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Isn't that the definition of the free market?
I've been reviewing the Tory party conference. Protected by rooftop snipers whilst they discuss winter fuel payment cuts, and cuts to tax credits, whilst also urging the poor to work like the Chinese, you'd have to have a heart of stone not to laugh at what a fucking madhouse this country has become :)
Who the hell elects these people? :)
R.M.F wrote: "Who the hell elects these people? :) "Rhetorical, I presume.
Oh,RMF, and you could ask Lynne what she thinks about the Taxpayers Alliance group:'Cut pensioner benefits now. They'll be dead before the next election'.
Geoff (G. Robbins) (The noisy passionfruit) wrote: "R.M.F wrote: "Who the hell elects these people? :) "Rhetorical, I presume."
Not at all.
Will wrote: "Oh,RMF, and you could ask Lynne what she thinks about the Taxpayers Alliance group:'Cut pensioner benefits now. They'll be dead before the next election'."
That they think they could get away it speaks volumes.
Given that in England over 50% of the population voted for the Conservatives or UKIP the question that really has to be asked is what has the left done to drive the electorate into the arms of these people.
I didn't read anything about the taxpayers alliance, sorry, yesterday my husband had a full head of steam up and included them in his rant. I kept my head down and did other things. But anyone who calls pensions, which have been paid for, 'benefits' will be up against the wall when I have my revolution. (Alongside millionaire anti- austerity organisers who go back to their mansions after rubbing shoulders with the masses)
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Geoff (G. Robbins) (merda constat variat altitudo)
(last edited Oct 06, 2015 09:27AM)
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The fact that he gave that to the Huffington Post tells you that he just wants it buried. Not that he is repentant.
Buried along with the pensioners, Geoff. I've read it now.
Jim wrote: "Given that in England over 50% of the population voted for the Conservatives or UKIP the question that really has to be asked is what has the left done to drive the electorate into the arms of the..."But what does it say about this country when the Tory party conference has a steel wall around it to stop disabled protestors from protesting, and snipers walking the rooftops?
And you wonder why I want Scotland to get the hell out of the UK :)
R.M.F wrote: "And you wonder why I want Scotland to get the hell out of the UK :) "If you think that an independent Scotland will be any different, you are deluding yourself.
Whilst I know what Lynne means with regards the state pension, technically the state 'pension' isn't a pension because there's no pension fund. All that happens is that if you pay enough of a certain sort of tax (with various exemptions for stuff you might or might not be doing) you are entitled to an age benefit.This is why they can shift the age at which you are entitled to claim it, and change the amount they pay out pretty much as they want.
If it was a pension, there'd be a pension pot which would hopefully be accumulating value due to the wisdom of those investing it.Not only that but you'd be paid out according to the terms and conditions signed up when they sold you the deal.
Instead the money is just tipped into the treasury and goes on whatever the current government's fetish is.
I've pandered to the whims of a number of governments who've blown my money on all sorts of things. If they were a genuine pension provider, they'd be jailed.
It was always called Pension, as in the DWP etc The crafty shift towards calling it a benefit with related articles seems to infer that you are the recipient of the nations largesse without entitlement. 'On benefits' is used in a very derogatory fashion.
Probably when it stops blaming guns and looks at the underlying problems.At the moment issuing Americans with guns is unwise,but so is giving them driving licenses or letting them chose their own clothes to wear when shopping in Walmart
Wasn't the money from the National Insurance Contributions originally ringfenced? Anyone know when the payments got added to the Welfare Budget, allowing Osborne to claim that we spend 7% of the world's total welfare spending and therefore it is too much and should be reduced?(He considers pensions to be Welfare spending to be cut, of course. And includes every country going, including all the african countries whose total annual budget is less than London's)
So, is anyone gonna give live feedback on Cameron's speech?Apparently, there's an app for that.
I think you will find that National Insurance was never ringfenced, Will. The reason for this was that there was never enough raised to cover the amount of claimants. The problem with a ringfence is that it works both ways, not only stopping money inside being used for other things but also for outside subsidies going in.National Insurance was always kept low to ensure that there were few complaints at the start. Unfortunately, it has never kept up.
