US vs. UK: Town Halls

On the May 4, 2005 episode of the Daily Show, Jon Stewart contrasted the British style of Town Hall forum with the American style. He showed clips of the populace's meetings with Mr. Blair, and clips of meetings with Mr. Bush. Now, and I hope I am not breaking any copyright rules, I will give you some quotes from these two forums.

England: Citizen- "If you arent fraudulent, you're grossly negilgent and for that you should be resigning anyway." (imagine it with a nice british accent, it seems less insulting)

America: Citizen- "I'm very happy to have you as a president." (bit of a southern drawl on that one, followed by lots of applause)

England: Citizen- "That is a lie, you lied to this country, and that is why we cannot support you in the following election." (lots of applause)

America: Pretty Sandra Bullock Lookalike Citizen- "First of all I would like to commend you for taking on this monstrous task."

England: Blair enters to a smattering of applause and boos.

America: Bush enters and shakes the hands of the ethnically diverse backround props.


I am just so fed up with politics in my country. I admire Mr. Blair's strength of character in being able to take that sort of abuse. He doesnt need to hide behind a pre-selected and screened diverse audience of people who have their questions distributed on little scraps of paper from Rove's office. He is a real politician, a man with enough with the charisma and fortitude to stand up to that and still win his election. Even the moderator in his forum accused him of exaggerating, to which Mr. Blair responded that he totally understanded why some people feel why the war was the wrong decision to make. HE EVEN ADMITTED THAT MISTAKES WERE MADE! HE EVEN ACCEPTED THE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEM!

Why doesnt this happen in our government? Why can our politicians not just be adults and say this sort of thing instead of doing what toddlers do and blame all their errors on something, anything, but themselves? I am just so frustrated with the Big Brother politics of America today, where if it doesnt look wrong then it isnt wrong. I could have so much respect for the Bush administration if only they didnt insist on being so deceptive about how they do business.

I guess this is just one more reason that Liberals are better than Conservatives.

Jaded

Alright, I realize that that was pretty much my first post. And I know that people with 1 post by their little title are given less credence than those whose posts number in the thousands. And I apologize for the Liberals and Conservatives crack... It was just me trying to get a laugh or two due to these two Political Figures' similarities in foreign policy despite their sides of the spectrum of politics. I honestly want to know what people think about these differences, I wouldnt have posted this if I didnt. ATS has members from both sides of "the Pond" and I would like to hear their views on differences in political tactics. Its just that a thread with allegations about John Bolton's sexual preferences has gotten more responses than this has, which makes me wonder if ATS is as dedicated to the pursuit of Understanding than it used to be.

Throw me a bone here. Let me hear your opinion on these discrepancies. Don't ignore this post like it were the Yellowstone supercaldera. Please?

Jaded

[edit on 14-5-2005 by Jaded Figure]

Oh, and if there has been a previous thread on this topic, point me to it so I dont have to waste this time and bandwith.

Jaded

Jaded. It's a good post. I for one found it interesting, albeit a bit obvious. but then I've been taking note of all of these elections over the last year. I don't know why you are not getting responses, PTS moves slower than ATS.

If this interests anyone it should be the Americans. But there are those supporters of Bush who would not like to acknowledge certain things. In the end Blair won, but at a loss. Public slamming of politicians is fairly normal thing in British and Commonwealth politics. Im not that amazed by it, but the contrast between American and British election forums is quite plain to see.

The American pollies sure do have it sewn up. Which is great for them, not so great for the people they "serve".

Cheers

Yeah, I saw the episode, and he did a good job of pointing out the differences.

British government is so different from American, and it's always really surprising to see the differences. We could really use a system like that, where people (ALL people) are held responsible for their views, and are subject to criticism by both sides. It's much healthier.

Oh, and welcome to ATS! If you have any questions, or just want a little introduction to the site, don't hesitate to u2u me or any other moderator. Enjoy your stay!