Thus far, this has been a stultifying election campaign enlivened only by the glorious promise of the SNP destroying the Labour Party in Scotland and then regaining Scotland’s independence. Here in Wales independence is a dream shared by only a few, so we are reduced to taking solace in sideshows and distractions, with explains why I’m reporting here on the two curious incidents, or the two-act farce, in Ceredigion.
First there was the disgraceful smear against Plaid candidate Mike Parker mounted (or fronted) by the Cambrian News, a rag with a long-standing policy of publishing anonymous or fake anti-Welsh letters and, in my area, serving as a mouthpiece for lodge and golf club to rail against ‘the council’ (code for Plaid Cymru) ‘neglecting’ south Meirionnydd. Complaints from men who argue for smaller local authorities on the ground
s that these would be more ‘democratic’ when what they really want are councils run by . . . well, men like them, handing out planning permissions willy-nilly to each other’s friends and families.
I have no wish to deal with the Cambrian News at any length, so let me try to explain it briefly for anyone unfamiliar with the tale. Mike Parker, the Plaid Cymru candidate in Ceredigion, is an Englishman who, some fifteen years ago, wrote a book in which he said that a number of the English who move to Wales are white flight racists. This suggestion would encourage much head-nodding among the Cambrian News‘ readership so, in order to damage Parker, the story had to be spiced up to the point where the headline screamed: ‘Incomers are ‘Nazis’, says would-be MP’. Clearly implying that Mike Parker is an intolerant, if not unhinged, individual who believes that all English people moving to Wales are followers of Adolf Hitler.
The fact that Mike Parker never even used the term ‘Nazi’ was irrelevant. The use of it by the Cambrian News and others has been justified on the grounds that ‘this is what Parker meant’, or, ‘there can be no other interpretation of Parker’s reference to “Final Solution crackpots”‘. Both wrong. First, attacking someone for what they have written is one thing, but once people start guessing what writers meant, then accusers are on very shaky legal ground. Second, if you read what Mike Parker wrote in Planet in 2001, especially his comparison of rural Wales with those western states of the USA that attract anti-federal government militias, it becomes obvious that the full sentence “To some extent, rural Wales has become the British equivalent of the American mountains (that are) inhabited by a sprinkling of paranoid conspiracy theorists, gun-toting Final Solution crackpots and anti-government obsessives” can only be referring to the USA. (My parenthesis.) Mike Parker is definitely not saying that rural Wales contains small armies of English nutters living in encampments and stockades. Which fatally undermines the excuse given for the use of ‘Nazis’.
The chorus of outrage and condemnation inevitably contained Labour voices. Among them was the dulcet tenor of Peter ‘the Great’ Hain, who repeated the word ‘Nazi’. Alistair Campbell, Tony Blair’s propaganda chief also joined in, before recanting. One contribution came from Parker’s Labour rival, Huw Thomas, a councillor in Cardiff but originally from Ceredigion. Young Huw was outraged by the alleged anti-English sentiment expressed by Parker (himself English, remember!). He fulminated, “These outrageous and deeply offensive
remarks are exactly the sort of poisonous rhetoric you’d expect from Ukip, not a party that claims to be progressive and left wing. There should be no place in our politics or our society for such divisive and hateful language. As a Cardi to my core, I’m proud that Wales and Ceredigion have a history of welcoming people from across this island and across the world. These comments are totally at odds with the Ceredigion I know and love.”All good stuff, though I’d recommend that Huw Thomas downplays the “Cardi to my core” bit, Labour’s supporters in Aber Uni and elsewhere might not like being reminded that their candidate is one of the natives.
While all this was going on that Greek bloke Hu Bris must have been lurking close by, hand cupped to his shell-like because, within days, it was Labour’s turn to squirm as the election in Ceredigion took a bizarre twist with revelations about the saintly and ‘welcoming’ Huw Thomas. It came to light that Huw had, during the 2006 World Cup, been much vexed by the proliferation in Ceredigion of cars flaunting England flags. His answer to the problem, aired on a Welsh language website, was to use Tipp-Ex correcting fluid to mimic “bird poo”! (Yes, I know, very weird.) Thomas was forced to admit his silliness, but rather than leave it at that Labour luminaries rallied around, trying to turn this minor disaster in an unwinnable seat into a national triumph, arguing that this was how a
n apology should be made – in contrast to the unashamedly unapologetic Mike Parker! The Labour Assembly Member for the Rhondda, Leighton Andrews, made himself look really stupid with a couple of tweets to which I couldn’t resist replying. (Click to enlarge.) Now I’m blocked from Porky’s Twitter account as well. These Labour politicos are so sensitive!
