One of the oddities of politics is that the far left and the far right share the same nightmares. They fear the tyranny of the State but without its protection the poor and uneducated would be at the mercy of usurers and charlatans. Home schooling is all very well for educated professionals but if it was left to the post-industrial working class to teach their children to read and write we would have even greater levels of illiteracy. If the banks were deregulated we would return to the casino capitalism that resulted in the financial crisis of 2008, and without a National Health Service the poor would die for lack of treatment.
Freedom can best be protected by a written constitution supported by an independent judiciary. Parliaments and senates are inadequate defenders of liberty because they are inevitably undermined by the party system. But a Constitutional Court would provide an enforceable system of checks and balances.
We have tried letting so-called professionals police themselves but the results have been disastrous. When Margaret Thatcher deregulated the banks they lent money with no regard for the solvency of their customers. We tried trusting members of parliament with their expenses but they abused the system, The government has had to introduce new structures within the police force to clean up corruption. And the newspapers were told to clean up their act by the Levenson Report.
The opponents of "big government" see all laws as infringements of liberty but without proper controls we would all be at the mercy of the powerful. It's clear that we need rules and regulations just as we need a police force to protect us.
Edward Snowden's revelations come as no surprise. MI5 has been collecting 200 million text messages every day for the Americans. GCHQ is funded by America and its data is automatically available to them. What they do with billions of mostly pointless messages is unknown. Nearly all texts are a waste of time. Modern life is dominated by what Peter Simple used to call "meaningless verbiage."
In America the libertarian movement is up in arms about data harvesting but in the UK we are so used to CCTV cameras and state intrusion that we take it for granted. Only the far left and the far right take an interest in this issue. The same people who dream about Britain quitting the EU and regaining her independence. But leaving the EU wouldn't make a scrap of difference to our defence and security arrangements. We would still be under American command in NATO and our spooks would still be bouncing data across the Atlantic.
National Unity
Scotland is threatening to leave the UK. The Scots already have self-government but the Nationalists are still not satisfied. The rise of separatism could infect the North of England, Wales, the West Country and Northern Ireland. These regions are just as remote from London. We achieved a measure of unity during the Olympics and British troops returning from Afghanistan are welcome in all parts of the country. But a sense of national unity is sadly lacking.
It's difficult for Londoners to appreciate the sense of deprivation felt by people outside the south east. Successive governments have relocated state agencies throughout the country. The vehicle licensing department is in Swansea. There are tax offices in Edinburgh and Belfast and extensive road and railway networks have been designed to bring us together.
Our identity has been eroded by years of political indoctrination, When I was a boy we used to muster in the playground on Empire Day wearing red, white and blue paper caps to form the Union Jack. We had no doubt about our nationality; we were British and proud of it. But since those days we have been bombarded with propaganda dedicated to internationalism.
Instead of focusing on the achievements of the British Empire we were encouraged to see it as a crime against humanity. The exploitation was remembered but the roads, railways, schools and hospitals were forgotten. We were taught to be ashamed of our conquests and made to feel guilty for building the greatest empire the world has ever seen. And instead of being British we were fragmented into the component states of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
No wonder we are confused. On top of this assault on our identity we are suffering the mass migration of millions of Afro-Asians protected by anti-discrimination legislation that makes it a crime to express an opinion..
But instincts are deep rooted and people are starting to reassert their identity. The incessant liberal propaganda has had a reverse effect. People are no longer afraid of being white or British. They do not feel guilty about slavery and imperialism because they know that it was Britain that ended slavery and gave away an empire. And they know that the British Working Class was just as exploited as the blacks by international capitalism.
The growing opposition to immigration shows that indoctrination has failed and the fight back has begun. People are not racists. They do not want to dominate others but they claim the right to be British. The established parties must listen to public opinion.
The Dream of Empire
PJ Ridout (Photo by Robert Lyons)
Oswald Mosley's pre-war policies were built around the British Empire. But after the war he was one of the first to realise that the Empire was finished. He therefore published "The Alternative" to promote his vision of Europe a Nation.
But many patriots refused to accept reality and clung to the dream of Empire. Instead they proposed a union between Britain and the White Dominions. This idea had been rejected at the Ottawa Conference in 1932 when Britain tried to dictate the terns of a trade agreement that would have restricted industrial development in the White Dominions. After the war Britain was bankrupt and totally dependent on the USA. The pound was tied to the dollar by the Bretton Woods Agreement and our trade was controlled by the American-dictated GATT treaty. A union with the White Dominions was out of the question.
Philip J Ridout had been a popular speaker for the pre-war Imperial Fascist League. He was detained under Defence Regulation 18B together with members of British Union and other patriotic parties who were interned without charge or trial during the Second World War.
