My wife and
I were in the centre of Taunton last Friday and, as is usually the case, we
could not pass Waterstones without dropping in to view what was on offer on the
bookshelves. Quite a few books caught
our eye. In particular I was drawn to
the following: Big Week by James
Holland which tells how the fighters and bombers of the USAAF’s Eighth Air
Force won air superiority over Germany in early 1944; Breakout at Stalingrad, an
autobiographical novel by Heinrich Gerlach who himself was wounded and captured
at Stalingrad; Patronising Bastards – How
The Elites Betrayed Britain by Quentin Letts who describes himself as a
“scurvy parliamentary sketchwriter, and Marches blunderbuss”. Unable to resist leaving the premises empty
handed, I bought Quentin Letts’ “peppery polemic”.
Back at
home I opened Patronising Bastards at
page 7 where The Rt.Hon. Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon GCMG KBH CH, the
most well-known Liberal Democrat in South Somerset, is the target of Quentin
Letts’ wit. He quotes Lord Ashdown,
before the EU Referendum results started coming, as stating: ‘ I will forgive
no one who does not respect the sovereign voice of the British people once it
has spoken, whether it is a majority of 1 per cent or 20 per cent. Either you believe in democracy or you
don’t.’ However, Mr Letts writes: ‘Once
remain lost, he rapidly tried to contest the result.’ Such an attitude
reinforces my belief that the great majority of those in the British Political
Establishment only believe in democracy when it suits them. In my view the Liberal Democrats are not bad
at local level as their councillors do seem to make an effort to sort out
problems that impact on their constituents, but nationally they are much too
politically correct for me.
Be that as
it may, Lord Ashdown comes in fifth on Quentin Letts’ list of the Top 100 Patronising Bastards, but
another former Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg, comes even higher in second
place!
I look
forward to reading more of Mr Letts’ humorous takedowns.
No comments:
Post a Comment