Talk Politics - Liberty Central

OK, we may have got a little carried away at time in the last week; while I hoped to strike a nerve, I certainly didn't expect to get as many disparate groups on board as fast, or things to grow as quickly as they have. There's a lot of frustration out there with the status quo, and riding that wave isn't exactly easy. Controlling it without getting carried away? Not sure if I could, let alone whether I should.

Re-read my original post, with a view to maybe taking the link out of the tagline. Not ging to, I stand by it completely. I don't want, and did not call for, a partizan, anti-Labour campaign; I called for a campaign against the current Govt, and identified their authoritarian measures as the problem. I have no problem with a politician who rejects attacks on our fundamental liberties, regardless of party; I may disagree with them on policies, but that's a debate worth having. But removing my freedoms for the sake of a few headlines and an appeal to the politics of fear? No thanks.

Politicians in favour of an authoritarian, moralising or state-controlling agenda I oppose, whether they be Thatcherites and Cornerstone Tories with appeals to Victorian Values or "Faith Flag and Family", or New Labour apparatchiks who legislate away fundamental freedoms and declare their intent to catalogue, control and nanny my life.

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences.”
C. S. Lewis (via)

The worst thing about our Govt? I'm pretty sure that, when it comes down to it, they genuinely mean well and beleive they're doing the right thing. They're not.

I want to be involved in a campaign to show that, to win the case for liberal values, individual freedoms, constitutional reforms and Parliamentary democracy.

That's why I want you to go here and read what Unity has to say about what comes next.

A tactical voting campaign is being planned. If done in the right way, for the right reasons, it could do some good. But I, personally, am not interested in partizan brinkmanship, back to the post that started it all:

liberal Labour bloggers can work within the party in an attempt to bring the control freaks to heel

That was the first part of my 3-point plan. It remains a central part of it. Authoritarian centralism is something I reject utterly. Unfortunately, the current leadership of the Labour party are authoritarian centralists par excellance.

If the Labour party has, fundamentally, changed by the time of the next election, if the next leader isn't someone who has bought into the project completely, then my opinions may change. I see no signs of this, I see no ministers that give me hope.

But I see Labour members that give me hope. Work from within your party, if you so wish. It needs to change, it has lost its way.

I have almost given up hope for the party I voted for in 2001, the Govt I stayed up to watch win in 1997. There are no lost causes in politics.

If the govt stops attempting to categorise me, rolls back its recent regulations, accepts the basic principles of liberty that we're working on and talking about, then maybe I won't get involved in a massive tactical voting campaign in 2009. Maybe it won't be needed.

For now, however, I'm afraid it is.

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