In 1951 he founded the British Empire Party and wrote the following words in his newspaper Bridgehead:
"Together with a number of Founder Members of this movement, I have felt for a considerable time that our Country and Empire is in a very perilous position. It is plain that the party politicians are intent only on outwitting each of them by making party capital from the Nation's misfortunes. They are more concerned with vote-catching than they are with the real welfare of Britons.
In a world continually shrinking due to scientific inventions, the threat to our survival from hostile nations is far greater than it has ever been. The only solution put forward by our present rulers is that we should sink ourselves into a Federated States of Europe (a scheme originally forecast by the Bolshevists Lenin and Trotsky) and we should surrender the control of our Navy, Army and Air Force to American commanders. In other words, the deadly threat from Moscow is to be met by placing our people under a foreign Parliament (already set up in Strasbourg) and our armed forces under the orders of Jewish financiers in Washington.
We of the British Empire Party maintain that our strength must be in ourselves - a federated Empire policy can prevent us from becoming slaves of Dollar Imperialism and will remove the threat from the deadly force of Moscow Jewish Communism.
Britain must have a government of Britons - Britons by blood and not adoption, who will preserve our race and national character and put the interests of the Nation and Empire First.
Agriculture, the fishing industry, coal-mining and the Merchant Navy (the tonnage of which is still greater than the combined tonnage of the entire world fleets) must rank first, if we are to be healthy in peace or strong in the event of war.
In spite of the deliberate policy of weakening the bonds of Empire practised by successive governments during the past thirty years, even today we still have at our disposal vast tracts of land and resources of raw materials awaiting development, and above all, we have the finest craftsmen and skilled workers in the world.
The time has come to clear out the party politicians who crawl to Washington and Moscow, and who are prepared to compromise and bow the knee to the very power that has sworn to destroy our way of life.
We want Peace and Security, a Federated Empire with a strong navy, Army and Air Force, could give us peace for a long time to come. Our combined strength would be the guarantee of peace.
In place of party politicians, instead a Government of Statesmen who will preserve this heritage of ours and make it a shinning example for all time.
This, with you help, is what the British Empire Party has set out to achieve."
This policy might have been possible in 1951 if Britain hadn't been worn-out and bankrupt after six years of war but it was hopelessly outdated by the time it was adopted by the National Front in 1967. The far right parties have nevertheless clung to the dream of Empire and Ukip is the latest party to promote a populist program of immigration control and national independence. They reluctantly concede that the UK should negotiate a treaty with the EU or join the European Free Trade Agreement. A small step for a thinking person but a giant leap for a nostalgic nationalist.
National Socialism
Otto Strasser
Following last month's article "Hitler's Fatal Gamble" I received several emails in support of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich. He may not have had many supporters in Berlin in 1945 but he has got plenty in Cyberspace in 2014.
Hitler's mindset was captured by Douglas Reed in "Nemesis" his 1940 biography of Otto Strasser. He recounts a conversation between the Fuhrer and Strasser in 1930:
"Hitler continued: What you mean by Socialism is rank Marxism. The great bulk of the workers want nothing but bread and circuses; they have no use for 'ideals' and we can never count on winning over large numbers of them.
To read these words, is to understand the sympathy that Hitler so long enjoyed, indeed until he made that pact with Bolshevy, among the ruling classes in Britain. They, too, admire Socialism, within limits, and Hitler, in this answer, precisely defines these limits.
We want a hand-picked new ruling class, said Hitler, one not moved, as you are moved, by love-my-fellow-man feelings, but one that clearly realises that its superior race gives it the right to rule, and one that will ruthlessly maintain and ensure this rule over the masses.
Otto Strasser, with a tenacity that commands respect, repeatedly sought to bring the conversation back to an intelligible level and to get down to an exchange of clear questions ans answers about specific problems.
Herr Hitler, he said, I am staggered by these views of yours. I hold your racial theories to be entirely false. In my view the 'race' is but the original raw material, and in the case of the German people four or five races contributed to make this. Political, climatic and other influences, together with pressure from without and assimilation from within made of this mixture a people; and the processes of history evolved the third and highest form, that which we call 'a nation', which in our case was born in August 1914. Your racial theories would deny that the German people is a nation. They deny that which I hold to be the task and meaning of the coming German revolution.
Said Hitler: What you say is pure Liberalism. There are no other revolutions but racial revolutions. There are no economic, political or social revolutions, there is but the struggle of the racially inferior lower class against the ruling upper race."
One of the few messages in support of my article came from my old friend Vic Sarson who described Nazi policy as: " the product of two negative forces; ignorance and resentment."
