Independence Day

Can you dare to imagine it? What if, on the 1^st of July, 2020, Britain once again becomes a free nation?  Free from the stifling socialist economic death grip of the European Union and free once again to fly an independent flag unaccompanied by the loathsome blue rag of the EU. Imagine if, one day, you will be able to say you are British and not be made to feel you should be ashamed of that privilege. Can you dare?

Imagine if, when we held elections, people were reliably informed of the facts and educated well enough to understand their implications and held their representatives to account for any shortfall in their mutual contract. Astonish yourself with the fanciful notion that when you elect a government on the basis that it supports free enterprise, that government will actually set about the business of dismantling barriers to trade and removing punitive market legislation. Or that if you vote for a party that believes in controlling our borders that National Insurance numbers will no longer be handed out like cheap sweets.

Try – it’s hard to do it, I know – to conjure up a vision of Britain where the vast majority are happy to rub along together, content in the knowledge that those who can are paying their way and those who are truly unable will be ungrudgingly cared for. Or a Britain where phrases like ‘benefit fraud’ and ‘on the sick’ are half-remembered, almost apocryphal terms from an anecdotal folklore belonging to a long-dead generation… and people once more say “mustn’t grumble” at the small misfortunes of everyday life, instead of instinctively seeking compensation.

How about a land where an average worker can support a small family without subsidy, where modest savings and pensions grow into comfortable retirement plans and police do not break down doors at dawn following a late night, unwise Twitter spat? Or where, in history your kids learn about the abolition of the slave trade and the ending of the grievance industry and in maths they become dextrous with numbers sufficient to understand the mechanisms of the economy. And in English they learn English. As a first language.

What if greater effort and application was invariably rewarded rather than exploited and loyalty shown to employers was matched by job security? What if this example created aspiration for individuals to become better at productive jobs while meddling non-jobs became merely despised occupations for the inadequate? What if – and here’s a thought – work actually paid and there was plenty of it? So much so that foreign faces raised expressions of welcome rather than xenophobic suspicions?

They managed it; when is it our turn?

Well, dream on because none of this can happen in a European political community wedded to ever greater union and ever greater state control of economic forces. But, hold on to that lovely thought and pray that when you become old and sick and senile it is this reality you inhabit in your shrunken, private thoughts and not the one that drove you to early dementia. Independence for Britain? It's all in the mind.

Made in the EU

I am a Little Englander. There, I said it. I want my monoculture back. I don’t mind immigrants, I never have. But I resent being told that our identity must be sacrificed so theirs can flourish. So when David Cameron says that Westminster is too white he reveals that he really is the heir to Blair. For a while I was applauding what looked like a valiant standing up for principle when he opposed Jean-Claude ‘drunker’ Juncker’s coronation on the European throne but today I begin to wonder if that was merely a staged event to woo back Eurosceptics to the Tory fold.

Toothless, friendless and despised, the formerly independent country of the United Kingdom will soon become a mere region of communism’s grandest scheme yet – to subjugate half a billion people to the whim of a dictator figure chosen by a process about as legitimate as musical chairs. The EU will become ever more federal, presidents will be appointed – like Juncker – without concern for the workings of any recognisable form of democracy and today’s levels of profligacy and corruption will look like models of propriety to future eyes.

In short, we are pretty much fucked if we stay in. Forget the brain drain from Britain to Europe; as ever fewer high earners realise they are paying an increasingly large proportion of the welfare bill to keep ever more grunts in low-paid grunt jobs, subsidised by state handouts to remain low-skilled and dependent, the evacuation of talent is already extending beyond Europe itself. Yes, you heard it here first; watch as in a few generations the Chinese and Indians and Malaysians will joke about European sweatshops and cheap, shoddy goods ‘Made in the EU'.

And for what? I have always suspected it but just like everybody else I have never had the means to quantify the harm it has done to Britain to be part of the whole rotten edifice. On Saturday Ed Miliband repeated the same tired, fourteen-year old lie, beloved of Nick Clegg but repeatedly refuted by the report’s original authors, that three million UK jobs ‘depend’ on the EU. I can only hope that the latest finding by cross-party think tank Civitas, that far from benefitting the UK, EU membership has done little or nothing at all for our prosperity. Indeed, in some respects it may even have hindered us; it has certainly made it almost impossible for us to retain any semblance of self-government.

I’m just sick of it. Sick of being lied to, sick of being taken for a compliant cash cow, sick of being robbed by imperious governments pursuing lofty socialist ideals. I’m sick of being derided and called racist for wanting to be British, sick of being made to feel ashamed of being white, middle-class, male, in work and daring to hold opinions contrary to the liberal metrosexmopolitan effete. I'm sick to my back teeth, just like my ailing country.

Heil Juncker! (*hic*)

For decades Britain has been in a coma, but just as Michael Schumacher appears to be finally showing signs of consciousness maybe there is hope for us yet. It might not be easy – although I believe it will be much easier than the useful idiots want us to believe – but not only will we cope, detached from the placebo of EU life support, we will thrive. I hope I live to see the day when my country can once again hold her head high as the brains drain back in our direction from the pitiful, impoverished, United Gulags of Europe.

For England & St George!

It's St George’s Day and a recent survey shows that even though we may be secretly (and rightly) proud of our heritage, we are apparently scared of celebrating our patron saint’s day for fear of being seen as that most heinous of bigot – a racist. In my typical contrary way I tweeted that I favour the spelling ‘realist’ and as a result a few people ‘favourited’ that post but not many dared to publicly retweet it in agreement because, well, you never know how it may be taken.

It’s no surprise though, because even though the taunt of racist has become a parody now, with friends routinely outing each other over the tiniest of  twisted slights by deploying the R-Bomb, there is still some nervousness attached to it. There is, I believe, a legal definition which can be tested in court, but in real life nobody has the slightest idea where preference passes over into racism. For instance I would far prefer to work alongside a fluent English speaker with whom I share many cultural norms – not least because I like a laugh and a joke and punchlines rarely translate well - but does that make me a spitting Nazi? Yes, it would seem, to some.

So no wonder the knives were out for Nigel Farage with both mischief makers and concerned public alike determined to denounce a suggestion that an oversupply of labour depresses wages as racist. Racist? Yes, because these workers aren’t native born. This is a straw man fallacy. UKIP’s actual position is simple - open the borders to a plentiful supply of cheap unskilled Labour and those already here are at a disadvantage. That is a pretty simple economic realism which is hard to attack but wait, those cheap units are foreigners, therefore… You Racists! It’s almost as ridiculous as the witch quiz in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

I confess to using it myself all the time. Ed Miliband’s dad was a Marxist, therefore Beaker himself must wish to enslave all of Britain under the yoke of communism. It’s a cheap jibe with which to express my opposition to another term under a Labour government, but it’s not clever. Ed would argue me under the table if I were to try and advance this as a serious political attack because it is lazy and wrong and who the hell am I anyway? No political commentator with any gravitas would ever support such a flimsy fallacy but Kay Burley threw caution to the wind and had a go anyway.

