Labour’s behaviour reminds me of the blind football at the Paralympics

Rupert Fotherington-Smythe

Rod, I hate to disabuse you, but it was, in fact, a German shepherd. The "whimpering into the receiver" was simply owing to language barrier problems. Hans (as is well known to all that know him) has never been good at languages. Some people reckon that he's just barking: but I wouldn't be so harsh as to say it's a mental health problem.

Dan Baynes

"My guess is that it will take a good 30 point deficit...."

Nearly there now.

Johnny L.

Rod,
Take this week-end off. Do something spontaneous. Nice one.

John Foster

The Labour party, has been barking for years, and most Spectatorites knew it. The whole socialist post-war enterprise is finished as is the idea of the Socialist Welfare State.

So Leftists, you pined for your leader and now you've got him, it's no good now pining for another student union communist - you got what you deserved.

The rest of us now want to see the dismantling of the nannying welfare state. It's time that people saw that the State is everyone's money - not an excuse for high-handed gladhanding idealism and the skewed kudos that goes with it.

As for the credit crunch - blame everyone who talked property up for so long and yet somehow knew that Victorian brick could never really be worth all that. We're all to blame not just the rhymes-with Merchant bankers in the global cubic mile. Likewise with letting politicians get away with it for far too long. Our fault.

We now know it's all got to totally fall apart before it can be reconstructed, where the individual is king again and collectivism is ploughed 6 foot under along with the common purposers, databases and CCTV cameras.

So Gordon tarry awhile in your debt-ridden PFI purdah, knowing it was you who aided and abetted us into this mess all along.

The people of independent spirit meanwhile, who largely pay for this welfare hindcart, can gloat knowing that their time is coming.

Time to start the f*** big government movement and where better than in attacking the unaudited halls of EU splendour.

Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, Common Sense, who has been with us for many years unnoticed.

No one knows for sure how old he was since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape.

He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as knowing when to come in out of the rain, why the early bird got the worm, that life wasn't always fair, and maybe it was my fault.

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (don't spend more than you earn - which applied to individuals and Governments) and reliable parenting strategies (adults, not children or educationalists, are in charge).

His health began to deteriorate rapidly when well intentioned but overbearing regulations were set in place - all obeying some arcane EU directive no one was supposed to know about.

Reports of a six-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate; a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student, only worsened his condition.

Common Sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job that they failed to do in disciplining their unruly children. Because they wanted to seem so clever and progressive in following the rules of Gordon's Nu Jerusalem.

It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer the contents of the medicine cabinet, sun lotion, a sticky plaster, or a cuddle of comfort for the young; but
could not inform the parents when the knives and drugs started to get handed around the playground.

Common Sense lost the will to live as criminals received
better treatment than their victims.

Common Sense took a beating when you couldn't defend yourself from a burglar in your own home and yet the burglar could sue you for assault. This set in as knife crime murder became fashionable as the Left realised their social engineering was a miserable failure.

Common Sense finally gave up the will to live when soldiers were sent to war without proper kit, while Labour ministers posed for photo opportunities in the heat. Fighting guerillas on a front line thousands of miles from home while the guerilla's cousins, nephews and Uncles live in inner city Britain. Wrong war, wrong front.

Common Sense was preceded in death by his parents, Truth and Trust; his wife, Discretion; his daughter, Responsibility; and his son, Reason.

He is survived by three stepbrothers; I know My Rights, Someone else is to blame, and I'm a victim.

Not many attended common sense's funeral because so few realized he was gone.

Politics is finished until people regain their sense of Democracy - tainted for too long by snake oil, spin and bureacratic professionalism. We need to stake the heart of this beast - it came in with the EU - and we WILL kill it off, no matter how long it takes or how many balaclaves have to be worn back to front.

CharlieRay15

Please stand for election Mr Foster!

JohnAnt

The nation desperately needs a replacement forestry envoy. Some of those trees are quite tricky to negotiate with. You want to lop the branches, chop them down entirely, but they won't budge: they just sit there like a block of of wood.
And speaking of the Prime Minister, he should be given some credit by his MPs. Not every bankrupt organisation keeps all the redundant staff on a high payroll for two years to allow them to 'manage their change'. They all know very well, any change of leader now means risking a general election a few months before the last possible minute, which is their current game plan. Their children's fee-paying schools don't come free, you know. No more taxpayer-subsidised mortgage payments. And then they might have to buy a car and actually pay for the petrol...Doesn't bear thinking of.
Give what you can.

Wilfred

John Foster - Bravo!!

David Short

The Labour party and the Conservative party have followed the American example, pointed out by Gore Vidal, and become two wings of the same party.

It works in America. It doesn't work here.

Minnie Ovens

Mr Foster, could you give us an attribution for the "Death of Common Sense".

Verity

That dog was a helper dog registered with the emergency services. It came up on their computers that if a call came from this number, and no human said anything, it was the helper dog dialling for assistance for its master.

This dog had saved its master twice before. So it is already way ahead of Gordon Brown vis-a-vis Britain.