UPDATE: There seems to be some confusion in the comments section that I endorse the actions of Godfrey Bloom. Let me make it clear, I found the use of the phrase 'Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer' utterly deplorable. However the way the parliamentary authorities reacted was equally shameful. It appears to be one rule for eurosceptics and another rule for the rest, take for example Martin Schulz, the man on the receiving end of Bloom's insult. He said a few months ago that the way eurosceptics behaved "was how Adolf Hitler behaved". Yet he was dealt no punishment by the authorities. The more worrying aspect of this rather farcical show, was the way the Parliament decided "democratically" to throw out one of its members. That is simply not acceptable in a liberal democracy.
33 comments:
The European Parliament is a disgrace.
It's a bit rich the Golf Club wing of the BNP calling anyone a Nazi.
So if one day a majority of MEPs decide 'democratically' that all MEPs not in agreement with them be removed from the chamber will that be acceptable to the Chairman & President? If, once these dissenters are removed, the MEPs pass resolutions 'democratically' to keep the removed MEPs from ever re-entering the chamber would that be acceptable to the Chairman & President?
What might follow then?
Hardly the Soviet treatment. Man breaches rules of conduct within the house, gets removed. It happens in Britain over things even more trivial: http://www.republic.org.uk/blog/?p=709
Typical, whining, manipulative socialists!
More famous quotes from history:
"We have only to kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down"
Kick harder UKIP!
"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning"
I pray that my failing health holds until I see some sign of collapse in the whole rotten structure.
"Man breaches rules of conduct within the house, gets removed."
Rules
1)Don't mention the War.
They call eurosceptics fascists in the EP, and things like the mentally ill, etc with impunity. Yet if a eurosceptic calls them back with similar, he is thrown out.
Yes it within the rules, Wan. Yet the rules are applied unevenly depending on what you believe. That is Soviet, not democratic.
Wan posted: "Hardly the Soviet treatment. ... "
Wan, it is *exactly* the Soviet treatment. It *is* "doublethink":
We, the Overlords and Supremes of the European Parliament have decided that the words expressed by Mr. Godfrey Bloom do not mean what Mr. Godfrey Bloom intended them to mean. We have decided that Mr. Bloom's words as *we* understand them are completely unacceptable in a democratic parliament. The word "fascist" to describe any member is unacceptable.
The fact that Mr. Schultz and other [dis]honorable MEPs like "Red Danny", aka Daniel Marc Cohn-Bendit, frequently and interminably use the word "fascist" has no bearing on our judgement as we decree the word "fascist" as used by Mr. Godfrey Bloom has an entirely different meaning to the word "fascist" as used by Messrs. Schultz, Daniel Marc Cohn-Bendit et al.
All those in favour of the difference of meaning between the word "fascist" and the word "fascist" raise your hands.
All those against raise your hands.
All those who abstain raise your hands.
On this vote of the EU Supreme Council it is decreed that "fascist" and "fascist" do *not* have the same meaning.
Therefore, remove Mr. Godfrey Bloom from the chamber.
*YES* Wan, it is *exactly* Soviet treatment ...
You do get the impression that they are fast losing patience with flat earthers who seem to think the Chamber exists solely for their youtube virals.
If he'd done the same thing in the UK Parliament, he'd have been named and suspended for five days without pay. The EP treatment of disruptive members isn't really too much different.
Jimmy
You may think the Euro shambles is the best thing since sliced bread but the vast majority of people in the country,ie the ones who pay for it, long since lost patience with the corrupt socialists like Shultz who want it to be their personal utopia and to hell with those who oppose them
The sooner this rotten tower collapses the safer we will all be..Thanks to the Euro that day may come sooner than we all thought...Praise Be
Actually, Jimmy, that's the impression that >you< get.
Others seem to get the impression that they are 'fast loosing patience' with freedom of speech.
I've just read elsewhere that this video of Godfrey Bloom's eviction is going "viral".
Now, just a thought, and perhaps a question ... has anyone ever heard of, or has a link to, a video *praising* anything at all about the EU? Like say, in praise of the EU parliament, or even "wot has the EU ever done for us?" And has such a vid *ever* "gone viral"?
Does the fact that only seemingly anti-EU vids attract large audiences ever penetrate through to the minds of some of the dummkops I watched today who were clapping Bloom's eviction?
Was that Dolores Umbridge sitting next to the President and telling him what to say?
Jimmy (craven apologist for the [One State - One Party - Ten Leaders] Labour Party) struggling with the concept of free speech, as usual.
Let's be fair. This is not an appropriate comment. Rightly or wrongly [probably quite rightly] Ken Livingstone was pilloried for his analagous comments to a reporter. This is in many ways worse because of the context. He ought to apologise or have apologised
Was the British concentration camp guard ticking off Godfrey none other than that quisling wormlike character Edward MacMillan Scott?
He's an ex-Conservative, I believe. This kind of footage must be worth a million or so UKIP votes at the EP elections.
Surely some creative soul could recreate the scene with all characters wearing appropriate uniforms, to enhance the effect?
Germany lost 2 world wars. Its now trying to win economicly. Can people not see what is happening. They do not like or want any opposition. All free thinking people should be concerned.
@ Jimmy
So, two wrongs? And you approve of Schultz's 'thinking'? Of course you do.
What you seem not to understand is that words are now being actively censored by these EU monsters. In much the same way as the Left has always chosen to control vocabulary - simply to control all dialogue. The whole concept of Free Speech is alien territory to the Left.
Just to make it clear this is not written by Iain, but his assistant Grant. As clearly stated at the top of the blog.
I find this thread deeply depressing. We used to be a country known for our civility, yet you're falling over yourselves to laud Bloom for this.
If you just take a moment to think, well over six million Germans died in World War Two. The overwhelming majority weren't Nazi high command types who had it coming. They were perfectly normal people who, by accident of history, were born into a country that was on the wrong side. The guy Bloom was throwing childish insults at (incidentally, the same guy who was on the receiving end of similar stuff from Berlusconi the other year - so at least it's not just us Brits) is likely to have lost quite a number of close relatives in the conflict.
It isn't bringing the institution down via unconventional means. It's just ill-mannered, rude, boorish behaviour.
Jon Stewart was right with his slogan, "I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not a Nazi". I'm afraid what passes for political debate on the internet is going down the road of extremism, incivility and ever more violent insults, and it's extremely sad.
That comparison in your update Ian is entirely apt. Indeed Schulz's remark is much worse because it is simple rudeness & completely untrue whereas it is clear that "ever closer union" if taken literaly, does end up with that unity Bloom described & that many EU aparatchiks do take it seriously. As the EU "Parliament's" one sided action proves.
I don't remember any EU Parliamentarians ever being expelled for calling Milosevic "another Hitler" or indeed worse lies, particularly by our (ex-)Nazi supporting genocidal German allies.
Sir Norfolk Passmore
"you're falling over yourselves to laud Bloom for this."
Nonsense. From what I have seen some people view it as an attack on his freedom of speech, plus double standards.
"If you just take a moment to think, well over six million Germans died in World War Two....who, by accident of history, were born into a country that was on the wrong side."
Actually the remark he made (justified or not - personally I think he was an idiot) was a political comment about his dislike of what he saw as the creation of a single European State dominated by the interests of Germany. Again you are making up stuff. As for your point about Germans being accidentally involved in the democratic election of the Nazi Party in Germany, it is a view.
"incidentally, the same guy who was on the receiving end of similar stuff from Berlusconi the other year"
Did they throw Berlusconi out?
"It's just ill-mannered, rude, boorish behaviour."
It not "just" anything. It is obvious (even to you) that he opposes a single European State, and believes that the European Single Currency is being run in a way that favours the interests of Germany.
