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The King`s Speech ( New Year Message )

On 7 Jan 2011 at 4:53pm Newmania wrote:

Fascinating review of this film in the Telegraph today but I thought I would bring this quotation from George VI`s most famous speech, (mentioned by Andrew Roberts) , to a smaller audience . It was shortly after the declaration of war in September on Christmas day.
One can scarcely imagine the emotions of the listening Nation,and the King used these lines from a poet I had never heard of , Minnie Louise Harkins.

" I said to the man who stood at the Gate of the Year,
Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown
And he replied ' Go out into the darkness,
And put your hand into the hand of God .'"
May we live in relatively uninteresting times eh

On 7 Jan 2011 at 4:57pm Clifford wrote:

It's hard not to sympathise with a man suffering from a stutter forced into a position where the central thing he does is speak in public. Even as a republican, I can't deny he dealt with things bravely. However, that he had to do so is yet another reason for the absurdity of the hereditary principle. Aneurin Bevan, who was also cursed with a stutter, chose to enter public life - George Windsor would gladly have chosen not to.

On 8 Jan 2011 at 2:44am Ouch! wrote:

Tom Paine, in The Rights of Man, said:

"... the idea of hereditary legislators is as inconsistent as that of hereditary judges or hereditary juries; and as absurd as an hereditary mathematician, or an hereditary wise man; and as ridiculous as an hereditary poet-laureate."

But then I ask myself, is the idea of an elected mathematician any less absurd? There are no qualification requirements for entrance to public office and the current lot with thier make it up on the hoof and u-turn the next week policies highlight this fact wonderfully.

On 8 Jan 2011 at 9:03am Newmania wrote:

The only hereditary principle we have in our polity is the House of Lords and that has now reached the point where it is not sustainable .We will ,instead, have a lot of Party place-men and assorted creeps . Whether this is progress I am uncertain but reform certainly could not be avoided.
The monrachy is not the same it has a sacramental role for the Nation and the tribe which George the VIth was called upon to play .
Its notionally ancestral link to the past stands for all our group memory and alleignace and it enacts the rituals of the people for the people . The thought of President Blair fills me with sadness and hopelessness . Please god no
Anyway I just thought it was such an inspiring quote at such a time and looking out at ay ear infinitely more foreboding than the one to come. They say Colin Firth will get an Oscar , I may have te revise my very poor opinion of him.

On 8 Jan 2011 at 2:45pm queequeg wrote:

The hereditary principle or nepotism writ large is not exactly a stranger in our public life whether it be House of Commons, Lords, BBC, Quangos, judiciary in fact the lot. Ask Hillary Benn.