What a to-do, eh, boys and girls! So have we learnt anything from all this thud and blunder? Well, if nothing else, the Cambrian News has told us what a disgusting, anti-Welsh rag it is, and why it should be boycotted. BBC Wales, whose newsreaders can’t be bothered to properly pronounce Welsh place names, reminded us that, just like the Secretary of State for Wales, it is the voice of London in Wales. But for me, the real lesson is that when we clear away the party politicking, the posturing and the propaganda it becomes obvious that Parker and Thomas were in fact dealing with the same problem, and agreeing. That this important fact will be ignored by the ‘Welsh’ media tells us all we need to know about its colonial nature.
Mike Parker was saying that there are some very ugly specimens among the English in rural Wales, racists, bigots, and “Little Englanders”. Talking of the England flags that so irked him, Huw Thomas wrote, “It truly shows the degree our society has been infiltrated by incomers who are not ready to integrate. Very often, from what I see, some flying English flags are young people, who have been brought up in Wales, but who are loyal to England”. Elsewhere Thomas refers to such people as “chavs” and “casual racists”. Both men are talking about the influx into rural Wales of people for whom Wales is just a western extension of England, some enlarged Cornwall with even ‘funnier’ names.
What’s more, the English colon isn’t a demon conjured up by Parker and Thomas, for he’s introduced himself to others, as this account by Martin Shipton in the Western Mail makes clear, ‘Like Mr Parker, I was once approached in a pub in rural Wales by an Englishman whose opening conversational gambit was: “Isn’t it great here without any f****** P****?”’ And if you’re the type of English person who is intolerant of other identities, then Welsh is just another non-English identity. The mistake that’s been made – especially by the professional ‘anti-fascists’ of the Left – has been to focus on Nick Griffin and other high-profile individuals – but they were never the problem! (Here’s Shipton’s piece on the Thomas revelation.)
So Mike Parker and Huw Thomas were both talking honestly of English colonisation. That taboo subject that will draw accusations of ‘racism’ against anyone who dares raise it. Making it almost a contemporary Welsh version of The Emperor’s New Clothes . . . but in this version the small boy who blurts out the truth gets run through with a pike. The fact that ‘racism’ has been used so consistently and over such a long period should make it obvious that those behind this tactic will not be found in the offices of local weekly rags, or at BBC ‘Wales’. This denial of rational debate is UK State policy, as is English colonisation itself.
Though I am far from being a ‘right of centre nationalist’ (I’m extremely to the left and more akin to anarchist than anything else) I read this blog with increasing interest, for though I would often disagree with much of the interpretation and many of the suggested solutions, I would have to say that it’s refreshing to see the issues that really matter given coverage here. The mainstream ‘Welsh’ media doesn’t cover anything relevant or contraversial, and glosses over too many of the issues that are important. Plaid Cymru has for far too long backed off from presenting too Welsh (whatever that is) a slant on things, to the point that it lives in fear of upsetting the English without considering that for the most part it would only be upsetting colonialists for the most part. I don’t think that immigration itself is perceived as a problem in itself, (not even by the writer of this blog) but rather the nature of the immigration, and by whom. The very fact that Mike Parker is an immigrant himself speaks volumes about the attitude towards immigration amongst most Welsh people, (though I suspect the colonists see him as having ‘gone native). Even Seimon Glyn made no anti-immigrant comments, merely drew attention to how colonialism is affecting everyday life for ordinary people in Welsh, and particularly Welsh speaking communities. And yet Plaid Cymru made no attempt to support or defend Seimon Glyn for his statements, and indeed sided with the idiots who could not plainly see that Seimon Glyn’s comments were only contentious because they were delivered in the context of a Welsh speaking part of Wales. Asking people to integrate isn’t asking them to give up their heritage, as that would be assimilation. It’s only reasonable to expect people to integrate, and if I’m not mistaken Seimon Glyn was involved in a TV programme that focussed on Polish immigrants to North West Wales, some of whom had settled and learned Welsh. The point being that where someone comes from matters not a jot, but where they are at in terms of their head space and attitudes matters one hell of a lot. The kind of Colonel Blimp colonialist attitude amongst the Afrikaaners of Wales, (to give them a title I believe Steve Eaves used for them very aptly in his song ‘Afrikaaners y Gymru Newydd) is nothing new and I’ve had similar experiences to many I’m sure, like those of Mike Parker becoming a magnet for anti-Welsh, (and quite possibly also