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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

My only surprise is that anyone is surprised…

Perhaps it is a measure of my cynicism but this does not surprise me in the slightest. Indeed my only surprise is that anyone is surprised:

Anyone with any sense who was in trouble would come to the whips and tell them the truth, and say now, “I’m in a jam, can you help?” It might be debt, it might be a scandal involving small boys, or any kind of scandal which a member seemed likely to be mixed up in, they’d come and ask if we could help.

This was the Tory party, but of course it matters not one iota which political party it is, for they are all cut from the same cloth.

12 comments to My only surprise is that anyone is surprised…

  • NickM

    And Cyril Smith probably also asked for a pie with it…

  • jdm

    I think your cynicism is completely warranted, Perry.

  • Perry, is it just me, or is your link incorrect?…

  • Michael Jennings (London)

    It’s now fixed.

  • Michael Jennings (London)

    People whose job it is to make you do what they say like it when they have things to blackmail you with? I’m shocked, shocked.

  • RRS

    Perhaps not always the same “cloth,”
    but always cloth woven in the same deceptive patterns from the same shoddy fibers.

  • Nick (Blame FrenchMEN) Gray

    That never happens here in Australia! Nobody talks about what our whips do.

  • RAB

    Asking Whips to help you hide your unfortunate peccadillo’s is like asking a Gestapo Officer where you can get replacement radio valves from, isn’t it?

  • Regional

    Nick,
    In Britain Whips are used on Tory politicians by their mistresses when they’re naughty little boys.

  • Laws are for the little people. ‘Twas ever thus.

  • Michael Jennings (London)

    Nick: Indeed not. The maintenance of party discipline is done in different ways in Australia to Britain

  • RogerC

    You can’t rule innocent men, and all that.

    If this is genuinely the MO of the political establishment when it comes to maintaining discipline, that must mean that they would prefer to select a corrupt candidate to an honest one (so far as such a thing can be said to exist). The corrupt, venal politician is likely to eventually do something actionable or otherwise career ending, giving you the opportunity to bail them out for the low, low price of their grubby little soul. If they’ve managed to get themselves into the sort of trouble that needs hushing up, it sounds like they probably weren’t using much it anyway.