Netanyahu hasn't done this already!

More tomorrow....

News November 9

Comment on today's news.

Corbyn and the Armed Services
Jeremy Corbyn is upset that the Chief of Military Staff has entered into 'politics' by saying that the Uk bombing Daesh in Iraq but not tracking back and bombing them in Syria is foolish and lacking in sense.  Also that having a Prime Minister who has very publicly stated he won't push the UK's nuclear button under any circumstances, is dangerous (as well, in my view as just plain silly).

Corbyn's right that the military shouldn't be involved in politics we can see the negative side of that in the flawed elections in Burma.  However, who better to provide a reasonably impartial viewpoint on the situation in Syria and Iraq, than a non-politician.  We all know how politicians trim their sails and are more interested in soundbites than hard facts.  I have a little more faith in the people that take the decisions to send our service personnel into harms way than in flip-flopping politicians.

It would, of course, been better if the comments had been made by other politicians.  Not just Conservatives but also those in the Labour Party who still believe that the UK has the moral right to defend itself.

Burma elections
Not really sure how to consider these.  On the one hand, the Burmese people have an opportunity to exercise their democratic right but just how democratic is that right?  Nobel Peace Prize winner, Aung San Suu Kyi, cannot be elected as President (this election will come, early next year)  because she has foreign born sons!  The military has a constitutionally-guaranteed 25% of the seats in parliament.  To amend the constitution, a constitution that was written by the military, requires a 75% or more majority!  Hundreds of thousands of the minority Rohingya muslims have been denied the right to vote.    So, a step in the right direction but still quite a way to go.

Osborne agrees 30% spending cuts with four government departments.
Before you jump-up and shout 'about time', consider that these cuts are over the next four years.

The departments are, transport, local government, environment and Osborne's own treasury.  So not the big spenders like health and welfare or the already over-cut defence department.

Apparently, these cuts will be in the order of 8% a year for each of the next four years.   I have written here before that departmental budgets need to be subjected to cuts of 15% a year and the complete closure of the environment department.  My opinion hasn't changed but given the worsening global economic situation, I am not sure that 15% cuts would be enough!

When you hear the Conservatives crowing about deficit cutting and Labour and the SNP's howling about austerity, bear in mind that all that is potentially happening, is that the UK is trying to start to live within its means.  The massive debt mountain £1.5 trillion still sits above the UK economy and acts as a huge burden on future generations.  I would advise large pinches of salt to be taken but am not sure what is the latest health scare news position.

Remembrance Sunday One
Caught-up with some of this on TV news.  It wasn't widely commemorated, as far as I could ascertain, in Erbil, Kurdistan.

We should be heartened that so many young people seem to have managed to throw off the PC teaching of the education system and recognise the contribution and sacrifice made by so many of our fellow-countrymen and our allies.

While the young continue to show respect to these heroes, we have hope!

Remembrance Sunday Two
That man Corbyn again!

Would it really have hurt him so much, to bow his head, when laying his poppy wreath?  A barely perceptible nod in the direction of the Cenotaph, simply isn't good enough.  Yet another sign of his dislike of Britain and the British.

I know I shouldn't be surprised by the actions of an active supporter of the murderous IRA but surely there is at least one grown-up remaining, at the Labour Party?
    
Refugees
Have you noticed that this issue is sliding down the news programmes?  With the onset of bad weather in the region (Erbil is currently experiencing quite severe winds and rains), we might see a halting or at least a serious curtailment, of the numbers of people crossing the Mediterranean.

Maybe these people will now look to what is on their own doorsteps?  Given that Summer suns will be replaced by Winter cold, rain and snow maybe these 'refugees' will head towards Saudi Arabia and seek asylum or at least refuge in the massive tent city that is sitting at Mecca.

We can but hope.

Clearly, the appetite in Europe, where it was previously positive, has fast turned against the swarm of people that are invading.  Who knows, given Angela Merkel's support for a completely open door policy, is now being rapidly rowed back from, Merkel's own position is said to be in jeopardy.  Merkel losing her job?  We can but hope.

 

Today's news

A departure for me as I will offer brief(ish) comments on current stories in the news rather than my normal lengthier piece.

David Cameron and the EU
It seems like Cameron has decided to get a little serious with his negotiations for Britain's continued membership of the European Union.  He is apparently going to tell our EU partners that if he can't get what he wants, for Britain, then he will campaign for Britain's exit, the so called Brexit.

Before you jump up an exclaim 'about time!' consider that Cameron isn't really asking for much.  And his partners will hold firm on their core desire for 'ever closer union' and pull Britain further and further into their orbit.  This is what the Euro-elite want.  Not the people of Europe, or more accurately the European Union (note to the BBC Europe and the European Union are not same thing) but for those folks, democracy is an over-rated luxury.