racist) bigots who mistake you for someone who is sympathetic to them because you don’t speak with a local accent. I am Welsh, born in Wales, but due to my upbringing I travelled about a lot, so I don’t have a Welsh accent when I speak English, so I know at first hand how big the bigot community is. It’s not huge, but it is significant, (I apologise to those who already are aware of this) and sadly bolstered by a far larger community of incomers who are, at best, negatively indifferent. Sadly, comparatively few fall into a similar mould as Mike Parker. Mike Parker is Welsh as far as I’m concerned. I’ve always dealt with anti-Welsh bigots by ensuring at some point I use the Welsh language is at all possible within their earshot, such as, if in a pub, (and assuming the person serving at the bar is Welsh speaking!) I’ll make a special point of ordering my next drink pointedly in Welsh, or greeting a local acquaintance in Welsh and exchanging pleasantries so that it’s clear that I am fluent in Welsh. It has an amazing effect, as then the bigots know they’ve been unmasked. If they were few in number, it perhaps wouldn’t be such an issue, but they are now sufficient in number, and have been so for many years where almost all local societies become the Welsh equivalent of expat societies on the Costa del Sol – locals tolerated, so long as they don’t insist on speaking their native language. I know not all English people are colonialist bigots, and it’s always refreshing when it’s people like Mike Parker who take these kinds of bigots to task.
Plaid Cymru needs to learn the lessons of the SNP and not shy away from the independence issue. It’s not the independence issue that makes people wary of voting for Plaid, but their embarassing avoidance of the issue. For how long is it now that Plaid has enjoyed significant support in places like the Rhondda, Caerffili and Merthyr? Some 40 + years since it started to garner sufficient votes to seriously worry Labour. It’s time that Plaid stopped worrying about being too Welsh, and got on with the business of making Wales a decent place to be, and I don’t see that it can make any inroads until it really starts to go for Welsh Labour’s jugular, which it has singularly failed to do. I know that many on here no longer view Plaid very highly, and I can’t say that I have a great deal of faith in them (I left in disgust when Lord Trawsfynydd B, (AKA Dic Sion Dafydd Elis Thomas) entered the House of Lords) but realistically it’s about the only choice we’ve got in the short term. In Scotland many people who do not consider themselves in any way nationalist vote for the SNP because the SNP works for all the people of Scotland, and crucially delivers. What has Plaid done?
I like your observation “In Scotland many people who do not consider themselves in any way nationalist vote for the SNP”. whereas in Wales, of course, many nationalists will not vote for Plaid Cymru.
I believe we are at the stage where a great many Welsh people, of differing political outlooks, have come to a number of roughly similar conclusions.
1/ Wales is organised and run as a colony of England.
2/ Unsurprisingly, Wales is being systematically colonised by a population movement from England.
3/ Among other effects, this colonisation is destroying Welsh as a living, community language and, more generally, Welsh identity and sentiment in large parts of the country is being eroded.
4/ Making it clear that devolution is a sham, or a deception.
5/ Plaid Cymru is not the answer to any of the above problems.
6/ Yet unless there is strong and determined opposition to Wales’ colonial status then Wales as a distinct and vibrant entity is doomed.
7/ So where do we go from here?
Jac, you’re not half as clever as you like to think.
You see, your quote of Parker’s article is key to your argument but you’ve chosen to fiddle with it to help that argument. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume it was an innocent mistake. Many would assume it was deliberate.
You quoted Parker thus:
“To some extent, rural Wales has become the British equivalent of the American mountains (that are) inhabited by a sprinkling of paranoid conspiracy theorists, gun-toting Final Solution crackpots and anti-government obsessives”
You added the two words: “that are”, into the article, within brackets. I’m not suggesting that you are claiming Parker included those words originally, it’s clear that you’ve added them yourself and I’m not saying otherwise, but the addition of those words that Parker didn’t use in that particular sentence is extremely important, because it changes the literal meaning of what he wrote.
Let’s step back completely from what he MEANT – let’s focus on what he wrote!
So, the way he wrote it was:
“To some extent, rural Wales has become the British equivalent of the American mountains, inhabited by a sprinkling of paranoid conspiracy theorists, gun-toting Final Solution crackpots and anti-government obsessives”.
Alas, with the absence of the words you inserted to help him out, the sentence can read literally that Wales has become “inhabited by a sprinkling of paranoid conspiracy theorists, gun-toting Final Solution crackpot and anti-government obsessives”.