Patti (baconater) wrote: "So, is anyone gonna give live feedback on Cameron's speech?Apparently, there's an app for that."
I think I'd probably throw up if I listened to him.
Anyone see the Channel 4 clip of Cameron on Saudi Arabia? Slimy git.
Initially the pension was a redistribution device taking money from working class men who often didn't live to 65 and gave it to middle class people who did.according to http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article...
National Insurance is now used to pay for:
The NHS
Unemployment benefit
Sickness and disability allowances
The state pension
NI is supposed to be "ring fenced" - meaning the money raised is only used for these areas and won't be spent on things like building schools or employing police officers.
However, the government can borrow from the National Insurance fund to help pay for other projects.
NI raises 109 Billion a year file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings...
According to the Guardian https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8dY...
The NHS takes 97.4 Billion of that
So I suspect in real terms money has to go from the rest of the budget to 'subsidise' the NI rather than NI being robbed to subsidise other stuff
I'm a bit vague as to what Cameron is supposed to do about Saudi Arabia. Put people out of work by not selling them armaments or make people pay more for their energy because we're not going to buy their oil and gas?
Perhaps not supporting them onto the UN Human Rights Panel when they consider beheading and crucifying a 17 year old an appropriate action (because he doesn't fit their brand of islam) would be a start?Considering that their rumoured financial support of ISIL and Al Quaida needs investigating would be appropriate?
All sorts of things, really
Fine, how many lads are they worth throwing out of work for?remember the Unions have supported Trident because we need the jobs. The Saudis are inadvertently providing decent jobs in boring northern towns.
It's easy to be moral when we don't have to foot the bill.
We don't need an investigation, we know that Daesh is out of Saudi Islam,and we know it's being funded from the Gulf states. They're giving the terrorists arms that they've bought using the money we paid them for oil.
And we know their legal system is abhorrent, remember death of a Princess, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misha%2...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_o...
Yet successive British Governments and Oppositions have happily dealt with Saudi since
So, what is your view, Jim?Knowing that they sponsor terrorism, and have one of the worst human rights records on the planet, knowing that the weapons they buy from us are often used against their own people in appalling ways:
Do we sponsor them on a Human rights panel or not?
Do we buy their oil, knowing that a lot of the money goes to the international terrorists we are fighting?
Do we sell them weapons that arguably may find their way into the hands of ISIL?
The thing that gets to me about the Saudi issue is the way that it's never publicly acknowledged that they fund terrorism and ISIS.We'll get news articles and speeches about the dangers of terrorism, the need for more snooping laws to foil these evil people who are trying to destroy our way of life.
Yet nothing about Saudi is ever mentioned unless it's a celebration that they're buying some Eurofighters from us.
Well at the moment, after the deaths in Mecca (that were reported in the media but the significance wasn't really discussed) the current regime is shaky.The Iranians are gunning for them and as are a lot of 'non-aligned Moslem states (The largest Islamic countries in the world are Indonesia, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. 12.7% of all Moslems live in Indonesia, 1.6% live in Saudi Arabia.)
So let's assume we take steps to overthrow them, it's not going to produce a liberal democracy. The best we'd get would be a Sunni Strongman who had a link to the Royal Family and could hold the country together with Saudi White Army and residual loyalty to the Dynasty.
The worst we could get was a major upsurge in the Shi'a/Sunni war that is going on at the moment, with the gulf states going down like dominoes, Iran restoring order using the massacre of Shi'a as an excuse. This is just extrapolating Iranian behaviour in Iraq where they seem to be providing deniable ground-forces to work with Russian airstrikes.
I don't suppose Russia would mind if the Iranians ended up controlling most of the gulf oil. I suspect the Americans aren't too bothered any more either.
So the first thing we have to decide is, "Are we going to destabilise the current Saudi Regime?"
If you say no, then you have to ask, "So how do we get them to do what we want?"
If you say yes,then it isn't a problem as such, but stand by for another wave of refugees and oil prices back over $140 dollars a barrel. Ironically the people who could do something, the Americans are chilled about this because the President isn't going to get involved, and big Oil would love the price back up. And frankly the Americans could regig stuff and needn't import all that much if they get their act together.