Her straw man argument (and that of many others intelligent enough to know much better) goes thus: Nigel Farage states that a flood of cheap labour depresses low-paid workers’ wages. (This cannot be denied – it’s one of the reasons many employers love the EU; such people will willingly do work that it has become uneconomic for many British born to do.) He, like thousands of other people in public positions employs his wife, a person uniquely available to help him in a way possibly no other person alive could. But wait, she’s German, therefore (and you can almost hear the cogs grinding) he’s not only a racist, he’s a hypocrite!

It’s as if the massed ranks of the media and the political classes put aside their mutual grievances, held a meeting and agreed some battle lines. Time and again, instead of attacking the many chinks (racist!) in UKIP’s armour they went for the man himself on the flimsiest of pretexts, cynically trying to poison him with an oversupply of the oxygen of publicity and betting that if they told the tale often enough it would transmogrify from fallacy into fact. Bomber pilots used to say “If you're not catching flak, you're not over the target.” Farage must be bang on; he’s certainly rattled the cages of some big beasts.

Do you want this dragon slaying or what?

Well today we celebrate - quietly, mind you - that racist heritage of ours as we raise a glass to a Greco-Roman-Palestinian who suffered torture and execution over his beliefs but is remembered in our folklore as a dragon-slaying hero. Be careful what you wish for, many critics said of Nigel Farage yesterday, as they repeatedly lashed out at the figurehead instead of taking on his army. Wise words you might do well to heed. The traditional way of creating a saint is to start off by making him a martyr.

Happy Saint Nigel George’s Day!

Thanks for the memory

Memories fade, often faster than we’d wish. Chris Bryant seems to have very quickly forgotten that it was his party, the Labour Party, who flooded the UK with millions of low-skilled immigrants in order to change the nation’s demographic forever. He must have forgotten this because he is now bemoaning the fact that companies, whose job it is to make profits for their owners, are employing low-skilled migrant workers in order to do just that. LINK

Of course, a more cynical man might claim that politicians employ selective memory loss as a simple tool of government, but we all have defective memories. For instance, I distinctly remember Ted Heath promising, through his piano-toothed, shit-eating grin, that membership of The Common Market would not involve the loss of even the tiniest piece of UK sovereignty. Given that a federal Europe was always the plan, right from the very inception, I must simply be mistaken.

I have other examples of my own memory loss. I don’t remember when compulsory EU number plates appeared, yet I do remember that we were never consulted about it. And I do remember that when our nice, blue authoritative British passports were swapped for European Union ones, we had a hell of a fight to retain the royal crest, but I don’t recall the vote to retain a European Defence Force.

I don’t ever remember being asked to vote for or select an EU flag or anthem and I certainly have no recollection of the British public being asked if it was okay to replace British birth certificates with European Union ones. It seems that in three years’ time no more British citizens will ever be born, just EU ones. 

This little nugget must also have slipped past Shiny Dave Cameron's powers of recollection because his referendum will post-date that event, thus render the outcome of the referendum irrelevant. If Britain ceases to exist, for that is the plan, where would we go if we voted to leave the country stated on our birth certificate? We would effectively be banishing ourselves.

History, you see, has little to do with the past and all to do with the narrative requirements of the present. Around about the time that the nice Mr Heath was lying through those big white teeth of his I read Ray Bradbury’s seminal work “Fahrenheit 451”. For those who don’t know, that temperature was said to be the point at which paper spontaneously burst into flames and government ‘firemen’ were employed to destroy all the books, the records of the past and with it the memories of what had gone before.

Even as we speak I imagine the history of the EU is being rewritten, sanitised and packaged up at great expense to be taught to the new generations of EU-only citizens. National identities will simply be written out of history and past glories will be evenly distributed across the regional politburos. How long before the quiet collection and burning of great historical works begins? My treasured Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Churchill’s History of the English Speaking Peoples, Antony Beevor’s The Second World War and all the rest will be consumed in the fires to be replaced with a slim volume claiming to tell the truth about the glory of Europe’s Thousand Year Reich. National triumphs will be portrayed as false and occurring before the great unification.

Thus we will hear about how the ancient Kingdom of Albion joined the EU in 1066 and marvel at the evenness of the medal distribution at the Agincourt Olympics. The great Fire of Paris in 1666 will have been recorded in the diary of Sébastien Pepys and the legendary King Arthur of Andalucia will have formed the first democratic round-table on which the European Parliament later came to be based. The great inventions of the Industrial Revolution will have hailed not from Coalbrookdale, but from the combined forges of all thirty-plus nations, pulling together to Common Purpose, while peasants throughout the entire continent will have revolted simultaneously during the first general Strike.

Folklore, religion and all the old wives’ tales will similarly be homogenised and belong to us all. Those with centuries of written legends will see their stories distributed evenly throughout those regions with lesser history or else discarded altogether. Some tales of course, are too totemic to be edited out. Thus the story of the brave hero of Habsburg, the skilled marksman who split the apple placed on his son’s head will survive the cull. In the Great History of Europe the name of William Patel will live forever.

Comic-Con

Scotland is to rig the vote, sorry, lower the voting age, to allow young pups to distort participate in next year’s independence ballot. If that smacks of Scottish Nationalist desperation then how do you feel about the European Union spending taxpayers’ money to indoctrinate the very young indeed? Yes, the EU is sending multilingual propaganda colouring-in books to infants everywhere. Don’t come bleating to me when your ten-year old dobs you in to the authorities and you spend five years in a gulag learning to love Big Brother.

Well, two can play at that game. I hereby present my own version of the Euro Comic translated into just one language – the correct one – and invite you to disseminate it far and wide. We may yet wake up one day in a green and pleasant land, free to be British again, although I’m not holding my breath.

Page 1 and the story so far... Mr & Mrs MEP have to run the gamut of protesters bleating on about useless wind turbines. Do these people not understand that they have to register before 1830 on Monday evening to get their full day's allowance? It takes a good few hours sleep on the gravy train Eurostar to even get to Strasbourg, never mind all those demands on their time.

When they get there,there is much work to be done. For a start they have to book dinner at a swanky restaurant commensurate with their status, then have a relaxing evening before the challenging and ever-hectic Tuesday schedule begins... around midday. There are many palms to be greased and many favours to return.

Life is not all rosy; some of the expenses and allowances have to be tracked down. It's not like they hand them to you on a plate - it's more of a suitcase stashed with money. And suitcases can be hard to lug around Strasbourg all day, so once Mr & Mrs MEP have signed in they must take a free limousine ride back to their apartment where they have to count it all up and then account for every penny they are unable to hide. Those EU budgets don't audit themselves you know!

