We need an election.
We need an election, we need one soon, and we need Labour to win. (*)
All this Tory fuss about a "national crisis" and "a state of war in the countryside" just means we need an election more. There is always a crisis, always a reason to postpone an election.
The Tories like to portray elections as frivolous matters, politicians playing power games instead of getting on with the serious business of "running the country". Well, they aren't frivolous. They are the centre of representative democracy. Elections are the only thing that stands between us and tyranny - not, these days the brutal tyranny of the dictator, or the sumptuous tyranny of the aristocrat; but the sly, subtle, soft tyranny of the manager, the advisor and the focus group, the Men who Know What's Best, politics remade into a branch of management.
Governments don't "run the country". Countries aren't things like business or farms that need to be "run". They are both less and more than that. Less, because they are made up of many people with diverse interests. More, for exactly the same reason.
A business has an aim - usually to make money. It has various plans and policies that are meant to help achieve that aim, various sub-goals and departmental policies that contribute to the whole. People who work in a business are there for the interests of the business & if their personal interests can't be reconciled with those of the business they can be sacked. Businesses need to be managed. An army is the same except that the people risk getting killed and if their interests can't be reconciled with those of the whole, they can get killed by their own side. Armies need to be led.
Politics isn't like that. Politics is about achieving a way of life that allows people with conflicting interests to get along without killing each other, or expelling each other. That can only be achieved when people with conflicting interests can express those interests, whether in speech, in work, in buying & selling, or in voting. Democracy isn't a kind of politics. Democracy is politics done right. If you don't have democracy you have tyranny, whether of managers or leaders.
Elected politicians aren't leaders, and they aren't managers. They are representatives - or maybe delegates. Their duty is not to run the country, their duty is not to subordinate the interests of the people to the interests of the nation. The nation as such has no interests other than the interests of the people, which are diverse and conflicting. The duty of elected politicians is to represent those interests and to find ways of rubbing along together without, as far as possible, anyone getting sacked (exiled, imprisoned) or killed.
Democracy is not frivolous, democracy is not a waste of time, democracy is not a silly game, democracy is not about the private interests of politicians, democracy is the only alternative to war and tyranny.
In the second world war Britain had a coalition government and cancelled general elections. The USA had their regular elections on schedule. They were right, we were wrong. Even in their civil war, the US held elections. Lincoln could have lost. They were not only right, they were gloriously right. Democracy is not optional.
The wonderful things about this country - and there are wonderful things - have more to do with democracy, liberty and freedom of speech than they do with cows or sheep. We can live without cows, we can't live without democracy or liberty.
Democracy is not an option for us. It is compulsory. Whenever someone suggests not having an election, not allowing the people to rule, leaving things up to the experts & the great and the good, that's when we need to reach for our ballot papers - if only because the next thing we would need to reach for is far worse.
Another Tory government would be a far worse disaster than foot and mouth. You can't vaccinate against Tories. And we already can't export them. We need an election, we need one soon, and we need Labour to win. (*)
We need a general election, and we need an election called in the face of the Tories bleating and mooing about crisis and scandal. Ideally we want William Vague (I have such trouble remembering his name) to stand up in public and demand that there be no election, demand that Nick Brown be allowed to run the farms of Britain for ever, demand that they, the Tories, be allowed to stand on the sidelines and yap, yap, yap, without saying what they would *do* about anything, without having to actually face the people and explain themselves. We need an election in the face of that and then we need whatsisname to lose so badly he cries all the way back to fffffyonna (or whatever her name is).
And then we need fixed four year terms for Parliament like all those other countries that approximate democracy better than we do.
Elections on the first Thursday in May every year, general elections every 4 years & we never need to have this argument again.
(*) though if it could be arranged for Jack Straw to lose to a liberal - lower-case "l" deliberate - it might be even better.
The Labour government hasn't exactly been wonderful. They have a disgraceful, disgusting record on civil liberties - but the opposition is worse. They have proved barely competent but unimaginative with health and transport - but the Tories have no new ideas. They have failed to improve education - but the Tories were the shits who almost destroyed it in the first place. They have a poor record on public transport - but the Tories hate public transport and would happily watch the railways rust into the ground. They have a brilliant record on constitutional reform, although they haven't finished the job. The Tories would try to move back to Westminster centralism. If I were a Scottish Nationalist I would be praying for a showdown with a Tory government. Labour hasn't done anything to curb Jack Straw's sub-racist ravings about refugees and travellers - but the Tories would make such evil the centre of national policy.