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Tag Archives: Leadership

Theresa May, Britain’s Prime Minister

12 Tuesday Jul 2016

Posted by michelinewalker in Brexit, Britain, EU Referendum

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Brexit, Colonialism, Jeremy Corbyn, Leadership, Theresa May

Theresa_May_UK_Home_Office_(cropped)

Theresa May (Photo credit: EN Wikipedia)

In my last post, dated 6 July 2016, I expressed alarm because, with the exception of Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the Labour Party, British Leaders were resigning when in fact the country was in dire need of leaders who could deal with the result of the Brexit vote. It seems Jeremy Corbyn’s fate is being decided as I write by members of the Labour Party.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/blog/live/2016/jul/12/labour-nec-jeremy-corbyn-leadership-from-labour-leadership-ballot-would-be-sordid-fix-politics-live

In other words, Brexit is not over, but Parliament is nearly functional, which is how it should be. Prime Minister-designate Theresa May (née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) will be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, beginning Wednesday evening, 13 July 2016. Theresa May was Home Secretary.

British Prime Minister David Cameron would not take into consideration a petition signed by 4,000,000 Britons. It could be that Mr Cameron had to respect the letter of the law or be perceived as inconsistent. But 1,000 lawyers are now saying that the Brexit result “is not legally binding.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-eu-referendum-result-not-legally-binding-lawyers-letter-a7129626.html

Britain as a colonial power

The Brexit decision was surprising. Britain was a formidable colonial power, but would Amerindians return the descendants of Pilgrim Fathers and Puritans to their ancestors’ native land, England? No. They wouldn’t and couldn’t. Yet, European colonial powers made themselves at home on territory they had merely discovered. In the Americas, they nearly wiped out American “Indians,” north and south. Many were displaced and many starved. A large number died because they had no immunity to the diseases of Europeans, such as smallpox. Several were otherwise eliminated.

“Current estimates are that the epidemic killed up to 90 percent of the Native population in the Massachusetts Bay area. When the Pilgrims arrived in 1620, they saw evidence of massive depopulation and attributed it to the “good hand of God . . . that he might make room for us there.” Another epidemic—this time smallpox—hit in 1633–1634.” [1]

As practised by Europeans, both genocide and settler colonialism have typically employed the organizing grammar of race.” [2]

Not that anyone should feel guilty and atone. These events belong to the past. But times have changed and one should respect all members of the human race and particularly the citizens of countries one colonized.

Countries have the right to limit immigration, but the “Yes! we won! Now send them back” is rather ugly. If British political leaders used the EU referendum as a platform to lure voters into thinking that voting to leave the EU would justify their getting rid of “them,” they acted irresponsibly. Just who is “them?”

Moreover, thinking and stating that Britons would be “better off on their own” may not be the case in a global economy and so many years after entering into a partnership with the EU.

Theresa May speaks to reporters after being confirmed as the leader of the Conservative Party and Britain's next Prime Minister outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, central London, July 11, 2016. REUTERS/Neil Hall

Theresa May speaks to reporters after being confirmed as the leader of the Conservative Party and Britain’s next Prime Minister outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, central London, 11 July 2016. (REUTERS/Neil Hall)

Conclusion

Britons need not put themselves through the agony of another referendum. They have shown that they were divided in nearly equal halves, which probably suffices. But the matter of a second referendum is under discussion.

I didn’t intend to write another post on Brexit, but Britain has a new leader in Theresa May.

Love to everyone ♥

P. S. Jeremy Corbyn will be on the Labour leadership ballot, NEC rules.

RELATED ARTICLES

  • Thoughts on Brexit (6 July 2016)
  • Brexit. The Day after the Vote (30 June 2016)
  • Musing on Brexit (28 June 2016)

Sources and Resources

See United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, 2016, Wikipedia

____________________

[1] See Jeffrey Ostler, “New England and the Pequot War,” in Genocide and American Indian History (Oxford Research Encyclopedia).

[2] Patrick Wolfe, Settler colonization and the elimination of the native, Kooriweb.org

UK_location_in_the_EU_2016_svg

The EU (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

© Micheline Walker
12 July 2016
Revised: 12 July 2016
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Leaders and Education

08 Monday Aug 2011

Posted by michelinewalker in Uncategorized

≈ Comments Off on Leaders and Education

Tags

David Gergen, Jeffrey Freedman, Leadership, obstructionism, Tea Party members disgraced

I share David Gergen’s admiration for Winston Churchill.  Churchill was a great leader and destiny placed him in the right place at the right moment.

During the debt-ceiling crisis, I hoped President Obama would issue an executive order and contain the damage.   I looked for leadership.

But there is leadership and there is leadership.  There have been leaders who got it all wrong.  Hitler had leadership.

So while I fully agree with Professor Gergen that America needs the tough leadership of a Winston Churchill, it seems that the imperative at the moment is education.  Better-educated and shrewd Americans would not have elected Tea Party members into office.

Let me qualify my statement.  The person I consider as better educated is not only a scholar, but a person who can smell a rat, when a rat appears, and can also tell moral and intellectual superiority when it stands before him or her.  He or she is a person of sound judgment and clever.

It is crucial, therefore, that ordinary Americans develop a more analytical approach to events and decision-making. They must also so adopt a set of values that can benefit them and their nation.

To my mind, the golden rule is mostly as Jeffrey Freedman, an exceptionally talented writer/screenwriter (Vivaldi), told me:  treat others as you wish others to treat you. Indeed, all human beings deserve respect, whatever their color, creed, age, sex, sexual preference, station in life, etc.

David Gergen is a very, very fine person.  He makes well-balanced and perceptive commentaries.  Moreover, despite the above, I think, as he does, that America currently needs very strong leadership, which it would have if the nation were a nation and stood behind its leader, which is not the case.

I hope last week’s circus and ensuing debacle will be sufficient proof that certain Republicans,Tea Party members in particularly, have disgraced themselves and should leave Washington.  These individuals lack an education as do the people who support them.

Americans, not foreigners, voted Barack Obama into office.  He is their President.  He has faced a great deal of obstructionism from panic-mongering and inept elected officials, but enough is enough.   He must now be allowed to lead.   Not only is he President, and qualified to be President, but he is also a compassionate, polite, and honest person, a good father to his children, a good husband to his wife and he is endowed with that rarest of qualities:  understanding

In short, the problem is not that President Obama and his administration lack leadership.  The problem, I believe, is that too many Americans and the persons they elect into office lack a sense of nationhood.

I wish President Obama well and send my best regards to Mr Gergen.

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