And then suddenly - almost as if they've done no work at all - it's Friday morning and time to go home. What a gruelling life Mr & Mrs MEP have, supervising the porters lugging their heavy suitcases through the open diplomatic channels and into a waiting Swiss bank account. But first they have an important mission to complete at the Parliament building.

I know what I want to be when I grow up! 

Easter Parade

The pilgrims had journeyed from afar to petition the mighty wizard of Brussels whose power raged unchallenged across the world. So great was his wisdom that everybody just called him The Wiz and some went so far as to say he really was a wiz of a wiz. If ever a wiz there was, that is.

Our pilgrims were a motley crew in strange outlandish garb and drew comment wherever they went. The tallest was a creature made of tin battered into a shape vaguely resembling a man. He had no heart, although he did have a big shiny dish of a face. The others called him Moron behind his back and Davidcam to his face and they didn’t much like him because he liked to pose as their leader.

The next was a man of straw, a real Worzel Gummidge. He was a scatter without a brain and with no functioning limbic system was apt to make random, haphazard movements and say things he didn’t really mean. He was the joker of the group and everybody just laughed and pointed when they saw him. His real name was Boris, but he answered to Scarecrow and everybody loved him except Davidcam, who read sinister meaning into every uncoordinated action.

Who’s that, hiding behind a tree, shadow boxing with himself? “Put ‘em up!” said Clegg the cowardly lion, every time Moron’s back was turned. Oh, it's just dear wee Clegg, the boy-man-lion who everybody loved dearly but nobody feared. His “Grrr” was more like a purr and nobody could take him seriously. It was rumoured that he had once led a political party but nobody who knew him would confirm it. All he really wanted was a nice cosy job working for the wizard. Soon Cleggy, soon.

And then there was Edorothy, who had come all the way from Kansington with her little dog, Herman, although because she had an adenoidal speech impediment, she pronounced it Harman. It was a snappy little thing and full of hate for all men, but dear Edorothy tolerated it more than anything else in the world. Edorothy just wanted what her father had wanted. And what had he wanted? Why, equality for all of course, at any price. When Edorothy told the others of her dreams they all laughed and laughed and laughed.

And then they set off, lickety-spit, on the yellow brick road to the magic city of Brussels, also known as the Emerald City, because its streets were paved with the crystallised snotty tears of once-free nations.

The Emerald City was a dull, dull place. It was quiet and orderly and clean and nice. It was expensive too; exclusive. And with none of that vivacious, loud and bright and frankly bloody annoying multiculturalism that everybody else had to pay for and put up with, law and order reigned. Just to be sure there were armed policemen on every street corner. The mighty wizard was a very cautious ruler and had many enemies, so he took security very seriously indeed.

The wizard’s palace was a stern and imposing building, reeking of money and power and it was rumoured that he had another one built, exactly the same, in Strasbourg, but nobody knew why – the wiz had many secrets. The four adventurers trembled as they mounted the steps. All those flags! But suddenly a blast of trumpets sounded a strident fanfare and the rumble and click of a mighty megaphone being switched on froze the four in their tracks.

“Stop!” boomed an imposing voice, “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

“We… we’ve come to see The Wizard,” stuttered Edorothy, “We want to ask him to give us a heart and a brain and courage. And Harman and I want to go home to Kansington.”

“Well you can just fuck off!”

“Are you the Wizard?” asked Edorothy, nervously.

“Yes!” boomed the Wizard again, “And you can all just fuck off!”

But now Edorothy’s dander was up and she took the steps three at a time and pushed open the enormous door to the palace. The others quickly followed her and with the doors closed behind them the amplified profanities that filled the air outside were but a muffled background noise. Over in the corner stood a wizened old man with an enormous head, spitting and snarling as he shouted into a microphone. He stopped when he saw the four.

 “Get out!” he screamed “Get out!”

“Are YOU the Wizard?” repeated Edorothy incredulously, as Clegg hid behind the man of tin and Boris flung his arms round spasmodically and uselessly. “I don't want to be rude but, really, you have the charisma of a damp rag and the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk!”

“Not you as well!” said the Wizard, “This is a thousand dollar suit I’ll have you know!”

“You mean Euros, surely? A thousand Euro suit.” Piped up Davidcam.

The Wizard slowly stepped away from the microphone. His shoulders slumped and he addressed the four petitioners directly. “Dollars,” he said, “The Euro is finished.” He picked up a suitcase which stood nearby. “Kansington, is it?” he asked, “I have a Learjet standing by, you may as well come with me.”

As the five descended the palace steps a rumble shook the square and behind them the palace crumbled into dust and was gone. The European project was over and peace returned to the world.

Somewhere in Kansas a pretty girl in a blue gingham dress clicked her red heels together and woke up. “Bollocks!” she exclaimed. “It was just a bloody dream.”

Have a Happy Easter, dear reader and don't eat too much chocolate!

Everybody's got one.

You have a vote. Just the one. A single, solitary voice in a cacophonous sea of sibilant pleas. A white noise of need with every breathy wish slightly different from the next. To each his need, goes the Marxist aphorism, but my needs are not your needs and yours not mine, so we’ll settle for something in between, if you please.

You didn't always have a vote and that was a shame. But if you thought that being given one solved that problem, think again. Because you may as well not bother scribing your ‘X’ unless you understand what it might do. Disraeli was against expansion of the franchise, believing an increase in voters would bring into parliament "a horde of selfish and obscure mediocrities, incapable of anything but mischief". Wise words.

The best you can do with your single vote is to add it to others in a way that reduces the number of selfish and obscure mediocrities. How’s that working out for you, voters? Since at least the nineteen seventies there has been an upsurge of that very type of parliamentary member; the opportunist career politico, elected exactly as Disraeli foresaw. Now it’s rare to find any other kind.

Being a good leader does not mean being popular. Few successful bosses are liked by all their employees and those who are are rare indeed. Everybody delights in the tawdry stories that portray world figures in a dim light. In Britain particularly, the schadenfreude runs deep in our psyche. So when it comes to electing our leaders in the national pissing contest we call a general election we really should avoid, at all costs, casting our vote on popularity; that’s how Nick Clegg got in. (Don’t worry, he’ll be off to Brussels quite soon.)

Whoever gets in has to be on the side of Britain, because once they’re in our votes no longer matter. We were sold to Europe in 1973 without a vote being cast. Binding promises to give us a say in our relationship with the EU have been broken. Treaties are signed without consent and wealth is plundered at the whim of unelected officials. If you think the last point is exaggerated, put yourself in the place of a Cypriot saver - as their banks open today for the first time in two weeks – being told how much of their own money they may see.

