I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Do not apologise, this is one of the great tragedies of the age. The liberal left that sings the praises of the Enlightenment, and likes to claim it as their own, is now throwing it into headlong retreat. The Enlightenment is being reversed, this is the Endarkening
Hmm - wonder how much AUUKUS has to do with Biden's ratings slump. America's alliance with France is surely the oldest in its history, the War of Independence was won with French help, and the sense of being revolutionary soulmates - symbolized by the very Statue of Liberty itself - is burned into to soul of either nation. Humiliating the French while being in cahoots with the old colonial oppressor may not impressed some Americans of a particular mindset and historical perspective.
Unless AUKUS was announced in August, nothing.
AUUKUS was announced on 16 September. I'm seeing a dip from around that time.
You could put a pistol to the heads of 9 out of 10 Americans, demand to tell them everything they know about AUKUS, and even if you spelled it out you'd be forced to blow their brains out.
As with most foreign-policy treaty-mongering (for good, ill or non-of-the-above) its short-term impact on American voters & their voting intentions ranges from nil to zilch.
It is currently the Unicorn Alliance. Apart from an agreement for the Australian Navy to get nuclear subs, and even that just a scoping exercise, we have no idea what AUKUS actually consists of. Does it bind us into war on China if the US is in need of cannon fodder? for example.
I wonder how people would have reacted in January 2020 if King Charles III refused to give assent to the Brexit bill.
Like those people who pretended to think the Queen should have refused Boris's prorogation?
The Queen did not save us.
Yeah, that was the silliness, spot on.
I vowed never to sing God Save The Queen again.
How often did you sing it before? I assume once a week at least.
As a schoolboy I used to sing it nearly every day.
As an adult I used to sing it at England football/rugby union matches but with not much gusto.
As agnostic republican God Save the Queen isn't really designed for me.
I am the Only Republican In The PB Village!
Not quite...
I have been a Republican most of my life, but of recent times I have had a great admiration for the Queen and she will be a great loss on her passing
Thereafter the monarchy needs to be downsized considerably and even constitutionally
Being a Republican (in a British sense) has nothing to do with like or dislike of the current Monarch. It is a dislike of the institution.
It certainly true, however, that surges in republicanism in UK have coincided with periods of widespread popular displeasure with the current monarch, for example following the death of Prince Albert when Queen Victoria secluded herself as the "Widow of Windsor".
So "nothing" seems a tad strong.
It's like converts to PR after an election loss - the driving force for a surge is not really about that cause at all, but at events.
Not to say support cannot genuinely increase or decrease too, but the up and down surges are more sensitive.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
I think that's right. There's a building in Copenhagen with an original British cannonball lodged in the wall - they've kept it to amuse visitors.
Have DM'd Matt as it's probably a bit of a specialised interest.
I wonder how people would have reacted in January 2020 if King Charles III refused to give assent to the Brexit bill.
Like those people who pretended to think the Queen should have refused Boris's prorogation?
The Queen did not save us.
Yeah, that was the silliness, spot on.
I vowed never to sing God Save The Queen again.
How often did you sing it before? I assume once a week at least.
As a schoolboy I used to sing it nearly every day.
As an adult I used to sing it at England football/rugby union matches but with not much gusto.
As agnostic republican God Save the Queen isn't really designed for me.
I am the Only Republican In The PB Village!
Not quite...
I have been a Republican most of my life, but of recent times I have had a great admiration for the Queen and she will be a great loss on her passing
Thereafter the monarchy needs to be downsized considerably and even constitutionally
Being a Republican (in a British sense) has nothing to do with like or dislike of the current Monarch. It is a dislike of the institution.
It certainly true, however, that surges in republicanism in UK have coincided with periods of widespread popular displeasure with the current monarch, for example following the death of Prince Albert when Queen Victoria secluded herself as the "Widow of Windsor".
So "nothing" seems a tad strong.
Sure, but the whole point of a hereditary position is that it is a genetic lottery, so the oldest gets the gig, no matter how ill suited. This becomes more obvious and concerning when the Monarch behaves badly.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Do not apologise, this is one of the great tragedies of the age. The liberal left that sings the praises of the Enlightenment, and likes to claim it as their own, is now throwing it into headlong retreat. The Enlightenment is being reversed, this is the Endarkening
Yeah, well it was all looking rather hopeless.... but maybe the enlightenment will somehow be saved by the forthcoming takeover by AI.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Do not apologise, this is one of the great tragedies of the age. The liberal left that sings the praises of the Enlightenment, and likes to claim it as their own, is now throwing it into headlong retreat. The Enlightenment is being reversed, this is the Endarkening
Yeah, well it was all looking rather hopeless.... but maybe the enlightenment will somehow be saved by the forthcoming takeover by AI.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Not necessarily, certainly had the Royalists won the Civil War Divine Right would have lasted well into the 19th century in Britain, only being diluted with the expansion of the franchise at that time.
Remember even after the French Revolution (which was over 100 years after the English Civil War, French absolutist monarchy returned in the form of Charles X in the early 19th century, Russia also had absolutist monarchy effectively until the 20th century.
Spain also had absolutist monarchy through the 18th century
Charles X is a case in point. Once the genie of Enlightenment is out of the bottle, it won't go back in. Charles X's attempted retrenchment was a disaster, and France was convulsed with trouble. Remember, THAT painting stems from this time. Liberalism took a time to spread to all corners of Europe and the new world, but England was at the forefront of this. The Levellers, the underground pamphlet presses, the internationalisation of resistance to tyranny... these were all out in the wild before the result of the English revolution was known. It's not really credible to think that such a thoroughgoing retrenchment would be possible before the era of mass surveillance and mechanised military.
Once you get a critical mass of dissent, the system changes or the system gets fucked up and changes anyway.
Yes but the Enlightenment was out of the bottle in France because of the victory for the republican side in the earlier French revolution.
In my scenario Charles I and the Royalists had defeated the English Revolution
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
The Barney Curley documentary from RTE that @paulyork64 mentioned on the previous thread is now available on iplayer.
The Yellow Sam coup of 1975 made Barney Curley a household name in Ireland and Northern Ireland and is still remembered with reverence today by anyone associated with racing. For the first time, Barney tells the incredible story in his own words, of how he managed to take £2m (inflation-adjusted) off the bookies in one eventful hurdle race in 1975 - without breaking the law. With access to the bookmakers and the jockey, as well as stars of racing such as Frankie Dettori and Ian Balding, this is the definitive story of one of the great characters of the turf. https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p09y2zdh/barney-curley-the-man-who-beat-the-bookies
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
I've just watched the second episode of the Blair-Brown documentary. Around 15 minutes of it was on the lead up to and negotiation of the Good Friday Agreement. It made compelling viewing, and was a stark reminder of how tough it was to reach that agreement. Huge credit to Blair, and also to all the key actors on all sides. It was quite an achievement, which hung in the balance until the final denouement. It would make a cracking film.
The LDs probably wouldn't say no to a by-election in North Wiltshire.
Result last time:
Con 59% LD 27% Lab 10% Green 4%
Gray is no different now to what he has been for years. Even if times have changed, they have changed enough for someone to be forced out over a remark, other than being put on the naughty step.
The LDs probably wouldn't say no to a by-election in North Wiltshire.
Result last time:
Con 59% LD 27% Lab 10% Green 4%
Is that Chippenham under another name? I believe LD won Chippenham 1997 to 2015. I might be wrong.
Chippenham used to be in North Wiltshire until 2010 when they became two constituencies due to higher than average population growth in the area. As you'd expect the Chippenham seat is better for the LDs than the new N Wilts.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
Being entirely selfish it will not effect my wife and I
As it happens this policy will, I predict, be dropped by a shameless Johnson days after COP21 ends and the whole circus has moved out of Glasgow.
I thought it was COP26 but I just think it is unworkable
My house is fully insulated but @Gallowgate said that only houses built in the last 20 years would qualify for the degree of insulation required and he is an expert on the subject
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
I visited in 2005 and it felt very pro-West at that time.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
I visited in 2005 and it felt very pro-West at that time.
Thought you were still discussing North Wiltshire and Chippenham for a second.
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
I remain against the consensus here and of the view that Biden is a fantastic back as Democrat nominee.
Firstly, because power is addictive and what politicians do. Whilst they may not be sociopaths, you can model them as same. This is a man who became vice president and then came back years later to become president. He wants it.
Secondly, because it's analogous to a carry trade; so long as he doesn't announce a plan to leave, there isn't a massive drubbing in the mid terms or a similar surprise announcements then it should be possible to lay the bet off into a shortening price if other signals start rearing their head.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
Even 15 years ago China was still firmly Communist, its economic freedoms were not matched with political freedoms.
Now the Maoist Xi has doubled down on the political restrictions while rowing back on some of the economic freedoms too
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Not necessarily, certainly had the Royalists won the Civil War Divine Right would have lasted well into the 19th century in Britain, only being diluted with the expansion of the franchise at that time.
Remember even after the French Revolution (which was over 100 years after the English Civil War, French absolutist monarchy returned in the form of Charles X in the early 19th century, Russia also had absolutist monarchy effectively until the 20th century.
Spain also had absolutist monarchy through the 18th century
Charles X is a case in point. Once the genie of Enlightenment is out of the bottle, it won't go back in. Charles X's attempted retrenchment was a disaster, and France was convulsed with trouble. Remember, THAT painting stems from this time. Liberalism took a time to spread to all corners of Europe and the new world, but England was at the forefront of this. The Levellers, the underground pamphlet presses, the internationalisation of resistance to tyranny... these were all out in the wild before the result of the English revolution was known. It's not really credible to think that such a thoroughgoing retrenchment would be possible before the era of mass surveillance and mechanised military.
Once you get a critical mass of dissent, the system changes or the system gets fucked up and changes anyway.
Yes but the Enlightenment was out of the bottle in France because of the victory for the republican side in the earlier French revolution.
In my scenario Charles I and the Royalists had defeated the English Revolution
I'm referring to Zeitgeist, not political power, which is why I emphasised the state of the countercultural and anti-tyranny forces before Charles I was deposed and beheaded. The point of no return had already been passed in England, long before Charles laid his head on the chopping block.
Had Charles I won and defeated the republican forces then absolutism would have been entrenched in England for at least another 2 centuries.
The military would have been firmly on the Monarch's and Royalists side and the movement for universal suffrage did not really arrive in any great numbers until the 19th century
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
Being entirely selfish it will not effect my wife and I
As it happens this policy will, I predict, be dropped by a shameless Johnson days after COP21 ends and the whole circus has moved out of Glasgow.
I thought it was COP26 but I just think it is unworkable
My house is fully insulated but @Gallowgate said that only houses built in the last 20 years would qualify for the degree of insulation required and he is an expert on the subject
I think the distinction is between fully insulated (in the sense of as much insulation as you can sensibly put on an older house), which is less than the amount of insulation you need to allow a heat pump to make your house reliably comfortable.
Design the building right ("Passivhaus") and you can cut the heating requirements by 75% or so, which is handily the sort of carbon dioxide reduction we're looking for.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
You might have abandoned liberal ideals, but not everyone has. The main threat to liberalism is from populist right wing politicians setting people on each other in order to distract them from the predatory class who are exploiting them.
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Do not apologise, this is one of the great tragedies of the age. The liberal left that sings the praises of the Enlightenment, and likes to claim it as their own, is now throwing it into headlong retreat. The Enlightenment is being reversed, this is the Endarkening
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that.
I'm not a historian of the period, but were not many of the same values espoused from 1917?
I wonder how people would have reacted in January 2020 if King Charles III refused to give assent to the Brexit bill.
Like those people who pretended to think the Queen should have refused Boris's prorogation?
The Queen did not save us.
Yeah, that was the silliness, spot on.
I vowed never to sing God Save The Queen again.
How often did you sing it before? I assume once a week at least.
As a schoolboy I used to sing it nearly every day.
As an adult I used to sing it at England football/rugby union matches but with not much gusto.
As agnostic republican God Save the Queen isn't really designed for me.
As an agnostic republican the Tory Party was never designed for you either
Your blackballing of Conservative voters cheers me no end as someone not of the faith.
Keep up the good work!
A Tory Party which supported agnostic republicanism would not be worth electing anyway, it would not be a Tory Party either anymore.
It is not being non Socialist that defines the Tory Party, the Liberal Party is equally not Socialist and has often been more free market than the Tory Party. It is being the party of the monarchy and the landed gentry and most committed to the Church of England as the Established Church above all that defines Toryism
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
You might have abandoned liberal ideals, but not everyone has. The main threat to liberalism is from populist right wing politicians setting people on each other in order to distract them from the predatory class who are exploiting them.
You'd have a bit more credibility if you recognised the threat to liberal democracy comes from both left and right wing actors. Look what @Cyclefree posted about the Sussex University academic. People vote for the likes of Trump because they know what letting screaming headbangers in the Woke brigade would do if they got power. You are so convinced of your own self-righteousness and holier than thou attitude, and that of the left, that you cannot see what is clear to many independents.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
What Putin and Trump and Orban were though was primarily a vote for a white Russia, a white dominated USA and a white Hungary.
In the USA as 2020 shows there is only so far that can go in an increasingly multiracial America, in France too the same applies to a lesser extent and certainly Macron would still beat Zemmour or Le Pen.
Yes voters do not want wokeism to go so far it erases their heritage but nor are most western voters white supremacists either
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
I guess the Huguenot rebellions were only a little local difficulty, then.
Religious conflicts, not wars over Monarchy v Parliament
But it was very much about the absolute power of the monarch, which the Huguenots rejected.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
I guess the Huguenot rebellions were only a little local difficulty, then.
Religious conflicts, not wars over Monarchy v Parliament
But it was very much about the absolute power of the monarch, which the Huguenots rejected.
It was rejection of Louis XIII's intolerance of their Protestantism they were rebelling against, they were quite happy with Henry IV having the same absolutist powers as he protected Protestants
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
No it wasn't. It was simply that the West was making a lot of money out of it and vice versa. Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism. 15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs. Now it isn't. Our interests diverged.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
What Putin and Trump and Orban were though was primarily a vote for a white Russia, a white dominated USA and a white Hungary.
In the USA as 2020 shows there is only so far that can go in an increasingly multracial America, in France too the same applies to a lesser extent and certainly Macron would still beat Zemmour or Le Pen.
Yes voters do not want wokeism to go so far it erases their heritage but nor are most western voters white supremacists either
Not necessarily true - look at the share of the vote Galloway got in B&S.
Woke is more than race. Arguably it is fundamentally more about the family, and its abolition, which is why there are so many arguments over the issue of gender and trans rights. The latter is actually of more interest to many minority groups.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
No it wasn't. It was simply that the West was making a lot of money out of it and vice versa. Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism. 15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs. Now it isn't. Our interests diverged.
Basically, China pulled the wool over the West's eyes for 20+ years and told the West what it wanted to hear. There were enough people, particularly on Wall Street and America's Boardrooms, who were only too happy to lap it up as it coincided with their own interest. Xi's mistake - arguably - has been to tear off the mask before China was in a position to enforce its dominance.
On topic Biden's support wasn't "just frittered away", he lost it withdrawing from Afghanistan, which is the most positive and consequential US foreign policy action since Obama withdrew from Iraq.
Was the housing stock in Denmark badly damaged in WW2?
I'm looking for a comparator country for improvement to Housing Stock over a decade or two, to get a handle on how we compare with Energy Efficiency etc.
I need one with a broadly similar age profile of stock to the UK.
Very difficult as many countries were heavily demolished by either Germany or the UK, and that makes a huge difference to age profile of housing stock, which is a big difference.
I think my only options with a similar climate which also matters, and emerged relatively unscathed, are Ireland or Denmark. Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and the rest having all been bombed heavily or fought over - if I have my history about right. Even in the UK, around 10% of housing stock was destroyed or damaged.
I think the British probably did more damage to Copenhagen in 1807 than the Germans did in the 1940s.
For some reason we don't tend to talk about that particular adventure much.
I'm not sure this phrase is widely used enough to get its own wikipedia article though
Copenhagenization is an expression which coined in the early nineteenth century, and has seen occasional use since. The expression refers to a decisive blow delivered to a potential opponent while being at peace with that nation.
I never knew we did that!
I love the toll of losses at the end of the battle
On topic Biden's support wasn't "just frittered away", he lost it withdrawing from Afghanistan, which is the most positive and consequential US foreign policy action since Obama withdrew from Iraq.
Positive to withdraw from Afghanistan but a total sh1tshow in his messaging and how he handled it. This from a sympathetic US journalist sums up his problems:
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
I wonder how people would have reacted in January 2020 if King Charles III refused to give assent to the Brexit bill.
Like those people who pretended to think the Queen should have refused Boris's prorogation?
The Queen did not save us.
Yeah, that was the silliness, spot on.
I vowed never to sing God Save The Queen again.
How often did you sing it before? I assume once a week at least.
As a schoolboy I used to sing it nearly every day.
As an adult I used to sing it at England football/rugby union matches but with not much gusto.
As agnostic republican God Save the Queen isn't really designed for me.
As an agnostic republican the Tory Party was never designed for you either
Your blackballing of Conservative voters cheers me no end as someone not of the faith.
Keep up the good work!
A Tory Party which supported agnostic republicanism would not be worth electing anyway, it would not be a Tory Party either anymore.
It is not being non Socialist that defines the Tory Party, the Liberal Party is equally not Socialist and has often been more free market than the Tory Party. It is being the party of the monarchy and the landed gentry and most committed to the Church of England as the Established Church above all that defines Toryism
I see you as more like a Tudor courtier than a 21st Century Conservative. A sort of Thomas Cromwell figure.
Johnson is Henry VIII, and what happened to Cromwell should be a salutory tale for you.
The best Bond is the one you saw first particularly if you were young - You Only Live Twice was mine.
Wasn't Anne the last monarch to refuse royal approval for something parliament had passed ?
Dr No and no-one has ever come near Sean Connery.
Connery is Bond. Everyone else is just acting.
Nope. Roger Moore was class.
I wonder whether there's a correlation with this opinion and supporting Trump?
I don't know, possibly. Daniel Craig has always struck me as a probable Biden voter. I reckon Sean Connery was definitely a Kennedy guy. Timothy Dalton, mmm, definitely a fan of John Major.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
No it wasn't. It was simply that the West was making a lot of money out of it and vice versa. Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism. 15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs. Now it isn't. Our interests diverged.
I disagree, but I accept the evidence is mixed
I have travelled widely in China, for 30 years. From 2000 until about 2015 it was a hugely optimistic if troubled place. After that the mood darkened, you could feel it in Beijing. In the air.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
Woke's real aim is essentially the abolition of the family, hence why the arguments over gender and trans rights is so fierce. Abolish the family and you can remake society in your own image.
Marx and Engels were big fans of the idea of abolishing the family believing you couldn't get rid of capitalism until you did.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I suspect that if you did a correlation "woke-ness" vs "vaccine uptake", you'd find that wokier areas have higher vaccine uptake.
Not one to be shaken easily by poll blips. I've been trying to work out which of the two main candidates, Macron and Le Pen, Eric Zemmour will help more than the other.
First, going by the coverage of that poll, the one that showed him knocking Le Pen out on his way to the second round, I suspected he might be a Macron stooge, because Macron would be the favourite in a race between the incumbent and a journalist, who unlike the one in No.10 has never been the mayor of anywhere or in the cabinet. But then...what if that's wrong and he's actually a Le Pen stooge? For several years the RN machine has put a great deal of effort into establishing fellow travellers and presenting the face of a "movement" that's considerably bigger than a mere political party. If Zemmour a) stands and b) keeps up enough momentum to come third in the first round (making it to the top two is unlikely, with Le Pen in the race), then there's no way that anything other than a small sliver of his support is going anywhere other than to Le Pen. He'll have helped her a lot, because in this scenario it will have been the far right that made the running, while allowing her to look moderate to former LR voters. Pundits are referencing Trump, but Zemmour is not exactly a character from the wrestling (do they even have TV wrestling in France?), preferring to refer to the Stavisky scandal and Action Française, as he generally positions himself as the man who will give the liberals, socialists, and freemasons what's coming to them (since he's of Jewish parentage we can remove "Jews" from that list, although they'd normally feature on it) as he reverses the Revolution, unpardons Dreyfus (OK, I made that bit up) and...wait a minute, let's not take his self-professed "Bonapartism" seriously and let's ask instead whether the Orleanist, Jean, Count of Paris, has any spare pages in his engagements diary. The point being that Zemmour is the current frontman for a 200-year-old polarising political tendency in France and unless Le Pen's showing in the polls completely collapses along with her party, his essential role may turn out to be that he plays a superb GOTV role for the RN's candidate.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
I was asked to define Woke a couple of weeks ago, on here. I did so. I'm not going to do it every bloody day, on demand
Search it out
Wokeness is much worse in the English speaking world, but it is now spreading to the EU
And on that unsatisfying note, goodnight PB, goodnight
On topic Biden's support wasn't "just frittered away", he lost it withdrawing from Afghanistan, which is the most positive and consequential US foreign policy action since Obama withdrew from Iraq.
Positive to withdraw from Afghanistan but a total sh1tshow in his messaging and how he handled it. This from a sympathetic US journalist sums up his problems:
The implicit assumption there is that there was a non-shitshow way to withdraw from Afghanistan. But look how weak the best objections they could find are: He didn't anticipate the speed of the collapse (nobody did, not even the Taliban) and he said something about what his generals advised which his generals later contradicted, which the writer thinks is a huge media fail but I think it's the first time I've heard it.
The best Bond is the one you saw first particularly if you were young - You Only Live Twice was mine.
Wasn't Anne the last monarch to refuse royal approval for something parliament had passed ?
Dr No and no-one has ever come near Sean Connery.
Connery is Bond. Everyone else is just acting.
Nope. Roger Moore was class.
I wonder whether there's a correlation with this opinion and supporting Trump?
I don't know, possibly. Daniel Craig has always struck me as a probable Biden voter. I reckon Sean Connery was definitely a Kennedy guy. Timothy Dalton, mmm, definitely a fan of John Major.
Dalton would have been in the US flying the flag for Bill Clinton during the Major Years.
Moore would have been a one nation Tory, but in US terms definitely a Dem.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
No it wasn't. It was simply that the West was making a lot of money out of it and vice versa. Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism. 15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs. Now it isn't. Our interests diverged.
Basically, China pulled the wool over the West's eyes for 20+ years and told the West what it wanted to hear. There were enough people, particularly on Wall Street and America's Boardrooms, who were only too happy to lap it up as it coincided with their own interest. Xi's mistake - arguably - has been to tear off the mask before China was in a position to enforce its dominance.
Partially yes. It wasn't only America. Arguably Australia and Canada were the 2 biggest to go all in. The UK and Europe did too, but were a little more removed. Look. The CCP are Chinese Communist and a Party. Arguably you can only be 2 of the 3. And the order of priority changes. The GFC has made easy riches much harder. So they have ceased being the Chinese Party, which paid huge dividends. It wasn't really a mask, as they'd have been happy to carry on indefinitely. Only one side in Western/Chinese relations had an ideology, and that was us. We were happy with the comfort blanket that they shared ours. They actually don't have one.
Being entirely selfish it will not effect my wife and I
As it happens this policy will, I predict, be dropped by a shameless Johnson days after COP21 ends and the whole circus has moved out of Glasgow.
I thought it was COP26 but I just think it is unworkable
My house is fully insulated but @Gallowgate said that only houses built in the last 20 years would qualify for the degree of insulation required and he is an expert on the subject
I think the distinction is between fully insulated (in the sense of as much insulation as you can sensibly put on an older house), which is less than the amount of insulation you need to allow a heat pump to make your house reliably comfortable.
Design the building right ("Passivhaus") and you can cut the heating requirements by 75% or so, which is handily the sort of carbon dioxide reduction we're looking for.
I don't see why it should be thought of as unworkable.
A ban on new installs of gas boilers from 2035 gives us until about 2045-2050 to replace all of them - which is well over 20 years - since they all have a lifecycle.
The Scottish Government policy announced today (I posted a link earlier) is 5 years earlier:
Their net zero target date is 2045 (vs 2050).
Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2025 for off-gas properties Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2030 for all properties
The suggestion for England is 5 years behind the Scottish proposals. If it all fails @malcolmg and @Theuniondivvie will be donning their knitted popsocks 5 years before @TSE and @Leon .
It's important to ignore the Greens, just as we ignore Extinction Rebellion, as they have marketed their position as essentially broadcasting the fictional claim that "nothing has been done".
Not one to be shaken easily by poll blips. I've been trying to work out which of the two main candidates, Macron and Le Pen, Eric Zemmour will help more than the other.
First, going by the coverage of that poll, the one that showed him knocking Le Pen out on his way to the second round, I suspected he might be a Macron stooge, because Macron would be the favourite in a race between the incumbent and a journalist, who unlike the one in No.10, was never the mayor of anywhere. But then...what if that's wrong and he's actually a Le Pen stooge? For several years the RN machine has put a great deal of effort into setting up fellow travellers and presenting the face of a "movement" that's considerably bigger than a mere political party. If Zemmour a) stands and b) keeps up enough momentum to come third in the first round (making it to the top two is unlikely, with Le Pen in the race), then there's no way that anything other than a small sliver of his support is going anywhere else other than to Le Pen. He'll have helped her a lot, because in this scenario it will have been the far right that made the running. Pundits are referencing Trump, but Zemmour is not exactly a character from the wrestling (do they even have TV wrestling in France?), preferring to refer to the Stavisky scandal, and to Action Française, as he generally positions himself as the man who will give the liberals, socialists, and freemasons what's coming to them, as he reverses the Revolution, unpardons Dreyfus (OK, I made that bit up) and...wait a minute, let's not take his self-professed "Bonapartism" seriously and let's ask instead whether the Orleanist, Jean, Count of Paris, has any spare pages in his engagements diary. The point being that Zemmour is the current frontman for a 200-year-old polarising political tendency in France and unless Le Pen's showing in the polls completely collapses along with her party, his essential role may turn out to be that he has played a GOTV role for the RN.
That's a pretty risky strategy, given it could result in Melanchon, Jadot or Bertrand pipping Le Pen / Zemmour for second place.
Ultimately, Le Pen has created Zemmour by tacking hard to the centre. She's created a space on the right that both Barnier and Zemmour (and latterly Nicolas Dupont-Aignan) have filled. Worth noting that Le Pen has backed away from France leaving the Euro (she now merely thinks it should be "reformed"), while Barnier and Zemmour are itching for Frexit.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
Woke's real aim is essentially the abolition of the family, hence why the arguments over gender and trans rights is so fierce. Abolish the family and you can remake society in your own image.