Keeping up
It's a myth that the Polish Cavalry charged German tanks in 1939 but they were an important part of the Polish Army and were not disbanded until 1947. After the First World War everybody knew that tanks and planes would dominate warfare. But cavalrymen wearing splendid uniforms, armed with pikes and sabres and riding magnificent horses were a sight that no general or politician dared to abolish.
There is always a gap between the introduction of new technology and its general acceptance. The police have been able to check car registrations for the past thirty years but the paper tax disc displayed on windscreens has only just been abolished.
We dumped pounds, shillings and pence back in 1971 when science and industry adopted metric measurements and the Centigrade scale but the Daily Mail still gives out weather forecasts in Fahrenheit and our road signs are still in miles. We make cars in millimetres and drive them on roads signposted in miles. All our trading partners including the EU, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and even the US military use the metric system. We could not export anything in feet and inches, or rods, poles or perches, or bushels and pecks.
We need to adopt the latest technology but we are governed by politicians who are incapable of change and put us at risk of being overtaken by more progressive nations. It is not clever to live in the past when our future depends on modernity.
Britain led the world in the Industrial revolution and played a leading role in science and technology. But it's all too easy to fall behind and we are in danger of doing so. To keep up we need to liven up. We no-longer have grateful colonies eager to buy overpriced manufactured goods in return for cheap raw materials. In the modern world we must produce the very best products to the highest standards and at competitive prices.
Even if we left the EU, as proposed by the popular press, we would still need to conform to EU specifications, just like Norway and Switzerland. EU quality controls, health and safety regulations and working directives are recognised all over the world. The only difference would be that as a non EU member state we would have to pay a ten percent levy to access the single market.
We cannot compete in international markets by clinging to obsolete methods. Most of our industry is on the ball and our universities and medical facilities are world class. But our politicians are hopelessly stuck in the past. They are as outdated as the powdered wigs and knee britches worn by the officials of the Houses of Parliament. Pointless remnants of the "good old days" when little boys were forced to clean chimneys and little girls were traded on the streets of London.
Comment from John Bean
I was pleased to see you allowing space to report on a new, young party, the United People's Party which believes in 'liberal nationalism'. I pretty much agree with Andrew Stott's view that "there are positive aspects to the EU but the negatives far outweigh them."
Indeed there is now growing support for this view, which is encompassed in the belief of a European co-operative or European Confederation, among founding members of the British Democratic Party. I hope this will soon be written into the policy statement of the BDP.
Although you did not mention the Brit Dems by name, readers of European Outlook could well believe that you included us as one of the movements of the "far right retreating into the fantasy of economics". As deflation finally sets in amongst the countries tied to the single Euro currency, with a drastic fall in living standards, I can see the socialist, undemocratic European Union being replaced by the original concept of a European common market, where sovereign states will be allowed to set their own interest rates. Again. Greece, Spain. Italy etc will be able to compete with Northern Europe, but not to the detriment of workers' wages in Germany, Holland, and even Great Britain.
My Reply
The United People's Party has been relaunched as the Patriotic Socialist Party. It describes itself as: "A party for the patriotic working class - we are patriots because we love this country and we are socialists because we strive to make it better." Sounds familiar!
I actually said that "economic nationalism" is a fantasy: the only country practising it is North Korea. Before the financial crash of 2008 monetary policy was used to combat unemployment in a recession by lowering interest rates to encourage trade and industry. But with interest rates at rock bottom in Japan, USA. UK and the EU this is no longer possible. Devaluation only gave a temporary advantage and it raised the cost of essential imports.
The collapse of Lehman Brothers triggered an international banking crisis. Iceland was bailed out by Norway. Belarus and the Ukraine were rescued by Russia. Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary depleted their foreign reserves and sank into poverty. The UK bailed herself out with £375 billion in Quantitative Easing. Latvia has just adopted the euro and there's a waiting list to join the eurozone. Finally, the Intervention Fund has not cost the German, Dutch or British taxpayers a penny - the money has been lent at commercial rates of interest.
Your party, the British Democrats, might benefit from Nick Griffin's latest bankruptcy and the split in the National Front but people who are fed up with immigration and the EU are more likely to vote Ukip.
Historical Footnote
John Bean writes the Nationalist Notebook column for the BDP website. He has always been opposed to European political union but in favour of European confederation. He maintained this policy with the National Labour Party and the original BNP but it was thrown out by the Empire Loyalists when the National Front was founded in 1967. In response to attacks from the LEL he published the following article in Combat in April 1959:
"Where the Empire is that we are supposed to be loyal to is not exactly defined: in our view it no longer exists. If earlier generations of Empire Loyalists - then to found in the Tory Party - had seen that the ordinary people of Britain had received some benefit from this Empire, instead of having to live in some of the worst slums in Europe, then their outcry would have been such that the Socialists and the Tory politicians would not have dared to have thrown that Empire away. But the Empire Loyalists have stated that they are not interested in putting forward a new creed. They want to patch up the old, and a Tory one at that. Even if they were successful it would not be long before the same rotten conditions arose.
