Extremes meet (politically)

A post about strange things happening to the political weather at the moment:

• EU Lisbon treaty is taking a pasting, viz:
  • The Irish voting "No" for various reasons
  • The Polish President refusing to sign the Lisbon Treaty
• An amorphous mass of people with different grievances are talking about politicians doing things without a mandate
• Or ignoring the will of the Electorate expressed through the Ballot Box
• Me agreeing with importance of Democracy at the local level with the leader of the centre-left Compass group - see this article.
• (although we'd probably quibble on the details!)
• David Davis offered support by Labour's Bob Marshall-Andrews on a platform
• David Davis debating the merits of freedom etc. with Tony Benn
• DD's even written to The Economist - lucky I've seen this now, or I'd be spluttering into my Saturday morning cornflakes! lol

In terms of the "Democratic deficit", it was the recent vote in the UK on the 42 days detention without trial that tipped me over the edge. I agree with David Davis that it was also the grubby way it came about, which was the last straw.

I'm also gobsmacked by the glaring EU democratic vacuum: we're being kept voting until the Powers-that-Be get the result they want... How is that Democracy? :-(

My feeling is that, if Politicians don't heed what their Electorate signals through their votes, there's going to be a big falling out.

I'd like to finish by quoting from Andrew Rawnsley writing in the Observer (dated Sunday June 15, 2008):

"That David Davis is several marbles short of the full bag is certainly the consensus view at Westminster. Tory and Labour MPs are united with each other and with most journalists in thinking that he is mad.

The public, though, appears to be responding in a strikingly different way. So far, we have only rough and ready indicators from radio phone-ins, websites and the like. But public opinion there has been heavily admiring of David Davis.

More than one member of the shadow cabinet who thinks David Davis is crazy has also told me that they have had emails and calls lauding him as a man of great principle taking a heroic stand.

This, I think, is something for the political class to ponder and ponder hard. So ingrained with cynicism is Westminster about itself that it can only see David Davis as a lunatic for sacrificing his career on the altar of his beliefs. The politicians need to ask themselves why so many of the public seem to regard David Davis as the only sane man in the asylum."

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