It can also be read literally in the way that you interpret it by the addition of those two words.
So, the sentence is open to interpretation, that’s my point.
I had a think to myself why you would have added in those words of your own, where there was once a comma. (See the book Eats, Shoots and Leaves.)
I concluded that the reason you added those words is because you want to make it clear to your readers – either inadvertently or because you were subjecting them to your own biased views – that Parker wrote unequivocally that it was the AMERICAN MOUNTAINS that were full of the gun toting etc etc and not Wales!
But he didn’t write that. He may have meant that. He may even have mean to write that, but he didn’t write that.
You are just assuming he did, rightly or wrongly, I make no judgement.
However, you would never be such a hypocrite, to assume what the writer meant, would you?
For, just a few lines earlier, you wrote “once people start guessing what writers meant, then accusers are on very shaky legal ground”.
Talk about setting yourself up for a fall, Jac lad.
Oh, and the irony hasn’t escaped me that you place a lot of store on the Cambrian News putting words in commas.
If they had put them in brackets you couldn’t really complain. Could you?
To follow your line of reasoning, Parker stated categorically that there ARE encampments, stockades, of armed, English Nazis in rural Wales. He neither said that nor implied it, he merely made a reference to such groups in the western states of the USA. Only a complete idiot could think that he said or implied that such people were to be found in Wales.
All that being so, it makes the attack on Parker by the Cambrian News a cheap political shot. As for you, if you still believe that Parker – or anyone else – believes the hills are alive with the sounds of gun-toting English Hitler-worshippers then you’re a twat.
Dafis – Leanne’s scriptwriter is Steffan Lewis. Her failure to challenge anyone on immigration to Wales isn’t an oversight – it is a deliberate omission.
The faction which is behind Leanne, and which controls Plaid at the top level, is complicit in the ongoing colonisation of Wales.
That is my opinion, anyway.
That’s also my opinion.
So are you implying that dear old Steff and 1 or 2 others are card carrying members of the “be nice to anyone who might vote Labour” set, who feel that the only way of beating Labour is to capture the “commanding heights” of wishy washy policy and ambiguous postures !
No wonder there are people in Wales who deeply resented the impression that Ms Wood was representing Wales on the TV hot air event, when it should have been stated clearly that she represented Plaid ( or the wing that’s a bit limp & floppy )
But that’s been Plaid’s approach for a few decades, ‘Let’s sidle up to Labour in the hope that voters in the Valleys and elsewhere won’t notice the difference – and then they’ll vote Plaid Cymru!’ The problem has been that when people see little difference there’s no incentive to change.
In Scotland the SNP approach has been, ‘We shall confront Labour head-on and give the Scottish people a real alternative’.
Now let me think, which approach has worked? Hmm, that’s a tough one.
Lefty wankistas!
Yet another shaft of insight from the arch-muppet :
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/apr/18/new-immigrants-must-speak-english-says-miliband
Wonder what Milipede thinks about the proposition that all immigrants to Wales should speak Welsh within , say, 5 years ? Add another 2 years on if they’re also learning to speak English ( which would apply to most Scousers and Brummies ! ) Wonder if Leanne will get the chance to raise these issues with the bug eyed bozzo, is there another TV pissing competition scheduled ? Need to dig up her script writer and feed him some imagination tablets.
Totally agree Dafis, last night was a lost opportunity but given Plaid Cymru’s incredible ability to miss open goals and shoot themselves in the foot, it should hardly come as a shock.
All the sycophantic fawning on social media and UK press coverage for Leanne Wood hasn’t helped Plaid Cymru gain an iota of additional support; they’ll get 3 seats as they have done for the last 40 odd years, I’d laugh if it wasn’t such a tragedy for Cymru.
If I cared and Plaid Cymru were serious about making progress outside the Rhondda having active local parties would be a good start in the rest of the Valleys and cities where majority of the population is, but none of the geniuses running Plaid Cymru get that.
As for the debate Leanne was put in the shade by Nicola Sturgeon for the second time, it was apparent who’s the First Minister and who’s the opposition leader struggling to break through, even gawky Ed Milliband was head and shoulders above her.
Ed is very fortunate that his party retains a significant foundation of “automated” voters pre programmed to vote Labour regardless of what’s on offer. He can’t handle Ms Sturgeon, he appears scared of her assertive nature, and probably hopes that he can avoid doing any kind of “deal” with her because he knows damn well that she will corner him, land some hard combos to head and body, and leave him to Salmond to finish him off ! What a wanker !
