The UK Libertarian

From the BBC:

Three former ministers have been suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party “for bringing it into disrepute”.

Stephen Byers, Patricia Hewitt and Geoff Hoon are under investigation over their apparent willingness to help a lobbying firm in return for cash.

They were secretly filmed by the Channel 4 programme Dispatches, but have denied any wrong-doing.

And:

Tory leader David Cameron said people were “disgusted” and Justice Secretary Jack Straw said MPs felt “anger”.

Seeing as 52% of our “elected representatives”, including Jack Straw, are proven thieves it’s likely that their only “anger” stems from Byers, Hewitt and Hoon’s breaking of that most cherished but unspoken commitment all politicians make in regards to accepting bribes:

Don’t get caught!

Because let’s not kid ourselves, with very few exceptions, they ALL take bribes from lobbyists.

That’s the entire game. That’s how regulation is crafted and designed. The game works like this: all politicians must on one hand be playing a dirty, backhanded, manipulative, dishonest and bribe-accepting strategy behind the scenes whilst on the other, saying the correct sound bytes, pretending to care about “constituents”, talking in vague non-responses whenever you’re asked a direct question and, most importantly, not getting caught!

The laws of probabilities alone tell us that  the vast majority of politicians are constantly engaged in dodgy dealings that are counter to their stated claim to “serve the public”. Just look at how often there are political scandals in the papers. Just look at that 52% expense-claim figure. These stories are only reported when a politician fails and get’s caught. Just by statistical analysis alone, there must be many, many more who have played the game smarter and not got caught. And yet whenever they’re on TV, being questioned about these scandals, the politicians will clench their spongy lying faces into their best approximation of what shame and disapproval might look like, and they will say things like:

Anyone who watched the Dispatches programme last night could not help but be, frankly, disgusted by what they saw.

But this is just a charade; an act; a game. Almost all the major politicians are engaged in this behaviour and they all know that they’re all engaged in it. What they are “disgusted by” is not the actions themselves, but that their colleagues were stupid enough to get caught. Don’t believe me? This is an actual quote from the same BBC article, by Jack Straw:

There’s anger… and incredulity about their stupidity… getting suckered by a sting like this. [emphasis mine]

I rest my case. I mean really.

Side note: I just watched the latest South Park. The episode deals with the recent slew of rich celebrities who have been all over the papers for cheating on their wives. Tiger Woods, David Letterman, Bill Clinton and friends are taken to the Karne Institute for Sex Addiction. Their rehabilitation officer, in a blackboard lesson that Jack Straw would certainly approve of, informs them of why they need to be in therapy: