Tag: Hillary Clinton

The Slide Into Authoritarianism ‘To Defend Democracy’

On By JacIn Brexit, Europe, European Union, Globalism, Housing, Housing Associations, Plaid Cymru, Racism, Russia, Senedd, Ukraine, USA, World Economic ForumLeave a comment

There’s a saying wrongly attributed to an old Chinese sage that runs, ‘May you live in interesting times’. Well, we do; and just as phoney as the provenance of that maxim are the statements we’re fed daily by our politicians and their media.

Much of what follows may be updates of what’s gone before; but I increasingly suspect the Western world is approaching a dénouement. That scene at the end of a murder mystery, when everyone is gathered in the drawing room, and all is revealed.

To start, I shall concentrate on our new prime minister, Andy Burnham, whose mounting problems make me think he might soon be gone like his predecessor . . . what was his name?

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THE APPOINTED ONE

Andy Burnham, ‘King of the North’, formerly mayor of Manchester.

As we all know, Burnham was not elected by the people, he was voted into No 10 by the Labour party. Not that the party’s MPs had much say in it, much less party members. Burnham’s coronation was arranged by the Fabian Society, acting for the Globalist network of which the Fabians are a part.

Burnham is already running into trouble. Let’s look at reasons for his difficulties.

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First, he inherited the plan to bring back blasphemy laws – abolished in 2008 – but only for Islam. There had been pressure for some years to introduce anti-blasphemy laws to counter ‘Islamophobia’, but Conservative governments had rightly been cautious.

The election of Labour with a huge majority in July 2024 gave the campaign renewed impetus. In November 2024 Labour MP Tahir Ali set the process moving again. With someone cleverly wording his proposal to call for:

 . . . measures to prohibit the desecration of all religious texts and the prophets of the Abrahamic religions?

The ‘Abrahamic religions’ are Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The ‘People of The Book’. But nobody was fooled.

Suspicions justified by the Labour government formally adopting an official definition of ‘anti-Muslim hostility’ in March. Which soon ran into criticism.

The government’s own counter-terror advisor, Jonathan Hall, has said that the proposed definition could ‘inhibit’ criticisms of Islam. ‘How far are people going to be allowed to push definition effectively in their own political interests?’, he asked. There is no doubt that this is precisely what activists will do. They will try to use this definition to restrict what can be said about Islam.

Inevitably, critics started asking how the government had arrived at the definition. Who advised the politicians? Who supplied evidence? And now it started getting murky.

Initially, the government said it had destroyed all the relevant documents. This would have been illegal. But when pressure was maintained, a civil servant answering to Angela Rayner, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, admitted the documentation did exist – but nobody was allowed to see it!

It’s safe to assume that laws against ‘Islamophobia’ were demanded and framed by Islamists.

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Second, and just last month, Burnham himself announced to the United Nations:

a new national centre to tackle disinformation and deepfakes from hostile states such as Russia . . . saying the government had a duty to “stem the poisonous tide” from damaging British interests.

Note that Russia is singled out. With no other country mentioned. Maybe setting the stage for his next delivery of performance politics.

By the way, ‘misinformation’ is anyone challenging the Globalist narrative. Whether it’s the climate crisis, Covid, DEI, open borders, CRT, gender woo-woo, etc. And it includes the alleged danger posed to us all by Russia.

Next, after his UN gig, and after regularly trailing the idea of closer co-operation with the EU, Burnham announced that it was “Russian interference” wot gave us Brexit . . . but then he started back-tracking.

If Russia did not influence the result of the Brexit referendum, then why resurrect complete bullshit dismissed years ago by the intelligence services? And why kick off this series of performances at the UN? And why single out Russia?

Then, last week, the head of MI5 seemed to slap Burnham down.

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And how can we overlook Burnham’s relationship with the owners of Manchester City? Even though Man of the People Burnham is an Everton supporter he has strong links with Citeh’s Abu Dhabi owners from his time as mayor of Manchester.

For those who’ve been living under a stone . . . it’s alleged the club’s owners funded Man City’s recent success illegally, often through massive sponsorship deals where the bulk of the funding came not from the stated sponsors but from other entities controlled by the owners.

