Thursday, June 04, 2009
British politics
Prime Minister Gordon Brown is in deep trouble:
"Prime Minister Gordon Brown was dealt a devastating blow to his leadership late Thursday when one of his most ambitious ministers resigned — hours after Britain voted in European elections — and called on him to step down."If an election is called, David Cameron, the Conservative leader, is very likely to win and become the next Prime Minister. The problem that Labour faces is a concern that it will lose more seats in the House of Commons if the election is held off until next year.
So, under the parliamentary system, the party in power effectively gives up power voluntarily in the present to avoid a rout in the future. I think our Founding Fathers might have been on to something when they did not pass down to us the British system of government.
3 Comments:
By 
, at
Fri Jun 05, 10:45:00 AM:
There are two elements of the Parliamentry system, or at least the British system has that I wish were here:
1) I do like the open forum debating of issues. The way our timed floor system works where a Politician is given a set amount of time to speak his mind unabated and uncontested pretty much stinks.
2) An average British Pol has to know his stuff in order to bring it to the floor and to be able to defend it with facts and clarity.
Because of that the average British Politician is far smarter than our average pol. Could you imagine President Obama trying to defend shutting down the DC Charter scholarship program for disadvantaged black students if he had to debate that like Tony Blair or Gordon Brown has to? There is no way in the world that dog would have hunted in London. With that said, could you imagine G.W. trying to defend and or make a compelling case on anything? As much as I supported the guy, he probably would not have been our guy had he been held up to this higher standard.
By 
Dawnfire82, at
Fri Jun 05, 12:47:00 PM:
There is a weakness there, however, in that eloquence can masquerade as competence and leadership. We're getting a taste of that result now; imagine having it built into the system as a feature.
By , at
Fri Jun 05, 05:43:00 PM:
I would quickly trade this potential weakness for far smarter people running our country. Think of the innumerable dolts who have been Congressman and Senators for decades. Let's go through the list, Joe Biden, Harry Reid, Jack Murtha, Nancy Pelosi, Charlie Rangle, even Ted Kennedy and John Kerry were C/D students at their respective schools and they are considered smart by comparison. The unfortunate part of all of those people is that they say things that are so unbelievably wrong and get away with it that would never happen in England.
My broader point is that with the kind of cover the MSM in America provides Democrats it brings down the expectations, or dumbs down, the tough issues to a point of idiocy. If you start with dumb people you will end up with a collection of really dumb ideas which will become dumb laws or bad leadership.
