Saturday
Dec042010
Nigel Farage: follow the leader
Saturday, December 4, 2010 
I still don't 'get' Twitter.
That aside, we've had an influx of emails overnight and this morning confirming that so-and-so is "following your tweets (@Forest_Smoking) on Twitter".
I looked into it and the common denominator (so-and-so "follows a user who follows you") pointed towards UKIP leader Nigel Farage.
And so it proved (see above).
I can only return the compliment. Click HERE to follow Nigel on Twitter.
Btw, did you read this extraordinary story on Wednesday: Crash pilot 'threatened to kill UKIP's Nigel Farage' (BBC News).
Thanks to Rose W for bringing it to my attention.
Reader Comments (18)
Isn't it obvious by now Simon to you and other so called "Conservative Party" supporters that freedom of choice will not return to this country unless we have a new govt. Just one term of UKIP will push all this crap backwards and hopefully return all of our parties to their original roots. That is my honest belief as one who has predicted all that has come over the last 10 - 15 years.
I didn't change my political support lightly but I had no choice. I'm not sure what party the Conservatives are now but they are not Conservatives as you have noted before.
I beg you Tory smokers and freedom lovers, please don't let us down again by further supporting this party if we get the chance to vote again in a national election and why not show the Tories how disappointed we are by voting UKIP in droves at the local council elections in May.
That might be one way to stop the horrendously oppressive laws coming our way via local councils thanks to ASH's white paper on health.
Please help. see sense. Vote UKIP at least once in protest. MAKE the LibLabCon listen.
I'm in. Like Simon, I'm a Thatcherite and this Tory party is not one I recognise.
UK and US both. The major parties no longer stand for their roots. They've all gone to the same side and just provide cover-up for one another, new party in power, same policies as the previous. They all need shaken up. A third or new party coming into power on both sides of the Atlantic and sticking to the root of our constitutions could force the major parties to realign back into what they were supposed to represent until they all became corrupted. The corrupting influence must come from somewhere higher up above the line of party politicians, so must be a shake-up happening in that invisible world several classes higher than the political classes that provide the charades to keep us all ignorant of the real culprits above them. Just an opinion - electing UKIP might be a good way to resolve lots of things all at once. I get in trouble and hated for saying these kinds of things, but I'm really just stating an honest opinion based on observation - and it's an "opinion", my two cents worth. I apologize if it sounds too simplistic, but it's honestly how I think.
now I know Nigel Farage seems quite a nice man, but come on girls, be sensible, his party isn't exactly ready to govern england yet is it.
He should change the name from UKIP to IKIP, as he seems to be the only person in the party.
Dick Hardcastle - there are more people than farage in UKIP but you don't hear of them because the media is about as keen to promote UKIP as it is smoking and rights for smokers. Like it's promotion of smokers as child abusers so it promotes UKIP as nutters.
Seriously, what harm one term and surely great benefit in local councils to resist this new white paper. That's a common sense view and not a simplistic one. We have to fight this. How would you suggest we do that when the ConDems are not listening to a thing we say?
To expect the Conservatives to be any different from Nulab is fantasy, false hope, or misplaced loyalty. I don't believe this NuTory ConDem Alliance is in any fit position to govern than your fear about UKIP.
The country pretty much runs itself and that's why Lansley is rolling over and just letting the DoH get on with its denormalisation plan.The civil servants have it all in hand. At least a UKIP Govt would be in a position to change those little things that mean so very much to ordinary people while leaving the big things to take care of themselves.
Meanwhile a message sent to Govt via a UKIP showing at local councils would surely pin their ears back.
I can't vote for my allegedly Conservative MP again.
He didn't abstain, but despite surely being aware of the misery and damage caused already, deliberately voted against Mr Nuttall's bill to ensure that his elderly constituents remained in isolation, and that our remaining local pubs would continue to close.
This country is in a real mess. There are no socialists nor are there capitalists. Everyone appears to be sat in the middle somewhere, leaving no choice for anyone. The smoking ban was put in place because the general public were deemed too stupid to make decisions for themselves. The general election proved this to be true. I voted UKIP because they offered an alternative. My worry is that, in this time of identi-parties with successive governments giving the impression to the people they consider 'too stupid to make a choice' that to hate a particular social group is acceptable, the alternative they may choose come next election would not be quite as liberal as UKIP.
Dick,
Maybe UKIP would be able to govern the country, and maybe they wouldn’t. But could they honestly, truthfully, do a worse job than the lot we’ve got in power now, or the lot we had before? D’you know, I really don’t think that’s possible. I hang my head in despair these days whenever the Government makes some “pronouncement” about some great “plan” they’ve got up their sleeves for some area of our lives because, even if it’s an area which I agree needs addressing, I simply have no confidence that any of them have the slightest idea how to go about achieving whatever needs to be done in a sensible, realistic and workable way. When I cast my mind back over the last few decades of my adult life I really can’t think of a single reform undertaken by any Parliament (regardless of whoever was in power) which has resulted in any significant improvement either for myself as an individual or for the country as a whole. And I’m no spring chicken, so that covers quite a few decades and quite a few different shades of Government.
