A woman journalist or opinion-writer of whom I had not previously heard, one Clare Foges, has suggested in an article in The Times that the leaders of the UK and Western Europe might learn from political “strongmen” (she cites an eclectic mixture: Trump, Erdogan, Putin, Duterte).
About the Writer
Having not previously heard of the writer, I did a quick Internet search. The surname suggests a Jewish origin, and someone of the same name posted this online in 2000:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/boards/localities.ceeurope.austria.Prov.vienna/167.588/mb.ashx.
It seems that Clare Foges wrote speeches for David Cameron-Levita and others prior to the 2010 election and immediately after it. She has also written at least one book for small children.
Having now read a little about her, I should say that she seems to have some intelligence, though perhaps not enough, or not enough knowledge, for the matters she discusses in print. Her understanding of society and politics seems shallow. She gave an interview to the Evening Standard in 2015. In it, she proposes, inter alia, better pay (!) for MPs, who “give up well-paid careers” etc. Ha ha! She really should take a look at the collection of misfits, also-rans and chancers who comprise many (not all, admittedly) of the more recent MPs!
https://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/clare-foges-the-woman-who-put-words-in-david-camerons-mouth-10437029.html.
Indeed, in 2017 she herself wanted to become an MP, for the fairly safe Conservative seat of the Isle of Wight, but withdrew after having been shortlisted:
https://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2017/05/exclusive-foges-joins-fox-in-withdrawing-from-isle-of-wight-selection.html.
In fact, the then-incumbent MP had hardly “given up a well-paid career”, having been a geography teacher in comprehensive schools for most of his life:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Turner_(politician)#Early_life_and_career
and that MP (also an expenses freeloader…) then “stepped down” after having “become a laughing stock” by reason of his quasi-matrimonial situation:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/11334299/MP-battling-to-save-seat-in-toxic-Tory-rebellion-after-fiancee-moves-in-with-his-aide.html.
In short, my provisional view is that the writer of the article is, at 37 or 38, someone who for whatever reason has fallen between the cracks, who might have become something in the political realm, even perhaps an MP (and after all, her background as pr/”comms” “intern”, sometime children’s book writer, “Conservative” speechwriter, amateur poetess and (?) professional scribbler on politico-social issues is no worse than that of many “Conservative” or “Labour” MPs, and better than some) but has not.
The Issues Raised
What are we to make of this article suggesting that the UK needs leadership informed by “strongmen”? Duterte is the Philippines leader who has presided over a campaign of extra-judicial killing of drug gangsters etc. Erdogan is the political-Muslim Turkish dictator (by any other name) who is dismantling the legacy of Kemal Ataturk. Putin and Trump are too well-known to need any introduction even to those who take little interest in politics.
The main issue, surely, is that government must govern. It must be effective. Ideally, there will be checks and balances: law, due process, civil rights, property rights (within reason); however, in the end, a useless government has no right to exist.
Political leaders (including dictators) emerge for reasons. In broad brush terms, Putin emerged because Russia under Yeltsin had become a chaotic mess. Pensioners and other poor people were starving or dying from cold or lack of food, by the million. Public sector workers were being paid almost nothing. Jew carpetbaggers had flocked to Russia like a cloud of locusts (or vultures) and were stealing and cheating everything, pretty much. “Russian” Jew “oligarchs” ruled from “behind the throne” and had tricked their way into “ownership” of vast oilfields, diamond and gold mines, heavy industries. Putin began to claw back some of that. Pensioners who had been getting (USD) $5 a month under Yeltsin, now (2018) get $400. People are at least paid for work. Chechen and other gangsters have been stamped on and many killed or imprisoned. Russia has flourished compared to the 1990s.
Erdogan is someone for whom I myself have little sympathy, not least because I value the legacy of Kemal Ataturk. However, Erdogan has improved the lot of the poor, we read, while the economy has improved under his rule.
Trump likewise seems an egregious person generally, and even more egregious as a leader of a government and as a head of state. However, his rise (fuelled by his own huge fortune, of course) was not based on nothing. Many people in the USA are living in poverty. I read that 40% of Americans now require US governmental foodstamps! Many jobs (as, increasingly, in the UK and elsewhere) are “McJobs”, precarious and badly-paid. The drug epidemic is out of control. Illegal immigration had run wild since the 1980s. Whether Trump can deal with these problems and others, with the “separation of powers” American system, is doubtful, but the dispossessed and marginalized, among others, voted for him to try.
The Missing Leaders
Clare Foges cited Trump, Putin etc, but not the controversial leaders of the 20th Century: Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Mao etc. They all took harsh measures but also did a huge amount that was positive. Hitler in particular saved Germany from degradation, removed Jew exploiters from the economy, the professions, the mass media; built autobahns (the first in the world); created air and airship travel routes; vastly improved animal welfare; planned new and better cities and national parks; put Germany to work and (for the first time) gave workers rights such as decent breaks at work, Baltic and other holidays in Germany, and also foreign holidays including cruises. Decent homes were built on a huge scale.
