I saw this comment from David Morton on Lib Dem Voice about why he was a Liberal Democrat:
David Morton Says:19th March 2009 at 11:26 am
1. Because if push comes to shove I’d choose Liberty over Equality (even though the preamble says otherwise !)
2. Because if we don’t re-order society on Gaian principles then the Biosphere will defend its self and we’ll go extinct.
3. Because the price of Liberty is eternal vigilance and we need at least one party that be relied upon to do the Philadelphia lawyer stuff, however unpopular.
4. Because while an Anglosphere would have been better, we buggered up the 1770’s and the EU is now our best bet of protecting liberty, Equality and Fraternity in a globalized world with a rising China. No other party will make that case as well or as consistently
5. Because Labour and Conservatism are both theories of the distribution of money and as such are two sides of the same copper coin
6. Because Liberalism is a theory of power and as such it gets to the core and the causes rather than the edges and symptoms of injustice.
7. Because I want a fair society but don’t trust the state.
8. Because activism is the rent I pay for living on this planet. (hat tip to Alice Walker)
9. Because what we think of as given Civilisation is only ever three generations away from extinction at any one time if we don’t build, teach, think anew, pass on and till the soil of civic society
10. Because as Benjamin Franklin so rightly said ” Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be Happy.”
While she has left us minding the shop we owe her a favour for the gift of Beer.
I found it hard to disagree- especially about beer...
David Morton Says:19th March 2009 at 11:26 am
1. Because if push comes to shove I’d choose Liberty over Equality (even though the preamble says otherwise !)
2. Because if we don’t re-order society on Gaian principles then the Biosphere will defend its self and we’ll go extinct.
3. Because the price of Liberty is eternal vigilance and we need at least one party that be relied upon to do the Philadelphia lawyer stuff, however unpopular.
4. Because while an Anglosphere would have been better, we buggered up the 1770’s and the EU is now our best bet of protecting liberty, Equality and Fraternity in a globalized world with a rising China. No other party will make that case as well or as consistently
5. Because Labour and Conservatism are both theories of the distribution of money and as such are two sides of the same copper coin
6. Because Liberalism is a theory of power and as such it gets to the core and the causes rather than the edges and symptoms of injustice.
7. Because I want a fair society but don’t trust the state.
8. Because activism is the rent I pay for living on this planet. (hat tip to Alice Walker)
9. Because what we think of as given Civilisation is only ever three generations away from extinction at any one time if we don’t build, teach, think anew, pass on and till the soil of civic society
10. Because as Benjamin Franklin so rightly said ” Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be Happy.”
While she has left us minding the shop we owe her a favour for the gift of Beer.
Comments
I am afraid my gibberish is a little rusty ....
2. That is eco-fascist nonsense - you are probably in the right party3. This is the party most enthusiastic for illegal war, child sex slavery & kidnapping & dissecting people.
4. That would be the German dominated EU that helped ex-Nazis start the only war in Europe since 1945 & carry out the genocide of hundreds of thousnads.
5. I take it you hace never heard that Adam Smith was a liberal icon
6. I thought it is a theory of freedom & limiting power.
7. and support a party dedicated to the expansion of the state in all directions.
8. Depends what cause the activism is in - being actively supportive of genocide. organlegging, poverty & blackouts is not admirable.
9. The phrase is 3 meals not 3 generations.
10. #1 is emptying the pubs.
No that is a good example . The Liberals were nowhere to be seen when the right to smoke in pubs was being removed.
As usual yhey were persuaded by the flimsiest of suggestions that there might be a "Positive freedom" issue , ie a collectivist freedom
In real life this is what always happens.
On the single occassion the rule of law and Parliament has been threatened by a mob , ie the miners strike , where were the Liberals
On the fence
In fact whenever there is any heavy lifting to be done Liberals are absent . Sadly Cameron looks more Liberal every day but its still the least worst option
To respond to your errors.
