There is madness in the air - democracy is hanging by a thread:

[HoratioTarr]

There’s an End of Days madness in the air. We’ve had a spate of terrorist attacks and a conflagration of biblical proportions which claimed dozens of innocent lives.
What the hell’s going to happen next?

While all this was unfolding on a Hollywood disaster movie scale, the self-serving political class has been convulsed by the fallout from a seismic General Election result which has left the nation rudderless.
That old adage about attempting to navigate a certain creek while suffering from a 100 per cent deficiency in the paddle department was never more appropriate.

The Conservative Party has reverted to unsavoury type; the Prime Minister did her trademark hiding-behind-the-sofa trick when the country was crying out for leadership; and Labour has tried shamefully to exploit tragedy to incite revolution on the streets.

Frankly, it’s been difficult to keep up over the past few days. At one stage, I turned on the TV to see Gerry Adams giving a press conference outside 10 Downing Street.

Don’t tell me Adams is our new PM. Who voted for that? Still, given the prevailing level of hysteria and insanity, nothing would have surprised me. I wouldn’t put it past Corbyn to enter into a formal power-sharing arrangement with Sinn Fein, just to get the ‘Tory scum’ out of power. And if that happened, no doubt it would be greeted ecstatically by spoilt, vacuous millennials — whose collective memory dates back no further than their last post on Snapchat, whatever that is — and who have brainwashed themselves into thinking this superannuated Trot is the new Messiah.

It’s not just the young, either, who have bought into the fiction that Corbyn is a fit and proper person to be allowed near the levers of power. The latest opinion poll across all voters gives Labour a 3 per cent lead, were another election to be held soon. Heaven help us. Yet instead of deciding to bind and heel, to steady the Buffs, the Tories appear to have suffered a serious nervous breakdown. According to one report, May has been given ten days by the Men In Suits to get her act together, or walk the plank.

Contrary to accepted wisdom, disloyalty is the Tories’ real secret weapon. Rivals are not so much jockeying for position, they’re under starter’s orders. They should be careful what they wish for. But if they’re going to shoot her, they should get it over with sharpish.

To her credit, Mother Theresa is still clinging to the wreckage, against her better judgment, in the hope that the ship of state can be corrected. Unlike, of course, Call Me Dave, who did a Captain Oates the moment the referendum went against him.

Yesterday, still smarting from the concerted kicking she got over her underwhelming response to the Grenfell Tower fire — deemed insufficiently lachrymose and touchy-feely by the commissars of emotional correctness — Theresa pulled on her best Widow’s Weeds and paid a visit to Finsbury Park, scene of the latest senseless attack on London’s streets.

Whether that will be enough to save her is debatable. As far as her critics are concerned, she could have turned up in the full burka and it still would have been ‘disrespectful’. Unaccustomed as this column is to sticking up for Mrs May, I’d far rather have a Prime Minister who responds to tragedy in a dignified and measured fashion than one who switches on the trembling lip, starts hugging all and sundry and cynically dragoons the dead for party-political point-scoring.

You can’t imagine Churchill kissing East End crones during the Blitz, just so he could parade his feminine side for the Pathe newsreels. Mother Theresa may have all the charisma and emotional intelligence of Albert RN, but at least she doesn’t flick automatically into the full Tony Blair ‘People’s Princess’ mode as her default response to adversity.
Twenty years ago, in this column, in this newspaper, in the wake of Lady Di’s death, I confessed to feeling like a stranger in my own land. Who were all these grown men and women crying a river over someone they didn’t know, and monstering anyone who failed to display the prescribed dollop of vicarious grief?

People are understandably distressed today about the heartbreaking loss of life at Grenfell Tower. I’m one of them. But that’s no excuse for those who are desperate to show they ‘care’ more deeply than others.
If I hear another well-heeled Notting Hillbilly proclaiming their new-found empathy with their less fortunate neighbours on the nearby sink estate — about whom they’d never given a second thought until last Wednesday — I shall reach for the sick bag. In this depressing age of rock-around-the-clock media, with everyone starring in their own movie, never underestimate the ability of self-promoting ‘celebs’ to make the suffering of others all about them.

