Three Conservative Prime Ministers have now fallen victim to the schism in Conservative Party over Europe: Thatcher, Cameron and now Mrs May. This is because there are two conservative factions in the House of Commons, elitist and populist. Elitists have no time for the ordinary voter, whom they regard as stupid, fat and uneducated, while populists regard central government as a continuing conspiracy by lean and cunning men against the common man.
All that is needed is for seducer to appear, causing this shaky conservative marriage to break apart. Nigel Farage is that seducer. Only one faction of the conservative party, the populists, will survive the split – the elitists are hated – but to do so the populists must be prepared to do a deal with Farage and form a government of Brexiteers and Tories at the next election which will come soon. Otherwise the country will fall to the chaos of a Corbyn administration.
Merkel has unresigned, Bercow has unresigned ……… could there be anyone else thinking along the same lines?
I dint think Aquinas said anything like that. One should read his Summa Contra Gentiles (also titled On the Truth of the Catholic Faith), where he takes on all comers (then, snd likely even now), strengthens and perfects as far as possible their aruments, and then demolishes their positions.
Monotheism is a generic term; there is no particular virtue in it unless it is the right monotheism. This is just reason. Conservatism has to seek truth, and in all things. There is no excess intrinsically to virtue.
As I recall, despite having the most elaborate and ingenious arguments, he settled on faith as a morally superior reason for belief. I don’t defend him – he regarded heretics (ie people he disagreed with about things that cannot possibly known for certain in practice or principle) as deserving death. Conservative pragmatism, caution, live-and-let-live, embracing of uncertainty and willingness to learn and revise are what gives it strength to my mind. Xenophanes was right: ‘In human affairs there is no certain truth and all our knowledge is but a woven web of guesses.’ However I was brought up a Catholic and corrupted by Jesuits, so I now you won’t agree.
Wherever the merits in the wars of religion, Catholicism, which is just the truth brought by Christ, affirms nature, natural law, and its lawgiver; and is intrinsically a support therefore fior common law, which is based on natural law, and which is that wonderful distinctively English social and political gift and a big part of freedom.
Doesn’t Aquinas say something about all people’s really believing in the same God, and perhaps that could be a way of resolving conflicts? He might have had in mind even Islam which he elsewhere excoriates. There was a sense of natural justice and a rational universe among pre-Christian peoples (with variations probably related to their continual warfare and their elevation of courage as a supreme virtue).
I can’t think of any ‘merits in the wars of religion’. It might be inflammatory to say this, but there is a sense in which monotheistic certainty (as opposed to pagan give and take, all welcome in the pantheon) is incompatible with Conservatism.
Adam Smith said virtue was more fearful than vice because its excesses were not subject to regulation by our consciences. That’s certainly evident in the jihadi mind today.
Canada is nearly complete as a leftist hell. And the thin thread holding things out of total chaos in the UK isn’t “secular values” but the shrivelled remants of its Catholic past and what remains of the Anglo Saxon temperament expressed socially. Its where what remains of good law and habits originate.
Must confess to contradictory reports about Canada. We were all impressed with the willingness to offer safety to those fleeing Islamic hell holes like Saud and Pakistan.
As to our Catholic past – you jest surely? 16th Century Europe where RCs and Protestants provided convincing evidence that Satan created and rules this world?
I am well aware of the historical tensions between the Poles and the Russians, Polish immigrants have been almost consistently a benefit to the UK. What I am driving at is that young, well-educated, hard-working Russians would also bring benefits. I know that Russia is Orthodox, but the EU and Russia fundamentally face a common threat. Bring them into the fold.
Agree with that. I used to teach a lot of overseas PG students. I had similar impressions of the common values with Chinese too who seemed as happy and free as anyone else. I suppose we could distinguish between citizens who would like a freer constitution, and citizens who support their repressive rulers. In the latter camp would be men in Islamic states who, as Thomas Aquinas said, enjoy the violence and concupiscence of the Muslim way of life.
I think it would have been a very good idea for the British to have allowed HK Chinese to get British nationality and live in the UK after the 1997 handover. They would have proved to have been a huge immigrant boon to Britain. They are secular, do not proselytize, are tolerant, smart, hard working, focus on the family, are well-educated and have a wealthy cultural history.
Instead, you chose…
The UK’s loss is Canada’s gain.
Too true. Too late.
I’m encouraging my kids to consider opportunities in Canada.
It’s important to remember that Brexit is not the biggest issue.
Mass immigration (ranging from the unfortunately incompatible to the murderously hostile) is the biggest issue.
We could leave the EU but be no better off, unless our regained control of our borders leads to our moving millions of current UK residents to the other side of those borders.
Neither any “Conservative” leadership candidate nor Nigel Farage shows the slightest interest in doing any such thing.
The so called “far right” (who are really not much different from the far left) are no help. I’ve investigated the likes of “For Britain” and the “Traditional Britain Group”, but they’re mostly as thick as pig-droppings, and obsessed with weird fantasies about Jews.
I conclude that it doesn’t matter whether we leave the EU or not. We’ll still be going to hell in a halal handcart, and nobody I’ve ever heard of has any practical proposals for putting the handcart brakes on, let alone putting the handcart into reverse gear.
