When I first learned about Athenian democracy as a teenager I was baffled that they could have decided government positions by lottery; what was to stop someone totally unsuitable and useless from ending up in control? But then I look at the current Labour front bench and think, how bad could it be?
I’m thinking in particular of Shadow Leader of the House Angela Eagle, whose performance on Question Time last night was a perfect illustration of how low the tone of so much political debate is – especially that involving manufactured outrage.
The outrage in question was over Lord Freud’s comments about the disabled and the minimum wage, which Labour cooked up in an attempt to make their opponents look like the nasty party. Freud had merely answered a question from a man who had a disabled family member who was unable to find work at the minimum wage.
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