You think a vote for labour will maintain your welfare lifestyle? Look around you. What wealth we have will be driven away as closer European integration means we have to spread the love ever more thinly. Your life will only get poorer as the population grows in the wrong way. You think a vote for the Conservatives will give you a vote on Europe? Don’t bank on cast-iron Dave’s hollow pledge; he has already said he will fight to keep us in. You like the Libdems? Then you’re not wise enough to have a vote.

Which leaves UKIP. Of course they won’t form the next government. Of course they don’t have all the answers. Of course they are not all uniformly attractive and popular people. Of course there are one or two nutters in there – me for a start - that goes for any party. But think about this, my vote-wielding chums. The other parties are suddenly turning nasty. The trash talk before the fight has started. To the LibLabCon troika, UKIP is the most unpopular smell in the air right now. They must be doing something right.

 You have a vote. Just the one. In 2015 you will have just one last chance to do the right thing for Britain. Don’t vote on party lines. Don’t vote for your narrow, short-term, personal interest. Between now and the general election register your concern and make your protest heard. In every local election, in every by-election, rattle those old party chains and vote for UKIP. Labour won't desert their EU masters, but you can make the Conservatives listen; make them change. That way, come the general election you might just have one final chance to vote against the EU.

Prayer for the Dying

The European Union has been described as an out-of-control juggernaut, crushing dissent beneath its irresistible wheels as it trundles blindly on to... where?  What is the eventual purpose of this unaccountable monster which ignores democracy even while claiming to promote it? Immune to criticism and deaf to expressed concerns it staggers intemperately on, eating up independence and subjugating peoples; all the while proclaiming itself a force for good even as it practices its evil.

The EU while saying the opposite is following the well-trodden path of all dictators; Robespierre, Hitler, Mussolini, Ceaușescu... the list is long. How much rope do we give the unelected Über-burghers of Brussels before we have to fashion that rope into nooses? For only a revolution will prevent their pressing forward with Common Purpose to the inevitable bloody end. It didn't matter who voted for what, yesterday, the EU budget will only ever go in one direction - up.

The European Union already has rulers, palaces, parliament... a flag, an anthem, a mission and firmly embedded corruption. In an insincere tribute to the new Pope, I offer the EU a daily prayer.

El Presidente, which art in Brussels, 

Hated be thy name; 

Our kingdoms crushed; 

thy will be done, 

in the EU as it is in Moscow. 

Give us this day our daily pittance. 

And forgive us our thought crimes, 

as we forgive them that brief against us. 

And leave us not as a free nation; 

but deliver us from liberty. 

For thine is the federation, 

the poor, and the gory, 

for ever and ever. 

We’re fucked.

Gawd 'elp us.

Shirts & Skins

Well, there’s plenty of huffing and puffing about ‘Yerp’ this week, for today’s the day the Tory propaganda machine begins its four-year campaign to lie and spin and scare the Bejasus out of an electorate which, while it has no idea how food gets to its table, or how the muggle magic of mobile telephony could possibly work, nevertheless holds, each one of them, a precious vote in its otherwise insignificant, tiny hand.

Many a mickle makes a muckle and Europhiles everywhere are happy to get their hands mucky in this dirtiest and shabbiest of all tricks. For, while all the time double-speaking about democracy, they plot to deliver the citizens of the United Kingdom, shackled and hamstrung into tyranny. Our laws, our economy, our very history is intended to be bought and owned and altered by an unelected secretariat who will answer to nobody as they wreck millions of lives, while pulling the strings of The Press to spread happy lies. 

For his part, Cameron thinks he just has to do enough to scare the shit out of everybody and they'll vote for the devil they think they know. Buoyed up on lovely Labour welfare for decades and not yet seeing any of the supposed cuts that are resulting in a massive increase in public spending, the average Joe will only know he was quite well off for a while and now he risks losing the lot. 

But losing the lot of what? I imagine a civilised and prosperous country has wide, clean city vistas of tree-lined boulevards, where throngs of contented folk gambol in easy harmony as they go about their pain-free lives. They work in safe, clean environments and return to modern, happy homes where they relax by indulging in whatever leisure pursuit suits their mood and later retire to live long, restful days in the dappled rural sunshine. 

I struggle to see where ethnic gangs, roaming our filthy back streets, fit comfortably into this picture. I don’t see a happy country having overcrowded mono-cultural ghettoes in between sub-cultural slums, where pregnant teenagers and verminous illiterate young men choose drug and dole dependency over dignity and purpose. In my imaginings, worthwhile people don’t seek amusement in violently abusing the emergency services they fraudulently call to their aid. 

Either version of Britain comes at a cost, but who’s going to pay for it? You gotta pick a pocket or two, so you have to have some pockets to pick. And those whose pockets are worth a dip are wise to events and eager to have a say in the manner of their ransacking. David Cameron is going to spout off today, in his much-vaunted and leaked speech, that he doesn't want Britain to leave ‘Yerp’ but that he wants a renegotiation of our relationship. 

Well, that’s just not good enough for a huge proportion of working UK citizens and it’s time to pick sides. Shirts or skins? We’ll play shirts; big, bright, Union Flag shirts, on our side of the English Channel. The rest can wear whatever multicultural skins they want, but they can stay on the continent. 

Back off, Barroso!

When we eventually secede from the European Union (if it doesn't happen now, or in four years, it will happen, possibly by bloody means at some time in the future) we can still have a relationship with Europe. They can be our poor neighbour. 

All for One and All for Me!

When I was a lad my dad voted Labour. Why? Because, in his words, he was a labourer and therefore he genuinely believed this party must represent him. But what I saw on the news every night was a country gripped by strike fever. Union shop stewards cracked whips and everybody downed tools on the merest whim. They went on strike over the length of tea breaks, the unfair expectations of business owners demanding quality output, attendance and some actual work and on many points of Marxist principle involving what they saw as the duties of enterprise towards its most expensive yet often most defective component.

Companies were hamstrung by over-manning, under-skilling, demarcation, working to rule and the ever-present threat of a crippling walk out because some useless oxygen thief had been dismissed on legitimate grounds but without months of union-led negotiations, time wasting obfuscation and campaigns at national level. Dad was never in a union and the Labour Party has never done a single thing to his benefit in any way whatsoever, yet some bizarre tribal loyalty kept him voting for them until he finally stopped bothering several decades ago. Now, of course, he wouldn't have to worry about who to vote for because in the popular phrase, it doesn't matter who you vote for, the government always gets in. 

Possibly nothing better illustrates this than the current prevarication over our relationship with the European Union. As the electorate overwhelmingly insists it wants a say, every political faction is doing its level best to deny that option. As a significant proportion of the population has deep concerns over the membership foisted upon us 40 years ago, so every way we turn we are denied the right to express those concerns. 

