Are our political rats worse than their political rats? When I write "our" I mean mainly British and American because I know more about them than other democracies, and by "their" I mean any of the sundry dictatorships that litter our global pavements like so many dog droppings. I suspect, gloomily, that there isn't too much in the way of difference between them because it seems to me that it is precisely and exactly the same sort of people who go in for politics as a full-time occupation in whatever part of the world they are situated. They all share both that besetting vice of wanting to boss people around and the absolute conviction that they know best. Happily, they mostly also share another characteristic - sublime stupidity. Unhappily, that often makes them "useful idiots" in the hands of people we rarely see but who frequently operate the real levers of power, that is, the senior civil servants, trade union bosses, the generals and admirals, and occasionally, the odd philosopher or two. The great difference between the two types of polity is that in our democratic system we do get the chance every five years to toss the rascals out which at least keeps them slightly honest - not very, but slightly! The people of North Korea, to choose but one from a myriad, have absolutely no chance of giving their politicians a smack and that is why their country resembles Bedlam with the loonies in charge. However, the sophistry employed by our democratic leaders which rarely withstands more than 3.7 seconds of scrutiny is not much of an advert. "Government of the people, by the people, for the people" would only be accurate if you substituted the last two 'peoples' with the word 'politicians'! And anyway, government by the people would be ghastly; all the people I know are more or less clueless not least because they always disagree with me! Need I say more?
More rumbles later . . .