1. You are quite free to smoke- you are not free to kill other people in public places by making them smoke passively and the science shows quite clearly how dangerous passive smoking is, so smoke as much as you like, but away from everyone else please.
2. No idea what this means- but unless we stop depleting the finite resources of the Planet, we will be reoving ourselves from the gen pool, the rest of your comment is untrue and obviously deliberately offensive.
3. What happened to 3?
4. If this is a comment about Yugoslavia- I was there and you can get your facts straight please before launching into a foaming diatribe. The villains were in Serbia and the war crimes trials continuially prove this everyday. It was Britain that gave millions to Belgrade- to our eternal shame- and it was Germany that was on the side of democracy.
5. Of course he is, and not the only one.
6. perhaps you might like to read it?
7. A complete untruth- The Lib Dems are the only party that adovocates a massive reduction in the size of Whitehall and the abolition of several ministries
8. He means being an active citizen as should be obvious.
9. Yes- but genetic extinction would come over the longer term horizon he speaks of.
10. I think high prices and poor service are more effective at killing the Pubs. There has been a shift in tastes away from fetid and sometimes violent drinking dens.
2 - That is, of course, a deliberate eco-fascist lie. Please provide evidence that the human race is currently dying out or admit to lying.
3 - As you wish - whatever the Ldsare up to it is nothing to do with supporting freedom - see 1,2,4-10.
4 - If you have any evidence whatsoever for that why did you not produce it at the Milosevic "trial". Since in 4 1/2 years they could produce no evidence they would have been very vrateful for some. However ANYBODY who says that Izetbegovic & Tudjman, both ex-Nazis publicly committed to genocide were not criminals is obviously an out & out Nazi himself. Next, having been there, you will be lying to say that Nazi Ashdown did not actively assist in the child sex slave business among western officials there. The only way you can claim that genocide, dissecting living people & genocide are not crimes is if you believe all Serbs are Untermensch - in which case you are an open Nazi.
5 - iin whuich case liberalism is a theory about money & you have been caight lying again
6 - Ludicrous answer
7 - A lie. The Tories & UKIP both say that - the diference is that they, occasionallym are willing to say what spending they would cut to do it. A promise to cut taxes without saying what spending will be cut is what is technically known as a lie. Honest tax cutting is according to the pary officiially forbidden.
8 - still "being actively supportive of genocide. organlegging, poverty & blackouts is not admirable."
9 - As 2 - prove it or admit it is a deliberate eco-fascist lie.
10 - Blaming the victim as you Nazis usually do. Or can you prove that pub service has got much worse since the ban (& if so why)
I think an apology from you is in order, and without it, I will be deleting any further contribution you make- My blog, my rules, and top of the list is courtesy please.
Not even a token attempt to produce any evidence on points 2,4,9 & 10 I mentioned.
Typical "LibDem" - I accept every claim you have made as representing the absolute pinacle of which you & your racist party is capable but not in any way factually accurate.
Insults of the kind you have thrown reflect someone who will not engage with the debate, indeed barely understands it. I still await your apology.
For example you have claimed that the Serbs alone were criminal & denounced me for saying that Tudjman & Izetbegovic had been Nazis. As you must know, having been there, both of these friends of yours had served in the forces of Adolf Hitler & both were publicly commited to racial genocide. If that does not justify the term "Nazi" then nothing possibly could. You must also know as an Ashdown supporter in Bosnia, Ashdown, as well as supporting these Nazis, supported child sex slavery among his supporters.
http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2002/08/06/dyncorp/index.html
If I have said anything untrue I will be perfectly willing to apologise for it but first you have to show it is untrue. In the same light I would ask you to apologise for the racist claim that the criminals were all Serbs.
So- a straight error of fact on your part there, and one that many people would find deeply offensive.
Alija Izetbegovic did not play much of a role in the Second World war, but he too was a Partizan- and fiercely opposed to the Fascist Ustashe State.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alija_Izetbegovi%C4%87
The rest of your comments about child sex, racialism and the rest are quite simply untrue- and you will find not a scintilla of evidence, because it does not exist. Even the wildest Chetnik fantasists do not claim what you allege. Please withdraw these utterly fantastical allegations.