Like their bedfellows, the Labour and Liberal parties, the Tory Party are moribund and exude the odours of decay. An alternative must be offered in their place; an alternative such as National Labour which builds for the future and yearns not for the irretrievable past. A future in which the best of the old British Empire will be preserved: unity between the White Dominions as the basis of a third force. A third force to confront the Empires of Communism and American finance capitalism that threatens not only Britain but all Europe. of which we are racially, culturally and geographically a part. "Wogs" do not begin at Calais Mr Chesterton."
Fruitcakes and Loonies
Ukip use figures plucked out of thin air but most of them rely on a simple hatred of foreigners. They claim that the EU is a bankers' racket and that we would achieve a measure of independence if we left it. But London is the world's premier financial centre and every British government backs the City of London. The Bank of England is supposed to be independent but it has been nationalised since 1946 and there is never a cross word between Prime Minister Dave Cameron and Mark Carney, the Governor of the Bank of England.
The ties between Parliament and the City of London extend to the back benches. Both chambers are stuffed with bankers and ex-bankers and many of them, like John Redwood, are openly listed on the parliamentary database as "working for Rothschilds Bank."
Another "swivel-eyed Tory" is Jacob Rees-Mogg, son of the coal owner and former editor of The Times William Rees-Mogg. Jacob has got his own investment company and is so rich that he doesn't have to work for the Rothschilds. He is therefore free to pursue his campaign against the twenty-first century and support such worthy causes as minimum wage contracts and a separate time zone for Somerset.
Jimmy Goldsmith
These fabulously wealthy reactionaries are in the tradition of Jimmy Goldsmith, the billionaire financier who directed the Referendum Party from his luxury home in Paris. The Times and the Sun are part of the New York based Rupert Murdoch media empire. The fanatically anti-European Daily Telegraph is owned by the reclusive Barclay Brothers who live on a private island in the English Channel . The equally deranged Daily Mail belongs to Lord Rothermere; another Parisian exile. And the Daily Express is owned by Richard Desmond the TV and "adult" magazine proprietor.
Given the opulent lifestyles of some anti-Europeans it's no wonder that they accuse the EU of being Marxist. We are expected to believe that Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande are dangerous communists intent on imposing a Soviet regime throughout Europe.
The popular press and the BBC's fascination with Nigel Farage has given his party a huge boost in the opinion polls. The great British public need little encouragement to hate the unreliable French, the brutal Germans, the excitable Italians, or the unspeakable Spaniards
But Ukip's image is constantly damaged by "fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists". Godfrey "bongo bongo" Bloom thinks that some Ukip women are "sluts". Geoffrey Clarke, a Ukip candidate, suggested that babies with Down's syndrome be aborted lest they become "a burden on the state as well as the family." Former East Midlands chairman Chris Pain described illegal immigrants as "sandal-wearing, bomb-making, camel-riding, goat-fucking ragheads." And now David Silvester their councillor for Henley-on-Thames, has warned Dave Cameron of the Biblical weather consequences of same-sex marriage:"
"The scriptures make it abundantly clear that a Christian nation that abandons its faith and acts contrary to the Gospel (and in naked breach of a coronation oath) will be beset by natural disasters such as storms, disease, pestilence and war."
Nigel Farage has promised to throw out those with "extremist, barmy or nasty views but a party that operates in the outer limits of credibility is bound to attract oddballs as members and financial backers. There are some anti-federalists who are not xenophobic but they are lost amongst a mob of football hooligans mindlessly chanting nationalistic slogans. And just as it's foolish to argue with drunks so it's pointless to debate with Ukippers or their fellow travellers.
Nigel Farage
Ariel Sharon
Former Israeli Prime Minister and Defence Minister Ariel Sharon died on January 11th 2014 after suffering a crippling stroke in 2006. He will be remembered in Israel and America as a brave and resourceful general who fought in every Israeli war. And in the rest of the world he will be remembered as the butcher of Sabra and Shatila.
But even "the bulldozer", as he was known, saw the need to withdraw from Gaza and recognise the legitimacy of Palestine. Israel has always enjoyed the unflinching support of the United States but the failure of American policy in Iraq and Afghanistan has brought into question the lunatic policy of "perpetual war for perpetual peace".
Israel owes her existence to the USA and would not last long without her economic and military assistance. The Zionist lobby in America is powerful but they will find it increasingly difficult to keep American taxpayers onside.
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