The reason why most people don’t vote for UKIP (or indeed for any of the other smaller parties) is because they cling remorselessly to the “better the devil you know than the devil you don’t” mentality, which in itself is nothing less than a cover for pure cowardice when faced with the choice of playing it safe as opposed to taking what, given the ineptitude of today’s politicians, as I say above, is a pretty small risk. However, when, as other posters on here have pointed out, the “devil you know” turns out to be rather more of an unknown quantity than you thought, adhering to that mentality manifests in reality into nothing short of “cutting off your nose to spite your face.”
All it takes is to put the X in a different box from usual ...... is that really too much to ask?
It will be our Nige for me
I have to say that after the betrayal and lies that both Conservative and Labour have shoved in our faces…then I fully intend to vote UKIP at the next election. What is perfectly clear is that no amendment will ever come our way under the major parties.
Nigel Farage is for me a pretty good bet – he is also a proud smoker.
In 2013 when (or if) the Euro elections happen the coalition will be serious trouble, I think that UKIP may become the biggest party in the UK when all the Chihuahuas come out and vote. ChIHUAHuas are Conservatives In their Heads, UKIP At Heart.
UKIP can easily portray the elections as a referendum on Europe and even I am disappointed by Cameron's pleadge on a post electoral referendum. To be fair Parliament and the Lords had democratically had passed the Lisbon Treaty but his continuing desire to wriggle on new changes to the treaty just make him look a little cynical.
Barroso and Van Rompuy look increasingly like Hitler in his Berlin bunker in April 1945 moving imaginary armies around the map in the vain hope they we may all come to agree with them. The Euro crisis and it is a real and major problem which will bring down the Euro project, especially as the Germans who bankroll the EU look like they may pick up their ball, take it home and reintoduce the Mark. It is no coincidence that Nigel was invited to speak to a group of German economists this year. His topics included that Germany should forget its war guilt and stop apologising.
Well done Godfrey Bloom for exposing the hypocrisy of the European Parliament.
We may well regain our sovereingty yet.
It's not just about sovereignty to me Dave or the millions of Ex lab and Ex Lib Dem voters who have gone over to UKIP. It is a very simple matter of wanting to be treated as equal, with respect, and to be left alone by the state which is working towards inclusion by inciting hatred of particular lifestyle groups.
I sincerely hoped for better under the Cons but as Cameron was keeping very tight lipped about the Tory plans for smokers before the election, I knew that the persecution would continue if they won and it has but in a more subtle way.
That's why I not only voted for but allowed others to vote for UKIP through me as a candidate. I do not regret it and I'm rather proud that I have not helped one bit towards the ConDem hatred of smokers and the further plans they have to denormalise us and our fat friends and drinking friends.
I do not want to continue living in a dictatorship. I was born in a free country. I do not recognise this land as the same anymore. It is terrifying and oppressive. Stalinist really does describe life here now fuelled by a new brand of Puritanism not seen since Cromwell's time.
I feel only UKIP offers us the chance to loosen the grip of the all powerful state, get control of our lives, our country, and our sense of right and wrong back.
... should have read ... "working towards EXCLUSION" of course :<( typo
"Cameron was keeping very tight lipped about the Tory plans for smokers before the election,.."
I am afraid that it was worse than that. Activists in Yorkshire who were leafletting or door knocking were told to say that there were no plans to amend the smoking ban if asked.
Then I'm even more depressed that some smokers did indeed vote to become Tory turkeys at Xmas :<(
if you guys are at aloose end I'm on Manchester Radio at 10.15 tonight talking about alcohol, fags may come up too. ;) http://www.manchesterradioonline.com/
Its ironic that what Pat Nurse was saying before the general election in relation to a vote for the Conservatives would be a vote for Nu Labour Lite, have now come to pass, just like the way a vote for Yes on Lisbon has turned out to be a disaster.
The fact that the smaller parties like UKIP and dare I mention BNP hadnt got the money the vested interests had, to buy over their biased media cheer leaders to give false hope to the 'stupid electorate' is all becoming clear now when it is too late.
But when people start to come to their senses again as they enivatibly will, as was the case last week when Ireland's incompetant incumbant party were trounced in a local election by a fringe party, I'm sure the fringe partys will triumph next time around.
Unless the Electorate in sufficient numbers decides to wrest back the authority to govern its own life as it sees fit, and continues to support an arrangement that has become moribund and deeply corrupt, then so long will the Shadow Government continue to govern us behind this absurd parade of marionettes. It will grow stronger, as we grow weaker - until we reach the point at which even the thought of 'change' (never mind resistance) becomes too demanding.
It seems to me that the nucleus, at least, of a new political force exists ( I mention no names), and if its novelty (or 'weirdness') is a little off-putting to some, then it's open to the doubters to join, offer intelligent opinions, and possibly shape it into something more to their taste, and probably more in tune with the wishes and character of the vast majority of people in this land.
And the Lack of Experience argument is a complete red herring. How much 'experience of government' did Adams, Jefferson, and Washington have in 1776 ? For mere amateurs, they didn't do too badly. Character, courage, and a passionate commitment to a generally agreed set of principles matter more than a track record of Mediocrity In High Places.
The Party is over. Time, I think, to look for a new one - and bring The People back into Politics.
I agree 100% Martin.
We need a new political party where the people's needs, not what the vested interests dictate are best for us, to keep the old regime in power.
We've all had enough of that bullshit thank you very much.