The Dictatorship of the Etonariat

[Bryn]

Slippery merchants ?

Had you been at the British Library on the evening of 9 July this year you would know I very much remain a member of that disorganisation.

[MrGongGong]

Had you been at the British Library on the evening of 9 July this year you would know I very much remain a member of that disorganisation.

[Dave2002]

Acton is so quotable - which pertick'ler quote did you have in mind - any of the following?


The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities.

And remember, where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control. History has proven that.

.

Most of the quotes seem to have application (I didn't know many of these), though does the second quote here refer now to BJ and the ERG?

[Bryn]

Acton is so quotable - which pertick'ler quote did you have in mind - any of the following?

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern.

History is not a burden on the memory but an illumination of the soul.

Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.

The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.

The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities.

And remember, where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control. History has proven that.

Liberty is not the power of doing what we like, but the right to do what we ought.

Every thing secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.

.

The second. Surely the most clearly applicable to the situation, and the most often misquoted.

[Boilk]

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

That famous quote is almost never heard or printed in full, which is:

Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they
exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority.

[CGR]

Interesting. Of the five listed by CGR, only three had any part to play in attempting to establish socialism, having fought to depose the previous part capitalist, part tribute-paying economies they were faced with. Of those three, only two, Stalin and Mao, were able to spend more than a very few years struggling to build a socialist society in the states they had control over, and those two faced massive international capitalist (imperialist) barriers in their ultimately failed attempts. Lenin did not live long enough to get beyond the initial stage of the task of transforming the Soviet Union into a socialist society. I think we have to bare Lord Acton's famous dictum into consideration when criticising those who actually took on the responsibility of trying to transform their devastated economies towards a socialist form.

And then, of course, there is National Socialism. A form of socialism that didn't kill as many as the socialism of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, etc., but that was only because we managed to stop it by 1945.

[Dave2002]

I didn't know very much about Lord Acton - apart from one or two of the most famous quotations - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_D...st_Baron_Acton

Here are some more quotes - https://www.azquotes.com/author/66-Lord_Acton
The link includes the following:

Socialism means slavery.

The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections.

Authority that does not exist for Liberty is not authority but force


There is one I don't fully understand, perhaps because I don't know the context in which it was said/written -

Federalism is the best curb on democracy. [It] assigns limited powers to the central government. Thereby all power is limited. It excludes absolute power of the majority.

[Joseph K]

And then, of course, there is National Socialism. A form of socialism that didn't kill as many as the socialism of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, etc., but that was only because we managed to stop it by 1945.

Ah yes. 1945 - the year we voted for Clement Attlee's Labour Party.

[MrGongGong]

And then, of course, there is National Socialism. A form of socialism that didn't kill as many as the socialism of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, etc., but that was only because we managed to stop it by 1945.

Do you think that "vegan cheese" is really cheese ?
or that JRM is really a Christian ?

Thanks for "stopping it" though
but I do wonder who is this "we" of which you speak ?

This self identity thing really has to stop

[Richard Barrett]

National Socialism. A form of socialism

In what sense?

[MrGongGong]

In what sense?

It's 50% "Socialism"
in the same way that a Minotaur is 50% man, 50% bull

but I suspect it's really 100% Bull

[John Locke]

National Socialism. A form of socialism …

People bring their own baggage to their interpretation of terms (compare the American with the British use of the term 'liberal'), don't they ? Are you a One-Nation Conservative or a New Right Conservative? Different groups, particularly in planning for power, can adopt their own add-ons which take them further and further from their source. Equating socialism with Nazism is, as one might say, jesuitical.

[Conchis]

Cummings would appear to be a eugenicist, and perhaps a rather ingenious one.

He is using the ‘righteous ire’ of the sans-culottes to bring about a cultural change that might eliminate such people from the gene pool.

Does he dream of a future Britain populated by blonde Ubermensch - a bit like his boss, but a lot better looking and without the permanent spare tyre round the waist?

Cummings himself looks like an aborted tadpole, so I’m not sure he’d match the beauty quota for his own new order.

[ahinton]

Cummings himself looks like an aborted tadpole, so I’m not sure he’d match the beauty quota for his own new order.

Nor did Hitler, though...

[CGR]

Cummings would appear to be a eugenicist, and perhaps a rather ingenious one.

He is using the ‘righteous ire’ of the sans-culottes to bring about a cultural change that might eliminate such people from the gene pool.

Does he dream of a future Britain populated by blonde Ubermensch - a bit like his boss, but a lot better looking and without the permanent spare tyre round the waist?

Cummings himself looks like an aborted tadpole, so I’m not sure he’d match the beauty quota for his own new order.

Cummings and Boris seem to be doing an excellent job in very difficult circumstances.

Boris's robust responses to the baying mob of Labour MPs the other evening was a wonder to behold. He dominated the House of Commons in a way not seen since Maggie Thatcher was PM.