As to your other comments. There is a gigantic body of scientific evidence as to how dangerous passive smoking is. I give you a link to BUPA which documents the current state of thinking on the issue. http://www.bupa.co.uk/health_information/html/health_news/270503smoke.html
As to Liberals and Freedom, I constantly quote the aphorism of JS Mill, a philosopher so central to Liberalism that a first edition of his book "On Liberty" is the badge of office of The President of the Liberal Democrats. "the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant."
Therefore your comments on the desire of the Liberal Democrats to increase the size of the state and restrict freedom are just plain wrong- completely contrary to the truth. Indeed, since George Osborne said that he would not repeal the new 45% tax rate, the Liberal Democrats are now the only party that says it will cut taxation, and with the programme to abolish several government ministries and take power from Whitehall it is the only party that will reduce the budget of central government. We have also had our public spending plans independently audited.
So, when someone comes here and makes a series of statements that are totally unsubtantiated and completely the opposite of the truth while also throwing around wild and highly offensive insults, I think calling "crap" is pretty mild. Please withdraw your statements- my patience is not limitless.
Izetbegovic was not a partisan he was a leader of the Young Moslems which served as auxiliaries to the Handzar division of the SS. Everybody in Yugoslavia knows this & I assume you do to. Incidentally his political commitment can be judged by the fact that when he came to power he created his own "bodyguard" unit & named it after the Handzars - a unit so obscene that other SS oficers compleined to Berlin that they were giving the SS a bad name.
I recognise your claim that everything else I hace said is a lie to be the absolute pinnavle of personal honesty of which you are capable. I have given you a link on how Ashdown's regime's involvement in child sex slavery was proven in court. As another example Izetbegovic's public commitment to racial genocide "neither peace nor co-existence" is a matter of record http://www.hvk.org/articles/0802/0.html
Obviuosly if you are not lying in the Nazi cause to personally support racial genocide thses links do not exist. In fact they do.
Again I ask you to apologise for your racist attack on the serbs as the sole criminals.
As to the rest - equally honest.
That BUPA are on board for the smoking ban does not affect the scientific facts - that there is no evidence of harm greater than the lecel of statistical unreliability of the very small "studies".
I acknowledge that Clegg is promising tax cuts. We both know that he is lying & that it is the genuine position of the party that actually believing in tax cutting or traditional liberal values is incompatible with party membership.
I do not dispute that, to fool the public, the party continues to use the term "liberal" & some of the symbolosim but we both know this is a deliberate fraud by people whose total contempt for any form of honesty you have already demonstrated.
http://ruaraidhdobson.wordpress.com/2009/03/03/aberdeenshire-and-the-executive-committee/
Mr Craig has a particular bee in his rather incommodious bonnet about Former Yugoslavia. For example, if you Google ‘Dragodan Massacre’ you will find that one third to one half of all the entries link back to him, saying much the same thing in much the same inflammatory words. Apparently this one minor incident is proof of every evil Mr Craig imagines.
Ultimately, I suspect Mr Craig’s problem is not politics but his mental health.
90% of the casualties in Bosnia were on one side- how else should I intepret things- that Milosevic was the Angel Gabriel? Everytime I present you with grown up nuanced factual argument you accuse me of lying.
Frankly that is a ridiculous, absurd and highly immature position to take. Your ignorance is tedious and your arrogance is irrational.
You may not be able to libel the dead, but you can libel Paddy Ashdown, and your latest nonsense is highly offensive, immature playground drivel and is not going to be responded to. Unless you behave like an adult, then I am sadly afraid that Norman Fraser is all too correct and that you should be seeking enlightenment from a mental health specialist rather than from this blog.
My patience is exhausted: without an apology for this disgusting and probably libellous comment, any future contribution from you will be deleted.