[South Lorne]

Lambie, on 30 March 2012 - 01:19 PM, said:

it's Ed Balls isn't it.

...I would say Red Ed ...puppy dog to the Union ...Unite....

[PopGun]

Lambie, on 30 March 2012 - 01:19 PM, said:

it's Ed Balls isn't it.

A good call, but my money is on Peter Mandelson... the sock puppet of John Inman's ghost.

[fluffy666]

RufflesTheGuineaPig, on 30 March 2012 - 01:38 PM, said:

The biggest coup the Tories have ever had, their crowning achievement in the last 100 years, was getting "New Labour" elected.

A group of Tories with red hats on, pretending to be Labour, implemented conservative policies until they destroy the economy. And then the public, feeling let down by socialism, turn the the Tory party for salvation, and they, is a whirlwind of neo-conservatism, backed by a wave of popular support by fools who know know better, hand the entire nation on a plate to their wealthy friends, reversing hundreds of years of progression and returning the country to a truly feudal state.

Things haven't gone wrong with the economy... they've happened exactly as intended.

+999

I find it amazing that people see a government that engages in privatisation of anything it can get away with, massively deregulates the banks, refuses to build social housing, presides over large scale, long term unemployment, and uses PFI (!), gets decried as 'left wing' or socialist.

[Fishfinger]

PopGun, on 30 March 2012 - 01:04 PM, said:

Yep, someone somewhere is stroking a white pussy with delight!

What I'm doing with my wife tonight is none of your business...

[Game_Over]

How can a country where the state makes up more than 50% of the economy be described as anything other than Socialist

Free education
Free Health Care
Free Housing
Free Food, beer and fags

Hardly Capitalism.

[wonderpup]

Quote

One possibility is that Tories believe in the most debased form of free market thinking - that what’s good for the individual must always be socially optimal.

This is the reality- Cameron and Co, seem to be running a neo liberal subroutine based on the delusion that it makes sense to aggregate the behaviour of the individual as a template for the whole economy.

This would be like trying to deduce the behaviour of an ants nest by following a single ant around all day, watching what it does- and then saying that the entire ant colony simply replicates this pattern- no serious scientist would take this seriously- except economists and those who have swallowed their nonsense whole.

Contrary to Thatcher's claim there is such a thing as society- and it exhibits the kind of complex emergent behaviours that seem to constantly trip up the Condem's as they attempt to nudge their way to success.

[wonderpup]

Quote

Free education
Free Health Care
Free Housing
Free Food, beer and fags

Hardly Capitalism.

True- you left out the part where all the speculators who enriched themselves by taking huge risks got bailed out when their bets went bad.

That's Capitalism- or so we are told.

[Lone_Twin]

The only thing cameron and co are guilty of is crediting the populace with a modicum of intelligence.

After 13 years of bullying and nannying by labour our infantilised country is no longer capable of listening to the words people say, appraising them and acting on them sensibly.

If you listen to the actual things said they are entirely sensible.

Of course it does give the weak minded and labour apologists the excuse to flap about blaming the government for the actions of several hundred thousand people.

This post has been edited by Lone_Twin: 30 March 2012 - 07:55 PM

[Traktion]

Milton, on 29 March 2012 - 05:22 PM, said:

Take your pick.

That's the main problem with modern politics. They confuse majority opinion with morality, then attempt to apply it to everyone, regardless of their opinion about it.

There are few almost universally accepted moral principles, but modern politics is devoid of any and is full of double standards.

They tell you not to steal, then steal much of your stuff. They tell you not to kill, then go around the world starting wars. They tell you not to counterfeit, then run the printers until they are dry. The list goes on.

It is one law for one person and another for someone else.

[Traktion]

Executive Sadman, on 30 March 2012 - 12:02 PM, said:

Delightful, isnt it?

The corporatist marxists in Con HQ think (probably rightly) if we privatize services, all those fearful of big govt will be relieved and put at ease.

Wrong. ALL these 'private' companies still operate under state monopoly. All these private housebuilders are nothing without planning permissions and credit created and issued by state monopolies.

The market is anything but private. Private ownership alone does not a free market make. Privatization is nothing of the sort, Feudalization would be a more accurate description. The control and coercion is still there, but the monopoly has had its legal status changed. That is all.

The problem is, private ownership spans many configurations.

If there are natural monopolies, giving them to the state and hoping that voting once every 4 years will help seems like a poor option. IMO, cooperatives and mutuals are a much better idea, where people actually own shares in the company and influence how it is run.

It seems we are often presented with a false dichotomy of either state ownership or non-mutual private ownership. Neither is good when monopolies are present as neither gives the public a genuine say in how they're run.

[bankfeeder]

wonderpup, on 30 March 2012 - 07:21 PM, said:

True- you left out the part where all the speculators who enriched themselves by taking huge risks got bailed out when their bets went bad.

That's Capitalism- or so we are told.

Nobody is calling that capitalism - it's just more socialism.

Capitalism would have allowed the banks to go bust.

This post has been edited by bankfeeder: 31 March 2012 - 07:05 AM