The Tony Blair plane incident

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So why do you think the pilot really missed the runway? I think it's because he was told Mr. Blair was on the plane he got all nervous and freaked out. I personally wouldn't want to fly or drive anyone that important. What if the Mr. Blair had been killed would we have had England try to go to war on US?

Why was the Blair family on a commercial flight anyway? Has the Royal Family broke the country? Pres. Bush gets first class transporation even if its to the dentist so figured all other leaders did to. I think its very nice of Mr. Blair to take cheaper transporation. But it seems like he and his family would be driven batty by all the people recognizing them on the plane, wanting to talk, get autographs, shake hands etc. The man might have wanted to nap on the plane course the jolt as they hit the runway lights would have woke up anyone regardless.

Do they get a free flight voucher for the inconvenience and scare?

Because we think the American set-up is presidential and lording it and we don't want that for Britain. Don't worry - Blair will get his private plane eventually, but I hope he won't try and pretend that he's saving the environment!

Wait, so does he have to pay to get extra peanuts?

I was debating which of the two threads to put this in...This is so silly. The President of the United States (well the executive branch) has a whole FLEET of planes, which I, who am a critic of what I feel is unnecessary government spending think is perfectly justified. President Bush also brought back the Executive Yacht, which had been removed by President Carter, which I thought was a good idea.

There is something to be said for maintaining the dignity of the office, Prime Minister Blair and the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

(STUPID POOR EDITING)

Last edited by jimservo on 27 Dec 2006, 11:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The 'dignity' of Tony Blair, the office of Prime Minister and the British parliament? You don't live in Britain, do you?

They've killed off any respect people might have had for it a long time ago. Most important decisions are made in Brussels these days. Millions of people despise - not dislike, despise - our parliament, government, civil service (essentially a law unto themselves) and the politicians that 'run' our country. They continually lie and shaft the public. Our parliament is grossly ineffectual when attempting to stand up to the bullying government of the day, with too many MPs too thick to even understand the basic ideas of differing Bills before Parliament.

I don't know what politics is like in America (presumably it's a two-party state) but people seem to still have some fight left in them there. The government gets what it wants almost without fail every single time. No-one here seems to care about anything. The only time people even remotely care is when it affects their own pocket, and almost every time they just mumble and roll over in bed (speed cameras are a case in point).

We have the most authoritarian and bullying government in living memory. A government that is constantly clamping down on freedoms. CCTV cameras? We have over four million cameras - that's around 20% of all surveillance cameras in the world for under 1% of the world's population. Automatic number plate recognition (a camera that logs your number plate and where you are and stores it on a searchable database for two years)? The British public were never actually consulted about these - they just started appearing. Hugely intrusive government mass surveillance databases on the lives of innocent British citizens (chiefly, but not limited to, the National Identity Register and the NHS Programme for IT's 'Spine' database)? Both are hugely over-budget and behind schedule, but are still going ahead. Anti Social Behaviour Orders - where people are given orders to comply with - the punishment being five years' in prison. Many of these activities that these orders are subject to would not be illegal for most people.

And then you have tax. Tax, tax, tax. This 'socialist' administration in particular has been obsessed with hoodwinking every last penny it can out of the British taxpayer. People pay, pay and pay again for the same services continually. I mean, it's not even as if the State actually provides value for money, because it doesn't. Stealth taxes are dreamt up all the time. Taxpayers are seen as an asset by government to be shafted as much as is possible. And of course, at the end of the day, what sort of people does this all hurt the most? Yes, that's right. The poorest.

There is no reason for us with disabilities to trust the state either. It is often incompetent and cannot do often simple things that it's asked. Whenever they screw up, the system attacks and hounds the person who criticised it. Which turned me into a libertarian. I don't trust government, I think is what I'm trying to say here. It does not have our best interests at heart. It claims to, when it's not selling off our private details to private concerns. Only we, as citizens, have our best interests at heart.

