Does the disenfranchisement of UK prisoners make them all Political prisoners?

[Lateralthinking1]

What bilge ! Your postings strike me as utterly irrational .

Well, when you feel sufficiently motivated to expand on your considerable logic, I look forward to hearing it. I am sure that there will be extensive effort from you. Hopefully, the sheer brilliance will far outweigh any impression given by your one word retort.

Contrary to your earlier sentence, a blanket ban is no more random than all rail passengers being subject to possible train delay. The alternative is that you randomly select classes of people who, like Her Majesty, must be given priority by the signals.

No one has yet mentioned in reference to post number 1 from Bryn what the position will be on political prisoners once every thug gets the vote. The Greenpeace people, the students, those who were outside St Pauls..........if they are the ones who are not to have a say in elections, then, yes, they will truly be political prisoners. And I guess that this just might well be the hidden agenda. Their case in the round can be defended on the grounds that they are especially excluded. If so, it is a deceitful manoeuvre.

[Pabmusic]

1962 - 9 out of 10
1970 - 7 out of 10
1975 - 5 out of 10
1979 - 7 out of 10
1982 - 8 out of 10
1995 - 5 out of 10
2000 - 4 out of 10
2004 - 3 out of 10
2010 - 2 out of 10
2012 - 1 out of 10

The figures relate to the British system. I very much like the countryside, the BBC, some music, some of the history and the NHS. I detest virtually everything else. I regret that some might find that upsetting. Obviously I would prefer to feel differently. If you were to ask me about British people in the round, I would say that it has gone from a 9 to a 4 or a 5. A percentage point lower in each decade. In many respects, people are no different from the way they have always been but everyone has been devalued ethically to some extent by the changes to our regimes. A very significant proportion are or have become predominantly unethical.

One thing I very much question is that work is a fundamentally good thing. I was raised with a very strong work ethic and on paper it should be a good thing for all. However, it is frequently clear to me that there are a lot of decent people who by nature have considerable integrity but also veer. It is in their employment that they are often required to make compromises. It becomes so natural that they start to see it as reasonable. The system increasingly promotes deceit. It is now a form of social brainwashing.

Well, I agree almost wholeheartedly (I'd be a bit more generous with the marking, I suppose). Problem is, we might not agree on the causes, or indeed with what's 'good' or 'bad'. I'd certainly include in the latter category the transformation of the Prime Minister into a semi-president, and the consequent side-lining of parliament; the rise of the power of international media, and especially the politicians' willingness to accommodate them; the big decline in education, accompanied by denials that it's occurring and rationalisations for the whole mess; the willingness of central government to take away rights that we have had for centuries (something that makes the ECHR even more valuable) - often in response to press 'outcries'; the general lack of knowledge of why things are like they are (not exactly history, but rather the motivations that drove things - the ECHR is a response to pre-WW2 attitudes to rights, for example).

I have left the country (though not out of protest) of course, but I can give anecdotal evidence of many British things the Philippines would like to see. A parliamentary system, rather than a presidential one. Jury trials. Judges that are not political appointees. Much less corruption (something, incidentally, that other Europeans noticed about the British in the early days of the Council of Europe).

For my part, I have only one question - why do I have to pay UK tax on my pension? (I do know the answer, of course. )

[Lateralthinking1]

Well, I agree almost wholeheartedly (I'd be a bit more generous with the marking, I suppose). Problem is, we might not agree on the causes, or indeed with what's 'good' or 'bad'. I'd certainly include in the latter category the transformation of the Prime Minister into a semi-president, and the consequent side-lining of parliament; the rise of the power of international media, and especially the politicians' willingness to accommodate them; the big decline in education, accompanied by denials that it's occurring and rationalisations for the whole mess; the willingness of central government to take away rights that we have had for centuries (something that makes the ECHR even more valuable) - often in response to press 'outcries'; the general lack of knowledge of why things are like they are (not exactly history, but rather the motivations that drove things - the ECHR is a response to pre-WW2 attitudes to rights, for example).

I have left the country (though not out of protest) of course, but I can give anecdotal evidence of many British things the Philippines would like to see. A parliamentary system, rather than a presidential one. Jury trials. Judges that are not political appointees. Much less corruption (something, incidentally, that other Europeans noticed in the early days of the Council of Europe).

For my part, I have only one question - why do I have to pay UK tax on my pension? (I do know the answer, of course. )

I agree with your comments.

I don't think I have argued against the ECHR in principle. Rather as in the case of the EU, I am concerned how it can operate in certain cases, ostensibly as I feel that it can often be against its raison d'etre. It needs people to be on side to maintain authority.

