Do not ask for whom the bell tolls…….
It tolls for thee, yeoman of the land of Magna Carta.
Whilst you slumbered last night, and in the many months before, the sinister shape of Directive 2006/24/EC crept into your lives and stole your freedom and your privacy.
Would it have made any difference if this burglar had worn a striped jumper and carried a bag marked ’swag’ ? – probably not, for you slept soundly, happily believing that if you voted for a new government – when someone else got round to organising an election, when someone else handed out leaflets, when someone else hired a loud speaker and toured your streets – if you put your cross on a different name, you could go on with your cosy life, untroubled.
You were quite happy to believe that it really wasn’t your concern.
You ‘tutted’ over that ‘racist mob’ the BNP. You ‘clucked’ at the alarmist stories in the Daily Mail. You ‘grumbled’ when you found your litter bin installed with a tracker device. Then you went on and re-mortgaged your house, marvelled at your good fortune, ran up your credit card, bought a new car, bought those ridiculous shoes that you couldn’t walk in, and settled down to watch reality TV. You may even have turned on the computer and read some of the blogs, ‘clucked’ again at the comments, and departed, never bothering to leave your point of view.
Never standing up to be counted. It wasn’t really your concern.
Someone else would sort it out for you. Someone else would make a fool of themselves, demanding smaller government, demanding to be left alone to organise their own life, supporting the Libertarian Party, being seen as a ‘conspiracist’.
Today it’s too late.
Today 52% of the population is dependent on retaining a Labour government for the very food in their bellies. Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas.
Today the government spend 43% of your wages on supporting, amongst other things, that 52% of the population.
Today the government has hung a debt of £33,000 round the neck of each of your children.
Today, Directive 2006/24/EC means that the government will be monitoring every e-mail you send, every friend you make on the ubiquitous Facebook, every mobile phone call you make, every time you log onto this or any other web page.
You can’t even ‘tut’ and ‘grumble’ amongst yourselves in private any more.
Now who will stand up to be counted?
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1
April 6, 2009 at 11:45 am -
I would like to stand up and be counted………unfortunately it is a bit difficult to do so in these ridiculous shoes that I have bought.
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2
April 6, 2009 at 12:17 pm -
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/site/en/oj/2006/l_105/l_10520060413en00540063.pdf
I have been reading through the details of the plan, very scary indeed. I would be interested to know how many staff have access to this data on a regular basis and is it being analysed for key words such as “terrorism” and “bombs”. Have you ever seen Enemy of the State? It is like they lifted the script and turned it into law minus the ending which I thought was meant to caution us about the dangers of having such a powerful surveillance state with little oversight. But what can we do?
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3
April 6, 2009 at 12:34 pm -
4
April 6, 2009 at 12:59 pm -
I suppose I still cling on to this childish ideal that most people get into politics because they want to make the world, starting where they get elected, a better place. I can actually imagine people laughing reading this but why does it seem like so few people even have an idea of how badly we are being represented. I can count the number of politicians I believe do a good job on one hand but is that their fault or the structure itself that prevents them from making any real difference. They say the only way to change the system is from the inside but becoming part of any system invariably changes the person.
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5
April 6, 2009 at 2:33 pm -
If you need any bells tolling, I’m your boy.
I can’t say more because Special Branch are on to me.
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6
April 6, 2009 at 2:34 pm -
If you are in London Zak then come help me out Im the Libertarian party candidate for Hornsey and Wood green Come help me get rid of Lynne Featherstone… and make me an MP
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7
April 6, 2009 at 2:36 pm -
Having read both the draft UK version of this and the original directive I can’t see any requirement for access to web sites to be logged, it does seem to be restricted to VOIP calls, E-mail and your computers connection to the internet. Other traffic such as accessing web sites doesn’t seem to be logged, also it doesn’t require the creation of additional data so if the ISP isn’t already forcing you through a logging proxy server (transparent or otherwise) there’s no requirement for them to start doing so. Though of course they may decide to change that further down the line, but logging web access can be tricky and if HTTPS is used it becomes a difficult problem.
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8
April 6, 2009 at 2:40 pm -
9
April 6, 2009 at 2:42 pm -
10
April 6, 2009 at 2:58 pm -
It is safe to say that the majority of people in the UK will not do anything about anything unless it hits them directly in their pockets. When their pockets are hit they take the streets. The Poll Tax rebellion is one example of people getting off their arses.
People take their liberty for granted. Like everything else that is taken for granted …………. its value is not realised until it is no longer there.
We lost our judiciary to the Conservative Government in the 1980s and now we have lost our liberty to a Labour Government. There is absolutely no hope for the UK.
In twenty years time the UK will be a group of islands custom-made for the Taliban to slip comfortably into.
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11
April 6, 2009 at 3:13 pm -
Henry North London ………….. I wish you good luck in trying to oust Lynne Fester. I fell out with her for ringing the fire brigade instead of a plumber when her boiler went on the blink ………… Not to mention the fact that she voted for the smoking ban in public places. ‘Orrible woman!
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12
April 6, 2009 at 6:26 pm -
My lips are sealed AR. But they do say you are known by the friends you keep. Oops!
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13
April 6, 2009 at 7:28 pm -
Janes …………… That’s why I would never dare join Facebook! I would hate to incriminate anybody – just for knowing who I am and what I get up to!
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14
April 8, 2009 at 2:43 pm -
I just want to know a little more about Saul’s ridiculous shoes ….
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15
April 8, 2009 at 3:06 pm -
Gloria, nice to see you. I’d almost forgotten what you looked like but you haven’t changed a bit.
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16
April 8, 2009 at 3:32 pm -
Tee-hee! Nice to be back, janes.
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