I think you should probably find out a bit more about politics in this country before you jump on the "Blair is great" fan club. Almost no-one here still thinks this apart from the ever-dwindling band of NuLabour loyalists and people who think that bland no-marks like Blair and Cameron are any good. It would be like if I went into a pub in Ireland or a large gathering in Poland (Polish people don't drink in bars like we do in England, they mostly drink at home instead) and started spouting off about a political culture I knew very little about. You'd almost certainly piss someone off and you would be called promptly on it and found out.

I think I'll be voting UK Independence Party next time. The three main parties don't (and won't) look after us. Voting for the Labour Party would give us more of the same. They've been in power for nearly ten years and it's getting wearing. The second biggest party, the Conservative (used to be, not no more) and Unionist (same with this, what with supporting devolution) Party. They haven't had any principles for years now but any last vestige of what they had left disappeared when they elected David Cameron to be their leader. They are a pathetic party. What are their policies again? Shafting more money out of people, opposing free trade and wanting to hug hoodies? Get a life. The Liberal Democrats have degenerated into being a joke party if they weren't one already. They also have no policies. One of its leading members, Lembit Öpik (a politician I previously had a smidgen of respect for) has gotten himself involved with a pop duo from Romania called The Cheeky Girls. The Lib Dems have become a lot less popular and oppositional since Kennedy was in charge and the party is quite rudderless at the moment. I don't agree with what the Greens say, so that leaves them out. What does that leave - fruitcakes (United Kingdom Independence Party, or UKIP) and racists (the British National Party, or BNP). I think a fruitcake party will do me very nicely, thank you very much. I even agree with much of what their leader, Nigel Farage, has to say.

Sorry for the overlong rant. I've just got up. You are welcome to say that you love Tony Blair but most people in this country know that he is a lying, cheating, bullying fraud of a politician and they can't wait for him to collect his things, piss out of political office and go on a lecture tour like he promised some years ago. That's the thing with politicians. Once they have power, they're addicted to it. The buzz. So that's why in the Blair era we've ended up with binge law-making - where government is constantly passing laws - even when many of the things they are passing laws for have already been done. This government won't listen to reason, either. You can't tell them they're wrong, because they'll just ignore you. The more people point out their follies, the more they will dig their heels in whilst putting their heads in the sand. I should send you a few copies of Private Eye. You'd be surprised what these bastards get up to.

I think I've probably ranted quite enough on this subject. It's beginning to both bore and depress me in equal measure. However, I leave it for other people to pass comment on this story.

I'd expect the Prime Minister to have less dignity than the President since the PM is not the Head of State

Yeah, you'd only want that for Britain if he were born into the right family.

Said family does not wield any real political power. Your families do.

That stuff is illegal where I live. We have a few cameras but none of them work because they were declared unconstitutional.

Tequila, I actually agree with much of what you said, my poor editing notwithstanding. I am not a huge follower of UK politics I must admit, but I don't think I am currently a fan of either party. The Tories leadership seem to be trying to position themselves to the left of Blair, while Blair is ending his stay at Downing Street with a sharp rightward lurch on Iran and immigration. On the other hand, you have the contrast of the building of a nanny state of much power that can order people around on their personal business, as well as his obsession with getting Britain into the nightmarish bureaucracy of the completely unaccountable European Union.

Sadly, the U.S. administration has little choice but to support him since he supported them and there is literally no one else in the major opposition ready to help out. It's kind of like Churchill and Roosevelt in the reverse, except Churchill (or Roosevelt depending on how you look at it) wasn't dyslexic and that war had higher causalities (and God willing, it will stay that way).

Of course, half of this analysis since I don't live there.

The immigration stuff is due to the scaremongering of the populist tabloid press here (like the Daily Mail, Daily Express, The Sun and others). I don't think immigration should be unlimited. Britain has enough problems with some Muslims living here and not integrating properly (like wearing burqas, for example). We have hundreds of thousands of Poles here at the moment. In a few days, Bulgaria and Romania joins the EU. We gave away control of our own borders to that glorious organisation, the European Union.

