The Tories love the 19th century and often talk about it in terms of cricket on the village green, happy well-fed yeomen taking their ease at the village pub and smock-bedecked children happily learning the "Three R's" (ritin, readin and 'rithmatic). Of course for the vast majority of our ancestors, trapped in urban slum housing and choking on the pollution, it was nothing like that but never mind. So what would Britain look like if the Tories were given free rein? First and foremost, of course, would be tax cuts for the rich - preferably to the point where they pay none whatsoever. Second a clear division between a hugely wealthy house-owning elite and a working poor paying out most of their income as rent. A state school system with a curriculum frozen around the year 1840 and a public school system frozen even further back in time. Workhouses for the undeserving poor, unemployed and disabled with glitzy 21st century hospitals for those who can afford to pay and the workhouse infirmary for all the rest. Contracts of employment will be a thing of the past with day-labour, low wages and no paid leave getting us all fit to compete in the new world economy. Pensions for ordinary people would vanish in a puff of smoke as the Tories friends, bankers, tell us why they are no longer affordable and wring their hands in anguish before counting their bonuses. The welfare state, to which most of us owe our very existence, was the reward we were allowed after saving the elite's bacon during World War II - one that had been denied us after we'd saved their bacon in World War I. Of course the Tories, as we've seen over the last week of celebration for the D-Day landings, will continue to tell us how marvellous we all were but, regretfully, we will now have to put all that behind us because of the new "realities". We've had our reward, now its time to get back to business as usual and, in any case, they no longer need us to man the trenches. Essentially, in a world that rewards the smug and self-satisfied for being smug and self-satisfied, we are surplus to requirements - an expensive drag on the forward march and further evolution of Homo Inhumanitatum.
Sunday 8 June 2014
What Would A Tory Government Look Like After 2015?
The Tories love the 19th century and often talk about it in terms of cricket on the village green, happy well-fed yeomen taking their ease at the village pub and smock-bedecked children happily learning the "Three R's" (ritin, readin and 'rithmatic). Of course for the vast majority of our ancestors, trapped in urban slum housing and choking on the pollution, it was nothing like that but never mind. So what would Britain look like if the Tories were given free rein? First and foremost, of course, would be tax cuts for the rich - preferably to the point where they pay none whatsoever. Second a clear division between a hugely wealthy house-owning elite and a working poor paying out most of their income as rent. A state school system with a curriculum frozen around the year 1840 and a public school system frozen even further back in time. Workhouses for the undeserving poor, unemployed and disabled with glitzy 21st century hospitals for those who can afford to pay and the workhouse infirmary for all the rest. Contracts of employment will be a thing of the past with day-labour, low wages and no paid leave getting us all fit to compete in the new world economy. Pensions for ordinary people would vanish in a puff of smoke as the Tories friends, bankers, tell us why they are no longer affordable and wring their hands in anguish before counting their bonuses. The welfare state, to which most of us owe our very existence, was the reward we were allowed after saving the elite's bacon during World War II - one that had been denied us after we'd saved their bacon in World War I. Of course the Tories, as we've seen over the last week of celebration for the D-Day landings, will continue to tell us how marvellous we all were but, regretfully, we will now have to put all that behind us because of the new "realities". We've had our reward, now its time to get back to business as usual and, in any case, they no longer need us to man the trenches. Essentially, in a world that rewards the smug and self-satisfied for being smug and self-satisfied, we are surplus to requirements - an expensive drag on the forward march and further evolution of Homo Inhumanitatum.
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Ah, the Darwinian concept of the survival of the fittest. Of course your argument presupposes that I have never been in business, which I have, and have never made any money, which again I have. I have never said that Capitalism is simply robbery. At its best it is a system that creates wealth. However, left to its own devices it will not willingly spread that wealth but will seek to hoard it for the exclusive use of a small elite. Not only is this socially irresponsible it is ultimately self-defeating and will, sooner or later, simply return us to feudalism. Your problem is that you don't understand capitalism and have no recourse but to sprout the usual clichés about those who do understand it and want it regulated to serve the interests of everyone and not simply the greedy and stupid. Do I hate some one simply for being better off than me? No. But what I do hate is the greedy miser who hoards his money in a tax free offshore bank account where it can do no one any good. Do I dislike idiots like you who know nothing but still insist on airing their idiotic opinions? No. I simply pity you.
ReplyDeleteSo how do you explain the billions that have disappeared down the black hole of offshore banking and the lack of investment in this country? Your mistake, I'm afraid, is that you can't tell the difference between an idiot such as yourself and someone who actually has knowledge of the subject. Tell you what how about you sending me your lecture notes on modern history and I'll send you those I wrote while working as a university lecturer in modern history. If not then perhaps your can send me the bibliography that makes you such an expert on the subject. A word of caution "Economics for Dummies" doesn't count.
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