Thursday 5 June 2014

Delingpole: Another MI5 Agent...

James Delingpole former Telegraph blogger and author of fine works such as this has understandably been an enthusiastic advocate of Farage's party to the extent of attempting to bid to be a UKIP MEP. Take this article from 2nd May 2014 for example:
Since the beginning of the European elections campaign, not a day has passed without some vicious new assault in the media on UKIP. But as we've seen, far from denting UKIP's popularity in the polls all this free publicity - bolstering its status as the rebel-outsider, none-of-the-above party - has seen it go from strength to strength.
The people who aren't part of this Establishment, however, not remotely, are the people in the country at large. They feel, for any of number of reasons, that they have become disenfranchised; that the Establishment looks after its own interests but not theirs.
For some the problem is political correctness; for others it's immigration; for others it's the plethora of regulations over which they feel they have no democratic control regardless of which political party is in power; for others still it's the sense that, despite this blessed recovery we keep reading about in all the newspapers, their standard of living appears to be going down.
It's not so much what UKIP stands for that is attracting so many voters as what it stands against: everything they hate.
And what is the embodiment of everything they hate? The Establishment, of course. No wonder the media arm of this Establishment is as proving as discombobulated as the political wing of this Establishment: they're all in the same boat.
The problem of course with being "anti" anything is that it only gets us so far and then a glass ceiling is always firmly hit. Eventually people will want to know what a party actually stands for. That requires well-worked out policies and detail.

In 2012 Delingpole wrote this (my emphasis):
Look at its manifesto. It's the most reasonable, people-friendly manifesto of any political party in Britain. You might quibble with the details: has its championing of grammar schools been rendered irrelevant by Gove's education reforms? Isn't it fence-sitting, rather, on fox-hunting by declaring it a "local issue." But by God, if we could get a government in power which ticked even half the boxes on UKIP's wish list Britain would once more become a land well worth living in.
Despite Delingpole's praise, this manifesto would subsequently be one that Farage denounced as "drivel". 'Dellers' betrayed like many before him.

So with this in mind it's interesting to note that like many of us ex-Ukippers Delingpole seems to have experienced the well-trodden journey of UKIP membership from hope, to frustrations to then despair - he has somewhat belatedly noticed there is something not quite right:
I'm nervous about UKIP for different reasons. My concern is that if they're not careful they're going to end up just like all the other members of the political class in the LibLabCon bubble - more interested in the pursuit and retention of power by telling special interests groups whatever they want to hear rather than in ideological principle.
The other is the apparent lack of anyone like Margaret Thatcher had — a Keith Joseph, say, or a Norman Tebbit — with the ability to underpin party policy with some intellectual and ideological heft.
What, pray, is the point of voting Ukip into power if all you’re going to get is another bunch of career politicians on the make, aping the cynical, vote-catch opportunism of the usual suspects from LibLabCon? You might get more grammar schools here, fewer wind farms there, but without a clear direction of travel you’d just get another party prey to the inevitable temptations of shoring up its power base with eye-catching initiatives aimed at grasping special interest groups.
Delingpole has spotted what a number of us have; that UKIP is bereft of substance and detailed polices (there's always always a manifesto in preparation) and that the leader is essentially trying to "wing" it.

Another (of so many) examples is Farage not bothering to campaign in the Newark by-election today but instead he has been photographed yet again on the booze accompanied yet again with another female.

Despite legitimate criticisms no doubt, as Compete Bastard notes, Delingpole's article will be "spun" as another example of "sour grapes". (how many more examples do there have to be?):
[Delingpole] is obviously out to get Ukip, and it's all just sour grapes because he didn't get selected to be an MEP.
For a party that's been about for 20 years it still doesn't have a detailed policy on how to exit the damned EU project. Therefore Autonomous Mind has it so right when he says:
This blog has long considered itself a critical friend to UKIP, despite the attacks by those who consider themselves virtuous defenders of the cause.  But if UKIP looks set to hamstring the prospects of the anti-EU side by acting as a repellant rather than a recruiter, then the friendship has to end and UKIP has to be taken on and defeated.
I wish there was an alternative to this.  But there’s far more at stake in a referendum than there is in preserving the ambitions of Nigel Farage.  UKIP’s failings must not be allowed to drag down the chances of the anti-EU side of winning a referendum.
I am often asked just what my agenda is as people cannot believe I want to leave the EU, but remain critical of UKIP.  It is very simple. We need UKIP to sort itself out and shape up, or we need to get it out of the way so we can take on and defeat the Europhiles.
It is no coincidence that so many go through the same experiences. So while Farage goes bonking and boozing around Brussels on the taxpayer, the heavy lifting of how to actually extricate ourselves from the monstrosity is left to others.

