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January 18, 2006
Patriotism
Mr Samuel Johnson, the great 18th Century philosopher, curmudgeon and lexicographer - English spelling is mostly his fault - once said that patriotism was the last resort of the scoundrel. He wrote this in 1775 as things were boiling to a head between the North American Colonies and the then Government in Westminster. At the time, he had a point, patriotism was then being trotted out and stoked up for the looming conflict with the Colonial "rebels" who had the audacity to want democratic representation in the Parliament that sought to impose taxes and laws on them.
One is forced to wonder whether Mr Brown's sudden interest in patriotism is fueled by the realisation that, as a Scottish MP, his role as Prime Minister of a United Kingdom in which he would be effectively a "foreign" dictator ruling over the English now that Westminster no longer governs Scotland, might be untenable. This is the conundrum once described as the "West Lothian question" by one of his own MP's when the subject of the devolution of government to Scotland and Wales was first mooted. Why should the Scots and the Welsh continue to elect members to the Westminster Parliament to vote on matters pertaining to the English Nation, when they were, in essence, no longer ruled by their own decisions? Surely this makes all the Scottish and Welsh MPs "occupying powers" in an English Parliament?
It is interesting too, that Mr Brown's own party has for years supported the Trade Union view that Patriotism equals Nationalism and is to be suppressed in favour of the rights of International Law and Labour movements. Multi-culturalism is one such child of that unholy mess - the truth being that it can flourish only where there is some cement that binds the disparate "cultural" groups together as one people and one nation. Take a look at the USA, it may not be fashionable to take any lessons from there, but in all seriousness it is the patriotic fervour that permeates that nation that binds all its peoples together, nothing much else!
Here, for years, Mr Brown's own Party has promoted Scottish, Welsh and any other "Nationalism", while decrying anything that might be said to be "English" Nationalism. This is why the likes of the British National Party have flourished, create a vacuum, deny one group the right to an identity and something will arise to fill that vacuum. Like it or not, we are still tribally oriented, and we need to acknowledge that in one form or another.
Many of us do feel patriotic, not in the great, flag waving, "my country, right or wrong" kind of way the left usually deride us for, but a sharing of identity and pride in our values and our achievements. Messrs Blair, Brown and the rest of their cronies hate that, they detest us for not agreeing that we are a horrible, old fashioned, out dated bunch of closet conservatives who do not share their vision of a Socialist paradise. They have consistently denied that the English should have a national day alongside St David's Day (Wales) St Andrew's Day (Scotland) and St Patrick's Day or the Commemoration of the Battle of the Boyne Day (Ireland [Catholic] and Ireland [Protestant])! Labour councillors consistently refuse to permit the celebration of St George's Day - a day I used to mark with a red Rose in my lapel, until Blair and his scoundrels stole the Red Rose of Lancashire and St George as a Party token.
Try applying for permission to erect a flagpole in your garden - as is common in many EU and Western countries - anywhere in Britain. You are unlikely to get planning permission because the planning laws and the enforcers of these are all Socialist sympathisers who detest any display of British pride or patriotism. In fact, flying a Union Flag in many of our inner city areas is likely to get your house petrol bombed - again a product of the years of propaganda put out by the Labour Party and its loony left. (An oxymoron I know - the Labour Party is the Loony Left!)
What worries me about this call to become patriotic and to return to being proud to be British, is that it is being made for all the wrong reasons. We should be proud to be British, but I find it hard to be proud of the Britain that Blair has created, a place where we are weighed down with unnecessary laws, surrounded by ignorant bureaucrats who bleed business dry with their unproductive costs and bureaucratic burdens, who destroy every public service they are supposed to deliver and whose thirst for power rivals even Mr Brown's!
Brown has rabbited on about "our National Symbols" which should unite us. It is noticeable that he has omitted one - the most important of all - the Crown. That, for me, rather says it all. This is merely another stunt by a bankrupt and corrupt Party to entrench themselves in power. It is time they were gone, from power and from public life.
Posted by The Gray Monk at January 18, 2006 05:00 PM
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