What stuck in my craw was the sight of a jumped-down aristo trying the tell the working classes how to behave. 

I misread the subject as BEEN dead.

What? Someone has been (but now isn't?) dead.
I was thinking ZOMBIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Geoff

Quote from: Steve J on 14 March 2014, 08:44:15 PM
Very interesting interview with Shirley Williams on PM tonight re: Tony Benn. Broadly speaking:
- Very principled.
- Great orator.
- Prevented the Labour party from being 'electable' for circa 18 years due to his influence on their manifestos etc.
- Only wanted his view to prevail in cabinet meetings etc, thus causing internal dissent within the party.

Another commentator pointed out that his support for Concorde was pretty much based on the fact that it would gaurantee jobs for his constituents. A point of view corroborated by my friend whose Dad worked on Concorde. Did you know the pilots seat alone cost £70 million pounds to develop and that's not at todays prices ?

Shirley Williams?

I woudn't believe a word that turncoat said.

Quote from: Hertsblue on 15 March 2014, 11:03:49 AM
What stuck in my craw was the sight of a jumped-down aristo trying the tell the working classes how to behave. 

Seems to me what he told the working classes was "Don't let people you didn't elect tell you how to behave."

No taxation without representation and all that.

Quote from: Hertsblue on 15 March 2014, 11:03:49 AM
What stuck in my craw was the sight of a jumped-down aristo trying the tell the working classes how to behave. 

Well, someone has to, I suppose.

Quote from: Ithoriel on 15 March 2014, 02:58:07 PM
Seems to me what he told the working classes was "Don't let people you didn't elect tell you how to behave."

No taxation without representation and all that.

Agree 100%

Benn was a real gentleman.

A very principled politician (yes they did exist).  While I did not agree with him on much You had to admire him.  I agree with Molinary that he may have wasted his talent.

Was the DID for principled Politian's deliberate ?

Looks like a deliberate implication that there are no politicians of principle around today.  I think there are maybe a couple, but generally the current crop are simply PPE careerists, and managers of Capitalism.

Quote from: Luddite on 16 March 2014, 03:53:27 PM
Looks like a deliberate implication that there are no politicians of principle around today.  I think there are maybe a couple, but generally the current crop are simply PPE careerists, and managers of Capitalism.

Its hard to tell who is who anymore...they all seem to have gone to prep school followed by public school then Oxbridge then a job in a cabinet office then become an MP then in the cabinet themselves..They all seem to have the same policies as well

Quote from: ianrs54 on 16 March 2014, 12:37:49 PM
Was the DID for principled Politian's deliberate ?

Yes, Most if not all are now more bothered about keeping thier career and staying on the MPs gravy train rather than stand up for a: Thier own principles or b: The policies and manifesto they spouted to get voted in.

A few days ago I commented onthe last man in Parliament with honest intentions. I was then corrected with the example of this gentleman who just passed away.

I truly believe if we had a Parliament full of people standing to their principle and doing their job (representing society NOT their rich buddies from prep school!) we would not be in this mess in the first place.

Quote from: sebigboss79 on 16 March 2014, 08:58:01 PM
A few days ago I commented onthe last man in Parliament with honest intentions. I was then corrected with the example of this gentleman who just passed away.

I truly believe if we had a Parliament full of people standing to their principle and doing their job (representing society NOT their rich buddies from prep school!) we would not be in this mess in the first place.

Don't forget Dennis Skinner, still carrying the torch

Quote from: sebigboss79 on 16 March 2014, 08:58:01 PM
A few days ago I commented onthe last man in Parliament with honest intentions. I was then corrected with the example of this gentleman who just passed away.

I truly believe if we had a Parliament full of people standing to their principle and doing their job (representing society NOT their rich buddies from prep school!) we would not be in this mess in the first place.

Pol Pot stood for principles as well. I'm afraid integrity alone can be very ugly.

Principled, hmmmm, he certainly had principles but was utterly unscrupulous in his attempts to get them accepted by the wider Labour Party which he and his coterie of lunatics rendered virtually unelectable. The degree to which he was hated by many in his party, like for example Jack Straw, will only become apparent once the obligatory period of Nil Nisi has elapsed. This was a man who encouraged the brainless militancy of the 70's which, lest we forget, buried most of British manufacturing. It wasn't Thatcher that killed the indigenous car industry, it was Benn, Robinson et al.

His espousal of Militant Tendency showed his utter detachment from reality and unfitness to hold high office (as Harold Wilson said, 'Tony immatures with age'). Also, he was a big admirer of the mass murderer Mao and, by extension, Mao's protégé Pol Pot (mentioned earlier). Lenin would have called him a 'useful idiot' and Lenin would have been right.

Together with his wealthy heiress wife Caroline (another moneyed pitier of the poor), he worked tirelessly to kill the Grammar Schools which for boys like me offered the best way up the ladder. Of course to the well connected like Benn (or Paul McCartney, or Alistair Campbell, pick your own posturing celeb) a first class education wasn't essential to progress socially, their position in society, their circle of friends and their contacts, ensured that their comprehensively educated children fast tracked to success.

Smug, patronising and self satisfied, his effect on the lives of the ordinary working people of this country was entirely detrimental, like I said, small loss.