This picture is the most depressing image I have seen so far from this election. It shows the ‘Little Women’ fawning over the man they regard as the leader of the ‘progressive’ forces in UK politics. ‘Progressive’! don’t make me laugh. It also tells me that after the elections of May 2016 Plaid Cymru will be propping up another Labour regime down Cardiff docks. This hideous little scene even manages to make Farage look dignified in his isolation. Yet another reminder that Wales needs a true national party. https://jacothenorth.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Little-Women.png
Got to agree with Dafis above that Miliband seemed scared of Sturgeon. When she gave him a bit of welly he looked so uncomfortable, a rictus grin on his face, obviously not used to being dominated by a woman, unlike me and most other Valleys Welshmen I know. His rehearsed replies from probably countless dry runs seemed so predictable. No matter how much he tries to give the impression he’s got (his own) Balls, “Hell yes, I’m tough enough …”, any Welshman could have advised him that when it comes to the crunch, the female of the species is deadlier than the male. And three of them are three times as dangerous. No matter what he spouts about no deals with the SNP, unless he has an overall majority, which will not happen, the formidable Sturgeon, via her Party in Westminster, will run rings around him as part of the price of keeping him in Number 10. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. If the Scots can show us that they can stand up to Westminster and get God knows what in the way of concessions, one day even the compliant Welsh may come to realise there may be something in trying to go it alone. Not in my lifetime though – if ever.
And if Sturgeon isn’t enough to frighten Miliband, lurking in the shadows is the Beast himself!
their enemies in Scotland took to calling them the Krankies some time ago but as a duo they have no match in UK politics for “talent with a hard edge”, although Balls & Cooper will take most of the prizes for just being nasty & utterly insensitive ( as evidenced by capacity for forgetting anything they were party to pre 2010). Would hate to live in their street.
Stupid observation from 1 of the Twitter twits – ” Very anti Scotland statement from Farage! Are UKIP really the ENP – English National Party? #lsege2015 ” Who is this bozo ? That’s a pretty mainstream stance from the Falange.
Has Farage or UKIP ever said or done anything to persuade you that they are anything other than Eng Nat Party ? Course they are, that’s why Wales doesn’t really matter in their grand scheme other than to provide pleasant surroundings for retirement and holidays. And that’s why the UKIP stance is popular among the Anglos already settled here, and the number of quisling natives who want to be seen as Anglos ( Dafydd Iwan’s old song is probably more relevant today than it was way back in 1969 or thereabouts ! )
Leanne Wood had a cracking chance last night to ask Nigel why he was so hung up about immigrants to which he would have given a nice cue for her to respond with a further question about the damage the Anglo Brit colons do to Welsh services, culture and identity. But the girl wasn’t scripted for that kind of duel and failed the opportunity.
Good morning Jac & all
well, well, nothing learned yet judging by behaviours last night. The 3 dames, Sturgeon, Wood and Bennett went all luvvie on Miliband at the end of last night empty vessel competition, blowing kisses and generally stimulating the vomit reaction from any discerning viewer.Yet the Labour muppet had made a barrow load of negative, rejectionist noises and the ladies should have just shunned the bastard just like they did Farage. I dislike Nigel but have to concede that from a solely English Nat standpoint he was leagues ahead on being rational. Of course the Welsh don’t really exist in the Nigel universe, so nothing to gain there other than more colons arriving to enjoy a comfy retirement or hols out west with natives to wait upon them ! Grim choices all round, Jac, but still not tempted by your wrist slashing option.
I’m guessing that “colons” is short for colonizers.
If so it’s an unfortunate abbreviation as it has another meaning and probably, all things considered, it would be better not to use it.
Enough of the smelly stuff is thrown by the Brit nationalist side in elections without handing them some extra on a plate.
well said , anon, I had never made that link before !. However it occurs to me that “colon” is most appropriate as they, our colonizers, tend to give off a bad odour, metaphorically, anyway.
seriously defective bunch in that photo in your twitter quip of earlier today. I think I’ll opt for despair on this occasion and save the wrist slashing until the NHS can deal with it without a 14 day waiting list for emergencies !! I’m getting a positive feeling about this campaign seeing toxic little shits like Owen Smith prancing about spouting his usual patronising drivel. There again apart from Mike Parker I haven’t heard much that arouses genuine optimism.
Certainly interesting times here in Scotland.
Your frightened to believe the polls in case it’s a dream.