But it didn’t end with football. Because it’s further alleged that in his role as mayor Burnham gave the oil-rich Arabs sweetheart property deals. With complaints over many years by other developers saying they’d been excluded from the tender process.

Here again, Burnham is struggling with the truth, and backtracking. With the suggestion that he might now be using his power as PM to cover up what he might have done when mayor, and to protect the Man City owners.

Even changing official records.

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As if to prove how gaffe prone he is, just a few days ago Burnham had to correct remarks made in the House of Commons in which he referred to the man accused of Ann Widdecombe’s murder as “the man responsible for the murder“. Thereby undermining the accused’s presumption of innocence, and possibly prejudicing the upcoming trial.

Could it have been deliberate?

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But all is not lost – for democracy will be saved by abolishing the need for voters to show photo ID. Straight out of the US Democrats’ playbook – allow illegal and undocumented immigrants to vote.

It looks as if the Globalists should have done a little more research before putting their latest puppet into No 10. He’s turning out to be a disaster for them.

But to cheer you up, the word in the corridors of power is that if Burnham is dumped – he’ll be replaced by Ed Miliband!

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WHY RUSSIA?

These silly allegations against Russia remind me of what the USA went through in 2016, within days of Trump winning the presidential elections.

A campaign led by the defeated candidate Hillary Clinton and former president Barack Obama, and involving the agency behind the JFK assassination, tried to salvage something from that defeat. Tying up the Trump administration for years defending itself against allegations with no substance.

Not even those making the allegations believed them. But that wasn’t the point.

Make the allegations, and with media support guaranteed, just keep repeating the lies and the media will do the same. But it got worse.

To ensure Trump wasn’t re-elected in 2020 the Democrats mounted ludicrous prosecutions, even attempting impeachment. They also rigged the 2020 elections in key states and Democrat-run cities like Philadelphia, Detroit, Phoenix and Atlanta.

As Josef Stalin is reported to have said in 1922:

It’s not who votes that counts, it’s who counts the votes.

And so the 2020 elections gave us Joe Biden. A man so obviously unfit for the role that it became painful to watch. Yet the media went along with the official line that despite his gaffes, his incoherent mumbling, his wandering off stages, his falling over, he was still “sharp as a tack“.

‘SHARP AS A TACK’

Even after the disastrous presidential debate in 2024, when Biden lost himself entirely and his wavering voice just trailed off – the media still called it a draw!

So who was really running the USA, and leading the free world between 2020 and 2024? Clue: that period is often referred to as Barack Obama’s third term. And in the past week Obama’s been over here meeting Burnham and others. What can it mean?

Is he planning some kind of government in exile? If so, maybe Obama should watch his step. A former president having talks with foreign governments without the permission of the current resident of the White House could be flirting with treason.

But ain’t Western democracy wonderful? Puppets like Burnham up front, ruthless political operators like Obama controlling them, and then, running the whole shebang from the shadows . . .

But why do the puppets, their handlers, and the media all paint Russia as the bad guy? The easiest way to answer that is to ask why the same people also hate Donald Trump. Because it’s the same answer to both questions.

Neither Putin nor Trump will submit to the Globalists. Understand that and so much else becomes clearer.

Trump is restoring US sovereignty by rejecting supranational organisations like the UN, WHO and, most recently, the ICC. He’s rebuilding the USA as a self-sufficient country that makes things, where money has real-world value.

In Russia, Putin dealt with the oligarchs who were ripping off the country’s wealth with the help of the international financial elites. Russia’s wealth is now Russia’s. And of course, Russia has unexploited natural resources that dwarf those of other countries.

Trump and Putin have become the twin bogeymen for the Globalists, their puppet politicians, the media they control, and their useful idiots of the Woke left.

It’s worth dallying with the media for a second. I often refer to the Uniparty, where squabbling is encouraged to give the proles the impression of choice and the promise of change. But in reality it’s just politicians pushing the same message in different ways. It’s all theatre.

Meanwhile, the proof of Globalist control of UK newspapers – from the Guardian to the Daily Mail – is in their reporting of Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. They speak as one, hostile to both, revealing who controls them.

