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purplecthulhu at 11:54am on 02/02/2004
purplecthulhu at 11:54am on 02/02/2004
And the demands by certain government figures that the BBC (and by implication any news organisation) should only report things that are 100% verifiably true will destroy all investigative journalism, all whistleblowing, and most other reporting besides.
Indeed, from a deep philosophical position, it can be argued that nothing is ever 100% provably true. As a scientist this is an issue that comes up all the time.
So this particular point not only shows the government to be morally bankrupt, it shows them to be philosophically bankrupt as well.
Lets get rid of them.
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Lets get rid of them.
As a point of principle I'm with you all the way. In practical terms, what are our options here? We replace one morally bankrupt party with another morally bankrupt party, and one whose policies are even dodgier to start with. Yes, we can vote for the third party, and I anyway do, but unless something remarkable happens to the political landscape in the next year or so, and while I'd love to believe it would, I doubt that, it's going to be a choice between Tory Unleaded and Tory Leaded. On the whole I'd rather have Tory Unleaded, with a change at the top. Tory Leaded is utterly unacceptable. But if we get Parliamentary Diesel I'd be a very happy woman indeed.
In the meantime, I am now with those yelling 'Blair Out' on the basis that while we the electorate can't get rid of him except by going on a circuitous route that would ultimately cause more suffering, we can perhaps make sufficient noise to attract the attention of his cohorts to encourage them to do something.
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Realistically they won't be winning. My best hope is for a hung parliament with the LDs having enough seats to be able to allow a stable coalition which can then institute real change to the electoral system that will prevent the kind of elected dictatorship we have now from ever happening again.
But I have to ask all of you labour voters out there who are opposed to the war and more especially opposed to TB's malpractice as PM... Do you have the strength of your convictions to vote for the non-Tony party that has a chance of winning? If you don't, then all your criticisms of TB are just hot air. Going on marches, talking to MPs, signing petitions are ways of influencing politicians who are already in power.
And as we have seen, a million people on the streets can easily be ignored. The only real way you have to tell them what you think is in the ballot box. If you oppose TBs policies you have to not only vote against Labour but have to vote for the candidate most likely to beat Labour, no matter how distasteful that might be - as long as TB is still in charge come the election.
Time to get those tactical voting charts out again...
Giving the Devil his due
Blair has done a lot of progressive things: he forced equalisation of the age of consent (using the Parliament Act to crush those pesky Lords), he created the devolved assemblies in Scotland, Wales, London and
Northern Ireland, the Government signed the Human Rights Act, so we now have a (weak) written constitution, it's signed on to the International Criminal Court, and the legislation for civil partnerships (read: "gay marriage with a clunky name") is being worked on as we speak. All of these are good solid progressive things.The fact that I think the Lib Dems could probably have done all of these better is a bit irrelevant. Blair was the one who actually *did* these things.
One of the bigger downsides of Labour is the fact that David Blunkett would make a fine Home Secretary ... for the Conservatives. I don't think that I'd call him a progressive on civil liberties issues.
The issue of university funding is some sort of unsolvable nightmare. Lord only knows where that is going, or who would be best at solving it.
So the biggest issue for or against is the war. I am not going to argue about it, as I think it's become a religious issue; people have made their minds up. No evidence exists, I feel, which could shake most people in their convictions either way.
There are of course other wars, on other continents. We intervened in Kosovo, and Milosevich is currently in the Hague on war crimes charges. We intervened in Sierra Leone, and things have improved somewhat there.
There's an old proverb that one should give the Devil his due. I don't think that Blair is that satanic gentleman, or anywhere near it, but I felt that I should at least try to state the Orthodox New Labour view as I see it.
[Some of my Conservative friends actually asked me was I going to change to their party? There are social liberals in the Conservative ranks, but I said that I was (fairly) happy where I was.]
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-J
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The sophists of ancient Greece believed that whatever the powerful believed to be true, was true. It's an easy ideology to follow, but I don't find it particularly compelling (possibly because I am not one of the powerful).
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I'm sure that a lot of people near Downing Street would love us to take a sophist point of view!
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I understand the Popperist ideal, but I'm not sure that I'd use it in real life. If I was arrested for something I hadn't done, I would defend myself by saying "I wasn't there, and I have witnesses X, Y, Z" rather than "according to Karl Popper, nothing can ever be proved true". The second *is* a legal defence (the prosecution has to prove its case, after all) but it's the sort of defence that is used by guilty people.
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But they're not the political Opposition to the government. They should leave that job to the politicians.
I was reading around today. I apologise for not recalling where I picked this up, but one person online said something to the effect of "there's a time and a place for investigative journalism; Panorama or the Roger Cook show. The Today programme is supposed to be part of the BBC-as-reporter-of-record; news that is known to be true [to the best of your ability]."
To be honest, I think that Andrew Gilligan went on a bit of a crusade. He knew that the Government was wrong; therefore, running the story was clearly correct and wholly justifiable. It was his misfortune to make statements that could be construed narrowly enough to be proven false.