The slippery slope - dictatorship anyone?

Is the new mantra no longer' oh I am not racist but ...'

replaced by 'oh I am not violent but ...'

CarlyD7- thank you- and yes, there is a massive difference as you so rightly say:

'...the difference between the Cons side - laughing, smug, bluster; no sense of being accountable; and the Opposition - who were passionate about the wrongs being done, the threats to MPs and the need to stop all this division.'

For all who keep posting about Nazi Germany...It won’t be forgotten, it isn’t forgotten and when it passes into ancient history no doubt it still won’t be forgotten.
What does need to be given a rest however, is posters on GN littering every thread with references to it, and how they see the present Conservative Government as somehow parallel with it. Johnson trying to force an election.....is that the action of a would be dictator? No! There is nothing to say that he wouldn't lose, or at any rate be returned with only a small majority.
The emotive language and behaviour around Brexit from all,
MPs and in the country reflects the shameful way in which Parliament, after having agreed the referendum, agreed to trigger article 50 has then gone on to do their level best to wriggle out of it.

Incitement to riot too. It seems pretty clear to me that lots of what we are hearing from the leader and his acolytes right now falls very firmly in that catagory

I too, like some other posters see this as a very dangerous time.

How can we expect our children to practice respect when those in parliament behave in this appalling fashion. I believe it’s time for mud slinging and confrontational speech to be banned in our legislature. In the 21st century, surely we should have moved on from this disgraceful spectacle. TBH, this so called tradition is obsolete. A hangover of disgraceful public school behaviour.

More importantly, I too see parallels between the rise of Nazism and the manipulations of this current government leadership. For anyone who is interested, the total disarray of German democracy in the 1930s enabled Hitler to pass the Enabling Act, which allowed the government to make law without recourse to the Bundestag. It seems to me the Johnson et. al. were engaged in a similar activity. Thus in my belief, the Supreme Court was preventing a similar situation.

I’m pleased that the current government cannot force a general election. Their colleagues were the ones who introduced a fixed term parliament. I didn’t agree with this change but it is working in the favour of all the opposition parties at the moment.

I voted remain but would accept leaving with a deal. I cannot support no deal under any circumstances because of the damage that would be done to a huge number of the population.

I would support a government of national unity as it seems to me we have a national emergency whatever way we look at it.

Incitement to hatred and incitement to violence are the two things that won't go out of my head. Isn't it illegal to broadcast such things?

Jess Philips making a statement on the hate strategy.

"The road to Auschwitz was built by hate, but paved with indifference."

Let us never be indifferent!

I was SO shocked, I turned off the TV. I couldn't help noticing the difference between the Cons side - laughing, smug, bluster; no sense of being accountable; and the Opposition - who were passionate about the wrongs being done, the threats to MPs and the need to stop all this division. I don't know what's happened to the Tories - they used to be a One Nation party but they're morphing into a cross between the Brexit Party and the BNP. I'm very worried.

I've read about this party political broadcast in primary school. Does anybody have a link to it? On the face of it, it sounds horrifying.

I agree that teaching about the British constitution should be a compulsory part of the curriculum.

The following is a post by a well known poster on our sister forum. I have started a thread with this but it is worth posting it on here as well

This summation is both well argued and intelligent.

Report RedToothBrush Thu 26-Sep-19 07:25:16
The anger and language are getting more shocking, but expect more of the same and increasing as our politicians refuse to take the lead and our democratic institutions are torn apart by legal action.

The legal action was right to defend the rule of law. Its the last line of defence of the people. The courts including the ECHR defend our rights.

This also needs to be seen in context and outside of Brexit.

It needs to be seen in context with how May abused the law and disenfranchised many from their right whilst she was at the home office (and after she left by continuing cases after she left) in a manner which is hard to see as anything less than merely put of pure spite.

May deliberately tried to get around the rule of law, knowing that many of her victims would never be able to seek justice or if they did it would be retrospectively after she had already abused the power of the state, achieved her goal of removing foreign nationals and denied them their rights.

Leave.EU and many on the hard right of the Tory party have long had their eyes on human rights as the power of the courts is one thing that stops the state abusing power. They have already sought to undermine the justice system via cuts to legal aid etc. Many no longer have equal access to justice as a result. It leaves the vulnerable to abuses of power from above.

May continued this as PM by trying to trigger A50 without scrutiny.

But it goes beyond this too.

It's in all those government contracts with businesses which we can not Freedom of Information request and therefore scrutinise. This is widespread at local council level. Where is all our money going, and to whom?

Where is the local government accountability?

It's in the abolition of the audit office.

It's a drip drip of the removal of checks and balances.

Johnson is merely the result of the erosion of all these things and no one standing up and questioning what is more or less corruption - even if it happens to be legal.

It's like what Trump is doing in plain sight. Milking the systems for his own financial benefit. We know and understand the issue of breaking the US constitution with emoluments

The desire for politicians to look for loopholes to get around the system is regarded as legitimate. So legitimate that its resulted in the opposition having to resort to it, in order to try and halt no deal.