We have come to expect this nauseating exhibitionism from dopey birds like Lily Allen. But we are entitled to expect the leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition to behave with a little more decorum. Yet, despicably, Corbyn — a hard-hearted terrorist cheerleader who has always been happy to overlook the thousands of innocents killed by his heroes in Hezbollah, Hamas and the IRA — had the audacity to claim at the weekend that he ‘cared’ more about the tragic residents of Grenfell Tower than Theresa May, a devout, churchgoing Christian and vicar’s daughter.

In case you’re wondering, I decided deliberately to exempt myself from the knee-jerk witch-huntery which followed the awful tower block fire. The facts spoke for themselves. There was no grandstanding or second-guessing necessary. Nor did I succumb to the temptation to dignify with a response those opportunist Left-wing ghouls who blamed the tragedy on the ‘Tory cuts’. They are without shame.

How else could Marxist stooge John McDonnell, Corbyn’s puppet-master and Shadow Chancellor, call for a million people to take to the streets in a ‘Day of Rage’ aimed at bringing down a democratically elected government?
Corbyn himself is advocating that private property should be seized to house the displaced of Grenfell Tower, even though it’s against his beloved human rights laws. The mask didn’t take long to slip, did it? You can’t say you weren’t warned.

While we all sympathise with the plight of those poor folk made homeless by the fire, Seventies-style socialist direct action isn’t the answer. And this from a man who aspires to the highest office in the land. We’re not out of the woods yet. The shopping with violence season will soon be upon us. Summer’s here and the time is right for fighting in the streets. The ‘no justice, no peace’ headbangers are gearing up for a ruck.By all accounts, they plan to storm Parliament during the Queen’s Speech tomorrow. Let’s hope the Old Bill are ready for them and prepared to crack a few skulls.

So this is no time for the Tories to start playing silly buggers again. And stop squabbling about Brexit, too. Respect the referendum result. Democracy is hanging by a gossamer thread and, far from rallying to its defence, the official Opposition is blatantly fomenting civil unrest.

Labour’s cynical exploitation of human tragedy, and its leaders’ refusal to accept the legitimate result of the election proves yet again it is utterly unsuited for office.

Whatever happens next, we need, if you’ll pardon the expression, a ‘strong and stable’ Government — initially to get us through the next few months and then through Brexit and beyond.

For better or worse, that means a grown-up, united Conservative Party. As I wrote before the election, the alternative is simply too horrible to contemplate.

It still is.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-4619728/RIHCARD-LITTLEJOHN-says-democracy-hanging-thread.html

[nicko]

+10000000.

[Andy]

Hogwaah written by the Conservatives  press splkesman who also hspoens to be a DM hack.
Unbalanced propaganda.

[Victorismyhero]

Hogwaah written by the Conservatives  press splkesman who also hspoens to be a DM hack.
Unbalanced propaganda.

you and your chums would know all about that...

[Fred Moletrousers]

Hogwaah written by the Conservatives  press splkesman who also hspoens to be a DM hack.
Unbalanced propaganda.

He is not; he is a respected author, broadcaster and columnist who is paid to contribute his personal opinions to the Daily Mail on a twice-weekly contractual basis -as well as to other organisations and outlets who value his unique writing skills.

You are still utterly incapable of differentiating between news and comment in the Press, aren't you?

I am hardly surprised.

No doubt the politically-controlled real "unbalanced propaganda" organ, The Morning Star (formerly The Daily Worker) is more suitable to you, though given your main predilection for enthusiastically contributing elsewhere to vile smears and lies about posters in other forums which you conduct in the naive belief that they cannot see them, even the contents of that newspaper might be too "right whinger" and incomprehensible for your tastes.

[Guest]

Richard Littlejohn respected! Have to give it to you Moley, you know how to tell a good joke with a straight face.