Vote Labour or Lib-Dem and Europe will prevail. The Conservatives have already embarked upon a five-year war of words to batter the voters into delivering the pre-ordained consensus, should they get re-elected – it’s easy making a promise you’re unlikely to have to make good on. And if you vote for the only party which openly demands a yes/no, in/out referendum it is almost certain that Labour will gain a majority in 2015. (No wonder Ed Miliband hasn't got any policies – he simply doesn't need any.) 

So, where does that leave us? The European Union is a vast, Socialist enterprise which drives down education and behavioural standards and employment opportunities for its poorest, keeps the middle classes onside by effectively enslaving them to a life on kick-backs and seeks to pay for it all by punitive taxation of those who can most easily up-sticks and leave. It is a crackpot model, it’s unsustainable and it will result in armed conflict at local, national and international level at some point. I doubt very much that Mr Obummer will want to wade in to help sort out the mess he seems so keen on provoking. So what’s to do? 

Given that all modern world governments seem hell-bent on some version of the socialist model, where the numbers of undeserving are increased at the expense of the worthy there seems to be only one sensible option. Look after number one; I'm alright, Jack; every man for himself. I'm unhappy enough about giving up my hard-earned to British social parasites; I'm buggered if I'm going to be buggered for the benefit of a bunch of Bulgarians as well.

Mine! All mine!

Starting now I'm reducing my taxable income by any legal means possible, giving nothing to charity ever again, hoarding my resources and hiding whatever I can. I shall aim to move to where multiculturalism is still pointed at and derided and I plan to consume only what I need, eking out what little I do have for the benefit of me and mine alone... and those with the outstretched hands can go fuck themselves!  

Migration Watch

As the snows descend it's only a matter of a few short months before the spring thaws, we can leave our hibernation bunkers and welcome the return of many native and alien species from their over-winter locations. But as ever, we must guard against the cuckoo and its ilk. 

When the Brent Geese depart our shores and the swallows return to bring joy to our skies, spare a thought for those areas invaded by the Canada Goose. This native of a foreign land has settled, without invitation, here in Britain blighting many regions with its heavy-handed and domineering presence. They move onto recreational ground, displacing and out-breeding other species, leaving nothing but shit and destruction wherever they go. 

Such a problem is the influx of foreign species into an environment not prepared for them that in 2008 the NNSS – the Non-Native Species Secretariat was set up. The secretariat is vigilant against the arrival of such dangerous and malevolent imports as the Chinese Mitten Crab, the evil Giant Hogweed (Heracleum mantegazzianum, about which Genesis warned so very long ago) and the Siberian Chipmunk. Not to mention the Ruddy Duck! (Orville, that is. I hate that duck.)

So mercilessly do such marauders as the Japanese Knotweed take over and destroy our property that our home-grown parasites are helpless against its advance. For such reasons we vigorously control the influx of alien pests from outside Britain, from Africa’s killer algae through Mexico’s Colorado Beetle to the voracious American Mink. So why should we not extend the same cautious attitude to the top predator of our planet?

On the Andrew Marr show on Sunday, Eric Pickles was pressed to estimate how many Romanian and Bulgarian non-native types were expected to arrive in 2014, when our border controls become utterly ineffective. He couldn’t put a number on it because nobody knows. But what is widely known is the general public attitude, expressed here by the eponymous people's newspaper. None. 

Billy Bunter could, however, declare that even before the inevitable happens we already have a shortage of housing that will be made even worse, as new migrants, who will have been well-briefed as to their rights, displace many of our native species from the social housing lists. Tell us something we didn't know! 

The 1883 poem "The New Colossus" on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty may state "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free." But that was another century and a very different, empty continent, crying out for hands to work the land and make fortunes from its vast, untapped resources. Our land is not vast and its resources are already under strain. Even more immigration is a slap in the face of all those settled here who can’t find jobs. It will serve as a constant depressor of wages and foment yet more and more crime and exploitation, more civil unrest and insurrection. 

Fuck Right Off!

We should have a statue not of liberty but of incarceration and our Statue of Captivity should be engraved – “Fuck off home, where you belong. We don’t want you here.” Racist? If that’s what you’re calling survival these days, I’ll take it.

Peace on Earth

So, yesterday, the hated beloved Eurocracy picked up the Nobel prize for tyranny, I mean peace. Can that actually be true? What is going on? Are we playing Opposites Year? So, Animal Farm style, it’s now democracy bad, tyranny good, eh? I think I’m beginning to get the hang of this.

Hitler was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1939, as a satirical joke some say, but then Stalin had two nominations, in 1945 & 1948, so who was kidding who? It would appear that some forms of submission to government control of absolutely everything are okay, just not Adolf’s version; and he worked hard on that bloody book.

In its contribution to “peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights” in Europe the EU has stood by to allow the free expression of dissent in the form of anti-governmental riots across many member states. You don't like your government? Then all is well, because the EU will remove it altogether. The display of Nazi insignia to greet Angela Merkel in Greece was a wonderful way to remind the proles just how much peace they've had for so long. And that peace doesn't come cheap.

In the name of peace entire nations have been ‘requested’ to vote again on referendum outcomes that were not conducive to the European Project. These words have passed into notoriety; ”Europe's nations should be guided towards the super-state without their people understanding what is happening.“ (Jean Monnet, founding father of the EU, April 1952) They are said not to be Monnet's direct words, but an accurate interpretation of his clear intentions; a voice from a troubled past maybe, but the current troika fully intend to apply more of the same.

To be fair, when the subject of a referendum arises it must be very difficult to phrase the questions just so, in order to get the correct answer. I mean, how ridiculous to ask simply IN or OUT? Some voters might be terribly silly and vote OUT just because they don’t understand the question. And anyway, that is far too simplistic.

No, far better to employ a team of experts to devise a series of questions, a mini-manifesto if you will, to gently lead the plebs electorate to the correct conclusion.  Having made a longitudinal study of these experts – I’m an expert on experts – I've had a stab at creating an EU approved Referendum for European. Answer Yes or No to the following questions (translations provided)

1. Do you want peace on earth and goodwill to all men? (Vote Yes or we’ll send in the army.)

2. Do you want to support local farmers? (Of course you do – we’ll price out of the market anybody offering a better product cheaper. 232% Tax onChinese garlic?)

3. Do you wish for an end to starvation? (Excellent. We’ll strip the shops of all that expensive choice and set up commission-approved food banks for all.)

4. Do you believe that everybody should have equal access to jobs? (Following Greece and Spain’s excellent examples we will enslave you all forever on welfare – that’s equal.).

5. Do you think everybody should have equal pay? (We will drive out the capitalists that pay for everything and drive down wages until all are equal.)

6. Should your children get the same education opportunities as others? (We already did this – it’s called the comprehensive system, where everybody leaves equally uneducated.)

7. Do you wish Tony Blair was out of British politics? (That's easy; there will be no more 'British' politics once TB becomes EU Emperor)

8. Do you support free speech and the right to be unmolested?  (We will legislate to prevent anybody causing you offence. If that involves curtailing the use of your language, so be it – you asked for it.)