Telling us that Russia is not the enemy of the West. Nor is the USA. They are its defenders. As Marcio Rubio reminded us in his speech in Athens.

The enemies of the West are those they’ve been for centuries. Rootless anti-human capital, socialism, and Islam.

But they never before combined. Though it’s unlikely the leftists and the Muslims appreciate who’s using them. Each probably believes they’ll come out on top after they’ve collapsed the West.

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HOW THE WEST IS THREATENED

The West is to be collapsed by a combination of strategies.

First, there’s managed decline through net zero and deindustrialisation. Similar attacks are being mounted against farming and food self-sufficiency. We see it all around us and across Europe.

Second, open borders. Encourage the migration of individuals and groups that it’s known in advance will be no asset to the country and are unlikely to integrate. These will help push up crime and promote social dislocation as well as increasing the welfare budget – until everything collapses.

I’m not making this up. It’s a variation on a theme laid out back in 1966 by a couple of leftist US academics. It even bears their name: The Cloward-Piven Strategy.

It may have been written for the USA in the turbulent 1960s, and envisioned using the black population, but the strategy is applicable elsewhere: Overload a system until it implodes.

In the modified version there’s an element of – and here I’ll use a term I’ve tried to avoid – ‘population replacement’. Which links with something I can’t help returning to – the watershed year of 2016. Brexit in the UK and Trump elected in the USA.

The shock the establishment experienced, and the realisation that the white working class was being ‘lost’, meant that a new voter base was needed. Which then explains the 2018 UN Global Compact on Refugees.

Today we see that Compact in operation – but not in the USA since Trump took over from whoever was working Biden.

But if you bring in millions of people then you must promise them – in addition to benefits – somewhere to live. And now it gets perhaps a little darker. As we saw in a recent exchange in the Senedd.

When Reform suggested locals should have priority when it came to social housing Kiera Marshall of Plaid Cymru giggled her way through a response.

We heard a Plaid Cymru SM argue that Welsh people should be discriminated against in their own country. You can dress it up in ‘progressive’ word salads, but that’s what it amounts to. So who is Kiera Marshall, SM for Caerdydd Penarth?

She says she’s from Townhill, but she’s not really from The Hill. For both parents, of the social worker/’progressive’ type, had moved to Swansea. And Kiera herself, went to the London School of Economics (LSE), founded of course by the Fabian Society.

Lot of kids from The Hill go to the LSE.

Note that she doesn’t claim to have experienced inequality, just observed it; maybe like some 19th century anthropologist studying a tribe of interesting primitives. For Kiera is just another middle class girlie telling us what to think, and how to behave.

Why is Kiera Marshall in Plaid Cymru? What sort of party has Plaid Cymru become to have one of its politicians advocating discrimination against working class Welsh people? Maybe the clue lies in the term ‘working class’.

But why do I even mention Kiera Marshall?

Some forty years ago, during the Meibion Glyndŵr arson campaign against holiday homes, I argued that depriving young local people of somewhere to live, somewhere to raise a family, was a form of birth control.

A similar case could be made today if non-native groups are given priority for housing over local people in their own communities. But as I say, I’m reluctant to get into talk of ‘population replacement’.

But it’s increasingly difficult to dismiss.

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CONCLUSION

We’re at a stage where the enemies of the West know they’re lying, we know they’re lying, they know we know they’re lying, but they don’t seem to care. Which could be interpreted as a sign of confidence . . . or desperation.

I believe it’s the latter. There are so many little clues. One was footballers over the weekend being made to ‘take the knee’ again. Has there been a big surge in racism? Then there’s Obama’s visit.

And of course, there’s been constant talk of war with Russia; because those I’m writing about know their time is running out, and thought war could save them and their project. This is why I say they’re ‘anti-human’.

Over in the USA, they’ll have the mid-term elections next month. Normally, the party of the president loses ground in the mid-terms, sometimes badly. But this time, as the realisation grows that the Democrats have been infiltrated – if not taken over – by Marxists and Islamists, the Republicans might do better than expected.