If Cameron really wants to demonstrate that he means business, here is a tip.   Have the UK Civil Service start a process of planning for Brexit.  I can't think of a better way of showing that you mean business, than showing you are prepared for all outcomes.  Have Civil Servants start negotiations with the UK's key trading partners - those outside the EU.  Start with China and India and then other Commonwealth countries.  The upcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, in Malta, would be the perfect launchpad!  Develop and publish the replacement for the Common Agriculture Policy.  Same for the Fisheries policy.  Start to withdraw from cooperation on the ludicrous European Union Foreign Service.

Does anyone think that this won't concentrate the minds of the EU bureaucrats and the so-called political masters.

Obama and Keystone
So Obama decided to pay back his big financial sponsor - Warren Buffet.  This was entirely predictable.  Buffet's Burlington Northern Santa Fe railway is booking an alleged $2 billion a year in profits from transporting oil, at $30 a barrel from Canada to the southern US versus the $10 a barrel that it would cost to send it down via the Keystone XL pipeline.

The US Presidential race

As a non-US voter, can I say - enough already.

Let's start with the Democrats - surely this can only be seen as a fight between Clinton and Saunders?  I appreciate that this is a most unpalatable choice but let's get real.  Without Biden, there is no one else.  Unless of course, some of the RINOs show their true colours, and change parties?  Jeb, Marco?
So will the other Democrat candidates please leave the stage.  Then we can have 'looney-Left tunes' Saunders slug it out with the not so much Teflon coated as media-untouchable Hillary.   Then we just might see the Dems and their media supporters having to choose between the spend like crazy Saunders and the make no hostages to the future Clinton.  Things might get interesting!

Now the Republicans.

'Elephant in the room time' - make that elephants.  Jeb, Marco, Kasich and the others, except for Ted Cruz, Donald Trump and Ben Carson, need to leave the field.  George Dubya needs to take his brother to one side and say 'save your money and give it up'!

The GOP needs to focus on the real candidates.
Carson may have been wounded by the latest revelations concerning West Point, or he may brush past that.  To me it sounds like the media trying to make a story out of next to nothing - so Carson bragged a little, haven't we all?

Trump will I think, start to fade.  He has done the GOP a great service by daring to say things that some others, like the ones who should now bow out, have steered away from.   While he is a populist, I think that he has to have something more substantial in his policy pocket than just being anti-immigration.  Plus he has had past cosy relationships with the Dems.

That just leaves Ted Cruz.  Most say that he is by far the best qualified, intellectually but perhaps more importantly, he has displayed a rare consistency in his following truly Republican policies.  Some say that this tars him with a Tea Party brush but he would be the most formidable opponent against Hillary.  Who knows, if he chose Trump as his running mate, then he might get some of that Donald magic!

Refugees 
Too late for me to say too much, tonight, I will come back on this tomorrow.  I sense that this issue will still be in the news!

Have a good night!

Professional politicians?

I sometimes wonder if it is an ‘age thing’.  Am I turning into a ‘grumpy old man’?  I will let others be the judge of that.

I certainly am becoming less tolerant of the foolish behaviour of those that have been elected as our leaders.  I will give four recent examples of what I view as poor leadership. 

The most egregious is that of President Obama.  I can’t figure out if it is by design or by default that Obama has managed to throw away America’s pre-eminence on the world stage but that is exactly what has happened on his watch.   

In the South China Sea, China is establishing itself as a regional superpower and flexing its swiftly growing naval muscles.  Where America’s navy used to have command and unfettered freedom to roam and support ‘Pax Americana’ the Chinese have been ignoring the claims (rights?) of South China Sea nations such as Vietnam and the Philippines.  They are simply moving into territory claimed by these nations and annexing them and expanding other small islands so as to extend their territorial claims.  All the while, the Obama administration downplays the actions of the Chinese, when it can be bothered to even recognise such actions, and refuses to meaningfully confront them.  It can be no consolation that by expelling the Americans, as the Philippines did in the post-Marcos era, they maybe brought some of this upon themselves because that misses the two fundamental points.  China sees that it has a manifest destiny to be a much bigger global player and, as a first step must have complete control of its own back-yard.  That they have also sent ships up into waters off of Alaska, even while Obama was visiting that state, maybe says something about how big they consider, their backyard to be!  Also, the lack of a robust response from the Obama administration will cause Pacific rim nations to read the writing on the will and start to drift from the American sphere of influence to that of China’s.

In the Middle East too, America has lost any initiative it had.  The unwillingness to confront Daesh and the blind support of any anti-Assad organisation has meant that America has effectively armed both its immediate and eventual enemies.  At the same time, America has failed to support the only local group – the Kurdish Peshmerga – who are taking the fight to Daesh.  Obama, having effectively lost Egypt, is now in danger of losing Iraq.  The inaction of Obama – and don’t be fooled with any talk about the coalition bombing missions, these have been nothing but a half-hearted sop to the home audience – has led to the emergence of Iran as a bigger player, that now, just about has to be at the table making decisions. 