Sorry if much of this stuff goes over your head but we have some very angry people in this country (of which even the formation is threatened - Scotland looks likely to go 'independent' soon).

I don't mind the speed cam's as I don't brake the speed limit - plus I like the fact they cracking down on people driving vhcs that with a good kick can fall apart infront of you, or have to brake hard to avoid a unfit car tire blowing infront of you in another lane....

As for the cameras they great only people who are against the law would be bothered about them, stop noobs from trying to get you nicked when the cctv people are watching...

I value it all I payed good money for my vhc and don't want to go through the junk of insurance as it's a bloody joke, already had a great fight about a person jumping a blind corner through red light's, saying it was myfault, lucky he was black listed by the insurance company - hes also black listed for whiplash tosser claimed for that too funny how I had no whiplash, hate white van men have no respect for a vhc that's not theres... Lucky I do have bull bars fitted to the front of my Vhc..

I will like it even more when they bring the Us insurance thing over here with the camera fitted in your vhc...

/*
And then you have tax. Tax, tax, tax. This 'socialist' administration in particular has been obsessed with hoodwinking every last penny it can out of the British taxpayer.

"" They hate us more than the gov on they pay tax we get load's of free stuff... ""

But I Do want to work after holidays going to go through the process of trying to get into the system of getting up to a job... Since my anxiety stop's me going through the normal way...

but it is done by gov grant's so I don't think they going wrong just the people you bump into that are meant to offer the advice don't even bother telling you about it...
*/

I'm not from Britain but I have more respect for PM Blair than Bush. I still liked Margaret Thatcher far more because she was a fiesty old thing. Why is PM on an American flight anyway? Was he going for a hunting trip with Cheney? <snort>

I noticed the cameras keep springing up at more of the intersections in town but so far no mention of sending tickets to red light runners. They should be more worried about the moron college kids paying more attention to their cellphone conversations than their driving. Some people are so freakin stupid its pitiful.

Having never been to Britain I really can't say much about how things are. Except I've always thought it was stupid the way I had to fill out custom forms to say what was inside the envelope when I mailed stuff to penpals. I don't have penpals anymore though, not the snail mail kind I mean.

American liberties seem to be dwindling by the second. A nearby airport has installed the see through your clothes X-ray scanner. At work they make us scan our hands instead of clocking in. Pretty soon they will be implanting barcodes if people don't start refusing this big brother sh*t.

It's all really absurd how they monitor traffic lights and airports but they won't stop people crossing the border and there's hundreds of people a day crossing over and bringing in drugs. No, I'm not talking about you Canadians. There's absolutely no reason any Canuck would want to cross over that border except to go shopping maybe. lol

A friend told me she went to Mexico to get prescription meds last weekend. The border guard tried to get her to hand over antibiotics as some form of bargaining to avoid harrassment and to let her back to the US.

The phone thing here cops turn they automatic cameras onto the drivers and start signalling them to get off the phone if they don't - you don't want to ignore them.......... that’s stage we are at, coat hangar man and lady are the worse drivers for the phone - map reading on the wheel, no hand's eating lunch & the accountants doing they paper work while they drive lol

Wont just stop at the phone, they will start checking everything - tire depth - tax - insurance....

Put it this way: in America you have at least some protection against civil liberties being eroded (the constitution) and the First Amendment for freedom of speech. In the United Kingdom we have neither of these things, and thus no protection from the state wanting to remove freedoms. Basically, it can do what it likes so long as the population lets it.

i used to live in miami, and one of the things i miss is the wacky things that always seemed to happen, only in miami.. planes slide off runways with heads of state, disgraced local politicians blowing their brains out in the lobby of the local paper, bales of cocaine washing up on the beaches, rollerskating 6 foot tall transvestites, miami beach, where you could see models, pro athletes, homeless, orthodox jews, holocaust survivors, teens enjoying a day at the beach, eat any type of cuisine yuu could imagine, all on the same sidewalk....