Their actions in doing this are a symptom of the problems we have from the erosion of democracy rather than a cause of it.

These things did not start under the coalition government either. You can clearly trace them back to Blair. PFI was all about essentially circumnavigating around the system of transparency and checks and balances to make the books look like we weren't borrowing as much as a nation. Frankly it'd cost us less to just let the state borrow the money.

All these things are connected and we didn't fully understand what we were doing or the price it was costing us.

It will take those who were involved and made those errors to acknowledge them to start to reverse things. There are many whose faith in politicians is zero because they know and understand these things along the road. Farage did too and he's kept his power dry understanding this anger and how he could harness it.

Johnson was an opportunists but Farage has long seen this coming and how he can exploit it.

Remember this does not end with Johnson.”

One of the most difficult things to counter is that so many people just don't know anything about the mechanisms by which our country is governed. That should be explained (neutrally!!!) in schools - without showing a party political broadcast to primary pupils.

Having been asked to moderate his language- instead of apologising, he just goes on and repeats

www.facebook.com/FemiSorry/videos/2543152312420128/

if you want to be safe, do as I say (or else) this is sick, this is wrong - and don't you dare say that anone concerned about this, is being 'hysterical' as that is lowest of the low, and a despicable trick

My husband spent a long time in the military and during this period (and I think still now) any member of the Armed Forces who were discovered 'misusing taxpayers money' were court marshalled. My question is, how much of taxpayers money has been misused so far (and continues) on this fiasco.

Lemongrove If you are surprised at me going down the road I have, could you not take that as an indication of just how strongly I feel about the present situation, and believe that to show that it is potentially far more serious than some people think?

I am not envisaging gas chambers and goose-step marches, but anything that allows riots in Parliament, lets the executive stir up hatred against sections of the population, or lets the executive's leader to flout the rule of law and truth in his actions is a brick in the foundation of a dictatorship.

CarrieAnn- we have explained why, again and again, and with evidence attached, why this vote was NOT democratic. Really can't go over this again.

We are talking now about the behaviour and language used, in general and yesterday in HoC- that Johnson and co are using.
BTW did you read about the propaganda sent to Primary Schools recently? Propaganda with children and schools is very much akin to 1933 Germany.

Lemongrove - your response to Elegran's erudite and apposite post only serves to reinforce the truth of what she and others have said, that the Germans didn't see the danger of what was happening in their country as most people in this country don't see what could happen here.

The scenes in Parliament were indeed unedifying, but the core issue is the Prime Minister's refusal to accept the law of the land where it stands in the way of his vision. We must not lose sight of that - it is profoundly significant.

If we had M.Ps who had agreed to the deal Theresa May brokered we wouldn't be in this position now.As a nation we voted to leave Europe,you may not agree,but it was a democratic decision.There was no mention of a deal when we voted and we just expected to leave.Just get on with it.All M.Ps have their own agenda and do not respect the electorate.

Absolutely spot on Elegran.

You're right DiWI, but it's not how the sorry episode will be spun by the government and its lapdog media.

The agenda is "Parliament vs the people". How many people really understand what's going on? They just see it as thwarting a so-called "democratic vote". Unfortunately, such people have a very superficial understanding.

lemon 'For goodness sake Elegran ! Am surprised that you are going down this rather hysterical road with the others I must say.
Could we give Nazi Germany a rest.'

no comment apart that this is sick.

We are tring to avoid getting a real dictatorship to live under. They don't spring up ready-made, they develop, starting with a demagogue ranting to a dissatisfied population about what is wrong with the country, getting them behind him and acting on the hatred he has inspired, smothering and ignoring the legal system that would keep him under control, and assuming more and more power.

No lemongrove Nazi Germany should be a lesson to us all. What happened should never be forgotten.

I am saddened to see the events in Parliament yesterday, however I am puzzled by the background leading up to these events.
When Boris Johnson campaigned for us to leave the EU his central message was for the UK to “take back control” by supporting the supremacy of the UK Parliament - the right for that Parliament to be the supreme law-maker. However when that Parliament made a law which he didn't agree with (an extension in the event of a no-deal) he prorogued it unlawfully without the necessary justification. Is his belief that Parliament IS supreme (as promoted in his Leave campaign) or it ISN'T supreme (so he can wipe it out until he achieves his objectives)? If he doesn’t believe in Parliamentary Supremacy then his entire Leave campaign was founded on a deliberate lie.
The Supreme Court decision upholds the supremacy of Parliament -not just a Parliament which does the bidding of a current Prime Minister. Whatever you think of of the actions of the current Parliament our democracy would be weakened if we didn’t allow it to do its job

Power in this country lies in Parliament with the acceptance of the electorate. The executive with parliamentary permission govern.

This power is confined within the rule of law. Our courts are guardians of the rule of law.

If the executive or parliament act outside of the rule of law, the electorate can resort to the courts who guards them from an overweening government.

This is what has happened.

I believe that is the intention ReadyMeals. It's actually quite scary that laws can be changed to suit the government of the day and sets a terrifying precendent.

It is said that Hitler never broke the law - he just changed it.