Hello,
I was wildly excited this morning when my polling card for next months European election landed on my doormat. I'm perfectly serious, I love voting. God alone knows why, as far as I can tell you'd have more influence if you locked yourself in a public convenience and wrote dirty words on a wall. For some reason by the time polling day comes I have worked myself into such a state that I come to believe that the whole election hangs on my vote. On wrong X and Labour could get in yet again!
Which brings me to my troubling dilemma. Having looked at the choice on offer I have whittled it down to two lucky finalists. I rather like the SNP candidate and think he would do a good job but that's a bit of a waste in Europe as it's a gigantic undemocratic, expenses scam. He seems like a nice chap but what if he got in with a bad crowd on the expenses scene? Think about it, he'd be the new boy, feeling a bit alone then the cool crowd take an interest in him. He feels great and bit flattered to have such exciting new friends and that's when they'll pounce! What if they corner him and tell him he's a pussy if he doesn't bump up his expenses. Of course he'd be the one caught and made an example of and no one would believe that the bullies made him do it and in real life he's a fellow brought up with the utmost care by respectable parents. All that's wrtong with him is that he's pro-EU.
It's a schoolyard classic used to happen all the time round the smokers during my days at secondary. I'll never forget the day poor Jatinder got booted out of school for grand larceny after being lured into leading role in a badly planned school equipment heist by the neds. I'm afraid it was partly my fault, he was a perfectly well behaved boy until a teacher made him my 'special responsibility' on account of what she felt was my 'calming influence'. Unfortunately he resented my authority and rebelled with disastrous consequences. With hindsight I could have handled the whole situation better. Instead of treating him like a person I acted like I'd been given a toy. If I wasn't threatening to debag him and spank his bare arse in front of the whole school I was trying to put baubles in his hair or lipstick on his face. Never underestimate the havoc that can be wrought by getting in with the wrong sort of folk. If you're reading Jatinder I really am very sorry.
God that was a wander wasn't it? Anyway the second lucky finalist is No2EU who will not be taking up their seat if elected and take a dim view of the European Union so the risks of them getting in with a bad crowd are minimal. Then there is also the opportunity of a European election to register a wee protest at that monstrous union of crooks and it does seem a shame to duck the issue by voting for a pro-EU candidate. In truth it's the haunting fear of splitting the anti-Labour vote that puts me off because my one piddly vote is so vastly important.
My question to you all is have you ever had a polling booth dilemma and how did you resolve it?
Honestly I'm like an alkie who doesn't know whether to tan the rum or the vodka first. I do not want your opinions on my choices, what I'm looking for is a good system to assist me weigh up the pros and cons.
Cheerio
19 comments:
I'd go for the rum.
Well so would I but it's not going to help me place the all important X.
I would go SNP to be honest. The problem you sometimes have with anti-candidates is that they can often be utter fucking dickheads.
Depends on the calibre of the anti-EU candidate.
Ah yes but they're not going to take up their seat in the event of being elected so it doesn't matter all that much.
Start your own campaign and run yourself :)
My dear Clairwil, I recommend you vote for No2EU. I would also recommend you don't vote for the SNP candidate.
You are quite correct when you say "you'd have more influence if you locked yourself in a public convenience and wrote dirty words on a wall", the EU is a fundamentally elitist project aimed at the creation of a European Superstate ruled over by the likes of Peter Mandelson and his European counterparts. You state that the EU is "a gigantic undemocratic, expenses scam", which it is, but it is much more than that, the elites who created it have a much bigger vision than that.
Unfortunately elites are the natural order of life and voting for or against them won't really make much difference. Indeed that is politics in a nutshell.
I suspect also that you have got the measure of this SNP candidate, he would be a naive provincial dazzled by the sophisticated metropolitan continentals. As you have noted in your 25/4/09 post, Scotland is a little backwards and that backwardness makes our representatives rife for corruption, just think of a fat ugly Lanarkshire man dressed in a cheap suit sitting at a table in a Belgian Bistro trying to impress a handsome well bred and well dressed Parisian with a glamorous wife, that‘s Scotland in Europe fur ye!