Today TNS had the SNP at 52%.
So you look at the online betting and it’s the same.
The safest Labour heartland seats are hanging on by their fingertips or have been lost as it stands at the moment.
If the 45% YES bloc vote SNP, SLAB is gone.
It’s like having a part in a historical film.
And the silence from unionists at street level is deafening.
What can they say, talking about it only gives non unionists the oxygen of publicity.
Btw, the YES people smile.
I can’t deny that I’m jealous, but I still wish you well.
No doubt Scottish Labour is paying a hefty price for jumping into bed with the Tories during the referendum campaign. Also the lies and the scaremongering and the shocking media bias have left a nasty taste in the mouth with many Scottish voters. They feel, quite rightly, bullied and that Labour has betrayed them. Unlike election night in Wales which will be yet again so predictable and depressing I and many others will be watching the results in Scotland with great interest.
The election in Scotland is the one that really matters, because it could decide whether this rancid Union survives.
Ian Si’Ree was a ‘white flighter’ who shunned the multicultural Bradford to set up home in Vale Road, Rhyl and was subsequently jailed for making and possessing over 100 illegal images of child sex abuse. North Wales Police discovered this paedophile by accident when they searched his house. James Si’ree his son, was part of an investigation into the murder of takeaway delivery driver Gabor Sarkozi at Meliden. James Si’Ree and Gary Bland of Bryn Avenue, Rhyl, another racist settler in Wales, were jailed for life for murder in 2012. All of those involved were members of the BNP and Ian was previously their candidate in the Euro elections. Can someone tell me why Mike Parkers observations are wrong? Can someone also tell me why Peter Hain MP and Leighton Andrews AM along with Labour Party spin doctors are denying the existence of these English racists, murderers and paedophiles settled in Wales? Not only were the comments of Mike Parker correct back in 2002, if they’d been acted upon by a Labour Home Secretary who shared he cabinet table with Peter Hain then, these children could have been protected and a hard working delivery driver might still be alive.
I remember reading about the murder of the takeaway delivery driver, he was Hungarian, and I remember wondering at the time about the killers’ backgrounds. But of course, our ‘Welsh’ media would never report that these scumbags were English. People are only identified as English who’ve moved to Wales when there’s a positive story to report. It’s just so obvious how the colonial media is managed.
Leighton Andrews AM is Carwyn Jones’ rottweiler. He saw off the biggest Labour rottweiler that ever graced Neath Port Talbot Council. Carl Seargent AM looks like a thug, but in reality he is seriously a very sweet natured man. Andrews is just the opposite and if he is supporting the pathetic little Tippex man, then Tippex man is safe. Remember, Heinious is yesterday’s man in Wales. He will soon be in the House of Lords probably wearing leopard skin adorned with ivory and not ermine.
I’m delighted to learn that Carl Sargeant is not the ogre he appears, but I’m less concerned with his appearance and his demeanour than with the deplorable policies and planning decisions he has fronted on behalf of the civil servants who run Wales. As for Porky, he’s just another intolerant Labour bully boy. Though I’m still waiting for the details of his conversion from Lib Dem white hope to Labour hatchet man.
A timely and well reasoned article again, Jac.
I hope the people of Ceredigion go on to elect Mike Parker and for the Labour Party candidate preferably to come an abysmal last, even behind UKIP. Oh, and to lose his deposit in the process. We know that politics is a dirty game, especially when there is an election due. However if the final result is close to this scenario it will send out a message that this deliberate and quite despicable smearing of any candidate gets its just desserts from the electorate. The icing on the cake would be for the Cambrian News to become tomorrow’s toilet paper. If only!
When it comes to Labour bigwigs like Leighton Andrews, Peter “bugger me it’s warm in this house” Hain and Alastair Campbell seizing on this story and sticking the knife in further, as much as I detest the duplicitous Campbell, he has seemingly had the good grace to acknowledge he jumped the gun on this one. And apparently, unlike his odious bedfellows Andrews and Hain, he doesn’t bar people from his Twitter account as soon as he comes under fire. Hain as we know will be the first to seize on any use (true or not) of the “N” word. After all it’s a well known fact down here in Neath that he has a lifetime patent on it and will come down like a ton of bricks on anyone who dares use it. The same applies to the words fascist, racist and bigot so be careful, Jac, if you want to use these in any article. Best clear it with his agent first if I were you.
