WHAT IS A 'PROGRESSIVE ALLIANCE ' ?

With the Conservatives maintaining a substantial lead in the opinion polls, various voices on the political left are urging the creation of what they laughingly refer to as a 'Progressive Alliance'. What they really mean is an amalgam of socialist parties, all of which are hell-bent on raising taxes, borrowing vast sums and interfering in our lives as much as they possibly can.

The Labour Party is currently a party of the fairly extreme left, with Jeremy Corbyn being a throwback to the days of Michael Foot and John McDonnell being an admitted Marxist; both favour the creation of a Marxist style state with strong central control and little room for individual action other than their own. Watching some of their colleagues in action, it's clear that they have similar ambitions and would be quite at home as extreme left wing union agitators.

There are then a variety of other socialist parties - the Liberal Democrats, who are neither Liberal nor Democratic, the Greens who are potty and the Welsh and Scottish Nationalists who would be Labour if they weren't so fanatically nationalistic.

Importantly, none of these parties, with the possible exception of the Greens, are 'progressive'; in truth, they are locked into a class war which ended long ago but which they continue to whine about. They all believe in increasing the size of the State and in the State's control over the lives of the people; none of them believe in individual liberty beyond the liberty to do what the State allows. The Greens do, at least, have long standing policies which look to the future, though their way of implementing these is by pursuing the same fundamentally socialist policies.

Socialism has been tried in many countries, most notably in the Soviet Union and China; both experiments resulted in brutal dictatorships and economic collapse. Socialism is fundamentally contrary to human nature and cannot ever succeed; people are competitive while Socialism is all about removing competition and replacing it with State direction. In a Socialist state, there is no incentive to rise to the top as the top is at the same level as the bottom, with only the ruling elite experiencing a better lifestyle. In the end, a Socialist state as desired by Corbyn and his pals winds down and stagnates, at best; at worst, it results in the rise of Stalin, Mao and others of their type.

Don't be fooled. Voting for a 'Progressive Alliance' means voting for a socialist government with an extreme left wing and potentially disastrous agenda. Don't do it.