Friday 4 December 2015

Betrayal in Syria; peace just got a whole lot more elusive

I'm afraid I'm moved to resigning my long-standing Party membership. As both a "Tribal" and (hopefully) thoughtful member of the Party since the days when it was known as "The Liberals",  I can't but feel the Party has lost its way and that hard-fought principles and freedoms are being jettisoned in the rhetoric of war and so-called Austerity.  Like Jayne Mansfield,  Alister  and others on LibDemVoice,  I see aerial bombardments and a promised seat at the Top Tables of arms fairs and diplomatic machinations as hardly  a basis for our consent to bomb  (my I add my thanks for your 'No' votes  Norman Lamb and Mark).
Yes, at least there was a free vote, and a mostly civilised debate (wise words, Caron) and reasoned arguments have been heard, but a leadership vacuum exists - someone at the top who prefers talking, but if not just that, at least a proper future plan and strategy, including reconstruction. Sadly, I think that Syria will be almost totally destroyed, with attendant on-going and ensuing  humanitarian crisis. A majority of our House of Commons  representatives clearly believes that the fight against Daesh and protecting the UK is best achieved by finding the money to carry out bombing in a land that is already heavily-weaponised and almost totally destroyed. And, by the way, we're only committed to accepting a measly 20,000 refugees over the next few years. And meanwhile, the LibDems will slip into obscurity and irrelevance.