Header pic: detail from a Peter Brookes cartoon
Do you remember those history lessons at school, where we learned about feudalism, and how it was an odd system they had in the UK centuries ago? A world where the people we now call citizens were called ‘serfs’ or ‘peasants’, and they and their work literally belonged to the Lord of the Manor? Where government, local, national and international, revolved around the aristocrats and the land-wealthy? Where ‘fealty’ ruled, where the Lords decided who were friends and who were enemies, and wielded their power (that is, the involuntary service of the armies of people they owned) accordingly?
The hellish state of our politics now, and our total disillusion with it, is all part of our realization that although we, the people, have moved on – the aristocrats and the wealthy have not.
David Cameron and Brexit
No, don’t say Cameron caused Brexit. He called a hasty and ill-planned referendum on EU membership, purely for his own convenience, then lied his way through the resulting referendum campaign. For better or for worse, the people decided – by a whisker – to leave the EU. I don’t think it was a fair campaign, I suspect most of us still don’t know the real pros and cons of being in or out of the EU but one of the things that’s become crystal clear is that if you are a small country and you aren’t in the EU, you have no choice but to do the bidding of the biggest bully of all, the USA, (the kingdom all the Lords of all the Manors owe fealty to).
Here’s David Cameron doing his duty….
Video compilation by Politics Joe
Cameron: “Our partners in America asked us to assist and that’s what we did.”
– Just like they asked us to help invade all those other countries the USA had down as ‘bad’ countries?
Cameron: “Look at the scale of what Iran was trying to do”
Er – compared to what Israel did to Gaza?
Interviewer: “What would Britain do if a hostile nation flattened one of our consulates?”
Cameron: “We would take very strong action.”
He keeps going on about ‘the scale of their reaction’ — again, compared to what happened to Gaza?
And perhaps most extraordinarily of all….
“You can’t expect Israel to live next door to a territory that is govemed by the people that carried out the Oct 7th attacks.”
But for 75 years now, Mr Cameron, you and your colleagues have expected Palestinians to live next door to Israel, a country which has presided over far more rapes, killings and demolitions than those Israel claims Hamas committed on Oct 7th.
Cameron says Iran’s retaliation (for attacks by Israel on its neighbours, culminating in Israel flattening Iran’s consulate!) was an attack using “301 weapons! It could have resulted in thousands of casualties!”
— Please, please would someone ask him how it compares to what Israel has done to Gaza?
Interviewer: “But Israel attacked sovereign Iranian territory.”
Cameron: “Clearly Israel haven’t attributed themselves to this.”
[Aside: urgh! I remembered that he caused the Brexit battles but I had forgotten he started the politicians’ habit of replacing actual clarity by saying ‘clearly’ followed by something foggy and awkward.]
In the next clip, he’s boasting about how well our chaps did shooting down unmanned drones to protect Israel. An interviewer asks…
“Why not shoot down umanned drones [in Ukraine].”
He replies: “We are doing everything we can to help Ukraine shoot down unmanned drones.”
(Except sending our jets over to do it for them, like we did for Israel).
This is why I called this article ‘Lord of the Manor’ and started with a reminder of how feudalism works. Ukraine simply is not such an important ally to Cameron’s political class as Israel, or above all, the United States.
Allies and enemies
I was at a fascinating discussion evening recently with Andrew Feinstein, former South African MP. One of the most fascinating bits was when we were on the subject of the appalling Israel/Palestine situation. Someone brought up the fact that Iran and China (who have, to our eyes, been largely good guys in the Israel/Palestine story) were also guilty of terrible atrocities, and we did some weighing up. Yes, Iran has numerous counts of slaughtering civilians on its record. Yes, China is buzzing with all the cruelties and oppression committed by a world power on the rise, but why does that make us so sure Iran and China are evil, when Israel is not? And why is Russia’s leader condemned as a ‘gangster’, when Ukraine’s leader…. Hang on – who was it who burned down a trade union HQ, and sanctioned mobs tying gypsy kids to lamp posts? Who had to be gently reminded to distance himself from Nazi militia?
In short, we had trouble thinking of any state that had not committed horrible atrocities, but we all felt the media-led pull to think of some atrocities as ‘unfortunate’ and others as signs of irreparable evil – depended on who are allies, and who are enemies, according to the likes of Cameron.
Finally, in that Cameron compilation, someone asks him about Netanyahu’s many crimes.
He says something about having lots of tough conversations with Netanyahu, because “That’s what friends do.”
Clearly (ahem) then, Ukraine is not one of our important friends, but Palestine is not one of our friends at all.
Lords of the Manors
Yep, for our political class, the feudal era never ended. Diary of an MP’s Wife is a ghastly book but I recommend it nevertheless because this social diary of a Tory MP’s wife lays bare the way our country is really run. In amongst the scrummages for status, for the right to reside in this or that country pile (because which swanky government job hubby gets decides which castle you get to live in), to attend this or that dinner-on-a-yacht (where foreign policy is devised to suit lucrative weapons companies), in amongst all that you can see (clearly) how the likes of Blair and Cameron, can lose top political jobs after committing public horrors like joining in a war against a UN ruling, or plunging the UK into an ill-informed referendum vote, but continue their lordly work amongst the powerful, attending those country-house and millionaire-yacht events, deciding who will be PM, and what stories will reach the public via the rich people’s media.
Having to duck swiftly out of a public, elected political role did not dent either Blair or Cameron’s political/business careers one whit.
In short, elected roles are largely window-dressing. if you’re very rich, the Lord is in his Manor and all is well with the world, whoever wins the elections, so long as the winner is a member of the Lords of the Manors club. That’s why Corbyn had to be slandered off the field. There was a distinct risk of him getting one of those public roles Lords of the Manor are supposed to have, and he wasn’t in the club.
If you’re not rich, which party is in power, and who is PM, makes not a blind bit of difference. They make sure that the mainstream parties have a huge advantage, and are led by suitably affiliated Lords of the Manors. That is why we need to overthrow the whole rich-people feudal system, now we know we’re citizens, not serfs.
Independents
That’s why my current favourite soap box is the independents thing. Whether it’s in local or county council or national elections, we need to get as many independents in as we can. Of course they vary in quality and of course many of them are inexperienced and untried, but that’s the whole point. It’s pretty certain that most of them are not anywhere near being lords of the rich people’s feudal system, and so each time one manages to get a foot in the door and say something in council or in Westminster, the establishment lackies have to break the rules to knock them down. And each time that happens, the public gets another good look at the naked emperor, and we’re that much nearer to bringing down the whole rotten system, and getting ourselves a government that actually works for the people.
We’ll have to get our skates on and do it this year, while there are plenty of independents in the field, and the idea is popular. You can bet your last dollar the Lords of the Manor are hard at work thinking up rules to make it even harder for indies to win elections.
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Cheers,
Kay
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Kay Green 