Quote:
Originally Posted by Damien
But tokenistic gestures make for bad laws. The issue is so vague that the law will be either so restrictive as to be meaningless or open enough to invite all sorts of challenges.
The punishment for lying politicians should come from the public but it doesn't really happen. We are too partisan so that we're more lenient to our own side whilst too harsh on political opponents, the press is the same way. If May had made the statement Corbyn did about Tuition fees then The Sun would be no where near as outraged, pointing out it wasn't in the manifesto, likewise if May had said she had never met the IRA despite photographic evidence to the contrary then social media would be spitting with venom over the lie. Most of us do this, just human nature.
Then you have cynics who lazily assume they're all the same which means genuine, hard-working, MPs get chucked in with the shysters. Simultaneously giving bad MPs cover and good MPs undeserved grief.
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It wouldn't be tokenism, it would be the real deal, it just wouldn't be wheeled out for every minor fib, just the whoppers. These things don't have to be hard, if the law is badly written we'll just rewrite it until we get it right.