Random selection has a history. A lot of classical Greek states used it and I believe the Republic of Venice did too. We still use it for juries. On the other hand, random selection by birth was the normal way to fill positions of power in the Middle Ages and it did not have a good record.

The problem today is that positions of power attract people who crave power and they are often the very people who should not be trusted with it. And in a democracy, the easiest way to get power is to lie to the voters. It's hard to see a way around this.

In the Book of Judges, someone tells the following parable:
Incidentally, the man who told that parable had to flee immediately afterwards as the reigning king put out a warrant for his arrest!

I prefer the King James version here, for the last part:

It's part of an attempt to dismiss and marginalise real political viewpoints (such as marxism, etc) among the general population and replace them with the largely apolitical, mostly big business and economics focused babble spewed by career politicians, who simply move with the tide and times.

It's the mantra that there is no longer a left nor a right, but there are many divisions in society - and of course there are. It's really an all out attack on the left of course - because whether you consider yourself right or left, it's undeniable that leftist regimes are the biggest danger to the super wealthy and are a tiny minority worldwide. Right wing capitalist systems are overwhelmingly the norm in most countries in the world and may be called conservatives, liberals, democrats, republicans, etc, etc.

As one of the "uneducated working classes", I have to wonder at the value of the education of those people who read such "literature" and seemingly soak it up like sponges.

Yes, the working class assume that what the middle class does is not really "work" - to an extent they're right.

This is bordering on a troll comment: I might as well assume that all the 'working class' do is sit on walls drinking tea. There are some extremely stressful and demanding jobs that everyone does, it doesn't matter what class they are. There are shirkers in both camps.

The middle classes are those who have private or public school education and do not work for anyone else - i.e. they are self employed and/or company directors. They are employers or free operators and usually part of families with inherited wealth, but are not part of the "upper class".

So someone who earns quite a high wage and enjoys a supposedly middle class lifestyle, is still working for someone else and is still "working class". They may not want to be perceived as such, because it's likely they will want to draw a line between themselves and the man with the dirty tradesman's overalls - but the fact is that they are employed by someone and "work" for a wage.

All of this "lower/middle/upper middle" bollocks is just another part of the class snobbery and pretentiousness in this country - keeping up with the Jones' etc. It's why you have idiots who ditch their regional dialects in an attempt to sound posh, but just end up sounding like pure idiots injecting "like" into every sentence.

This kind of mindset increased during the Thatcher years, which relied on "divide and conquer" - pitting working people against each other to break the influence of trade unions and force down labour costs.

I am also sure that the media's tactic of pitting 'leavers' against 'remainers' has an ulterior motive, I'm just not sure what it is yet.

When I was at school, my history master was an anarchist. In those days the House of Lords was still hereditary, and he once said that he preferred it to the Commons — "I'd rather be ruled over by those chosen by accident of birth than by those who push themselves forward claiming to know what's good for me." I felt he had a point!

With all of this talk about class this seems relevant now....
The Grumpy Guide To Class - Part One
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZAyYBDUNug

The Grumpy Guide To Class - Part Two
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLUY5xtqRoM

The Grumpy Guide To Class - Part Three
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDw1YcywJ6k

How about not being ruled over by anyone and the law applying equally to everyone.

And where does the Law come from?

The Commons propose the law, debate and amend.
The Lords proof read, debate and amend.
The Commons debate and amend the the other place's amendments
Bill tennis is played for a bit.
Eventually bills are passed into Law, one hopes in a better state than the initial incarnation.
It is a system which works very well.

The Country would come to a standstill if everyone was involved in the formation of Laws.
This is why we have General Elections, to elect the people who will create/amend the Law.
The Lords are Unelected, but the idea is they have life long experience which they draw upon to test the new Laws, and amend as appropriate.

It is slow, but without this system you have a dictatorship.

Firerat, I was implying not having the mindset of being ruled over. Self reliance, independence etc... Having the government be in the background barely noticed rather then in the forefront of all/most decisions in ones life. I'm also in the camp of more laws = no laws. Better to have less laws that are actually followed/enforced/held accountable to then a litany of laws that no-one understands and are easily manipulated.

Question: Who are the "Lords" accountable to? Since they are not elected, who do they answer to, what process does the UK have to "remove" one from office or punish one for crimes (bribery, fraud etc...)?

It wasn't intended that way.

But it is a common attitude among many who have physically strenuous jobs that jobs involving no/minimal physical exertion are not "real" work and I can sympathise with that even though almost my entire "working" life has been of the latter type.

In my younger days I once spent a week on a gill-netter and would go to considerable lengths to avoid repeating that experience. Well, the truth is at my age I couldn't do it.

In an ever changing world more laws are required.

10661666 prompted a new law which dealt with the proximity of buildings.
Laws were passed regarding the use of asbestos.

food allergen labelling, tighter laws in the works.

Of course laws can also be abolished, those regarding homosexuality for instance.

A simplistic quantitative approach is just naive.


They are still subject to the law, so that deals with "crimes"
( it is actually only very recently that that came to be, a Law had to be passed )

There is talk of reform, basically reduce the numbers.
I wouldn't like to set an age limit, some are "sharp as razors" even given their considerable age. Others well, not so much.

Fair enough, I suppose this brings up the general question of what qualifies as 'real work' and I suppose 'real' can be defined by how much the work makes a man connect with his body and his nature as a human being. Manual labour can put a man more in touch with his physical side, in touch with the outside world [depending on the work type], and this can make him feel more human and connected to more historic value in the natural world than sitting at a desk. Still, I think the point is [not the one that you're making, but I'm offering it] that thinking that only manual labour is 'real work' these days is a bit blinkered - society has developed immensely since the times when we all had to do manual labour and everyone still has a part to play in the community, it's just that the range of those parts is far broader.

And thanks for teaching me about gillnetting, I'd never heard of it before.