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fodders

Blair to be impeached

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The parliamentary motion to impeach Tony Blair for "gross misconduct" over the war against Iraq will be published next Wednesday, the day after the Queen's speech.
It will be the first to be tabled in 198 years, since Lord Melville, a close friend of the then prime minister, William Pitt the younger, faced impeachment for misusing public money in running the Admiralty.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,,1354571,00.html

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Best news EVAH. Lets just hope this follows through and he really is impeached. I can't wait to see Bush's reaction to this, too.

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Excellent. Too bad, the Neocon Repubs have hijacked and own the investigative and enforcement agencies here.

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Snarboo said:

Best news EVAH. Lets just hope this follows through and he really is impeached. I can't wait to see Bush's reaction to this, too.


Unfortunately it won't, Labour have too big a majority and the other parties are split on the issue.

Still, it would be interesting to see what happens if he does get it...will we switch sides and support Europe (thus incurring the wrath of the US when the rest of the world declares war on them) or stay where we are and support the US? (thus incurring the wrath of the rest of the world when they declare war on the US).

We're screwed either way, really.

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KILROY FOR PM!

Come on, having a chatshow host run the country has got to be cool, he can cut off any opposition party members by going "And thats all we have time for" or "Join us after the break when we'll be meeting a midget who married a martian zombie dog"

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And he'd certainly have a unique way of talking to officials from middle eastern countries: "Oi, give us your nukes you turban wearing t**ts".

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Isn't his approval rating at 30% or something? Wouldn't it be in the best interest of most of the politicians to impeach him as to gain favor with the people?

Oh that's right, you have a parliament system, where the people's opinion doesn't matter as much. :P

What the fuck was Blair doing on the Simpsons anyway? Doesn't he have a country to govern?

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IIRC has latest approval rating is something like 36%, whereas Howard's is around 30%.

BTW individual British voters have far more influence than American voters, since we don't use a silly electoral college system. Also, in Britain the two main political parties aren't the only ones who actually appear on the news and even influence governmental decisions, unlike in the US.

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Well yeah we have the stupid electoral college, but isn't your government very Republic-like, where you elect representatives and they elect the PM? From what I hear, he's basicaly like the Speaker of the House here.

At any rate, if there are any measures going through congress that we dissaprove of, we can just contact our representative and/or senators and bitch at them not to pass them (or vice versa in the opposite case) and threaten not to vote for them. This works out because we only use the electoral college for presidents. Congressmen who value thir jobs listen to their constiuates. They can't really pass anything without the consent of the people. The only reason none of this works out is that the corporations and such use propagnda to change the public's will. :/

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We vote for the MP (Member of Parliament) in our local area, and the party who ends up with the most MPs wins. The Prime Minister is the leader of the winning party, and is voted in as an MP just like everyone else.

Thereotically it's possible for a party to win without their leader being voted in as an MP, but IIRC that's never happened, since they always go for "safe seats" that they're 99.99% certain to win.

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That's generally the case, but it's entirely feasible that a party leader could have a marginal seat - no one knows when they start their political career that they will end up as a leader. For instance, if Portillo had narrowly held his seat at the 1997 election, he could quite conceivably have been chosen as the next leader. Of course, his seat was one that could only ever have been lost when the Conservatives suffered a landslide defeat, so the point is kind of moot.

BTW, Thatcher's majorities in Finchley weren't all that large to start with (c. 8000 in 1979, IIRC), but her personal following turned it into a very safe seat indeed by the 1980s.

Oh, and I think the title of this thread ought really to be "Blair extremely unlikely to be impeached". This thing really doesn't have much support in parliament, and if his enemies in the Labour Party really wanted to replace him (a major backbench revolt would be the only way this impeachment stuff would have much of a chance), they'd hardly do so in a way so likely to damage the party's image.

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NiGHTMARE said:

BTW individual British voters have far more influence than American voters, since we don't use a silly electoral college system. Also, in Britain the two main political parties aren't the only ones who actually appear on the news and even influence governmental decisions, unlike in the US.


Unless you live in a safe seat. (although mine is no longer safe)

And although there are 3 main parties, the Lib Dems are still a long way behind the others, so although they do have an influence (as they can often make proposals that Labour back-benchers support) it's still a 2-horse race when the Hustings come a-knocking.

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And the less said about these three horses the better. They are all Identikit parties who have almost identical policies come election time (More funding to the NHS, Schools, etc.) . In fact, I have a strong gut feeling that Blair was only re-elected because the oposition at thee time were even worse than Labour. (Though this is no longer the case, IMO)

And George Galloway is supporting Blairs impeachment. THERE'S a suprise.

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Well, it least one of the axis of idiocy shitheads (Bush, Blair and our PM, Martin) might be getting the axe. Hopefully Martin and Bush get impeached, too. Martin for non-confidence, Bush for stupidity.

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The rules for impeachment in the United States have changed. It was once you were impeached for getting caught lying. Now so long as you say just say "no it isn't" or "No I didn't" you are absolved of any wrongdoing even if you are caught... numerous times.

Womanizing, drunk driving, drug abuse, ignorance and incompetence are all acceptable.

Don't mess with Texas.

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I wasn't just talking about the Lib Dems. I'm sure most British people have heard of the Green Party, the Referendum Party, the British National Party (boo hiss!!!), etc. They also get their party political broadcasts shown on TV.

However, ask the average American to name more than one U.S. political party besides the Republicans and Democrats, and he'll probably have trouble. Mainly because they don't get their party politicial broadcasts shown on TV, unless they have major financial backing.

Similarly, a lot of the American political parties don't even have any seats in their government, whereas there are numerous non-Labour/Conservative/Lib Dem MPs, from all manner of parties. IIRC even the Monster Raving Loony Party has managed to get a couple of seats over the years!

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NiGHTMARE said:

... there are numerous non-Labour/Conservative/Lib Dem MPs, from all manner of parties. IIRC even the Monster Raving Loony Party has managed to get a couple of seats over the years!

Unless you're talking about the nationalist parties and the (Northern) Ireland parties, I can only think of a few independents (i.e. not representing a party, and most often someone who has left one of the main political parties) that have been elected to the British parliament in recent decades.

Local council elections are a different matter of course, while the European parliament is elected on a different basis, allowing UKIP and the Green Party to pick up several seats in the two most recent elections.

As for approval ratings, anything much above 40% is pretty high for British politicians.

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There's been one in the last couple of elections, Martin Bell in 97 (the high profile anti-sleaze guy) and a doctor in 2001 who the Lib Dems pulled out in support of (so he wes effectively a Lib Dem candidiate in terms of the vote).

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It's a known fact that over 60% of all politicans are womanizers. As a matter of fact I believe it's part of the entrance exam for being a politician.

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ROFL, BNP. I read about them once and it reminded me of that Pink Floyd song, Waiting for the Worms.

Would you like to see Britania rule again?
...
Would you like to send our coloured cousins home again?


I dunno why that's funny and the KKK isn't. Oh wait, I forgot about the fact that they run around in sheets with pillowcases on their head.

lolololololololol

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What's funny is that there was apparently a tribe of black coloured people in the British isles long before the white man came along.

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