9. Do you want people to be happy? (You do? Good. Legislation for enforced jollity is on the way.)

10. Do you want democracy? (Yes? I don’t think you fully understood the question.)

So, how did you do? Answer YES ten times and you really haven't been listening, but even a single yes would be enough to declare you IN under EU referendum rules. Listen now as the distant rumble of malcontents with vested interests grows into a roar of approval for full integration. Marvel as formerly disenchanted politicians suddenly get onside with the project. See for yourself how much money and energy will be poured into persuading you that you can't think for yourselves. Vote for slavery, vote for collectivism... or grow a set and vote for yourselves.

Say again?

I am no enemy of ‘green’ technologies. I say ‘green’ in quotes because it’s rare that we use any of the Earth’s resources in ways that are truly wise and don’t have an overall negative impact on somebody along the way. Often, Green proponents are dreamers, just as hell-bent as other causes on forcing their policies on those who don’t agree and rarely managing to make a real case. But, if there IS a case for using a low-impact energy source, I’m all for it.

This weekend a story about EU green energy policy caught my eye: Apparently, David Cameron backs the EU's grand design for energy. I’m not entirely sure what his backing of that ‘grand design’ really means, so I am inclined to try and find somebody who really knows. But I know that’s not going to be possible; nobody with interests in the green energy industry will tell you the objective truth. 

Some of you know that I teach electricians for a living. They don't, in the main, understand what electricity really is, how it does what it does and alarmingly, how to make it safe. Although they may do an excellent job of repeating what they have been shown, they REALLY don't understand generation, transmission or storage of electricity. So there’s no point in you asking an electrician. 

David Cameron won’t have asked any electricians either. Neither will he have consulted any engineers, because politics and cold hard facts just don’t mix. No, he will have been advised by ‘advisors’ (again, in quotes) and who will those advisors ALWAYS turn out to have been? That’s right, lobbyists for the technologies they promote… Directors of ‘green’ technology companies, or their willing dupes. 

Humans are on record as being profligate, poor decision-makers. We barely listen to the arguments and then return to our knee-jerk first choice. Or we work out we can’t afford that car/jewellery/suit/suite… and buy it anyway. It’s partly because our true nature is reactive, rather than contemplative, but even so that’s hardly an excuse in government. 

With my sparkies I tell them, tell them again, get them to repeat it several times, then tell them again. Then when I ask them what I just told them they often reply, “Sorry, what?” It’s the calculators in primary school argument all over again; there is no substitute for hard graft and if you don’t grasp the fundamentals you just aren’t ready for the rest. 

A politician is unlikely to be able to grasp the technical principles behind policies he is being lobbied to promote. But he can at least ask again. And then again and again until that chink of light appears. 

So, Mr Cameron, before you engage in yet more unnecessary spending of money we can’t afford in pursuit of ideals we generally don’t hold, achieved by means we don’t really understand and making profits for anybody but us, you might want to hang on to this handy crib-sheet of questions for the green lobbyists:

DOES it work? HOW does it work? Can you PROVE to me that it works? How much will it COST in total to set up? How long will it last? What will it save? If it doesn’t save anything, why should we consider it? How many jobs will be lost? How many of the jobs created will go to British workers? Can you prove all of that? If not, why are you here? Now, tell me again why you’re asking for public money? If it’s as good as you claim it is, surely you can get private funding? Next! 

Next... Ah yes, the European Union. Tell me Mrs Merkel, “DOES it work? HOW does it work? Can you PROVE to me that it works? How much will it COST?...”

England, my England

I'm confused. I live next door to people I don't know. I'm not that bothered about knowing them and given that no overtures have been made, I'm guessing they're quite happy with that arrangement. In the main we rub along okay. They occasionally have a party and make a noise, I occasionally tell everybody on Twitter how annoying it was and that's about the limit of our interaction.

I have no doubt that should our road get flooded, or an earthquake blight our little corner of England, we would help each other to safety if needs be. Then, being British, we'd maybe shake hands, or shrug, say something enigmatic and insincere about not grumbling and get on with our separate little lives. Thereafter maybe a wave of acknowledgement in passing or a hurried "hello" on the infrequent meeting.

But should they decide to have relatives over to stay I'd be mighty pissed off to arrive home and find them camping out in my living room. Similarly, a raid on my kitchen cupboards, the uninvited use of my car or the viewing of Eastenders on my telly, under my licence would earn them a look of my sternest disapproval. I would show them the door and lock it after them.

I wouldn't pay them to go somewhere else, nor would I be evenly remotely interested in chipping in to pay for something I don't want in a part of town I never visit, for the benefit of people I will never know, who haven't asked for that help and don't even need it in the first place. That would be utterly ridiculous. None of that has anything to do with me. I should be free to choose who I assist. Or not.

That's how I'd like it to be with Europe. The sometimes annoying neighbour, who we could occasionally help out in a crisis, but who would otherwise just keep the hell out of our affairs. And there's no reason in the world why that couldn't be the case. For all the bollocks spouted about how we can't do this and we can't do that, of course we can. We simply announce we're shutting the door and locking the larder. How hard can it really be?

Europe, you outstayed your welcome and it's time to go home. And if anybody still believes that the EU is a force for good, you should cast your eyes over this recent Telegraph article. And when, over the next two years, you start to see lots of YOUR money being spent on the campaign to persuade you that the EU is a good thing, please remember that this is exactly what happened in 1975. Don't get fooled again.

Carry on up the Khyber

Michael Gove appears to be leading a movement to claw back powers from the EU. Oh, if only this were really true and not just a fanciful dream. Because he's still talking the language Brussels wants to hear, "If this, then that," when he should be talking the language the country wants to hear, "In or out", with the choice having nothing to do with 'them' and everything to do with 'us'.

The official line is much less clear, with Home Secretary Theresa May, saying she is ‘minded’ to opt out of 140 measures governing crime and justice. Well the numbers tell the true story here. The EU has forced onto its member states not a few hundred measures but thousands upon thousands.

This is not some cosy trade agreement which is on the whole benign and UK-friendly. It isn't (and apparently never was) meant to secure the lasting security and comfort of its people. It has always been a giant project aimed at creating a single federal entity and it intends to do this whatever the so-governed actually want. Not so very far from Hitler, the EU believes it knows best, regardless of the evidence of its own eyes and the increasing resistance of its populations.

At the same time Britain is trying to messily disentangle itself, yet again, from Afghanistan. Consider that we have been dabbling in Afghan conflicts since 1839 and maybe you'll see that, sometimes, things take a little longer to resolve than we might like. Good intentions invariably end up becoming a millstone round our collective neck.