But of course opinion polls, and MSM pundits, are predicting a hammering for Trump and his party. Funny that, innit? Though almost predictable.

The images of the French riots won’t help the Democrats.

If anybody thinks those riots, the arson and looting, are about schoolkids not having enough textbooks, then you need to slap yourself. Hard.

Having their plan of war with Russia rejected by the people of Europe, knowing the US Cavalry won’t come riding over the hill, and seeing the EU rejected by the rise of the national sovereignty right, the Globalists might conclude that destroying Europe from within is the only option left in the time still available to them.

Which again, I find encouraging. Reinforcing my belief that the crunch is coming; everybody’s gathering in the drawing room, paying attention, and the enemies of the West will soon be exposed.

♦ end ♦

© Royston Jones 2026

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President Donald J Trump, a statement

On By JacIn Middle East, USA, World48 Comments

It’s no secret that I supported the election of Donald J Trump in 2016.

That was for a number of reasons; not least because I identified with the people who supported Trump, the forgotten Americans; and because the thought of Hillary Clinton in the White House, spewing forth her well-practised brand of venomous liberal hypocrisy, filled me with revulsion.

Even so, I was never blind to Trump’s failings. For not even his most fawning acolyte would describe him as an intellectual, or a man of great moral integrity. But I put these reservations aside in the interests of the greater good, which for me meant reversing the trends of recent decades that are nothing but – to adapt Clausewitz – communism by other means, in their attempts to undermine the very fabric of the West.

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Even in 2016 I wished that the candidate to have emerged from the Republican hustings and primaries had been a more worthy and inspiring beneficiary of the zeitgeist, and less liable to hinder the West’s return to sanity. But we were delivered Trump, and I accepted it, kept my mouth shut. Since then, on the many occasions when I’ve thought he was wrong, I still stayed silent.

This silence has become increasingly difficult to maintain for a number of reasons. One being that in the age of the internet and social media a blowhard and a buffoon has fewer places to hide. Especially when he chooses to issue pronunciamentos via Twitter.

I would never have believed that a tweet could convey such bombast, such sheer fucking stupidity, with such frightening clarity.

You have to remind yourself that this is not some acne-plagued youth who’s a bit pissed off about something – ‘This is the president of the USA!’

Now things have come to a head.

Trump’s decision to give the green light to an Islamist dictatorship to attack the West’s most reliable ally in the Middle East crosses a line. I can no longer bite my tongue. God knows the Kurds have suffered long enough at the hands of their many enemies, and they have been betrayed by the West more than once. By France and Britain after the Great War and more recently by one or more of Trump’s predecessors.

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And now by Donald J Trump 45th president of the United States of America himself.

What Trump fails to understand is that the influence of the USA and the West is not solely reliant on economic power and military might, there must also be a moral dimension. It means doing the right thing, and standing by your friends and allies is doing the right thing.

Even when a people or a country are not necessarily our friends we should still not be blind to their plight. Trade deals with China should never mean ignoring the ethnocide being practised against Tibetans and Uighurs. And in seeking arms sales to and oil exports from Gulf states we must not ignore humanitarian considerations within those states and the wider region.

But if US foreign policy remains determined by Wall Street and whether dictators and mass murderers are ‘our bastards‘ then we are in trouble.

The final straw for me came when Trump defended his decision to throw the Kurds to the Turkish wolves by arguing that the Kurds weren’t on the beaches of Normandy in June 1944! It was then that I decided I can no longer stay silent.

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Only a complete idiot could have made such a remark. Perhaps tomorrow he’ll rebuke the Kurds for not riding to Custer’s rescue at the Little Big Horn.

The Kurds are not simply fighting for themselves, they are defending Arabs, both Muslim and Christian, plus of course the Yazidi population that ISIS tried to destroy by butchery and enslavement. Which brings us to the ISIS fighters that the Kurds defeated and now hold, with their families, in a number of camps.

Turkey’s attitude to ISIS has always been ambivalent. Many thousands of foreign fighters from Europe and elsewhere were allowed to cross Turkey unhindered to join ISIS. If Turkey’s invasion proves responsible for bringing ISIS back to life then that really would be some legacy for Donald J Trump.

