Lisbon ends the 200 year old experiment in democracy
Lisbon ends the 200 year old experiment in democracy So that’s it then. The Lisbon Treaty passes into law and brings an end to the great two hundred year old experiment in modern western democracy. And you never got to have your say on whether you were prepared to give up on the idea of government of the people, by the people and for the people. We are back to benign oligarchy at last – the condition with which western European elites feel most comfortable: protected from the vulgar impulses of the Mob, unaccountable to anyone but their own peers. Nobody ever got round to asking if you, like the pliant peoples of European countries whose own democratic history has been – to put it kindly – rather patchy, were happy to cash in your birthright. The right to make that decision was promised by everybody and, in the end, delivered by nobody. (Not that I blame David Cameron and William Hague for making the decision that they have made in the immediate circumstances: what would the post facto referendum question have been: “How would you have voted if this vote had actually mattered?”) Mr Cameron will make a plausible stab at defending all those precious principles which have been forsaken. I have no doubt that the rhetoric will be quite fine: it had better be. But it will be a funeral oration not a practical policy outline. There will be time later to argue and debate about the possible future. But for the moment, we must pause and grieve. http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/janetdaley/100015607/lisbon-ends-the-200-year-old-experiment-in-democracy/

Lisbon lies
The EU has declared war on the UK. The conspiracy to make sure Lisbon comes into effect without giving the Uk people the vote they were promised by all three main parties in the 2005 election will increase the distrust of the organisation and its power loving political elite. The way it ignored referendum results against the constitution in France and Holland, claimed that the Constitution had been abandoned when it had just been renamed, and then thrust it on the unwilling Irish by making them have a second vote has reminded us all here just how much the elite hates democracy and despises the views of the people. There will be a price to pay. No incoming Conservative government can live with the massive transfer of power that has now taken place. Parliamentary sovereignty has to be reasserted. The passerelle clauses, which give the new EU the right to take more power in the future without a renegotiaiton, clearly cannot apply in the UK. The UK will need to regain its rights to control its own criminal law codes, employment law, foreign policy and much else. The UK must reject unequivocally the single currency, a common army, and grandstanding officials claiming to speak for a Euro state. The EU has been too clever by half. It should remember that to many British voters the EU is just a source of higher taxes to pay its bills, and more needless regulation. A body like this if it wishes to govern us in many areas need consent. Today the EU does not have popular consent for many of its policies and plans. http://www.johnredwoodsdiary.com/2009/11/04/lisbon-lies/

Sensible fellow, Redwood. Pity he looks like Mr Spock or he would be higher in the national pecking order. Appearance counts for more than substance in today's Britain, more's the pity. :roll: