Cameron wants techies to open up Parliament Tory leader David Cameron would welcome some key technological changes to the way that Parliament makes its business available to the public. That is just one thrust of proposals for modernising government, which he set out in a speech to the Open University in Milton Keynes, yesterday. Starting with the contention that "We …
Okay, before I begin, I detest Labour more than any other party on the planet, so to the weak minded - don't assume just because I'm attacking the Tories I'm a Labour fanboy, I'm not, I would quite happily see Labour as a party disbanded and every politician within it begging on the streets.
But anyway, David Cameron, the guy is full of shit.
Yesterday we were being told about how awesome he is because he wants to bring "power to the people", telling us that he had many initiatives to do this, yet the one single initiative that truly brings power to "the people" rather than a minority, proportional representation, he rejects outright. Why? Because he knows he's guaranteed power next election right now, and proportional representation would weaken his power. For those who don't know, the current system, first past the post, allows a party that say only 40% of the population want in power to be able to completely control parliament such that they can pass laws without challenge just as the current Labour government does, we've seen how well that works out. In contrast, proportional representation means that if only 40% of the population support a party, then that party only gets 40% of the power.
So effectively when Cameron says he wants power to the people, what he means is he wants power to some of the people, but not those that don't support him. He wants disproportionate power for the people that do support him.
So now, onto this story, suddenly he's telling us he wants to make the internet integral to our democracy which is absolutely fantastic.
Well, it would be, if it weren't for the fact he also supports 3 strikes without trial meaning you can effectively accuse someone of file sharing 3 times without having evidence that would stand up in court to get them band from taking advantage of these existing and proposed online services that are essential and integral to society and the political process.
Dear David,
Shut the fuck up, and come back when you've actually figured out what you really want. Don't go on about improving democracy when the reality is you're quite content with it staying as is or made worse. Don't go on about embracing technology when you simultaneously support policy that both holds it back and runs counter to improving democracy.
Really, at a time when parliament is in disrepute and some politicians are actually trying to make ammends Cameron should be ashamed at abusing the opportunity for business as usual - say one thing and mean another.
Proportional representation is the single most important change that British politics needs, it means parliament is made up proportionally by the people's feelings rather than a minority, it means an end to tactical voting as people's votes for their preferred party, even if a minority party, actually counts.
Cameron's argument against proportional representation is that it means hung parliaments and backroom deals - as if backroom deals aren't a problem with the current system? As for the hung parliament argument? Well, Canada has had a hung parliament for over 2 years and yet they're the fastest growing economy in the G8, they're also the country that has come by far the best out of the recession in the G8 and haven't had to bail out a single one of their banks, as such their banking sector is healthy and still lending supporting other sectors. They also have some of the most sane and balanced copyright laws on the planet. So why does a hung parliament actually mean an improvement? Because the only laws that get passed in a hung parliament are laws that everyone agrees are for the benefit of the country rather than laws that a minority think are for the benefit of the country as per with Labour right now and as per with the Conservatives under Cameron's proposals.
While I have some reservations about the Obama administration, one of the things he's done that I really like is creating data.gov
It's basically an API that communicates with a DB containing an VAST amount of public domain information. Where in the past you would have had to glean the information from whatever source and manually create a DB, it's now all laid on and kept up to date for you.
The possibilities are endless, but one of the things I'd like to do would be to create an application that keep track of any "last minute" amendments to bills going through parliament.
It's a well known trick, tacking controversial legislation onto the end of an unrelated bill at the last minute, so as to sneak it through.
"It’s a good start – but a small one: perhaps the time has come for techies to submit their own ideas to Mr Cameron as, for once, a senior politician might just be listening."
Others might conclude that the Banking Sector would Benefit One and All Better and Offer Greater Reward, which can always be Shared with Politics, with Ideas which Reform Closed Shop Institutions which may be listening but which never reply for fear of entering into Dialogue which they would not be able to Control and Subvert for their Lead.
And the Electronic Environment is one which has all those who would Fear for their Shared Future Thoughts and Past Recorded Actions, Paralysed into Ineffective Rear Guard Protection whilst the Field races ahead into Pastures Green.
And was Jay Leno wrong whenever he says, “Politics is just show business for ugly people”?