More importantly, this has ceded to Russia, the opportunity to go in and bolster its long-time client state of Syria and to be portrayed as doing more forcefully and effectively what they Americans have been so far reluctant to do.  Like Bill Clinton, before him, Obama wants to (very reluctantly) fight an enemy, solely from the air, though Obama is even more squeamish about ‘boots on the ground’ or indeed any kind of meaningful involvement.  If news reports are to be believed, the Obama administration has spent $500 million training a handful – maybe as few as twenty – of Syrians to fight Daesh and/or Assad (their mission wasn’t really clear).  Of these only one or two remain in the programme and the caches of weapons and materiel that the Obama administration supplied, is now in the hands of rebels!  Shades of America’s actions in Soviet occupied Afghanistan, methinks.  Wasn’t Einstein who said that the definition of madness was doing the same thing, time after time and expecting a different outcome?

A further unfortunate outcome of Obama’s timid Syria policy, is that Russia’s muscular approach in Syria, is allowing their not-so-covert invasion of Ukraine to slide off of the news pages.   Pause for a moment and think back to the last time you heard a news story about Ukraine.  The invasion is still going on but the news media circus has moved on.   Remember too, that during this invasion, a passenger airline has been shot down from the sky by a Russian supplied ground to air missile.  The official report on the air crash came out and caused a minor stir and has now been filed away.  283 people died and still Russia gets to sit at the top table with civilised people!  Another gift from Obama!  In the recent talks on Syria, John Kerry praised the efforts of Sergei Lavrov, the Russian Foreign Minister.  Instead he should and so should the rest of the world, pound and pound the Russians until the murderers of those 283 people are brought to justice. 

Rather than focus on the short-comings of Obama and his inept administration, it wouldn’t do to ignore Chancellor Angela Merkel.  As I have said, in earlier posts, Merkel’s statement of an open invitation to ‘refugees’, was just like those teenagers that post on Twitter or Facebook ‘party at my house, tonight’ and then are shocked to discover that the whole world, or at least a significant part of the local area’s youth turns up and crashes the party.  Now Merkel is rueing the day she stupidly opened her mouth.  Germany, by the end of the year, may have taken in between one and one and a half million ‘refugees’ .  It is clear, from social media, that those ‘refugees’ already in country have worn out their welcome.  There are regular demonstrations against the ‘refugees’ and against Merkel’s policy – even though she is, belatedly, closing the door.  We hear and see  that these ‘refugees’ who, contrary to the images that are mostly portrayed in the media, are very predominantly young males.  We also hear that an epidemic of rape and sexual assaults is breaking out, in Germany and the satellite countries.  Also, a number of diseases such as scabies and STDs. 

Then there is David Cameron.  He was elected, with a parliamentary majority, in the May General Election.  This came as something of a surprise, to many (most?).  Maybe even to Cameron, himself?  Now Cameron is desperately trying to hold a renegotiation of the terms of Britain’s membership of the European Union without actually negotiating anything.  The result will be then put to a referendum before the end of 2017.  Cameron is in a difficult position (of his own making) because having been elected, as Conservative leader, in 2005, on a Euro-sceptic ticket, and needing to keep many of his own MPs on board as well as trying to see-off the anti-EU UKIP, he now has to negotiate something which he really doesn’t want and then run the risk of the British people rejecting his efforts and then his government needing to negotiate Britain’s exit from the EU. 

In case you are not clear on what it is that Cameron – and by extension, the UK – want as part of the renegotiation, you are not alone.  Most people in Britain have an idea of what the country wants, however, this hasn’t been expressed, other than through media polls and such, to our EU partners.  One appreciates that negotiations need to be conducted with a certain degree of secrecy but I get the impression that Cameron doesn’t even know what to put forward as Britain’s negotiating position.  Must be very frustrating for our EU partners.    

A sure sign of the way the political wind is blowing – or at least how Cameron and the political elite, want it to blow – is that there seems to be no contingency plan for how Britain might actually manage to extricate from the European Union, should the people of Britain, so decide.  To me, announcing that such planning was being undertaken, would serve as a very strong signal to the UK’s EU partners, that Britain means business but this negotiating tool isn’t even being mentioned. 

Perhaps all of these examples reflect what happens when we have professional politicians as opposed to those that have experience of the real world.  Obama, Merkel and Cameron between them, have never really had a ‘proper’ job.  Never run a business or worried about how to make this week’s payroll.  Never had to go through the same daily grind, that so many of the voters must endure, etc..

I started this post by wondering if this was an age thing.  I conclude though that it is them, not me.  I think I am reasonably sane and normal, it is just this political elite that is acting crazy! 

What do you think?