What makes someone a conservative?
I suppose if you have something to conserve, that might make you want to hang on to whatever it is.
I recently volunteered in a conservation project electro-fishing in a tributary of the Eden to catch, measure and count the salmon fry.
The aim is to conserve the river as a habit for the Salmon.
So in that sense I am a conservative.
But only in that sense.
The current debate in the US Presidential race is a classic. The conservative, republican candidate has run an anti-Obama campaign culminating in the now infamous Clint Eastwood, empty chair debate.
But throughout the Obama Presidency there has been no attempt on the part of Republicans, to work for the common good, so all the Presidents' attempts to address the dreadful inheritance he was handed and the economic disaster that happened with the sub-prime mortagage scandal have been stymied by the forces of conservatism.
There has been no facing up to the fact that the countries problems arose on the Republican watch and were aggravated by tax breaks for the rich and a huge budgetary overspend on pursuing regime change in Iraq.
In this country the woefully inadequate narrative of the ´mess we inherited from Labour' has become less strident.
Neverthless the conservative voice is still heard.
The paralympic spectators might have booed the Chancellor, revealing the habitual sneer for the defence mechanism it is, but that has not stopped him in his strategy of welfare cuts for the poor, including many disabled people, and tax reductions for the wealthy.
The trickle down theory does not work.
It has never worked. Effectively reducing taxes for the rich is an upwards distribution of wealth.
Couple that with the recent reshuffle where individual appointments have, as has been pointed out by more than one posting on facebook and a general flurry of comments across cyberspace, promoted a number of ministers with previous to portfolios where they have clearly stated positions which if carried through will lead to a more divided and ultimately poorer society.
Health, justice and equality are all areas where the new incumbents have stated positions which suggest that the future will, to put it at it´s best, be pretty frightening if as Neil Kinnock famously said, you are young, old, poor or ordinary.
So what makes someone a conservative?
I find that a hard question to answer even though I am posing it to myself.
The net result of conservatism it seems to me is a divided, unjust, uncivil society in which the devil takes the hindmost and the privileged live a defensive life behind high walls, security fences and electronic gates.
I worked as a community worker on an outer estate in Birmingham, on one balmy summers evening I was sitting on the balcony of a flat on the twentieth floor of a high rise block, looking over the estate and sharing a cold beer with a local resident.
We were talking local community politics. I asked him about his political idealism, he was a member of the communist party, its not idealism he replied, its practical.
When I sit up here and see the estate, peaceful and quiet, with folk getting along and pullinig together, then I can enjoy my beer knowing that I have made a contribution that has helped that happen.
My happiness is linked to that wider human happiness that I have helped create.
The current political agenda is in my view truly frightening and I fear for the future.
I suppose if you have something to conserve, that might make you want to hang on to whatever it is.
I recently volunteered in a conservation project electro-fishing in a tributary of the Eden to catch, measure and count the salmon fry.
The aim is to conserve the river as a habit for the Salmon.
So in that sense I am a conservative.
But only in that sense.
The current debate in the US Presidential race is a classic. The conservative, republican candidate has run an anti-Obama campaign culminating in the now infamous Clint Eastwood, empty chair debate.
But throughout the Obama Presidency there has been no attempt on the part of Republicans, to work for the common good, so all the Presidents' attempts to address the dreadful inheritance he was handed and the economic disaster that happened with the sub-prime mortagage scandal have been stymied by the forces of conservatism.
There has been no facing up to the fact that the countries problems arose on the Republican watch and were aggravated by tax breaks for the rich and a huge budgetary overspend on pursuing regime change in Iraq.
In this country the woefully inadequate narrative of the ´mess we inherited from Labour' has become less strident.
Neverthless the conservative voice is still heard.
The paralympic spectators might have booed the Chancellor, revealing the habitual sneer for the defence mechanism it is, but that has not stopped him in his strategy of welfare cuts for the poor, including many disabled people, and tax reductions for the wealthy.
The trickle down theory does not work.
It has never worked. Effectively reducing taxes for the rich is an upwards distribution of wealth.
Couple that with the recent reshuffle where individual appointments have, as has been pointed out by more than one posting on facebook and a general flurry of comments across cyberspace, promoted a number of ministers with previous to portfolios where they have clearly stated positions which if carried through will lead to a more divided and ultimately poorer society.
Health, justice and equality are all areas where the new incumbents have stated positions which suggest that the future will, to put it at it´s best, be pretty frightening if as Neil Kinnock famously said, you are young, old, poor or ordinary.
So what makes someone a conservative?
I find that a hard question to answer even though I am posing it to myself.
The net result of conservatism it seems to me is a divided, unjust, uncivil society in which the devil takes the hindmost and the privileged live a defensive life behind high walls, security fences and electronic gates.
I worked as a community worker on an outer estate in Birmingham, on one balmy summers evening I was sitting on the balcony of a flat on the twentieth floor of a high rise block, looking over the estate and sharing a cold beer with a local resident.
We were talking local community politics. I asked him about his political idealism, he was a member of the communist party, its not idealism he replied, its practical.
When I sit up here and see the estate, peaceful and quiet, with folk getting along and pullinig together, then I can enjoy my beer knowing that I have made a contribution that has helped that happen.
My happiness is linked to that wider human happiness that I have helped create.
The current political agenda is in my view truly frightening and I fear for the future.
No comments:
Post a Comment