Trump is now an embarrassment for the USA and the West, and it’s time we were rid of him. But it must not be done by impeachment, which would be a victory for the wrong side. Trump must be removed, or his power curtailed, by his own side in order to salvage something from his disastrous presidency.

I still stand with those who elected Trump in 2016, the forgotten Americans. I am still committed to the struggle against the enemies of the West, both internal and external. And I look forward to more success in the future, but that success can now only be realised without Donald J Trump.

♦ end ♦

 

Weapons of Mass Deception

On By JacIn British Nationalism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Devolution, English Nationalism, European Union, History, Labour Party, Plaid Cymru, Third Sector, Welsh Government144 Comments

Well, boys and girls, it’s that time of year. Those of you who haven’t done a runner with the Christmas Club money will be relaxing at home wrapping your bottles of Old Sheepshagger with festive ribbons before immediately opening them, feigning joy and surprise, then getting quietly pissed. For now, as Christmas approaches, we tend to look back and contemplate the year past, before looking forward to 2017. Why should I break with tradition?

This year saw the revolt of the Hitherto Ignored, and 2017 will see those who’ve done the ignoring swear to change their ways. This is explained by the angst and confusion now being experienced by ‘progressives’. (I laugh every time I type that word!) For these exalted and superior beings always justified their vacuous spoutings and their laughable posturing on the grounds that they were the voice of the inarticulate Mob.

This year the Mob has found its own voices and, surprise, surprise, its spokesmen are not Leftists and liberals. Which means that those self-appointed spokespersons are now left high and dry, exposed as speaking for none but themselves. This has made them angry and bitter, to the extent that some of them now slag off as ‘fascists’ those they so very recently eulogised and patronised!

Truly is it written, ‘Hell hath no fury like a ‘progressive’ made to look an utter twat!’

Let us start this review with May’s Welsh Assembly elections. (Check the results here.) Labour’s share of the vote continued to decline, down 7.6% in the constituencies and 5.4% in the regions). The Tories did marginally better with figures of -3.9% and -3.7%. For the Lib Dems the figures were -2.9% and -1.6%. The parties to increase their share of the vote were Plaid Cymru +1.3% and +3.0% and, most spectacularly, Ukip, +12.5% and +8.5%.

Despite all the noise they make, and all the publicity they’ve had (including some from me), the Green Party of Englandandwales achieved the mighty totals of 2.5% of the constituency vote and 3.0% of the regional vote. The latter figure being less than the 4.4% won by the Abolish the Welsh Assembly Party on its first outing.

The single most noteworthy result was of course Plaid Cymru’s leader Leanne Wood taking Rhondda from Labour heavyweight Leighton Andrews. Though given the imperfect electoral system Labour today is still in control of the Assembly after getting a third of the votes cast.

For anyone interested, I told you my voting intentions in Assembly Elections 2016 and picked through the bones in Assembly Elections 2016: Hopes and Ashes.

Next came the EU referendum in June. Again, I made my position clear before the event with EU Referendum: Why I Want OUT! Even so, I was rather surprised to be on the winning side.

Then, in November, our cousins across the Pond elected Donald Trump to be their next president. I can safely say ‘our cousins’ because, as Welsh people, there is a greater likelihood of us being related to those who voted for Trump than to those who voted for Clinton. Unpalatable though that may be to many Leftists among us.

Meanwhile, our continental cousins almost elected a nationalist president in Austria, and followed that up by giving the Italian establishment a kicking in voting out Signor Renzi via a referendum.

Liberals and socialists interpreted these results as disasters, some of the more overwrought viewed them as the first steps on the road to the Fourth Reich. In truth, the Leftists should have asked themselves why so many millions of ordinary, decent people detest them, their politics, their media and their distant, out-of-touch systems so much that they were prepared to vote for a self-obsessed buffoon, a gang of saloon bar hearties, and a clown.