There does appear Presently, to be a Handbags at Dawn Bun Fight between the Banking Sector and Political Parties for the Control of Money Supply which Enslaves Labour for Power and Control, as a Conspiracy between them for Joint Custody of the Facility would be just too much of a Good Thing not to be Used and Abused Outrageously ...... although that is the Old Par for the Course.
"Objectors claim that selectively edited clips could be used to make parliamentarians look silly."
How pathetic can you get? Anyway, clowns are supposed to look silly.
"The Civil Service also objects that its staff should not be required to moderate any comments put up in response to officially posted clips"
They don't need to moderate comments. Just disable comments on the clips, duh! They knew that this was possible of course but they said that to give the false impression that there would be extra work to do in moderating comments. I'm not sure what the correct word is for this particular kind of falsehood, let's just call it a fairly sophisticated lie; it's what they do most of the time so they are good at it.
The cameras in Parliament should be fed out as an IPTV stream available to any UK ISP so that we, the people who put them there and pay for their seconds homes and keep them living in style, can watch what they are doing.
As an extra, the cameras should have cross hair targets and paint ball guns so that sufficient 'votes' over the internet within a short period of time will cause the currently targeted clown to be splatted.
"selectively edited clips could be used to make parliamentarians look silly"
I'm sure they could, but somehow i have a funny feeling that nothing could make them look sillier than presenting clips unedited.
Having seen parliment session sn the news, the whole thing seems like a several hundred year old joke. Society no longer acts the way that they do in parliment, and hasn't for a long time.
Pardon my cynicism, but he's probably only appearing to be listening because he sees political advantage in it...
When we see some concrete evidence of him actually doing stuff, then maybe I'll believe it.
Let's begin with his party (and all the others) making Manifesto Promises to get rid of the ridiculously draconian, vague or ill-defined laws that Nu Labour have brought in and restore the basic liberties and rights that we've long enjoyed in this country and perhaps his words will gain a bit of credibility.
If he's said anything of value, it's entirely drowned in party political playground politicking.
Just shut up.
And incidentally stop telling us 'what the electorate really want is X', because you don't ask and you don't care anyway. It's just entertainment for you.
Shut up, grow up, act like it's a job where your decisions matter to us plebs.
And stop the party $%^&* politics! All of you! ALL OF YOU! NOT JUST CAMERON, ALL OF YOU!
"Objectors claim that selectively edited clips could be used to make parliamentarians look silly."
Very easy to do without any editing whatsoever:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8025199.stm
and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7776187.stm
After a few years of John Major (remember him? heh heh) Blair sounded pretty good, & he made loads of promises, just like Cameron, then everyone voted for him in '97. I doubt if he made good on any of the big promises at all.
It'll be even worse with the Tories, as most the the party are still ardent Thatchlerites. I'd like to hear Cameron's justification for the 3 strikes nonsense ......... but none of it matters, because what they do in power will bear no resemblance to their manifesto or anything they've ever said.
Time to raise the black flag
"While I have some reservations about the Obama administration, one of the things he's done that I really like is creating data.gov
It's basically an API that communicates with a DB containing an VAST amount of public domain information. Where in the past you would have had to glean the information from whatever source and manually create a DB, it's now all laid on and kept up to date for you."
My dear boy, that idea was mooted in the UK a good 12..13 years ago. In the days when eGIF was written, someone started to work on central directories and central repositories, but nobody could see the sense because FOI didn't exist. And then they screwed up on the gateway so it became MS only. And Labour happened, who had already worked out that if you employ consultants you can pretty much do what you want and always have someone to blame. So in came consultants, and out went economics, interoperability and sanity.
Because there's no profit in that for consultants, and thus no jobs for the boys later.
Which is why teh controls and transparency followed soon after..
"Cameron wants techies to open up Parliament"
Now there's an Opportunity to put Dave the Rave on the Spot ... by Simply Offering a Viable Virtual Program and sharing the Leadership Interest Transparently Online ....... just to ensure that it is not all hot air and guff in a bluff. The problem is in getting techies to take an interest in such puppets though.
If he's real Smart, he'll Simply Float a Good Program and Shame/Leverage the Government to Fund it, just in time for his Election to replace the Cuckoo in No 10. The excuses against any Novel Change from the Government would be highly damaging and revealing, methinks.
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