Hell will freeze over before the repugnant Hain has the humility to apologise. Those who have followed his career know he had to apologise to the House of Commons following the failure to declare donations at the time of his disastrous and unsuccessful Deputy Leadership bid. This apology to the House has been conveniently forgotten in his published memoirs, it is as if it never happened. Yet the orange wanker can refer in the same book to Elfyn Llwyd being made to apologise to the House after using parliamentary privilege to name Hain in the alleged peerage offer made to Peter Law (Blaenau Gwent) in 2006. Skin like a bloody rhino but will hopefully be extinct before they are.
I lost all respect for the Labour Party a long time ago, but now they seem to believe that they have a monopoly on truth and everyone else must either be silenced or ignored. If I’d been threatening or offensive to Hain, Andrews and a host of others who’ve blocked me I could understand, I’d do the same. But all I’ve done is contradict them or point out the error in their argument. No wonder so many compare Wales to a one-party state.
Brilliant analysis Jac. Mike Parker Plaid Cymru was attacking racists, while Huw Thomas Labour was inciting vandalism of English cars. Leighton Andrews couldn’t see that? Incredible.
Agreed, but fundamentally, both were addressing the same problem. The problem Plaid Cymru pretends doesn’t exist.
Everybody remembers Question Time when Ieuan Wyn Jones allowed Glenys Kinnock, of all people, to get the better of him regarding the Seimon Glyn affair. Instead of making a pigs ear of it he should have explained to people what was really happening to Welsh rural communities due to the influx of English settlers and why people like Seimon Glyn were protesting. Even today Plaid Cymru sweeps this thorny issue under the carpet. Recently on the televised debate Leanne Wood, to my amazement, said that in Wales immigration wasn’t a problem! My first though was what planet is she on. I’m surprised nobody from the media has asked Plaid Cymru if it has a policy or even an opinion in resolving the problem of inward migration to Welsh speaking rural communities as I, and many others no doubt, would like to know.
For Plaid Cymru, a socialist party, ‘immigration’ is a Left / Right issue, and only ‘racists’ oppose immigration, of any kind. Which is why I guarantee that there are senior figures in Plaid Cymru urging Mike Parker to stay schtum and not make a fuss, even after the election.
Excellent analysis, shame that until we have a real welsh political party and welsh owned media who’ll tackle the issues head on these arguments go round and round with no conclusion, but Labour knows it went too far and is back peddling and they’re not the only ones whose mask slipped last week, BBC Wales is fast becoming a parody of itself.
And while I’m happily cheering the Scots on to Independence and loving the implosion of SLAB as they call it, we need to be on our guard because the iron grip will be tightened in Cymru after May 7th if the SNP do well.
That fear and paranoia is affecting Labour’s Welsh branch as Leighton Andrews and Labour types were happy to promote the false Nicola Sturgeon smears in the Telegraph, think about it a Welsh Labour Government Minister happy promoting a Tory paper and its lies, it’s a pity most can’t or wont see them for what they are. As for Andrews and Chris Bryant they are particularly paranoid about Leanne Wood and Plaid in the Rhondda which might explain the poor judgement, overplayed hand and hysterical overreaction to the Parker ‘revelations’.
As for Cambrian News its ‘excuse’ for the article was that Mike Parker didn’t get them a biography in time so they went looking for info on him online, feeble bullshit even by their standards and I agree with you I’d sue them not just for the slander and to make a point, but to bankrupt them in the process and bury their ‘journalism’.
Feel free to delete if you don’t think it’s appropriate, but for those who want to help Mike Parker, there’s a crowdfunder for him and his campaign team https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/cefnogwch-support-mike-parker-ceredigion#pledges
And your old friend Phil Parry has another world exclusive this week about splits at senior level in Plaid Cymru over backing for Mike Parker, more tawdry Labour spin from their puppet, i bet his mam is proud.
I’ve been arguing for a while now that the only political game in town is the Union, but this presents the Unionist parties with major problems. First, to avoid making it too obvious how worried they are about the SNP and thereby giving the SNP too much publicity. Second, how do Tories and Labour fight an election in Englandandwales pretending it’s a normal election, and they’re bitter enemies, when in reality this election is all about the Union, an issue on which they are totally agreed.
Even in a headline, is not the journalistic convention that anything between inverted commas is a direct quotation?
That is my understanding, which would mean that the Cambrian News stated that Mike Parker did call people Nazis.