Next year sees elections in France, Germany, Netherlands and other countries. In France, the Left is hoping that the victor will be François Fillon, the presidential candidate who takes a hard line on Islam, hopes to do away with the 35-hour working week, wants to abolish wealth tax, is opposed to abortion and same-sex marriage, and is a great admirer of both Margaret Thatcher and Vladimir Putin. Because it’s a straight fight between him and Marine le Pen of the Front National.

This gives you some idea of how far the political pendulum has swung in the Western world, because socialists in France wrote off the chances of their candidate – whoever it might be – a long time ago.

In Germany Dr Merkel (or Frau Sauer) is under pressure for a number of reasons, not least her decision to open Germany’s borders to refugees. It went well for a while, German guilt for WWII overcoming reasonable apprehensions that most of those arriving seemed to be able-bodied young men and were not coming from Iraq and Syria, but from North Africa, the Sahel, Pakistan, the Balkans . . . mmm, were these really refugees?

The ‘Willkommenskultur’ soon began to dissipate, and disappeared almost entirely after the truth eventually leaked – despite the best efforts of politicians, police and media – about the rapes and other sexual assaults that took place on New Year’s Eve in Köln, Hamburg and other cities. The recent attack on a Christmas market in Berlin dealt it another blow.

Another factor contributing to the evaporating sympathy for the ‘refugees’ was that Angela Merkel had hoped to take them in, garner the kudos, and then, with rather less publicity, offload as many as she could onto neighbouring countries. These countries, quite rightly said, ‘You invited them, you look after them’.

Immigration is clearly a major issue in the Western world; it has influenced the votes of 2016 and it will do the same in 2017. So let us be thankful that calling someone a ‘racist’ can no longer close down debate. Equally, that wanting an honest discussion on how to deal with Islamic terrorism can no longer be dismissed as ‘Islamophobia’.

I suspect that the rise of Islamic extremism over the past couple of decades has played a big part in undermining the Left in western countries, and this of course contributed to Brexit and the election of Donald Trump. For two main reasons.

First, the Left – certainly its more extreme and vocal elements – has a default position dictating that it must always support the West’s enemies, on the grounds that these are bound to be victims of Western colonialism or ‘oppression’. Pure evil, intolerance, racism, etc., are crimes of the white man, and the white man alone.

Those promoting this nonsense tend to be celebrities, students (and others equally gullible or brainwashed), plus of course members of ethnic and other minorities. This has inevitably alienated many white people, to the point where they now view socialism and liberalism as ‘luxuries’ they cannot afford, or else as viewpoints hostile to them, attacking who and what they are.

Second, in the recent US presidential election liberals and Leftists around the world rallied to Hillary Clinton, yet her financial links with the Gulf states – countries where stoning is practised, where women aren’t allowed to drive, where immigrant labour equals slave labour – undermined her liberal credentials while exposing the gullibility of the ‘progressives’ who supported her.

Slowly but surely, more and more people are waking up to the hypocrisies of the liberal elite, and the lies of its manipulative media. You can’t fool all of the people all of the time.

‘But what has this to do with Wales?’, you mumble through a mouthful of mulled wine whilst absent-mindedly stroking the maid’s derrière. Well, it’s quite simple – do you really think that politicians and their mainstream media only tell porkies about faraway lands and our more distant cousins? Of course not.

First of all, let’s consider this island known as Britain or, when six counties of Ulster are added, the United Kingdom. Now the big political debate at the moment is what kind of Brexit we should have. Should it be hard or soft? Should it be red, white and blue? (Don’t ask me what these mean, I haven’t got a clue.) Should there be a West End musical version?

The truth is that the type and the timing of the EU exit is irrelevant, a distraction. I say that because the United Kingdom is going down the tubes no matter what. And if things are bad in the UK then they’re even worse in Wales. Let’s look at a couple of recent news items to explain what I mean.

First, education. The Pisa rankings (for 2015) released earlier this month tell us that the UK came 27th in maths, 22nd in reading, and 15th in science. Within the UK, Wales came bottom across the board.

Then last week, we learnt that our GVA figure for 2015 again confirms our position at the bottom of the UK heap. Gross value added figures measures money generated per job within an area, which explains why Cardiff has the best figure for Wales (£22,783), though much of it will have been generated by commuters living outside the city. Overall, Wales accounts for 5% of the UK population but is responsible for only 3.4% of the UK economy.