Hope this helps.
Kim,
I did once think of going into politics as an idealistic youth but realised that I'd either end up as bad as the rest of the pigs or be assisinated for constant whistleblowing.
Anon,
Now this I like you've picked a name I can use to follow any subsequent comments you might make but retained your air of mystery.
The EU is a deeply sinister set up and I doubt voting against it in itself will have much effect. I suppose the best one can hope for is that if it is repeatedly rejected in elections and continually tries to ignore the result, as in the bullying of the Irish to accept the Lisbon Treaty they don't want, people might actually start getting restless and stop letting the politicians away with it.
Good Lord what are we six posts into a thread expressing concern at the EU and I haven't been accused of hating the Dutch or some such rubbish. This must be a record.
I haven't had a polling card yet. When are we meant to have them by ?
Ooh! Spank me like a circus monkey!
Marcel (Circus Monkey).
As usual
I quite agree with Clairwill and caught up in the spirit of her enthusiasm for being a self-confessed ballot addict.
SNP all the way
for lots of good reasons -
- anti-British war crimes
- anti-torture
- anti-imperialism
- anti-PFI
And if people can't figure out that being anti-war crimes is actually a good positive thing - and being anti-neoliberal PFI saves you money and improves public services - then you shouldn't be allowed to vote is all I'm saying.
Anyone who votes BNP shouldn't be allowed to vote either, as these scumbags aren't about liberal democratic politics but represent an attack on it, or am I the only person ever to have heard of Hitler and World War II?
Great post Clairwil.
all the best.
ps
Guerilla gardeners everywhere, or Glasgow at least -
Save Our AllotmentsOatlands Leisure Gardens
Wed 29 Apr 2009
pps
Targeting Westminster Benefit Thieves, NotDWP - Dept for Workhouses if you're Poor
My question to you all is have you ever had a polling booth dilemma and how did you resolve it?- Here is some sage advice from Craig Murray regarding your dilemma Clairwil -
Who Do We Vote For?Craig Murray
13 May 2009
I know what you mean about the unelected unaccountable European Commission beaurocracy, but exactly how representative of peoples views is the parliament at Westmidden, for instance?
On practically every issue you can shake a stick at, the two-party dictatorship that runs the UK Parliament are at one end of the political spectrum and the general public ar at the other.
Who votes for the bishops and aristocratic nobs in the House of Lords?
Personally, I would rather the EU reformed and made more democratically representative and accountable - but the uk parliament abolished with Scotland and Englandandwalesandnorthernireland independent.
ps
sorry for the formatting mistakes but I think it's a bug in the blogger software not being able to identify line-endings after hyperlinks, rather than me
Joe,
Blogger pulls some strange formatting tricks, so don't worry about it.
I wouldn't bar BNP voters from voting, it'd only set them off mooing all aver the internet about being oppressed or planting nail bombs.
I will probably vote SNP in the general election but will be using the Euro elections to give Salmond a boot up the arse over his expenses claims. He's by no means the worst offender but there's no harm in reminding him who's boss.
You're right about the two party centre and undemocratic nature of Westminster -one of many reasons I've never voted for any pro-union party.
That said the EU is way worse. I'm not against any form of European union but would prefer this to be done on the basis of agreements on single issues with each nation having a veto, rather than committing ourselves to an institution who's future direction we cannot possibly know. Quite apart from anything else I'm buggered if I'm going to support 90% of legislation being made in Brussells having spent a life time moaning about Westminster.
The SNP are the most unionist party!
They are entirely pro EU.
Holyrood, Westminster, Brussels - none of them are democratic. However the divide themselves they are still united in their belief that they rule and everyone else gets ruled.
Thanks Clairwil.
The SNP are the most unionist party!- And the British royal family are die-hard commie republicans.
Whatever next - how to nail custard to the ceiling perhaps?
