Forgive my stupidity, but until recently I'd never managed to get a handle on the true meaning of democracy. I'd consulted my Oxford Concise, but that had only added to the confusion: 'one man (sic), one vote' had never seemed to tie in with what was going on in the world around me.

It took George Bush finally to clarify the matter and, given his intellectual track record, that's some achievement. It was the unprovoked invasion of Iraq (I refuse to acknowledge it as a war) by an unelected President (likewise I refuse to accept the Florida scam which was the key that opened the door.) Despite universal protest, Bush wanted to attack Iraq, so he used his vote: one man, one bomb, 'to protect democracy'.

Whose democracy?

His democracy. I'd got it at last.

Okay, so that's the American take on it, but what about the British version, the one without a Bill of Rights? Leaving the subject of Ireland out of the question (if only because not to do so would render pointless any dialogue on the subject), one has to ask just where Tony Blair belongs in all this.

While Bush single-handedly threw the world into 'a war that will last a lifetime', Blair lurked behind the lace-curtains of intrigue, too feebleminded to make a stand against his paramour, too limp-wristed to cast his own vote: one man (well, not quite), no vote (Bush was going to have his war regardless).

As it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish Blair from his role model (one is inclined to say mentor), Margaret Thatcher, so the issue becomes more complex. Dragging a pre-senile Ronald Reagan behind her (he's got more up his sleeve, but less in his pocket than Dennis), she launched globalisation onto an unsuspecting planet.

Then, doubtless to impress her partner in arms, she created a new standard in modern-day, personalised democracy, the Falklands debacle: one man (well, almost), one war (well, not really). It was out of this highly developed sense of individualism that she also came up with 'care in the community', while at the same time informing her hapless subjects that there was no such thing as society: eat your heart out, Winston Smith. Have no doubt about it, Thatcher's determined mono-vision is at the root of Blair's myopia. However, in the final analysis, Thatcher, Blair. Reagan and Bush are all one of the same: naked emperors, and that's to avoid the issue of Rupert Murdoch (when you're that naked you don't need a hook to hang your coat on).

So what, you may ask. has this got to do with cosy old N16? An awful lot, and that's not solely through the eyes of a disgruntled anarchist like myself. The endemic greed that Thatcher made fashionable as 'free enterprise' (and Blair appropriated as New Labour) is precisely what is ripping out the heart of Stokey's centre: Church Street. And that's a crying shame.

Twenty years back, despite Thatcherism (or was it because of it?) Church Street, which was then pretty run down, became a beacon of independence (read non-corporatism): secondhand clothes and book shops, bohemian coffee bars and what was to become London's major, cutting-edge jazz club, the Vortex, all accessible to non-residents by steamy, smoky, but much-loved double-decker 73s.  Oh yes, those were the days.

Ten years back, and everything was looking good in an alternative kind of a way. Houses were still affordable (just about), and some of them were even still squattable (if you weren't too bothered by regular visits from the then notorious constabulary). Stokey's uniqueness as a village within a city was becoming recognised which, in truth, was the beginning of its demise. Nonetheless, at that time there were 'rainbows in curved air' (thanks, Terry Riley) and, to celebrate the fact, the Church Street Festival was created. There was even talk of a new Leisure Centre just off the main drag. 

Now then, let's fast-forward and take a look at how things are right now in dear old Church Street: rows of bendy buses giving the feel of an overground version of Oxford Street station, a disaster of a Leisure Centre where once there stood attractive public baths, a defunct Festival which was once able to reclaim the streets (if only for one day, until 6.30pm), and nothing but the loving memory of 'London's listening jazz club' (I'm still listening, but all I hear is silence). It's a wonder St Mary's Church isn't up for conversion into 'luxury studio apartments' (you don't think it's possible?). The independents who remain (of which, thankfully, there are still many) have got a hard battle on their hands and deserve our support: the fat-cats are out and about, and Church Street is one of their prime targets. You have been warned.

Enter stage-far-right, Centric Securitieas Ltd. Now they're the kind of guys who buy up properties just as the tenant's lease is running out - that way they can double the rent and ensure that the tenant has no option but to get out. They're also the kind of guys who sniff out areas like Church Street (Hackney's Broadway Market is another one), because they know the pickings are going to be good in Olympic City. Don't be fooled by the 'gentrification myth': gentrification is the antithesis to urban regeneration. If it's proof that you need, take a long look around Smithfields Market. It used to stink of meat, now it stinks less of meat and more of money.

Yes, you're right, I don't like entrepreneurs, and I didn't like what Centric wanted to do with the Vortex (three luxury studio apartments do not a jazz club make), so I instituted a petition: over 2500 signatures in less than three weeks. Similarly large-scale petitions were gathered over the 73 buses, the Leisure Centre and the Festival, but for the sake of space I'll concentrate on the Vortex.

On 3 November, despite all the lies about WMDs, George Bush managed to rig a legal election: he'd had his Reichstag with the WTC, so it was pretty much a foregone conclusion (if it hadn't been, we'd in all probability now be mourning the loss of the Empire State). It was also on that day that I was informed by Hackney Council that our battle to save the Vortex was as good as lost.

The fact that over 2500 people wanted to keep the Vortex as it was, and were prepared to cast their vote to that effect, meant nothing to Centric, which, in effect, is where this article started. Centric's bossman (if you don't know his name by now, you haven't been down Church Street for a while) had played the democratic card: one man (answers on a postcard), one vote (call it a bankroll). There you have it. War? Property deals? Iraq? Church Street? They're all much of a muchness: one man's meat (think Smithfields), and sod public concerns (think Baghdad).

One of the first things Centric's bossman told me was that he loved jazz. The second thing he said was 'treat everything I say as a lie'. Okay, so Bush and Blair may only infer it, but it seems to me that they give out much the same signal; it's called double-speak. Blair said 'I know I was wrong about Iraq, but I feel I was right'. Now what kind of sense is that? In the New World order of things, answers beg the question, in fact they're downright dangerous (as the unfortunate Dr David Kelly discovered to his cost). With that kind of warning, who dares even to look?