It is difficult to compare Britain with other countries. One naturally has high expectations of one's own country of birth and there is an inbuilt negative bias based on the extent of disappointment about its failings. And in the case of Britain there is that knowledge that we often led the world on certain principles. It wasn't all good by any means but that is a fact which can't be denied.

In that light, Steptoe in a suit, but without his efficiency and charm, is a devastatingly disappointing symbol of modern leadership. Very often the most that I feel I can say about those who are called to a Select Committee is that I would have guessed they were football managers. Is it any wonder that so many of them are keen to avoid the limelight and even answer basic questions?

If pushed, I would choose Norway but located where Spain is for the weather. In reality, I am someone who emotionally couldn't ever move. While born in the 1960s, I can only live in a world of Attlee.* Conditioned in that way, the country is on a loser if it expects me to be able to change. And as I am on a loser expecting it to be like that, there will never now be any real connection.

* Or Butskellism - I have no need to make left/right distinctions based on modern lines.

[ahinton]

This thread has generated greater quantities of hot air - and very interesting arguments - than most, yet few posts within it have, it seems to me, paid due attention to the original question, which is not "should prisoners be entitled to vote?" (as the majority of responses might appear to imply) but "does denying the vote to prisoners mark them out as political prisoners?"; given that the decision on this one way or another is arguably a political decision, it could well be said that the answer to the thread question in "yes", albeit not in the same way as those who are imprisoned for committing political acts.

If the two questions were merged to make one that read "even if for no other reason and irrespective of all other arguments on the subject, should the right to vote be restored to prisoners purely in order to ensure that most of them would thereby no longer qualify as political prisoners?"...

Given Lat's various negative attitudes to Britain expressed here but given also his avowed inability to move from the country that he despises so much, mightn't there be an argument that a prisoner who has not been convicted of electoral has more of a moral right to vote than Lat does?...

[MrGongGong]

What bilge ! Your postings strike me as utterly irrational .

and look where "rationality" has got us ?
a bit like a certain posters use of the word "sensible" ..........

If we used "rational" and "sensible" ways of deciding things we would have NO art, NO music and in this house NO woodburning stove or home made bread

[ahinton]

and look where "rationality" has got us ?
a bit like a certain posters use of the word "sensible" ..........

If we used "rational" and "sensible" ways of deciding things we would have NO art, NO music and in this house NO woodburning stove or home made bread

OK, but we have to have something, don't we? - otherwise we wouldn't even have anarchy!

[Flosshilde]

and look where "rationality" has got us ?
a bit like a certain posters use of the word "sensible" ..........

If we used "rational" and "sensible" ways of deciding things we would have NO art, NO music and in this house NO woodburning stove or home made bread

Surely wood-burning stoves - the modern ones that have virtually no carbon output - and home-made bread are extremely rational & sensible?

[ahinton]

Surely wood-burning stoves - the modern ones that have virtually no carbon output - and home-made bread are extremely rational & sensible?

Very possibly so - but quite what that has to do with whether prisoners should get the vote and whether they can be considered to be political prisoners because and while they still don't have it appears to be beyond me...

[Lateralthinking1]

There is something to be said for recognising that considering things rationally is a fringe activity. The minds of these two are at the epicentre of political architecture. And as their expressions reveal, the main objective is to feel that they are winning at ludo:

[MrGongGong]

OK, but we have to have something, don't we? - otherwise we wouldn't even have anarchy!

And we can't have that can we ..........:

[Flosshilde]

There is something to be said for recognising that considering things rationally is a fringe activity. The minds of these two are at the epicentre of political architecture. And as their expressions reveal, the main objective is to feel that they are winning at ludo:

They certainly make me feel physically sick.

(it's amazing how Steve Bell gets the essence of a character)

[Lateralthinking1]

They certainly make me feel physically sick.

I knew that we could find something to agree on in this thread. There has always been political point scoring on those benches.

Whether we have ever had a Government or Opposition that have been so transparently "na, na, na, na, na" is very doubtful. On occasions, it renders me speechless. Mostly, I find it frightening in the extreme.

[amateur51]

I knew that we could find something to agree on in this thread. There has always been political point scoring on those benches.

Whether we have ever had a Government or Opposition that have been so transparently "na, na, na, na, na" is very doubtful. On occasions, it renders me speechless. Mostly, I find it frightening in the extreme.

You are not alone, Lat

[Pabmusic]

You are not alone, Lat

And may I add my support, too?

[MrGongGong]

And may I add my support, too?

Moi assui