Joe,
I think Anon has a point in European terms. The English electorate seem to have a much clearer view of what current Ey integration means wheras in Scotland we still need to get by Westminster.
A big argument against independence was always that Scotland would be excluded from the EU (as if!) which I suspect might be why the SNP are so much in favour of it. They want to show that Scotland can be a 'normal' country like the rest of Europe. Post independence I think the role of the EU will be more of an issue in Scotland. If there was an anti-EU, pro-independence party with a shred of credibility I'd vote for them. Until then the SNP is will usually get my X.
Joe, "facts are chiels that winna ding, and downa be disputed". Unless of course you can show me some evidence that the SNP are actually quite hostile to the "unelected unaccountable European Commission beaurocracy" then the SNP are a unionist party, end of story.
Anon A Moss
please feel free to provide any evidence you have that the SNP are not hostile to unelected unaccounatable beauraucracies.
Merely repeating your initial claim doesn't make it come true.
As a matter of fact, the current UK government and British Establishment, contrary to their euro-sceptic propaganda, are quite agreeable the European Commission, so much so that they refuse to hold a UK referendum on a European Constitution.
It's the 'human rights' bit and the threat of public accountability, transparancy and democracy that the British Establishment hate about the EU.
As you probably know, the British state is the most repressive in western Europe, hence the reason it's frightened of European human rights legislation - but doesn't complain when a constitution comes along that seems to favour less democratic accountablility and involvement in political decision-making and affairs of state, which are traditionally viewed by the British Establishment as none of the British general public's buisness.
If you want greater democracy and accounatblity then don't vote unionist, in any election, period.
Thanks for that Clairwil - its always a pleasure and an honour to have you comment on my ridiculously biased gibbirish.
Just to say, that I appreciate what you're saying and it's a perfectly fair enough comment regarding the unaccountable nature of much of the EU, which I entirely agree with you on.
As I was saying above, its the British Government, the Council of Ministers etc who have deliberately engineered the EU to be as unaccountable as it is. Don't believe British eurosceptic propaganda. They're only eurosceptic when it comes to the likes of better workers rights or statutory days off for expectant mums, etc
I find the idea of a post-independent Scotland quite an exciting opportunity in all sorts of ways NATO, UN, EU, Scottish Parliamet, local devolution to Shetland, Orkneys etc
all the best C.
ps
I came across an interesting book yesterday in my local library which seems interesting enough to pass on and let others know about -
Women and Contemporary Scottish Politics: An Anthology -
by Fiona Mackay and Esther Breitenbach (2001)
Joe,
I'm under no illusions about the motivation of some of my right wing sceptic chums but to me it's irrelevant whether the EU passes good or bad legislation at present. We simply cannot know what it's future direction will be. Of course the politicians want it undemocratic and lucrative and I doubt the British are alone in that. The lot of them would die of fright art the prospect of genuine democratic European solidarity.
I shall have a look at that book an aim to feaured in any follow up that may occur.
"Anon A Moss
please feel free to provide any evidence you have that the SNP are not hostile to unelected unaccounatable beauraucracies."
Well perhaps I am a tad obtuse, but I tend to assume that if they were hostile to the aforementioned unelected unaccountable bureaucracies (going on the assumption that you agree that they are) they would say so, perhaps in their press releases or manifestos. For example here is Le Salmond girning about not getting to join the Euro:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/2973516.stmThat is but one example, but I could find many more. I was hoping you might be able to point me in the direction of one to counter my assertion that they are a unionist party, something like - Salmond tells EU: We're sick of your shit.
"As a matter of fact, the current UK government and British Establishment, contrary to their euro-sceptic propaganda, are quite agreeable the European Commission, so much so that they refuse to hold a UK referendum on a European Constitution."Well how many referendi would they require before getting the right answer?
British elites are part of the wider global elite, of which the EU is but one part. However I don't see the SNP as their natural foe by any stretch of the imagination.
"If you want greater democracy and accounatblity then don't vote unionist, in any election, period."No to the union! Tell Brussels to get stuffed.
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