[HoratioTarr]

Hogwaah written by the Conservatives  press splkesman who also hspoens to be a DM hack.
Unbalanced propaganda.

Let's see you explain in detail why you think this is hogwash. Take your time.

[HoratioTarr]

Richard Littlejohn respected!  Have to give it to you Moley, you know how to tell a good joke with a straight face.

He's certainly perpetrated his fair share of journalistic gaffs. But this is an opinion.

[JulesV]

Richard Littlejohn respected!  Have to give it to you Moley, you know how to tell a good joke with a straight face.

Is he related to Garry Bushell?  Cut from the same cloth.  They sound like a pair of wide boys with their nasty estuary accents.

[Guest]

Why is it people can never tackle the points made but instead look to deligitimize the author of the article?

Because they simple cannot counter the points

[JulesV]

Why is it people can never tackle the points made but instead look to deligitimize the author of the article?

Because they simple cannot counter the points

Slapped wrist for me, but fortunately we have you to address all our failings and right all our wrongs.
In between pointing out the error of our ways. Busy man!

[Fred Moletrousers]

Richard Littlejohn respected!  Have to give it to you Moley, you know how to tell a good joke with a straight face.

He is respected very widely, not only by his peers but also his readers, for his literary skills and style and his independence of mind and thought...and the guts to pursue them.

I don't think that he will be unduly worried by the usual petty opprobrium directed his way by readers of the Daily Mirror (a million less circulation than the Daily Mail) and the Morning Star (they never declare a figure but a piddling 14,000 has been bandied about the the trade press), let alone the stridently vociferous Left.

And I don't think your view of him would register the slightest blip on his Richter Scale of caring a fish's tit - a remark that you will no doubt deem to be an offensive sexist comment on the species gill-bearing aquatic craniates.

[eddie]

People always trash the author of something they don't personally believe in. It happens all the time on here - it all depends on which newspaper/article/author each particular poster likes.

I dont personally like Littlejohn either but he's a right to his opinion and yes, instead of simply bashing him they should challenge the points raised.

[Fred Moletrousers]

People always trash the author of something they don't personally believe in. It happens all the time on here - it all depends on which newspaper/article/author each particular poster likes.

I dont personally like Littlejohn either but he's a right to his opinion and yes, instead of simply bashing him they should challenge the points raised.

I enjoy reading his articles, though not regularly, and frequently disagree with him - sometimes violently.

But then again, I subscribe to Voltaire's mantra that "I disapprove of what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it."

Plus, of course, so far as newspaper, radio and TV journalism is concerned he's always been a highly saleable article...simply because of his independent attitude.

And, a lesser known fact, he appears as one of the most influential of UK journalists in the Press Gazette Newspaper Hall of Fame.

So far as Sassy is concerned, if anything is not included in the Labour Press Office daily list of supportive media articles, it cannot possibly be either (a) accurate or (b) true.

[HoratioTarr]

People always trash the author of something they don't personally believe in. It happens all the time on here - it all depends on which newspaper/article/author each particular poster likes.

I dont personally like Littlejohn either but he's a right to his opinion and yes, instead of simply bashing him they should challenge the points raised.

And therein lies the problem. Instead of people actually considering things, they take sides just because they either don't like the person or it goes against their political bent.

Littlejohn has actually spoken some sense here. And people who speak up about how a thing like radical religion makes them feel or if they disagree with it are branded by the media as racist or Islamophobic. I don't think I've seen anyone on here ranting so much about Abu Hamza or Anjem Choudary, Ahmad Musa Jibril and Abu Haleema? All the dramatic breast clutching over anyone bringing up the nefarious past of the Finsbury Mosque are also pilloried. Hamza preached hate from that place for years, collecting acolytes along the way, and might have been there now if the police hadn't raided the place.

So, yes... people will get riled up about this and no amount of talentless minor celebrities or self serving politicians trying to make us all feel guilty will change that.

I don't actually discriminate against religion because I despise it all. It should be banned. Without it the world might have turned out to be a much nicer place.