Marx and Engels were big fans of the idea of abolishing the family believing you couldn't get rid of capitalism until you did.
Now you've really lost me. Do trans people and the genderfluid not want families?
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
I was asked to define Woke a couple of weeks ago, on here. I did so. I'm not going to do it every bloody day, on demand
Search it out
Wokeness is much worse in the English speaking world, but it is now spreading to the EU
And on that unsatisfying note, goodnight PB, goodnight
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
No it wasn't. It was simply that the West was making a lot of money out of it and vice versa. Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism. 15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs. Now it isn't. Our interests diverged.
I disagree, but I accept the evidence is mixed
I have travelled widely in China, for 30 years. From 2000 until about 2015 it was a hugely optimistic if troubled place. After that the mood darkened, you could feel it in Beijing. In the air.
This is purely subjective, as I say
Nowhere is that more obvious than in PRC-Taiwan relations. Under Zemin and Jintao relations really thawed between the two countries. Direct flights recommenced. The Taiwanese government allowed Chinese companies to own strategic assets like telecoms.
It looked like there would be a general agreement: Taiwan would not formally declare independence, it would be supportive of the PRC in public, and economic ties would deepen. The hope was that as China liberalised and became more democratic, the two would become ever closer.
That was - really - the period from about 1993 to 2013.
Under Xi it has completely changed. The velvet glove has changed to the iron fist.
Is it serious enough to end in the invasion of Taiwan? We don't know. But it seems highly likely that one of two things will happen: either Taiwan will be coerced into joining China under some HK-like deal. Or Taiwan will declare independence, and who the hell knows what happens then.
But do not underestimate the extent to which China's actions have really screwed the pooch in Taiwan. For the first time, polls there consistently show 50+% of people wanting official independence, and maybe only one-in-ten wanting reunification with China.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
Woke's real aim is essentially the abolition of the family, hence why the arguments over gender and trans rights is so fierce. Abolish the family and you can remake society in your own image.
Marx and Engels were big fans of the idea of abolishing the family believing you couldn't get rid of capitalism until you did.
Being entirely selfish it will not effect my wife and I
As it happens this policy will, I predict, be dropped by a shameless Johnson days after COP21 ends and the whole circus has moved out of Glasgow.
I thought it was COP26 but I just think it is unworkable
My house is fully insulated but @Gallowgate said that only houses built in the last 20 years would qualify for the degree of insulation required and he is an expert on the subject
I think the distinction is between fully insulated (in the sense of as much insulation as you can sensibly put on an older house), which is less than the amount of insulation you need to allow a heat pump to make your house reliably comfortable.
Design the building right ("Passivhaus") and you can cut the heating requirements by 75% or so, which is handily the sort of carbon dioxide reduction we're looking for.
I don't see why it should be thought of as unworkable.
A ban on new installs of gas boilers from 2035 gives us until about 2045-2050 to replace all of them - which is well over 20 years - since they all have a lifecycle.
The Scottish Government policy announced today (I posted a link earlier) is 5 years earlier:
Their net zero target date is 2045 (vs 2050).
Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2025 for off-gas properties Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2030 for all properties
The suggestion for England is 5 years behind the Scottish proposals. If it all fails @malcolmg and @Theuniondivvie will be donning their knitted popsocks 5 years before @TSE and @Leon .
It's important to ignore the Greens, just as we ignore Extinction Rebellion, as they have marketed their position as essentially broadcasting the fictional claim that "nothing has been done".
A huge amount has been done.
I just can't see how it will work.
Are we really going to force someone to demolish a house just because their boiler has packed in? Because that's effectively what you are doing if you require everyone to use a heat pump in all circumstances.
My 1920s bungalow doesn't have a full cavity, so it would have to go. There's no space to clad it externally.
Or are we going to end up forcing people to go back to direct electrical heating of the kind you still find in places off the gas network?
The government will end up having to make exceptions. Many of them.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
Clearly not
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
Yes but Russia only ever had something approaching liberal democracy for under 10 years under Yeltsin.
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
But the trajectory of China was much more hopeful, 15 years ago. It was no threat to Hong Kong, it seemed to be rising benignly, speech was becoming more free - then Xi came along, and Ugh
No it wasn't. It was simply that the West was making a lot of money out of it and vice versa. Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism. 15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs. Now it isn't. Our interests diverged.
I disagree, but I accept the evidence is mixed
I have travelled widely in China, for 30 years. From 2000 until about 2015 it was a hugely optimistic if troubled place. After that the mood darkened, you could feel it in Beijing. In the air.
This is purely subjective, as I say
Nowhere is that more obvious than in PRC-Taiwan relations. Under Zemin and Jintao relations really thawed between the two countries. Direct flights recommenced. The Taiwanese government allowed Chinese companies to own strategic assets like telecoms.
It looked like there would be a general agreement: Taiwan would not formally declare independence, it would be supportive of the PRC in public, and economic ties would deepen. The hope was that as China liberalised and became more democratic, the two would become ever closer.
That was - really - the period from about 1993 to 2013.
Under Xi it has completely changed. The velvet glove has changed to the iron fist.
Is it serious enough to end in the invasion of Taiwan? We don't know. But it seems highly likely that one of two things will happen: either Taiwan will be coerced into joining China under some HK-like deal. Or Taiwan will declare independence, and who the hell knows what happens then.
But do not underestimate the extent to which China's actions have really screwed the pooch in Taiwan. For the first time, polls there consistently show 50+% of people wanting official independence, and maybe only one-in-ten wanting reunification with China.
Really astute post. 2 minor quibbles. Firstly it is Jiang and Hu. Those are their surnames. Secondly. Taiwanese independence has been popular over the whole period you mention. Yes, it has broken through the 50% barrier, but it was significant in 1993. (The year I moved there by coincidence). What has fallen through the floor is the number who want reunification. They are a generation who are dying off rapidly. Ironically, the ease of travel to the Mainland has been a huge eye-opener. It is no longer a theoretical question. Plus, of course, the number who remember pre-1949 on the Mainland gets tinier and tinier.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
Woke's real aim is essentially the abolition of the family, hence why the arguments over gender and trans rights is so fierce. Abolish the family and you can remake society in your own image.
Marx and Engels were big fans of the idea of abolishing the family believing you couldn't get rid of capitalism until you did.
Woke-ism is really a cipher for a status battle between the increasing numbers of graduates who are surprised that their position in life is not as important as they expected it to be.
I'm really looking forward to when he inevitably refuses to give royal assent to some bill he doesn't look.
Charles is more intelligent than both his mother and his son but less politically astute than they are.
