Comments on: Servicemen from Iraq and Afghanistan

By: suraci

suraci — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 08:07:55 +0000

Boris, these services men and women are not serving us, democracy, freedom or anything else so laudatory. They are serving gangsters in illegal wars. They are complicit in an ongoing war crime, one that may yet snowball into a wider conflict that draws us all in.
I wish them no harm, but nor do I support them, any more than I would have supported the Nazis in the 30’s.
It’s time we all stood up for what is right. This is our generation’s Vietnam.

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By: raincoaster

raincoaster — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 12:04:09 +0000

But Boris is famous for not turning people down…

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By: willesden

willesden — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 18:44:51 +0000

Changing the subject briefly:
“If they would like me to run, I’m not going to let them down,” he told his local newspaper, the Oxford Mail. [Boris on re-standing for Henley constituency).

I don’t support they would. They’ll vote for any conservative candidate.

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By: raincoaster

raincoaster — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 10:10:32 +0000

@ henley: No, I think it’s just that this is one article it’s hard to have a difference of opinion on. Either you love what Boris is saying here or you’re insane. I’ll be the first one to take a swing at him when he writes something dopey: you should see what I called him over the Israel/Lebanon war!

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By: russell g

russell g — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 00:42:37 +0000

It is a sign of the quality and professionalism (some may say control) of our military that there hasn’t been a complaint from our men on the ground, involved in such a dubious conflict. But very gratifying to hear the men in charge voicing their (carefully disjointed) malcontent.

This will be Blair’s noose all the way to his grave. I’ll never forget the twitchy, shifty nervousness of both Tony Blair and Georgie Bush at their Atlantic island pre-invasion meeting which completely gave the game away to anyone who is able to read body language, who has a sixth sense, who is perceptive or for that matter who has some good old fashioned common sense.

What a shame we have been dragged into the USA’s inability to win a war, when it’s in charge, that is.

I think many servicemen would take great heart in IDS’ speech to conference today. They are not all privately wealthy, well-educated people. The loss of a limb is far more significant for them than it is for an Oxbridge graduate.

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By: Steven_L

Steven_L — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 23:41:25 +0000

“Time to give Dave a chance, methinks.” (PaulD)

In May 2005 I didn’t think much of their last manifesto, especially the bit about handing over my student loan debt, that I incurred after Blair’s ‘education, education, education – ha ha! tuition fees you mugs’ (I was in Sixth form in May 1997 and too young to vote) over to private banks to administer – probably with unfair penalty charges and all sorts of other scams.

However I had decided that ‘enough is enough’ long before DC got his fingers on the dispatch box and announced as such and planned to vote for Michael Howard regardless of the fact MBNA or Capital One might begin managing my student loans.

Hence the reason I’m putting my oar in the water!

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By: idlex

idlex — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 16:27:49 +0000

Personally I have no animosity whatsoever towards our troops. They were sent to do a job, and they’ve done their best. It’s not their fault that it was a foolish venture. Nor did they tell the country lies in order to get us into this mess.

We are all casualties of this war. But our troops have been the ones who have been doing the real dying. And they deserve more recognition than anybody for their sacrifice in this futile war. If ever some sad requiem is held in memory of them, it should be without pomp or ceremony or swagger, and with muffled drums. These men did not have to die, and that is the shame of it, and it is upon all our heads.

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By: PaulD

PaulD — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 10:42:24 +0000

Laid up with a bug, I watched a lot of the Tory conference yesterday. One policy announcement has been lost behind the headline-grabbing stamp duty and inheritance tax, yet I believe it is of far greater significance.

David Willetts announced war on the compensation culture, starting with schools. His six-point plan is

� amend the Compensation Act in introduce the concept of “reckless disregard”

� instruct courts to recognise the special benefits of sports and adventure when making decisions

� make risk-management training for adventurous out-of-classroom trips a requirement of teacher training

� make the Adventure Activities Licensing Authority independent of the Health and Safety Executive and give it responsibility for all sport, adventure and playground activities

� change the law so there is no obligation on activity organisers to warn of an obvious risk, and

� change the law so there is a presumption of contributory negligence if individual participating in sport or an adventure activity ignores risk warnings or was under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

This is a terrific start to curing the compensation madness whose damaging effects now touch on almost every aspect of our lives, especially where children are concerned.

We can only hope it will be extended way beyond school activities. There is a strong case for beefing up the “idiot factor” in compensation cases, such that greedy opportunists and frivolous claimants are sent packing if they suffered by their own stupidity.

I liked what I heard from the first day of the conference. More of these ground-breaking ideas and my faith in Cameron’s Conservatives might well be revived.

It was a refreshing change to hear politicians who seem genuinely to be looking at the fundamental causes of social breakdown and finding solutions which involve harnessing the expertise and drive of people at local level rather than imposing more controls from above.

Unike Brown, they realise we can no longer buy our way out of trouble. This country is in a dreadful mess. It will take ingenuity – and probably some unpleasant medicine – to turn things around. New Labour have proved beyond doubt they cannot do it; indeed their unshaken belief in the power of Big Government and their obsession with vote-catching quick fixes has only made things worse. The cracks are turning to chasms and they’ve run out of wallpaper.

Time to give Dave a chance, methinks.

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By: Havana59

Havana59 — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 06:31:51 +0000

P.S I could never support someone who doesn’t comb their hair either!
Pull yourself together man!

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By: Havana59

Havana59 — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 06:28:34 +0000

The majority of the British public were against this illegal war from the start. You supported it and for General Dannat or yourself to think that parades are a good idea is just plain daft. They wouldn’t get much support for a start because those of us out here who have followed this shameful episode from the start know that these servicemen are not doing this for the British public but for a zionist led elite in Washington and Whitehall. Furthermore, many of us know what the British political establishment thinks of serviceman and the way that it treats them once they are no longer of use. It is claimed that 1 in 4 homeless people are ex-servicemen and very little is done for the homeless in this country. Anyway I shall support John Bird for London Mayor, because many of my friends have watermelon smiles and I could no more vote for you than that Dictator loving Livingstone.

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