BBC Question Time, and the Irrelevance of the Political Elite

The past couple of weeks, I've sat through BBC's question time amazed at the lack of balance, intelligence and common sense on all sides.

Last week the main issue was Brexit (again!) With one old guy in the audience shouting that the referendum should be ignored because those that voted leave did so on the basis of lies and untruths spoken by the leave campaign.

Sorry old geezer, the people voted and no matter what their reasons, they voted to leave. The reason why they voted to leave is irrelevant. Just because you didn't get what you want, doesn't give you the right to overthrow the will of the people.

Last night was worse, with much wailing about Trump's win. The panel was 4-1 against Trump, which was hardly balanced.

It was like a kids party, where no-one was happy, everyone was name-calling and the one Trump supporter on the panel was continually shouted down. It just struck me how juvenile politics in the UK has become. The most adult viewpoints came from the audience, who had a more pragmatic view.

The thing that struck me is not one of the 4 anti-trump members of the panel could understand his appeal. And that carries on across America as we see anti-trump protests appearing in various towns and cities.

I'd like to explain why trump won. Outside the neo-liberal political bubble viewpoint that is constantly shown on the media with no counterpoint, there is a majority of people that don't hold that view.

In the UK, is surfaced as an anti-EU, anti-immigration, anti-PC, anti-establishment vote that got the win for the leave campaign. You can rationalize it as a protest vote if that soothes your mind and allows you to think there isn't a majority of  people out there that have the opposite view to the neo-liberal "let everyone in, there are no Muslim terrorists, women and minorities should be given preferential treatment instead of equality" viewpoint.

In America, it crystalised as a "low-tax, no-more-illegal-immigrant, pro-homegrown business, anti-white-collar, anti-corporation, anti-government-expansion" viewpoint.

The women on Question Time last night could not rationalize that women would vote for Trump. They couldn't accept that minorities would vote for Trump. Indeed they tried to rationalise it as the majority didn't vote for Trump, in that the popular vote (the absolute number of votes cast for each candidate) was greater for Clinton and therefore she was somehow cheated out of office.

But the majority of people in America and the UK are poor, white and/or working class.

The poor, white working class are despised by the establishment on both sides of the Atlantic. Their viewpoints are refuted, shouted down even,  at every turn by the political elite that refuse to acknowledge they exist, let alone support their viewpoint.

With Brexit and the American Presidential election, someone came along and started speaking their language, publicly aired their opinions and fears and won.

It's now time for the political elite to start working for the majority and keep their lefist, elitist, nose-snubbing opinions and policies to themselves.

They need to remember they work for us.