However if a bill was unpopular according to polls he would probably get away with refusing to give royal assent if he tried to do so
Parliament would immediately make refusing royal assent impossible. In theory people might support that kind of thing, but in practice they'd see we don't want kings with that ability, it only still exists because it won't be used.
It couldn't, unless it had royal assent for it.
Remember the Government are still the Monarch's ministers. Both Parliament and the Monarch's approval is needed to make statute laws
Yeah, they would change that.
Parts of our system are legal fictions, and if people tried to make the fictions real, something explicit would be put in place instead. I'm a monarchist, but it's monarchism on the basis the monarch does as they are told.
Parliament couldn't legally put Charles I on trial either, or make laws, but it didn't stop them doing so for 11 years in various guises. Was the Convention Parliament acting 'legally' by saying James II had abdicated in 1689?
People decide what is legal afterwards.
But in fact if Charles did try something like that I bet he would then sign an Act that he could not do it again in future - as Parliament would make it very clear where the power lies.
I don't think you appreciate how much the power of our system is on the basis of people not abusing theoretical powers. Consent for that system would collapse if they were subject to personal whims of a king.
They can't change that.
Charles 1st was executed as he tried to rule without Parliament and raise his own armies.
A Monarch vetoing a Bill which was unpopular would be ruling with Parliament but just having more Crown input. Charles would be perfectly entitled to do so and nothing Parliament could do about it, if he exercised such powers he would obviously not try and restrict his royal prerogative
I love the sidestepping. Parliament did not have the 'legal' authority to put a king on trial and execute him, no matter what he did, not with the legal system they had*. You think Charles I, or any previous King, gave assent to a law that said 'You can execute a king'?
They, or rather a portion of it, just gave themselves that power when they felt it was necessary.
And that is the point, HYUFD. It doesn't matter what is written on paper if people and those in power decide to do something different. Charles II was, from view of the authorities in 1660, in his 12th year of being king, but that hadn't mattered up to then. Yes, Charles III can theoretically refuse consent, he has that legal power. But the idea that Parliament is therefore helpless to do something about it? Legally, yes, but not in reality.
*I'd recommend The Tyrannicide Brief, all about the trial of Charles I, which talks about how they made a real effort to make it as fair and legal as possible, and creatively used what law there was to suggest it was legal, but it really wasn't. There wasn't a way to make it so, hence the need to operate outside it.
'They can't change that' is just a ridiculous statement to make. It's Charles I or Saddam Hussein defence that the courts trying them had no power to do so. Maybe, but it didn't save them!
Honestly, you're fantastic at turning monarchists into republicans if you're arguing Charles could be a tyrant and no one could stop him.
Parliament only executed Charles I after they won a War against his forces first, it was called a Civil War for a reason. Saddam was also only executed having lost power after the Iraq War.
In reality Parliament could force the Monarch to sign popular Bills yes, Parliament would be powerless to force the Monarch to sign unpopular Bills however if the Monarch disagreed with them too
That's where we disagree - take the King aside and say 'My party would have no choice but to support a republican position if you refuse to pass our legislation, which we have a democratic mandate to do' and he'd come to heel, since you've been arguing Charles is smart. What idiot monarch would risk the demise of their throne on the basis that opinion polling shows opposing a single bill would be popular?
We've had this dance before in the period after 1689 but before the modern age, when Kings still had significant actualy authority. They lost that fight, there's a reason it has been so long that assent has not been refused - because each and every one of them realised it was a dumb thing to do. You think 300 years of not refusing assent was because there was never something the government wanted to do which was unpopular, which the monarch opposed?
And the point about Charles I was not that it took a war, but that what was considered 'legal' changes depending on what is convenient. It took far less bloodshed (though not zero) for Parliament to ignore that James II clearly had not abdicated but to say that he had in effect done so.
No, Charles could merely say in response 'polls show the public back my opposition to this Bill so tough.' If the governing party took a republican position on an unpopular Bill not in its manifesto it would likely simply lose the next general election to the Opposition.
James II was trying to impose Catholicism on England, that was why he could not prevail as the public were strongly Protestant, had the public wanted a return to Catholicism Parliament would have had to bow to his demands
I think you keep missing the key point that what they did was obviously not legal, but it did not matter. Which I'd think is important when you take very legalistic positions. Or rather were, as you seem to now just be in favour of mob rule.
Had Charles I won the Civil War the Divine Right of Kings would have become the law
How did the Divine Right of Kings work out in other countries where it was tried?
France did not have a Revolution or Civil War of any significance on Monarchical power until the French Revolution, had the Englsh Monarchy won the Civil War that would have entrenched Divine Right for centuries
You're almost certainly wrong about that; the Enlightenment was a driving force behind the political currents that culminated in the French revolution. The scientific, literary, philosophical, and economic progress made during the 18th century would have happened anyway, and the dissemination of ideas that challenged the ossifying grip of kingly absolutism would have been in continuous conflict with it until the kingly absolutism broke. The liberalism of the 17-20th century Europe was an unstoppable tide, and the only options were to accommodate it or get smashed to bits by standing in its way.
Sorry to bring this back to the woke, as is my obsession; and straying away from the general conversation... but on another historical scale the woke could be looked at as the end of the enlightenment and a prelude to a return to some form of kingly absolutism. That is what I actually think will happen, and what indeed has actually happened in some countries, like Russia. The woke are the absolute antithesis of much that was important in the enlightenment, they deny science, try and censor literature and are against the liberal tradition of free philisophical inquiry. Once this stuff goes, then we are back being ruled by a king.
Are you arguing Russia is woke?
I said that the woke were a PRELUDE to kingly absolutism, not the manifestation of it.
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
Did Russia have a period of woke liberal rule? Must say I missed that. Absolute rule is the default state.
darkage is right again, tho.
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
Yebbut. Trump lost. Babis lost in Czechia two days ago. Poland is having anti-government pro-EU protests. In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
Woke's real aim is essentially the abolition of the family, hence why the arguments over gender and trans rights is so fierce. Abolish the family and you can remake society in your own image.
Marx and Engels were big fans of the idea of abolishing the family believing you couldn't get rid of capitalism until you did.
Woke-ism is really a cipher for a status battle between the increasing numbers of graduates who are surprised that their position in life is not as important as they expected it to be.
Is it? Or is it just that young people don't see things the way their elders do? You would need to account for the views of those too young to have graduated to support that assertion. And for those younger non-graduates.
Being entirely selfish it will not effect my wife and I
As it happens this policy will, I predict, be dropped by a shameless Johnson days after COP21 ends and the whole circus has moved out of Glasgow.
I thought it was COP26 but I just think it is unworkable
My house is fully insulated but @Gallowgate said that only houses built in the last 20 years would qualify for the degree of insulation required and he is an expert on the subject
I think the distinction is between fully insulated (in the sense of as much insulation as you can sensibly put on an older house), which is less than the amount of insulation you need to allow a heat pump to make your house reliably comfortable.
