Sudden outbreak of sense at the Guardian
March 2nd, 2009It’s becoming a bit of a truism that if you want sense about political issues, the ones that effect your day-to-day life, the last place you should look is the Politics section of any given newspaper. Those pages are given over to adverts for various political parties, as surely as the motoring pages are for advertising brands of car.
On Jack Straw, “Having pissed in the public’s face, Straw went on to shake the final drips down its nose.”
On politicians’ hypocrisy: “Ministers wouldn’t speak frankly at cabinet meetings if they felt their discussions would be subjected to the sort of scrutiny that, say, our every waking move is.”
And getting to the rotten core of the matter:
It’s all over. The politicians have finally shut us out of their game for good and we have nowhere left to turn. We’re not part of their world any more. We don’t even speak the same language. We’re the ants in their garden. The bacteria in their stools. They have nothing but contempt for us. They snivel and lie and duck questions on torture – on torture, for Christ’s sake – while demanding we respect their authority. They monitor our every belch and fart, and insist it’s all for our own good.
Straw wrote, “If people were angels there would be no need for government . . . But sadly people are not all angels.” That rather makes it sound as though he believes politicians aren’t mere people. Maybe they’re the gods of Olympus. Maybe that’s why they’re in charge.
I love it when my belief that, at core, most people are anarchists is confirmed by anarchist arguments turning up in unexpected places. People are not angels or saints, that’s why they should not wield power over people. This is adding to a picture of people not-really-that-turned-off by attempted police scaremongering about a supposed “Summer of Rage” beginning with anti-G20 protests in London.
