Litnet

 

Die opstel was gerig aan beleidmakers en is soos verwag kan word, aangesien die skrywer 'n Lid van die Parlement in die VK is.

 

Dit is egter hierdie gedeelte wat ek glo volkome van toepassing is op van wat jy gesskryf het:

 

Since becoming a politician, I have had the opportunity to read the Hansard records of previous parliamentary debates.

 

I have seen how brilliant people made elegant, seductive arguments in defence of slavery, or the subjection of women, racism, or the criminalisation of homosexuality.

 

I have read Palmerston saying in 1842 that withdrawal from Afghanistan was unthinkable and ‘would bring a blush to the cheek of every Englishman’.

 

I have seen how Aneurin Bevan justified the destruction of community hospitals, with the line ‘I would rather be kept alive in the efficient if cold altruism of a large hospital, than expire in a gush of warm sympathy in a small one”. 

 

And I have re-read the headlines that bullied politicians into supporting Franco, the magazines that over-rated Macmillan or Wilson, and the newspapers that failed to hold generals and politicians accountable for the Boer War.

 

Perhaps the most striking ‘lesson’ has been how unpopular celebrated people were in their time. Churchill was hated by much of the press, the country, and his own party: when he begged for just fifty to join him in the lobbies calling for rearmament, in 1938, only 3 defied the whips to do so. 

 

Gladstone was right to push for Home Rule in Ireland, but destroyed his party, and was vilified, for his attempt. 

 

Peel was right about the Corn Laws, about Catholic emancipation, and about foreign policy, but everyone disliked him. They loved Palmerston, who was wrong about everything.

 

Hierdie sal seker net die toets van tyd leer? 

 

Baie dankie

Wouter