There is nothing quite like the zeal of the converted. Mike Parker, who still has a tinge of a Midland accent when he speaks English, is one of those converts. A thoroughly agreeable and ‘healthy’ individual, who, because of his healthy unbiased view of the situation in rural Wales – when he first chose to come to live here – saw that the emperor was indeed naked in his new clothes, and he had the backbone to espouse in writing what he saw through a clear lensed pair of spectacles worn by a neutral incomer.
I still feel deeply indebted to Parker for the way he stood up for people like Seimon Glyn & I along with many others back in 2002. He joined Cymuned, and even went to the effort of turning up for a televised debate at that time in the studio in Caernarfon, which was basically an attempt at badger baiting by the BBC during the furore following comments I had made (whilst I was a Palid Cymru vice president) during Eisteddfod week in Dinbych, when I said publicly that Wales was indeed a reflection of what was happening in Montana, where ‘oddballs, social misfits & society dropouts’ fled to escape what they hated in their own society, namely racially different people within their communities in the cities. In other words it was the flight of the racist ‘whites’. Mike Parker, because of his detectable English accent noticed that these racists would approach him in pubs and the like to give vent to their poison, in the mistaken belief that he would be supportive of their views. He wasn’t, and made it known publicly through what he wrote. the sad thing for those ‘white flight’ incomers back then was that they had not in their ignorance realised that what they were escaping to was something else that they had not bargained for!
I well remember when Parker was invited to make a comment during that debate, the audible sharp intake of breath was tangible, when he started by declaring that he was an English incomer, and then went on to attack the attacks made on us (the ones labelled Nazis) followed by his revelation that the real ‘Nazis’ were those of his own race who had landed here. The most audible sharp intake of breath was heard from Naz Malik – who happened to be sitting right next to me, I should have realised then that his fake AWEMA group was nothing but a sham and that he knew nothing about the rights of minorities in their own country. Something he admitted to me when we spoke informally after the programme recording. On the other hand, Mike parker, when I spoke to him, had a refreshing understanding and a good grasp of the reality.
I parted company with Plaid cymru shortly afterward, in disgust over their lack of backbone (they would do well to note the difference between their lily livered approach to these problems when compared to the SNP, who held their nerve and stuck to their guns – especially on the subject of independence. Today you can see the contrasting results in the two parties).
I will vote for Mike Parker in the forthcoming elections – if only as a quiet mark of appreciation, and the return of a favour. I have not voted for Plaid Cymru since 2002, and can’t bring myself around to vote for any other ‘British’ party since then, so my vote has been gathering dust in sunny Aberaeron!
However I fear for Mike Parker’s future within his party. If he dares defend his past statements he will most likely discover a twelve inch knife ‘parked’ in his spine, bearing the embossed emblem of a yellow poppy emblazoned on it’s handle (yellow being a very appropriate colour to represent the knife’s owners).
Good comment, Gwilym. A lot of people need to be reminded that we’ve been here before with this ‘racist’ bollocks, it’s what happened to you and Seimon Glyn. And it has worked. Plaid Cymru is now so terrified of raising the subject that our enemies feel they can get away with anything. Though it could be that they’ve been too cocky by linking Mike Parker with the ‘Nazi’ smear because any analysis of what he wrote makes clear what he actually said, and what – I believe – he meant.
It will be interesting to see what the Cambrian News runs this week, because my guess is that they have to backtrack to some degree. The retraction by Alistair Campbell and the excellent piece by Martin Shipton cannot be ignored. And I would guess that there have been other protests of which we know little.
Which is why if I was Mike Parker I would sue the fuck out of the Cambrian News, especially if he was to lose by less than a thousand votes. Not simply for the money, but in the hope of establishing the origin of the smear. But then, knowing Plaid Cymru – with so many skeletons in its cupboard – he will probably be dissuaded from ‘making a fuss’ – that worst of all crimes for some Welsh.
more fur flying this morning with Red Tories moaning that loads of the Blue Tory candidates in Wales are living in remote parts of England. Oh tut ! At least these Blues are more open in their desire to colonise and control whereas the Red Tories are still wrapping themselves in some faux Welsh identity when it suits them, but put a real issue in front of them and they’re off shouting “racist, racist ! not inclusive boo hoo “! or some similar juvenile mantra.
Already getting bored with these muppets sounding off. It’s a shame that most of the electorate are not taking in the nature of the noise the clowns are making and take poitive steps to ensure they don’t get elected.
The only real difference nowadays between Tories and Labour is that the Tories are more honest. They don’t promise one thing in Wales and vote for the opposite up in London. They can get away with this because the mainstream media, the Brit Unionist media in Wales, gives them an easy ride.