Design the building right ("Passivhaus") and you can cut the heating requirements by 75% or so, which is handily the sort of carbon dioxide reduction we're looking for.
I don't see why it should be thought of as unworkable.
A ban on new installs of gas boilers from 2035 gives us until about 2045-2050 to replace all of them - which is well over 20 years - since they all have a lifecycle.
The Scottish Government policy announced today (I posted a link earlier) is 5 years earlier:
Their net zero target date is 2045 (vs 2050).
Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2025 for off-gas properties Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2030 for all properties
The suggestion for England is 5 years behind the Scottish proposals. If it all fails @malcolmg and @Theuniondivvie will be donning their knitted popsocks 5 years before @TSE and @Leon .
It's important to ignore the Greens, just as we ignore Extinction Rebellion, as they have marketed their position as essentially broadcasting the fictional claim that "nothing has been done".
A huge amount has been done.
I just can't see how it will work.
Are we really going to force someone to demolish a house just because their boiler has packed in? Because that's effectively what you are doing if you require everyone to use a heat pump in all circumstances.
My 1920s bungalow doesn't have a full cavity, so it would have to go. There's no space to clad it externally.
Or are we going to end up forcing people to go back to direct electrical heating of the kind you still find in places off the gas network?
The government will end up having to make exceptions. Many of them.
That's not right.
It's perfectly possible properly to insulate / improve solid walled houses. I have done a whole series of them myself. It doesn't need a full cavity - which as you say weren't a regular thing until perhaps 1925-1930.
You can internally insulate it (which will take around 3-4" off each external wall done well), or externally insulate it. In either case you can easily take it up to a decent standard (say a C or even a B on the EPC scale). Those approaches are even routinely used under the ECO programme for people who qualify for support, and have been for many years. Perhaps there are slightly more wrinkles and PM needed, but it is a normal thing to do.
Today building without a cavity is also a normal thing to do in many technologies / types of build.
Personally I have done an 1850s cottage, several pre WW1, and a couple more from the 1920s - all solid walled.
Yes there will be exceptions, but a very small proportion.
If you're house is very well insulated (not difficult, just lots) direct electrical heating can be fine and is coming back for new houses. One option is to have essentially Willis Heaters (like immersion heaters) installed directly in the slab, and run them on Economy-7. A quality house will take days to leak the heat out, so that approach can work fine running overnight.
These days many do not bother with heating upstairs, except perhaps an electric towel rail and a fan heater in the cupboard for once a year when a boost is needed or something breaks.
(Though that highlights that for well-insulated, airtight houses, controlled cooling is as important as controlled heating.)
Comments
Though if sage did not advise it then the leaders of the four nations could hardly have gone against sage advice
Not to say support cannot genuinely increase or decrease too, but the up and down surges are more sensitive.
https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/81/health-and-social-care-committee/membership/
Paul Johnson dates this national trait to the English Civil War
darkage is correctly noting that as the Enlightenment shrivels away in the West, other nations are also retreating from the ideals of liberal democracy; Russia has a new Tsar, China goes the Full George Orwell
Our own abandonment of liberal ideals makes it much harder for us to criticise them
https://twitter.com/PoliticsForAlI/status/1447672384362844162?s=20
Result last time:
Con 59%
LD 27%
Lab 10%
Green 4%
In my scenario Charles I and the Royalists had defeated the English Revolution
Peter Pomerantsev wrote a brilliant book about how the future first arrived in Russia. How the Putin regime brilliantly manipulated the liberal left in the 2010's to entrench its power, which was the prelude to what we have now in Russia; the return of the absolute ruler.
The Yellow Sam coup of 1975 made Barney Curley a household name in Ireland and Northern Ireland and is still remembered with reverence today by anyone associated with racing. For the first time, Barney tells the incredible story in his own words, of how he managed to take £2m (inflation-adjusted) off the bookies in one eventful hurdle race in 1975 - without breaking the law. With access to the bookmakers and the jockey, as well as stars of racing such as Frankie Dettori and Ian Balding, this is the definitive story of one of the great characters of the turf.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p09y2zdh/barney-curley-the-man-who-beat-the-bookies
China has never really had a liberal democracy, absolutism, whether by Emperor, Tsar or Communism or Nationalism is the norm for them
My house is fully insulated but @Gallowgate said that only houses built in the last 20 years would qualify for the degree of insulation required and he is an expert on the subject
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/oct/07/tory-councillor-in-worthing-suspended-over-alleged-support-of-far-right
Firstly, because power is addictive and what politicians do. Whilst they may not be sociopaths, you can model them as same. This is a man who became vice president and then came back years later to become president. He wants it.
Secondly, because it's analogous to a carry trade; so long as he doesn't announce a plan to leave, there isn't a massive drubbing in the mid terms or a similar surprise announcements then it should be possible to lay the bet off into a shortening price if other signals start rearing their head.
Now the Maoist Xi has doubled down on the political restrictions while rowing back on some of the economic freedoms too
The military would have been firmly on the Monarch's and Royalists side and the movement for universal suffrage did not really arrive in any great numbers until the 19th century
Design the building right ("Passivhaus") and you can cut the heating requirements by 75% or so, which is handily the sort of carbon dioxide reduction we're looking for.
Absolute rule is the default state.
Keep up the good work!
It is not being non Socialist that defines the Tory Party, the Liberal Party is equally not Socialist and has often been more free market than the Tory Party. It is being the party of the monarchy and the landed gentry and most committed to the Church of England as the Established Church above all that defines Toryism
In the end, desperate westerners will vote for strongmen - autocrats - to save what is left of their civilisation from the barbarian hordes of the Woke. We've already seen this with Trump. And Orban. And the Poles.
Now Zemmour rises in France.
Brexit was a way of avoiding this terrible plunge, let's hope it works
In the USA as 2020 shows there is only so far that can go in an increasingly multiracial America, in France too the same applies to a lesser extent and certainly Macron would still beat Zemmour or Le Pen.
Yes voters do not want wokeism to go so far it erases their heritage but nor are most western voters white supremacists either
Taiwan was under threat. The Uighurs and Tibetans were persecuted and there was no freedom of speech or political pluralism.
15 years ago our focus was Islam, and the promotion of the rapacious globalisation of capitalism. As was theirs.
Now it isn't.
Our interests diverged.
Woke is more than race. Arguably it is fundamentally more about the family, and its abolition, which is why there are so many arguments over the issue of gender and trans rights. The latter is actually of more interest to many minority groups.
aggressive in its conduct of war than it had been before.
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/576110-biden-administration-competency-doubts-increase
In none of these is "woke" predominant. Still nobody can tell me what woke even is other than the fear of those of a certain disposition that they may be a little out of touch.