As the report I linked to (by BBC Wales’ Sarah Dickens) also tells us, “It would be wrong to say Wales has a strong economy purely because unemployment is relatively low. Only 72.9% are employed – lower than the UK figure of 74.4%”. Which tells us that Welsh politicians crowing over Wales having a lower unemployment rate than the UK as a whole are talking their usual bollocks. The truth is that more of us are economically inactive and too many of us are doing shitty, low paid jobs.

These dire figures don’t say a lot for devolution, nor for ‘Welsh’ Labour, which has run the show since 1999. Things are bad, and getting worse. There is no other interpretation unless you’re a politician or some other kind of professional liar. These figures also tell us that the EU funding given to the poorest parts of Wales since 2000 has been wasted by ‘Welsh’ Labour. So it won’t be missed.

(22.12.2016: I didn’t expect support from this quarter, or so quickly, but Victoria Winckler of the Bevan Foundation says – among other things – that too much EU money was used to replace UK government, ‘Welsh’ government and local authority funding, with the result that, because it wasn’t spent on new projects, people saw little improvement.)

But then, I’ve always argued that devolution is a chimera. Now I have been vindicated by no less than the Secretary of State for Wales, Alun Cairns. When he announced that Air Passenger Duty would not be devolved to Wales (i.e. Cardiff airport) he was quite open about the decision having been taken to protect the interests of Bristol and other English airports. This, remember, is the Secretary of State for Wales and the MP in whose constituency we find Cardiff airport!

More recently, more honesty; when his department underwent something of a face-lift and dropped the dragon which had suggested the Welsh Office exists to serve Wales. Why anyone should get worked up about this is beyond me. Would you rather be lied to? Is that more comforting?

Face it – Wales is screwed, good and proper. All that matters is that enough money comes in to keep the politicians and their cronies in jobs that no one would miss, and the rest of us in a state of resigned acceptance. A basket case country with a begging bowl ‘economy’. Nothing will improve because there is no force for real change. Plaid Cymru gave up decades ago and threw in its lot with the English Left and the colonialist system.

The party’s position was summed up recently by leader Leanne Wood, when she stated, without any hint of irony or sarcasm, that “We’ve got no problem in attracting people here to retire” (0:31) before going on to express concern about the high levels of elderly people in Wales!

Which means that Plaid Cymru has “no problem” with the inevitable burden placed on our NHS and other services. Or that Plaid Cymru has “no problem” with locals being outbid for homes in rural and coastal areas. I suppose it also means that Plaid Cymru has “no problem” with the anglicisation of Wales. But what it really means is that Plaid Cymru, more than at any time in its history, is a party that has completely lost its way. It is now an irrelevance.

For a start, Plaid Cymru has lost touch with the Welsh people. We voted to leave the EU, yet Plaid Cymru carries on as if we voted the same way as Scotland. We didn’t. And the reason we didn’t is that Plaid Cymru isn’t even a pale shadow of the SNP.

The voters that Plaid has been trying to detach from Labour for decades – in the Valleys, on Swansea Bay, the north east – voted for Brexit and they are also turning to Ukip, yet Plaid is in denial. Plaid Cymru the socialist, environmentalist, statist, EU friendly party has lost the plot. Big time.

And because Plaid Cymru has lost the plot due to its socialism and its inflexibility on certain issues, and because some within the party now regard as crypto-fascists many of those who were once viewed as potential converts, they risk driving many of our people towards Ukip and, worse, alienating them to the extent that they begin to think there is no alternative to Englandandwales.

In many respects, Plaid Cymru is now viewed as part of the out-of-touch, liberal elite that drove so many people into the arms of Farage, Trump, and others yet to arise. That is some achievement.

Which is why Wales needs a new voice that speaks for the nation and the national interest. A voice that is ideologically flexible but immovable in its defence of the Welsh people. A voice that will never say, ‘We have no objection to being colonised’.

This is the task for 2017.

Nadolig Llawen a Blwyddyn Newydd Dda