18 Jul 2026
issue 18 July 2026
Comments
If Nigel Farage is so confident that the £5 million donation he received from a friend is entirely kosher, why is he so frightened of being subjected to the official parliamentary code of conduct on the matter, or does he think he is above such scrutiny? That is a dangerous tightrope to tread.
In 406 bc, after a naval battle in the long war between Sparta and Athens, a ferocious storm prevented the Athenian generals from picking up their survivors and the dead. In the law-making democratic Assembly, consisting of all Athenian male citizens over 18 (the dêmos), fury was high, and there was a demand from one Callixenos that the six out of the eight generals who had returned to Athens should be tried en bloc. When it was pointed out that this was illegal, the majority shouted that ‘it was outrageous that the dêmos should not be allowed to do whatever it wanted’. After all, the dêmos made the law. Why could not thedêmos change it?