The Khyber Pass - between a rock and... more rocks

So, there's no point in tinkering around the fringes of the European disaster zone. Little false victories like rejecting a handful of edicts here and a couple of policies there will still leave us fully shackled to the yoke. Michael Gove is still trying to hedge his bets; give a little, take a little  But when it comes to the EU there really is only one option left - kick it right up the Khyber Pass.

Give Peas a Chance!

Oh my dear good Lord above, the European Union wins the Nobel Peace Prize for "advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights" Alfred Nobel's great bequest to the world has been awarded to the undemocratic, population-enslaving destroyer of formerly proud nations. You've got to be kidding, right?

After a year notable for riots in many capital cities, the installation of puppet administrators in place of elected governments and the looming inevitability of a disastrous break up of the European monster, Herman Van Rompuy and Jose Manuel Barroso issued a joint statement:

"This Prize is the strongest possible recognition of the deep political motives behind our Union."

There you go - they no longer even have the decency to lie about their intentions. Europe is ours, they are saying and we will do with it what we wish. Now hand over everything to us.

Reasonable observers of the farce have come out, open-mouthed in incredulity:

Martin Callanan MEP, leader of the European Conservatives group, said it was "a little late for an April fools joke".

Nigel Farage, UKIP leader, said "This goes to show that the Norwegians really do have a sense of humour. The EU may be getting the booby prize for peace because it sure hasn't created prosperity. The EU has created poverty and unemployment for millions."

In the Daily Telegraph, Tom Chivers commented, "Without wanting to go into whether or not that's a good idea (it seems a bit strange, even to me), does this confirm at last that the prize's organisers have stopped worrying so much about whether the recipients are actually deserving, and instead decided simply to pick people who will annoy Right-wingers?"

Now it's maybe not for me to bandy about words like 'bribe' and 'nobbled' and 'did you know that Thorbjørn Jagland, head of the Nobel Peace Prize committee, is also Secretary General of the Council of Europe?' but somebody has to, so it might as well be me.

The EU rides roughshod over the lives of the people of Europe. Member states are powerless without bloody revolution to take back the most insignificant of powers. It levies higher and higher taxes; for what else is the membership levy?

And on the subjects of peace and harmony and dignity it shows callous disregard for the most fundamental of human rights, the right to self-determination.

The Nobel Peace Price

Will they have to give the prize back when war breaks out all over the mainland? How much peace has Europe brought to British farmers and fishermen? How peaceful is your day when you listen to yet more news of yet more heavy-handed intrusion into yet more lives?

Peace? I'll fucking give them peace!

Fact or Fiction? Pick your faction...

So Boris arrives at the Conservative Party Conference to a rock-star's welcome. Mobbed by the press and adoring fans, the man who 'has no ambition to stand for Prime Minister' might just be the Tory's best  bet for re-election in 2015. Who would have thought it? In X-Factor Britain nobody wants to hear bad news from the straight man, but they'll happily suck it up for the comedy-geezer.

In other news actor Damian Lewis may have incurred the wrath of some Southern rednecks for his part in the US TV hit, Homeland. Mistaking actors and their beliefs for those of their characters' is a commonplace modern occurrence. It's less common for actors to confuse their own beliefs, but Arnold Schwarzenegger must have had a bump to his head because suddenly he can remember with some clarity what he ACTUALLY said about Hitler back in 1975. Oratory, my arse.

All these stories feature a blurring of the boundaries between fact and fiction. In an age when live, on-the-spot, as-it-happens information is available as never before, the propagandists have taken advantage of the populace's lack of critical analytic skills to spread lies and paranoia via the simple expedient of overwhelming the audience with a stream-of-consciousness, non-stop ticker-tape of political white noise.

Listen to the radio, see the party conference delegates take to the stage, watch the 24-hour TV news and see how data is presented to represent any and all arguments. Labour put up the higher earners top tax rate, the coalition brought it half-way down, but what does it mean? Labour say this is the equivalent of giving millionaires a £40k cheque. The Conservatives say the Laffer curve predicts, nay demonstrates, that more tax will be paid by such people. The Libdems think it's something to do with stand-up. What YOU think, sadly, will likely not be determined by facts but by which version of the story you've already decided is true.

Politics seems a lot like the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy version of espionage - who is working for what end? It is simply impossible that all Conservatives hate poor people, or that all Socialists want a return to nationalisation or that all LibDems are simply a bit dim. (Actually, that last one is probably a bad example - they are a bit dim.) Is it cruel or kind to want people to be self-determining? Is it progressive or crazy to believe in equal outcomes for education? Is a federal Europe a vaguely 'good thing' or an exploitative blight on the economies of all the countries it has infected?

Where people appear to be determined most of all to tell the truth as they see it and report on the facts of the matter, they are met with slander and mud-slinging and simple nay-saying. Witness Nigel Farage's frequent well-aimed verbal missiles in Brussels, yet see how The Rompuys and the Barrosos simply shrug and carry on dipping their hands in our pockets. At least the UKIP message on Europe is consistent.

But are the Conservatives or Labour (we know what the Limp Dems want) FOR Big Europe or AGAINST it? They won't tell us outright, which is interesting. Why won't they tell us? I think it's because they haven't quite worked out how to present the fiction they think we want to hear in order that we'll cast our vote in their favour, so that either of them can then then take us further into Europe, against apparent majority democratic opinion, while appearing to give us a choice in the matter.

Does that mean I believe in some Euro conspiracy to enslave us all? Would it really be all that bad if we all cosied up together in the tractor factories and sang workers' songs into the never-ending twilight? Is it really so bad that successful, productive countries will forever give up their advantages to prop up unstable, inefficient administrations? A cautious yes to all three, but that's just me...

The EU Gulag swings into action

It all comes down to what you believe... or what you want to believe. Do you vote with your head, or with your affiliations? What, indeed, would Boris do? Listen to the facts, believe the fiction... pick a faction. So, nailing my colours to the mast, as the party which naturally has my ear refuses to come off the fence, my particular faction is UKIP. Say what you like about my choice, but they are the only party who are telling me what I want to hear.

I'd like to teach the world to sing...

The syrupy tones of The New Seekers fades into the distance as, holding hand in hand, they bring love and peace to the world via the medium of Coca-Cola. Actually, the song and the advertisement pre-date the 1971 hit single, but that isn't important; as always, what's important is the message.

Harmony, they sang, why can't we all get along? If we all did things the same way, if our weights and measures were harmonised, a component made in one country would easily integrate with a machine made elsewhere. If Frankfurter's bolt could slide easily into Nancy's nut we'd all get along, side by side, top to tail, hand in hand, gland in gland.

And if industry, they argued, why not our infrastructure; strategic, political and economic? Hey, here's a plan, let's all use the same money! Of course. It's so much easier to quantify a trade deficit without all that messy currency converting to distort the figures. Oh, and, talking of money, harmonisation doesn't come cheap, you know. Cough up. (Cough up? At the cost of our membership I'm coughing up a lung here!)