[Original Quill]

The Conservative Party has reverted to unsavoury type; the Prime Minister did her trademark hiding-behind-the-sofa trick when the country was crying out for leadership; and Labour has tried shamefully to exploit tragedy to incite revolution on the streets.

So much for the right.

…and Labour has tried shamefully to exploit tragedy to incite revolution on the streets.
* * * *

Labour’s cynical exploitation of human tragedy, and its leaders’ refusal to accept the legitimate result of the election proves yet again it is utterly unsuited for office.

So much for the left.

...the self-serving political class has been convulsed by the fallout from a seismic General Election result which has left the nation rudderless.

And everything in between. All is lost!

So Chicken Little was right…the sky is falling?

[Original Quill]

Why is it people can never tackle the points made but instead look to deligitimize the author of the article?

Why is that didge? I'd like to hear it from the horse's mouth.

[Guest]

Why is it people can never tackle the points made but instead look to deligitimize the author of the article?

Why is that didge?  I'd like to hear it from the horse's mouth.

Why are you asking me, when I never slated the author?

You should be asking the posters who did and why they cannot counter the points made

Seems you are doing something worse, misdirection.

Anything else?

[Original Quill]

Why is that didge?  I'd like to hear it from the horse's mouth.

Why are you asking me, when I never slated the author?

You should be asking the posters who did and why they cannot counter the points made

Seems you are doing something worse, misdirection.

Anything else?

Oh, I thought you were talking more generally.

[Fred Moletrousers]

Richard Littlejohn respected!  Have to give it to you Moley, you know how to tell a good joke with a straight face.

Is he related to Garry Bushell?  Cut from the same cloth.  They sound like a pair of wide boys with their nasty estuary accents.

Hardly.

Early life

Littlejohn was born in Ilford, Essex in 1954.[5] His family moved to Peterborough when he was five.[6] His father worked as a policeman and later as a manager for British Rail.[5] Littlejohn attended West Town Primary School where he passed the eleven-plus, obtaining the highest marks in his year.[5][7] He was offered a public school scholarship which he turned down because the school did not play football, and subsequently attended Deacons Grammar School.[8][9][7]
Journalism

At 16, Littlejohn found employment as a trainee journalist in Peterborough. He worked for local newspapers during the early 1970s.[6] In the mid-1970s, he joined the Birmingham Evening Mail as an industrial correspondent.[8][10]

He worked at the London newspaper the Evening Standard from 1979 to 1989, initially as industrial editor, later a feature writer, then in 1988 as a columnist.[6] While industrial editor in the early 1980s he was asked to stand as a Labour Party candidate, which he declined.[11] In 1989, he joined The Sun as a columnist,[12] which attracted controversy, and he was voted "Irritant of the Year" at the 1992 What The Papers Say Awards.[6]

In March 1993 he gave his support to the "Save the New Statesman fund" to raise cash to contest libel suits served on the magazine by the then Prime Minister John Major and caterer Claire Latimer.[13]

In 1994, he left The Sun to write for the Daily Mail,[12] contributing columns on news and current affairs (in a similar format to his Sun column), and one on sport. His Mail columns earned him the title "Columnist of the Year" at the 1997 British Press Awards.[6]

In February 1998, Littlejohn became the UK's best-paid columnist when he returned to The Sun to write a twice-weekly column as part of a £1million deal, which also included presenting for BSkyB.[14]

Source: Wikipaedia.

Some "wide boy."!

And I'm sorry, Jules, but I had a pretty good career in journalism and finished up editing a provincial paper before going into PR and broadcasting - and I have a very pronounced South Yorkshire accent that I imagine you might also condemn as "nasty."

And you are one of the very last people here that I would wish to regard as a snob.

[Raggamuffin]

Richard Littlejohn respected!  Have to give it to you Moley, you know how to tell a good joke with a straight face.

Is he related to Garry Bushell?  Cut from the same cloth.  They sound like a pair of wide boys with their nasty estuary accents.

What kind of "nasty" accent do you have then?

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