"Jon Stewart was right with his slogan, 'I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not a Nazi'."
It may have escaped his notice that nationalistic socialism, hatred of capitalism, America, and Jews, plus a belief in a powerful European Super State has hardly completely disappeared from European politics. Nor do I think it is because of the EU that there are no longer gas chambers in Poland. I do not recall the EU wanting to do much to stop Serbian nationalistic socialists from engaging in a policy of "ethnic cleansing" for example, and that was only a few years ago.
"I'm afraid what passes for political debate on the Internet is going down the road of extremism, incivility and ever more violent insults, and it's extremely sad."
It is called freedom of speech old bean.
The House of Commons expells people all the time. You think you could call someone a Nazi in the commons and get away without apologising? No way. People have been expelled for far less in the Commons, actually.
As ever with Brussels you need to look at the underlying agenda.
Bloom's comments are not so much an insult to Schultz, but rather laying bare the ultimate plan and ideology of the EU; which is in fact to create one super state of the regions, extirpating the nation states, controlled by an elite of politicians holding executive power and control and supported by the nodding donkey that is the European Parliament.
The response to Bloom is typically european, banning him for speaking out, much as others have been banned for taking photographs, or announcing that certain MEP's had criminal records. It is the statist response and I'm sure that those in control at Brussels feel that they are short served by not being able to place poor ole Geoffrey into a mental asylum and pump him full of narcotics, for his own good of course.
Unlike Mary Honeyball this probably supports the posit that we need to get out of the EU.
Mary on the other hand feels that we should now join the Euro....
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/leftwatch/
A comedy sketch writer couldn't make this up and even "The thick Of It" would baulk.
Ski Test said, This is not an appropriate comment.
"Appropriate" means "I don't like it". So what?
"It may have escaped his notice that nationalistic socialism, hatred of capitalism, America, and Jews, plus a belief in a powerful European Super State has hardly completely disappeared from European politics."
You'll see from the video that McMillan Scott makes this precise point, although this blog in the past has tended to rush to the defence of what might be politely called the wilder shores of European nationalism.
Incidentally Bloom was the man who famously praised the French for the murder of Fernando Perreira on the Rainbow Warrior. He justified this stance by saying that the boat itself was "fascist". Plainly as insults go, Bloom is a one club golfer. Any other country would rightly regard him as an embarrassment.
Wild - I won't respond point by point but would just say that freedom of speech (which as you say includes the freedom to be gratuitously offensive) has never stopped assemblies of all kinds having rules of conduct for members. You can be thrown out of the UK Parliament (and many others) for being gratuitously offensive, calling a fellow member dishonest (even if they are in fact) and so on. I don't want Bloom's head on a plate - I just think he gave a poor impression of his country and it was right to send him out.
In relation to, "Did they throw Berlusconi out?" the answer is "yes" (or to be technically procedurally correct, they suspended the session).
"I don't want Bloom's head on a plate - I just think he gave a poor impression of his country and it was right to send him out...In relation to, "Did they throw Berlusconi out?" the answer is "yes"...they suspended the session."
Fair enough.
Bloom did not call Schultz a Nazi, end of story. Anyone care to disagree and show exactly where he did?
As Grant points out, Schultz is prepared to dish it out but clearly cannot take it. That's the measure of the man.
The rules speak of disruption. Bloom did not disrupt anything. Such calls are generally accepted. Their fuss is what eventually disrupted the sitting.
All of these comments saying much the same thing happens in the UK Parliament to Members hurling insults miss the whole point of this story.
In the UK Parliament the rules are applied across the board. (I wonder if we will be able to say that again after Speaker Bercow has had a few years tenure?)
In the EU Parliament fascist and similar insults are freely hurled by many on the left yet when someone who *they* consider does not believe in the Grand Project returns the insults they start shedding tears.
"They do not like it up 'em ..."
Post a Comment