Britain could do worse than follow Hitler’s lead, introducing some updated and English/British form of social nationalism.
Stalin was far harsher as a leader and as an individual than Hitler or Mussolini, though Mao might be considered far worse (but of course he was non-European). Stalin however (like Hitler) was put back domestically by war. Stalin did recreate the industrial sector, which was booming before the First World War but which Bolshevism all but wiped out as a thriving economic sector. Stalin’s major mistake (apart from his cruelties and brutalities etc) was to allow the agricultural sector to be ruined via Collectivization, the legacy of which is only now being very slowly erased.
Mussolini did a huge amount for Italy. His posturing on balconies etc is what people now think of when his name is mentioned, but he eliminated the Mafia (until the Americans caused its revival after 1943, releasing the imprisoned leaders and followers), started to get rid of the terrible urban slums (unfortunately more were created as a result of the Anglo-American invasion of 1943); Mussolini also created an advanced scientific and industrial sector, mainly in the North. Famously, he also greatly improved the railways, and “made the trains run on time” (both truth and metaphor). Now, the wartime propaganda of the Western Allies and Stalin is all that most people outside Italy know– Mussolini as clown. Ironic that a real clown (the leader of the Five Star Movement) is now a major political figure in Italy!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beppe_Grillo.
Britain 2018
The UK has been pretty much left to rot since 2010. The Blair government, though repressive and in the pocket of the Jewish-Zionist lobby, tried to modernize infrastructure generally. New buildings were constructed: hospitals, libraries, schools. Credit where due.
The David Cameron-Levita-Schlumberger government of idiots was not only the most pro-Jewish/Zionist government Britain has ever had, (until Theresa May became Prime Minister), but also the least-effective of modern times (again, until that of Theresa May?). It not only failed to do anything new and decent, but also failed to maintain that which already existed, in every sector, from libraries and schools to the air force and navy.
The lesson surely is that government must be effective. If it is not, the State stands in peril. The people eventually demand action. They are beginning to demand it now.
The article by Clare Foges is, it seems to me, a sign of the times, or a straw in the wind. The political times in Britain are a changin’…
Notes
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/profiles/3tMvnMp3DFW3z99Zvc7WC3T/clare-foges
https://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/clare-foges-the-woman-who-put-words-in-david-camerons-mouth-10437029.html
A critical article from the New Statesman:
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/elections/2018/07/sorry-clare-foges-dictatorship-isn-t-just-character-flaw-it-s-crime
Another critique of her views:
https://www.property118.com/clare-foges-anti-landlord-the-times/comment-page-4/
She was desperate to become an MP but no-one wanted her:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-politics/11436355/Sir-Malcolm-Rifkind-resigns-Kensingtons-next-MP-might-be-this-woman.html
Another Clare Foges article. She seems to be very much of her time, meaning 2010-2015, as in this Cameroonesque piece of sort-of social Darwinism. I think that Clare Foges can be written off as a serious commentator.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/put-feckless-patients-at-the-back-of-nhs-queue-5hnlqqstg
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2267901/Clare-Foges-The-raven-haired-poet-ice-cream-seller-wrote-PMs-big-speech.html
Further thoughts, 6 December 2018
According to the Daily Mail, Clare Foges is “a devout Christian”. She may still be of part-Jewish ancestry (see above). My other query about the “devout Christian” bit is how does a “devout Christian” want to put IVF couples ahead of people needing NHS treatment for serious conditions just because they drink, smoke etc? Is that “Christian”? Even evil Iain Dunce Duncan Smith is said to be “devoutly Christian”…Yeah, right!
In the end, I suppose that it scarcely matters whether Clare Foges is this or that…and I just noticed that her Daily Mail bio was written by the egregious Andrew Pierce, so we can probably discount it…
Incredibly, she is appointed OBE!
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/labour-blocks-david-cameron-speechwriter-claire-foges-from-joining-party-to-oust-jeremy-corbyn_uk_58d90195e4b03787d35a3d08?guccounter=1&guce_referrer_us=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvLnVrLw&guce_referrer_cs=Y57ohgKaElO9EWmxBHKC1w
Looking at her photos and her behaviour, I think that she is probably at least partly-Jewish.
Her Twitter comments (read the thread):
https://twitter.com/ClareFoges/status/985813260824989696
She has not tweeted since April 2018.
She writes in The Times, but also as freelance pr person…
http://www.finelinelondon.com/
She has certainly written columns in The Times [of London] several times, but is not on that newspaper’s list of its 29 “key” columnists. I have just taken a look on the Internet, and not seen anything online written by her as Times columnist in the past months (since August 2018), though her Linked-In profile avers that she is still a Times columnist. I did see a piece from November 2018 published in The Sun “newspaper”.
https://uk.linkedin.com/in/clare-foges-906a4676
Update, 9 November 2020
I have just seen that Clare Foges has been writing a column for The Times about once per week in recent months. I had not noticed, never now reading that newspaper (does anyone?I suppose some still do).
Ian Robert Millard 