Regional variation? You must be kidding! Local produce? Give over! Cornish Pasties, Melton Mowbray pies, Yorkshire pudding; they'll all have to go. In the future we'll have standardised, normalised, harmonised, homogenised Euro-fodder. Victory Pie will become Glorious Project Pie. Coronation Chicken will become Rompuy's Delight (contains traces of chicken) and Upside Down Cake will be, well, it will be just the approved standard cake.

If we could get people to be "shorter in height we could fit twice as many in the same building site; you'll see it's all right." (For any youngsters who click on that link; don't worry, music was LIKE that in the olden days.) Hey, we could even harmonise our terrorists. In the future they will all come with an eye patch and a hook-hand, so we can spot them in a crowd - although this didn't seem to work in the UK when trialled over the last two decades.

Standardised, homogenised Euro-pattern terrorist

David Cameron has said a referendum on Europe is not a priority. It seems we're on our own then. So, join with me. If we all hold hands and huff and puff hard enough we can blow down the house of cards, we can blow the dark, Satanic Euro-windfarms back to Deutschland and we can turn back the tides... or suffer hernias in the process. Were else does the wind go when you strain too hard? Oh yes, Europe - Blow it out your arse!

Acute angina? Thank you very much!

Apologies to regular readers for the paucity of posts thus far this week; there's nothing like a day in the Acute Medical Unit to focus the mind on the important issues of the day. Thank goodness I had the presence of mind to take my Kindle along as I was rushed into an assessment which took the best part of a day, on and off.

Actually, rushed is a tad specious, as it took four days of discomfort and a bit of nagging from somebody-who-knows-better before I deigned to allow the NHS to confirm my diagnosis. In fairness they were all very thorough, patient[sic] and courteous, batting aside my concerns that I was wasting their time and my entreaties that I was only there because I was nagged. The diagnosis? Indigestion... we think.

So, there's nothing to see here, move along the corridor smartly and try to avoid staring at the mad-haired Scots lady trying to manoeuvre a fag past her nasal oxygen cannula whilst reciting... well, it could be anything really, it's in Scottish. Avert your eyes, also, from the grossly be-tattooed, multiply pierced, heavily pregnant teenager and her attendant posse of identically clothed 'individuals' - they're the future, they've got rights, you know. (There should be an exam, really there should.)

With all due respect for the long-suffering staff, the last place you want to be if you're ill is in a hospital. But I'm not, so it's all good. And I did get to put in a spot of reading. Whatever you think of UKIP and in particular, Nigel Farage, you can't deny he has to be one of the most colourful and charismatic politicians out there, right now. In the AMU I was reading Flying Free, his engaging memoir in which he sets out his stall for a retrenchment, at the very least, of our role in Europe.

I've blogged about Europe before; about how I was just one year too young to make my feelings known in 1975; about how I never trusted the shifty Ted Heath and about how I have yet to hear a single fact-supported argument for the travesty of democracy that is the European Union. Nigel's book pointed me at a number of avenues for further research and I append a few links below.

But I don't need to 'do the math' as they say. I don't need to study dry old economic theories and European war histories. I don't need to peruse a balance sheet of pros and cons.I don't need to do any of those things to know that Europe is pure poison. Free movement of people across borders? I used to have that anyway; it was called a British Passport. In fact, even as a post-war, post-empire nation, Britain had far more respect and possibilities than we will ever have again if the spectre of costly, corrosive, creeping Euro-Everything is not halted.

And just as against the Nazis - whose European ambitions were so close to those of the EU Commissioners - the English Channel is a natural border between the European mainland and the last free country this side of the Atlantic. All you need to know about the three main parties is that not one of them has made any serious noise about withdrawing from Europe. What they have all been complicit in is handing over ever more power  while flatly denying it.

Now I'm not saying that UKIP is the answer to all our ills, but surely a party willing to draw the line has to be a better bet than all the governments willing to hand over £19.2bn per year, or if you prefer, £53m per day, to the unelected, unimpeachable, bureaucratic nightmare of Brussels.

Yeah. Fuck you, Britain!

If you have a spare hour, have a read/watch of some of these:

http://www.ukipmeps.org/uploads/file/ReferendumStichUp.pdf

http://www.ukip.org/content/latest-news/2777-nigels-birmingham-speech

http://campaignfortruth.com/CTE/realfaceinfo.htm

http://www.forvik.com/index.php/documents/the-eu

See you at the referendum!

Foul Ref!

So, the big topic of the weekend has been Shiny Dave and William Vague's slightly contradictory stances regarding the only 'ref' anybody is interested in. Forget Euro 2012, it's Euro-ad-infinitum we're concerned about. Both main parties have arrived at the same mealy-mouthed formula, which goes roughly thus.

The time is not right. We will open discussions on the desirability of holding a referendum on our role in Europe when it becomes clearer what The EU will become. At that time we may entertain the possibility that we might need to renegotiate our terms of membership.

That means precisely sweet FA (<~~ see how I got another footie reference in? Genius, that!) In other words we are too bat-shit scared of making any decision at all and we will continue to throw your money at the European confidence trick until war breaks out, populations starve or... or... or what? Nobody knows. Nobody.

Labour are sitting pretty , jabbing from the sidelines while breathing an enormous sigh of relief that they didn't get into power in 2010. But it is a criminal shame that none of the main parties dare entertain the notion of democracy.

It is an entirely reasonable thing to choose your battles and your battleground wisely and not enter into open conflict until intelligence suggests you have a chance of winning. But the Conservatives have been ripping themselves apart over Europe ever since the failed attempt to rid us of it in 1975. In the twenty-teens it will be the issue that finally killed off the Tories. And if they are so weak, then good riddance.

The EU will never let us renegotiate - would the golf club tear up the rules in our favour and then let  us take the prime tee times for an associate member's fee? Of course not. There are only two paths for the European project now. A federal  Europe of soviet-style gulags, working for the massive machinery of state in return for a meagre standard of living and a media diet of joyous fake news. That, or a break up into self-determining sovereign nations.

The Gulag Flag

So back to the referendum:

1. When is the right time? It's right now. (Not when the govt thinks it will get the answer it wants, which is to do nothing.)
2. What is the right question to ask? Europe - IN or OUT? (Let's actually settle this forty-year issue once and for all.)
3. Any other options? No. None.

I'm not one to put my signature to causes, but on this occasion I believe something has to be done. Maybe (just maybe) enough names on this PETITION and something might happen. Unless the current government do this and do it now, there is only one party with the balls to offer us the choice.

So, Cameron, hold a referendum NOW or I'm definitely voting UKIP and I don't even care if Labour get back in as a result, you cringing, Euro-servile coward.