Picture by Joncitizen
My God but this week’s Question Time on BBC One was depressing. For a start it revealed the scary fact that there’s another Kinnock in the British Labour party. He looks quite like his da Neil, only without the hair. He also takes himself quite seriously.
He said a number of things but most noticeably about his party leader’s views on Trident and nuclear weapons, as opposed to his views on same. They differ diametrically. Corbyn says he would not be prepared to press the nuclear button and would divert the proposed £100 billion for its renewal into worthier areas like health and education. Kinnock said in so many words that he would press the nuclear button.
What was further depressing was that quite a few in the audience were button-pressers too. The programme came fro Cardiff, which made you wonder if there was something damaged in the Welsh national psyche. A number of the audience also were eager to pour scorn on the idea of Plaid Cymru having the aim of an independent Wales. Of course they’re entitled to their view, just as the rest of us are entitled to agree with them or consider them a bunch of cringing idiots. No matter how much Leann Wood, the Plaid Cymru leader, tried to explain that hers was not a single issue party and that Welsh independence was far from an immediate goal, the contempt still kept coming.
One youngish man in the audience was particularly memorable. He was passionate in his speech, the veins standing out on his neck, that British armed forces should help with the struggle to eliminate ISIS. He talked of the methods of ISIS as being something so barbaric, most people thought they’d been left in the Middle Ages. And that was why he favoured pounding ISIS out of existence.
You can see the muddled ethical thinking there, I trust. And I have a horrible confession to make: as he strained forward, neck-veins bulging, face red, eyes popping, urging the use of violence on a massive scale if need be, I felt for one brief second that maybe, just maybe, in carefully selected circumstances, there might be something to be said for ISIS’s policy of beheading.
I would rather die in the knowledge that my fellow countrymen were not responsible for such a scale of human atrocity.
In fact I would rather my country were destroyed by nuclear attack than be responsible for destroying another country with such an attack.
100 billion, such a scale of a waste of money, the mind boggles
Makes you wonder how far that would go towards curing cancer
Perhaps this will be what finally breaks up the not so united kingdom.
Jude, you seem to think the QT audience was packed with guns-ho warmongers rather than one which was randomly selected.
Do you think they are taking a lesson out of the Stephen Nolan TV show textbook where he ‘conveniently’ seems to have audiences specially picked to agree with his personal view of his hot topic of the night?
Heaven forfend!
Labour Royalty
Neil is the Taff who so wants to be a Toff
Kneeling before La Liz is how he gets off
Lady Gladys is the rarebit
She outkneels by a fair bit
Knows she the art of how to trouser cough.
Ah, another young warmonger in the Question Time audience. I remember watching Question Time a few months ago and George Galloway was on the panel. The topic was Iran and if they have nuclear weapons. One young man was demanding an invasion of Iran and also aid to the Syrian rebels (aka ISIS). When the young man continued his rant, George Galloway rudely interrupted him and demanded “Right, get your tin helmet on and go fight yourself and not put other people’s sons and daughters in danger! What are you waiting for!?” to which he received a resounding applause from the audience.
That’s the issue with warmongers, they are very vocal on encouraging war but if it was them on the front line you tend to notice they turn pacifist very quickly.
When it comes to Isis I believe they are full of CIA agents and are basically run by the American Government. Osama Bin Laden himself was a CIA agent in the 1980’s. They are used to destabilize the regions in the Middle East. Who else noticed the US/UK Governments panic when Russia decided to bomb Isis targets? I certainly did. There was a time when the US/UK Government were talking publically of aiding the “Syrian rebels” (aka ISIS) while at the same time talking of fighting them….yeah, that makes sense. Reminds me of what the UK Government was doing here in the North of Ireland. Talking of “fighting” Loyalist paramilitaries but the next minute letting the British Army and UDA do joint patrols and kept the UDA legal for 2 decades despite countless sectarian murders of Catholic civilians….
I don’t watch Question Time as much as I use to but I will certainly be watching when it comes to Norneverland next month, which should be interesting. Who remembers last time they were here? Ian Paisley Jnr went overdrive on his comedy routine when he tried picking a fight with a member of the audience. His flustered, reddened face said it all 🙂
Interesting words in the American media today. The Russians are attacking “moderate opponents of the Syrian regime…military might will not work,,,” You could not make it up.
It has to be said that Question Time audiences in Wales always seem to be suspiciously short on actual Welsh people. It’s not so much Question Time Cardiff as Question Time for the English middle classes, located for your jollification in West England. Can’t have Welsh people asking sensible, complicated questions on television see, or we dreadful natives might work out that we’re capable of doing things for ourselves. You’ll also notice that, Leanne Wood aside these days, the panels are noticeably short on anybody from the Welsh Parliament, but think themselves qualified to pronounce on Welsh politics.