Johnson is Henry VIII, and what happened to Cromwell should be a salutory tale for you.
I have travelled widely in China, for 30 years. From 2000 until about 2015 it was a hugely optimistic if troubled place. After that the mood darkened, you could feel it in Beijing. In the air.
This is purely subjective, as I say
Marx and Engels were big fans of the idea of abolishing the family believing you couldn't get rid of capitalism until you did.
First, going by the coverage of that poll, the one that showed him knocking Le Pen out on his way to the second round, I suspected he might be a Macron stooge, because Macron would be the favourite in a race between the incumbent and a journalist, who unlike the one in No.10 has never been the mayor of anywhere or in the cabinet. But then...what if that's wrong and he's actually a Le Pen stooge? For several years the RN machine has put a great deal of effort into establishing fellow travellers and presenting the face of a "movement" that's considerably bigger than a mere political party. If Zemmour a) stands and b) keeps up enough momentum to come third in the first round (making it to the top two is unlikely, with Le Pen in the race), then there's no way that anything other than a small sliver of his support is going anywhere other than to Le Pen. He'll have helped her a lot, because in this scenario it will have been the far right that made the running, while allowing her to look moderate to former LR voters. Pundits are referencing Trump, but Zemmour is not exactly a character from the wrestling (do they even have TV wrestling in France?), preferring to refer to the Stavisky scandal and Action Française, as he generally positions himself as the man who will give the liberals, socialists, and freemasons what's coming to them (since he's of Jewish parentage we can remove "Jews" from that list, although they'd normally feature on it) as he reverses the Revolution, unpardons Dreyfus (OK, I made that bit up) and...wait a minute, let's not take his self-professed "Bonapartism" seriously and let's ask instead whether the Orleanist, Jean, Count of Paris, has any spare pages in his engagements diary. The point being that Zemmour is the current frontman for a 200-year-old polarising political tendency in France and unless Le Pen's showing in the polls completely collapses along with her party, his essential role may turn out to be that he plays a superb GOTV role for the RN's candidate.
Search it out
Wokeness is much worse in the English speaking world, but it is now spreading to the EU
And on that unsatisfying note, goodnight PB, goodnight
Moore would have been a one nation Tory, but in US terms definitely a Dem.
Look. The CCP are Chinese Communist and a Party.
Arguably you can only be 2 of the 3. And the order of priority changes. The GFC has made easy riches much harder. So they have ceased being the Chinese Party, which paid huge dividends.
It wasn't really a mask, as they'd have been happy to carry on indefinitely.
Only one side in Western/Chinese relations had an ideology, and that was us. We were happy with the comfort blanket that they shared ours. They actually don't have one.
A ban on new installs of gas boilers from 2035 gives us until about 2045-2050 to replace all of them - which is well over 20 years - since they all have a lifecycle.
The Scottish Government policy announced today (I posted a link earlier) is 5 years earlier:
Their net zero target date is 2045 (vs 2050).
Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2025 for off-gas properties
Ban on installing fossil fuel boilers from 2030 for all properties
The suggestion for England is 5 years behind the Scottish proposals. If it all fails @malcolmg and @Theuniondivvie will be donning their knitted popsocks 5 years before @TSE and @Leon .
It's important to ignore the Greens, just as we ignore Extinction Rebellion, as they have marketed their position as essentially broadcasting the fictional claim that "nothing has been done".
A huge amount has been done.
Ultimately, Le Pen has created Zemmour by tacking hard to the centre. She's created a space on the right that both Barnier and Zemmour (and latterly Nicolas Dupont-Aignan) have filled. Worth noting that Le Pen has backed away from France leaving the Euro (she now merely thinks it should be "reformed"), while Barnier and Zemmour are itching for Frexit.
Do trans people and the genderfluid not want families?
It looked like there would be a general agreement: Taiwan would not formally declare independence, it would be supportive of the PRC in public, and economic ties would deepen. The hope was that as China liberalised and became more democratic, the two would become ever closer.
That was - really - the period from about 1993 to 2013.
Under Xi it has completely changed. The velvet glove has changed to the iron fist.
Is it serious enough to end in the invasion of Taiwan? We don't know. But it seems highly likely that one of two things will happen: either Taiwan will be coerced into joining China under some HK-like deal. Or Taiwan will declare independence, and who the hell knows what happens then.
But do not underestimate the extent to which China's actions have really screwed the pooch in Taiwan. For the first time, polls there consistently show 50+% of people wanting official independence, and maybe only one-in-ten wanting reunification with China.
Are we really going to force someone to demolish a house just because their boiler has packed in? Because that's effectively what you are doing if you require everyone to use a heat pump in all circumstances.
My 1920s bungalow doesn't have a full cavity, so it would have to go. There's no space to clad it externally.
Or are we going to end up forcing people to go back to direct electrical heating of the kind you still find in places off the gas network?
The government will end up having to make exceptions. Many of them.
2 minor quibbles. Firstly it is Jiang and Hu. Those are their surnames.
Secondly. Taiwanese independence has been popular over the whole period you mention. Yes, it has broken through the 50% barrier, but it was significant in 1993. (The year I moved there by coincidence).
What has fallen through the floor is the number who want reunification. They are a generation who are dying off rapidly. Ironically, the ease of travel to the Mainland has been a huge eye-opener. It is no longer a theoretical question.
Plus, of course, the number who remember pre-1949 on the Mainland gets tinier and tinier.
You would need to account for the views of those too young to have graduated to support that assertion.
And for those younger non-graduates.
It's perfectly possible properly to insulate / improve solid walled houses. I have done a whole series of them myself. It doesn't need a full cavity - which as you say weren't a regular thing until perhaps 1925-1930.
You can internally insulate it (which will take around 3-4" off each external wall done well), or externally insulate it. In either case you can easily take it up to a decent standard (say a C or even a B on the EPC scale). Those approaches are even routinely used under the ECO programme for people who qualify for support, and have been for many years. Perhaps there are slightly more wrinkles and PM needed, but it is a normal thing to do.
Today building without a cavity is also a normal thing to do in many technologies / types of build.
Personally I have done an 1850s cottage, several pre WW1, and a couple more from the 1920s - all solid walled.
Yes there will be exceptions, but a very small proportion.
If you're house is very well insulated (not difficult, just lots) direct electrical heating can be fine and is coming back for new houses. One option is to have essentially Willis Heaters (like immersion heaters) installed directly in the slab, and run them on Economy-7. A quality house will take days to leak the heat out, so that approach can work fine running overnight.
These days many do not bother with heating upstairs, except perhaps an electric towel rail and a fan heater in the cupboard for once a year when a boost is needed or something breaks.
(Though that highlights that for well-insulated, airtight houses, controlled cooling is as important as controlled heating.)