Fifty years ago we had Enoch Powell – slightly mad, but eloquent, intelligent and devoted to his country. Now we have, at best, the soccer hooligan Tommy Robinson.
What has happened in fifty years? Where have all the genuine conservatives gone? What, if anything, can be done?
Looking around the countries of the world, you’d have to be as “thick as pig droppings” not to realize that wherever different ethnic groups and followers of different (mainly monotheistic) religions live side by side in large numbers, ethnic, racial and religious tensions rise accordingly. This problem is amplified by land borders; the UK, being an island, was literally insulated from these problems for centuries, but not any more – with a Zodiac and a nice border force and a helpful RNLI, chancers and adults posing as children can be on a beach in Dover with a blanket and a mug of hot tea in a few hours.
The coming civil unrest between these groups in Western Europe will serve as a good warning to Asia about the folly of mass immigration, the blame for which lies entirely at the door of economists, who treat humans in their simplistic models as entirely fungible.
Not that we have not had similar problems here too. China is relatively culturally homogeneous (except in the West), as are Japan and Korea, but we have had clashes in Myanmar, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand (in the South) for one or more of the above reasons.
True,so true. But our liberals see everything in terms of black and white. The fact that different types of black are as different from one another as they are from whites enters not into the equation. So in they come, a pat on the head, a blanket, a hot something to do because we liberals are too dense to realise that they’re not quite all the same, a picture in the paper and we’ll all live happily ever after
Agreed Sheilagh, the Zodiacs and ever so helpful RNLI conjure up a dream becoming reality, a sort of real-life “Open Sesame”, except they comprise many times more than forty thieves … and others.
None so blind as them what won’t see, innit ?
What you are asking for is not possible of course but there is a possible approach that has never been tried: education and information. From the inconclusive chats I’ve had my impression is that almost all Muslims are completely ignorant of their scripture – the Koran and even the Bukhari hadiths.
If they had presented to them in schools, public debates and articles in the press samples of the outright nonsense, nastiness and threats that they are being gulled into supporting, we might get somewhere.
Congratulations PJR, yours is an excellent post.
I’ve said it before; what does anything – the economy, law and order, housing etc – matter, if England is no longer England?
To put it another way; was anyone worried about the economy in May 1940?
Wars are won by strong technologically advanced economies, so if no one was worried about that in 1940 they should have been.
What makes the England we all value is a compilation of the things you list – economy, law and order and justice especially, and housing, health, education and so on.
Immigration is not either all bad or all good. We gain by the million Poles here would be my guess, and lose by the fake refugees, mostly young men and losers in middle east sectarian wars.
The new leader needs to a person of judgement, not in hoc to any ideology because attachment to hammer-headed policy has always been our undoing.
>We gain by the million Poles here would be my guess, and lose by the fake refu…
By this token, the Russians are also your natural allies. You’ve dealt with them before in tough times against a common enemy.
I’m not sure what you’re driving at here. I meant the Poles share our secular values, or at least are uninterested in making RC converts. The Poles I know all believe that Putin will pull a stunt at some point, especially if his back is to the wall on some other matter.
One of my mature students had a KGB parent who scooted off and got UK citizenship as soon as it became clear Putin was taking over. Plenty more like that I guess that we could welcome wouldn’t you say/
“We gain by the million Poles here would be my guess …”
Never been on a social housing waiting list, have we?
No, but the Poles I know (one or two for more than 60 years) are self-employed or in well-paid professions.
The lack of housing of all kinds is the fault of HMGs who have pampered and subsidised a handful of big builders though land-hoarding (of freely/cheaply given public land)and ‘Help to gouge the taxpayer’ and shutting out SME builders.
“The lack of housing of all kinds is the fault of HMGs who have pampered and subsidised a handful of big builders though land-hoarding (of freely/cheaply given public land)and ‘Help to gouge the taxpayer’ and shutting out SME builders”.
You assume homes can be built as quickly as East Europeans can settle here. A Polish national can fly to the UK in the morning and be working in a food processing plant in the afternoon. No pattern of home building can match that speed, just like you can’t train new healthcare professionals or provide new school places that fast.
And where are all these homes supposed to go? ‘Not in my cosy, middle-class back yard’, I hear you say.
Not so mister. Any governments with an ounce of sense, especially Conservative, would long ago have seen that everyone who wished could own a home. Immigration has only made failure more obvious.
Only about 5% of UK land is built on so there’s plenty of room and my first choice would be the so-called green belt (much of it not green or pretty) because those are the places people want to live. The greenfreaks can plant replacement trees on brown fields if they want. gardens are more biodiverse and eco-friendly than fields by the way, not that greenthicks can be expected to grasp that.
I did back the plan for 100 houses opposite my home, but guess what – only 50 were built starting at £800k (in Leeds) and not one of the promised affordables.
Conservatism has nothing to do with selfishness (vide Adam Smith).
Cogent, Thank you.
Hold on folks. Mrs May has made a number of promises that have not been kept ………
May God save “your green and pleasant land”, if He can find the time.
…a century or so ought to do it.