The MogBlog

Democracy, my arse

Jul 22

MoggyEducation, Geography, Life, Politics 354No Commentshttp://blog.alastairmogford.com/2010/07/22/democracy-my-arse/Democracy%2C+my+arse2010-07-22+15%3A04%3A19Moggy

Of all the realistic and possible ways of governing a country, it is clear that a capitalist democracy is the best, and many would agree.

However democracy in the UK has it’s limitations, and I intend to make my thoughts clear here. You may remember that in early May, we had a general election. People voted in their millions, all picking MP’s from their constituencies to help govern the country. It worked, turns out the Tories got the most votes, but whilst doing so, lacked a majority, and instead took the Lib Dems in with them forming a coalition.

And now they are demanding five years of this. Great, an election with 29,691,780 votes, and not one of these actually voting for the coalition we got. Not to mention it was Nick Clegg who chose to join the Tories in coalition, shaping the future of the country – a decision so massive for the future, and was conducted by a man who’s party shares only 8.8% of the seats in the House of Commons.

Some people think that Proportional Representation (PR) is a good alternative to the current first-past-the-post system. And whilst it may deliver more proportional results for the winning party, PR increasingly opens up more opportunities for smaller political parties (such as UKIP, Green Party, BNP, Independents, etc.) who will gain more MP seats, reducing the number of the main political parties – meaning it will be even less likely for the main two parties, Labour and the Conservatives to get their crucial majorities.

The other reason for my dislike of PR is that voting in a general election will require you to indicate in a rank order who would like to see as your next governing party. This may be ok for some, but my idea of voting is to vote for the ONE person I would like to see in power, simple as that. In constituencies where political parties, such as the BNP, which you may highly disagree with – you will be forced to vote for them somehow in that rank order.

Not even to mention that given the votes in the 2010 election, the BNP gained twice as many votes (563,743) in the popular vote than the Green Party (285,616) did, so who would you expect gets the elected MPs? The Greens got 1, but the BNP got none. If these results were under proportional representation, the BNP could have ultimately got 2 or even 3 MP’s into the Commons for this government. Think of it like that.

Aside from PR, I think the coalition is doing well. It is about time that we had a strong government trying to structure a decent economic recovery.

However Monday’s news was the “Big Society” plans being announced by David Cameron. I admit that I am more a Conservative supporter than any other party, but this Big Society bullshit is really rubbing things in. I, as a citizen on this country, do not need to be told how to live my life – let alone being part of a voluntary group that takes control of certain public services – which I personally feel is an insult to those hardworking people that do this already as their paid job.

And then it raises the question about who is right for what job in the cabinet, and it doesn’t take long to see that what we see in some positions is clueless people making huge decisions about sectors they know nothing about. Take for example, Andrew Lansley, the current Health Secretary – who has never been a doctor, nor has ever studied medicine. The closest he gets is his father, formerly a pathologist. Therefore how are we meant to believe for a second that he knows what’s best for doctors and nurses in the NHS? Surely a better person to ask would be Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary… He was a GP before becoming an MP, and he read Medicine at university, but no, Fox now has a job controlling the armed forces – something he knows nothing today.

The same goes for Micheal Gove, the Education Secretary. Never a teacher, nor head teacher, examiner, schools governor, etc. The closest he gets is an arts collection and a wife whose a journalist – surely he’d be better suited as an advisor to the Culture and Media Secretary?

I could go on, and turns out Labour was even worse. Over the past 13 years they had charge, cabinet ministers dotted between jobs all over the place in different sectors, as if they were teenagers looking for work experience in different industries.

So this is it. Democracy, where the cabinet contains people that can only presume what’s best for the sectors the instruct. Great.

Half Term Geography Homework Fun…

Oct 27

MoggyEducation, Facts, Geography 1971 Commenthttp://blog.alastairmogford.com/2009/10/27/half-term-geography-homework-fun/Half+Term+Geography+Homework+Fun...2009-10-27+09%3A45%3A58Moggy

Well, I am here, doing my A2 Geography homework (which, I have you know is a very interesting subject, and absolutely no connotations of it being boring are to be given off…!!), and in this past exam paper, I stumbled across a question that had me rather amused…

Living near an active volcano can be unsafe. To what extent do you agree with this statement?

The question itself is rather an interesting one, I could write the whole 7 marks it requires just on the pro’s of living near a volcano, but the question itself – as you’ve just read it – made me so just want to put the answer:

Very.

Some fun with Numbers!

Apr 14

MoggyEducation, Facts, Famous People 31No Commentshttp://blog.alastairmogford.com/2009/04/14/some-fun-with-numbers/Some+fun+with+Numbers%212009-04-14+13%3A54%3A00Moggy

Some random number facts:

• 1961 was the last year to read the same upside down as the right way up.
• The next year to read the same upside down as the right way up will be 6009.
• There are 31,557,600 seconds in a year.
• There are 168 hours in a week.
• A jiffy is equates to 1/100th of a second.
• The Leaning Tower of Piza contains 294 steps
• There are 6500 windows on the Empire State Building