Despair and betrayal is an all too familiar pattern with UKIP. And sadly 'Dellers' is not immune either. Who to vote for is the cry. If not UKIP who? The answer is simple - the Lib Dems, currently the outcome will be precisely the same.  

10 comments:

  1. Does anyone actually take any notice of self-important bloggers like Autonomous Mind? Outside the Tooting Popular Front, er Harrogate Agenda group, that is?

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  2. Whilst I agree with many of the posts by Frog -EU Ref etc It is with regret that it appears they spend most of the time talking to themselves

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    1. I appreciate your comment regarding 'talking to ourselves - it's one of the reasons I try to link to as many different blogs as possible,

      However what may not be obvious - and it wasn't to me for some time - is the diversity of the readership and thus influence, which often incorporates some senior members of UKIP, Whitehall and journalists

      However it is my view that UKIP will, in its current guise, lose us a referendum - I therefore cannot remain silent, even if it means talking to myself.

      I simply won't go down without a fight.

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    2. It may appear we are talking to ourselves because of the number of comments. However the thousands of readers attracted between EU Ref, TBF, WfW and AM suggests a good many people are getting a realist point of view.

      A bit like TBF, it sometimes surprises me the kind of people who read my blog. When I was contracting at one of the big six energy companies, I was stunned to hear the Chairman and the CEO discussing one of the posts on my blog (with no idea I was the author) and how it related to their business.

      I know that Farage was having regular print outs and updates of my posts relating to the Somerset Levels flooding. I know my expose of William Dartmouth's wind farm plan stirred a hornet's nest.

      If we are reaching those levels we are likely reaching the next generation of leadership and hopefully influencing their thinking.

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  3. Truly sadly, there is NO current realistic alternative to UKIP. The Harrogate Agenda? - Haha, who has even heard of it , and who, amongst our rather mindless electorate would study it enough to even get the gist of it? What amazes me most is that North sems to think that logic and compelling arguments will eventually win the day: yes, indeed, just like he managed to make Farage see sense!

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    1. As it currently stands Ukip isn't an alternative either, a vote for them is a vote to stay in the EU. No polices or even an exit policy means we will lose any referendum. Bloom even recognises that:

      "Even on its core issue of getting Britain out of the EU, Ukip has a problem. In 2012, polls suggested more than half of voters wanted to bid Brussels au revoir. That figure has now slumped to around a third."

      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2651747/A-one-man-band-no-policies-Former-Ukip-Euro-MP-Godfrey-Bloom-hes-uneasy-future-party.html

      Policy free parties don't win elections (that count) and don't win referendum campaigns.


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    2. I agree with that, but I don't wish to abstain at general and local elections (something which is never interpreted by the Parties or the Commentariat as 'None of the Above' - rather, it is interpreted as Apathy: which definitely is not the case! I would rather lose my eye-teeth than vote LibLabCon: therefore I need a Party like UKIP which at least claims to have similar beliefs to myself.
      Admittedly, UKIP under Farage is going nowhere fast, esp on Brexit, BUT a) I doubt the Establishment will ever let us have a referendum, and b) Such a referendum is pretty certain to be lost anyway - and a great BREXIT planwouldn't help in the slightest since the average voterwouldn't be interested and couldn't understand such a plan if it were spoonfed to him/her.
      Cynical? I think pretty realistic!

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  4. Sadly you are right about Farage and UKIP but I say a vote for the Liblabcon is worse.Four parties are better than three for it proves that people are willing to change the status quo, the more division the better.

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