I think the best option would be if the South and South East Asian countries stepped in (62% of world Moslems) and tried to damp the middle east down a bit.
Cameron having a quiet word in Indonesia and the Indian subcontinent, (you know the sort of thing, The Saudis are making Islam look bad, and it's time they stopped holding you lot over a barrel because of the Hadj, so if you want to make a fuss we'll support you.)
Also I suspect some of those countries are getting sick of how Saudi Arabia is doing its best to bring Wahhabi Islam to their 'ex' nationals in the UK, because that feeds back to family back at home.
But there's no point in Cameron actually doing anything overt, because that's Western colonialism, and the Saudi's will pick up brownie points with some sections of the world for defying him and indeed rubbing his nose in the fact they've defied him
Oh and technically most of Daesh kit is ex-soviet, except for some US stuff they've picked up from those who the Americans equipped. All of it is widely available from a score of willing suppliers :-(
Jim wrote: "Oh and technically most of Daesh kit is ex-soviet, except for some US stuff they've picked up from those who the Americans equipped. All of it is widely available from a score of willing suppliers :-("So, to sum up your post - better the devil we know, because the replacement could be a whole lot worse.
I'm inclined to agree with that.
So the fact that they buy weapons systems from us, thereby creating employment over here you see as more important than their other activities is what I was really asking?
In the long term, the problem will solve itself. Either their oil runs out, or the warmists get their way and we become less dependent upon it.This gamble by Saudi to drive down the price of oil to give them commercial advantage by driving out the opposition is failing badly and affecting their cash reserves. They badly miscalculated that they could force the US to stop shale drilling by making it uneconomical. They didn't factor in that they could extract it at a low price.
Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states have lived high on the hog for a long time on the basis of a geological twist of fate, but nothing lasts forever. Ask the Romans, Greeks, etc. They are merely a blip in the great scheme of things.
Geoff (G. Robbins) (The noisy passionfruit) wrote: "In the long term, the problem will solve itself. Either their oil runs out, or the warmists get their way and we become less dependent upon it.This gamble by Saudi to drive down the price of oil..."
Christ almighty, I agree with Geoff!
Will wrote: "So the fact that they buy weapons systems from us, thereby creating employment over here you see as more important than their other activities is what I was really asking?"I'm taking a purely pragmatic approach.
In this country we have never had a policy of not trading with people we disapprove of.
So we still buy grain of the Americans and Gas of the Russians. The American death row system and gun fetish is pretty distasteful, and the current Russian government is pretty distasteful as well. Are they more or less distasteful that the current Saudi regime? With the Americans I'd prefer to live in the US than Saudi. With the Russians I genuinely don't know any more.
With the question, is it more important to sell them weapon systems or curb their disgusting behavior, I would tend to say, 'curb their disgusting behaviour' because for me that's an easy call. Provided the Saudi government doesn't fall and we don't get the other problems, for me it's a free hit. I get a warm moral glow and it costs me nothing
But go to Warton or Samlesbury, or Telford, or Malvern and people might have other priorities.
I live in a town where we produce weapons of mass destruction and hand them over to the British government. I don't think we can take a high moral stance on this issue
R.M.F wrote: "Christ almighty, I agree with Geoff!"Stop it, right now!
Just caught a few lines of Cameron's speech whilst collecting my lunch (and maybe losing it). He was wittering on about crime being down (nothing to do with government there, all western countries crime is down)and then saying that 50% of released criminals re-offend and are not educated.What we need in this country is a sensible debate. Is prison for punishment or rehabilitation? If it's the former, which most people believe it is, then that explains it.
If prison is for rehabilitation and education, then I'm in favour of it, however most people will scream "why do people who commit crime get a free education?"
Everyone should get a free education, is my view. My teenager's grant monies (from three different sources) are now sorted out. Annually she gets £ 9000 tuition fees, and a few quid under £ 10000 maintenance monies. Of all this about £ 7000 a year will be placed on her student loan account. That's manageable. I feel so sorry for the kids in England who will be in debt forever.Geoff, I am entirely in agreement with you that the only purpose to imprisoning people is to educate and rehabilitate them away from crime.
And just saw this as I ate my lunch Sports Direct needs to move beyond 'Dickensian age’
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/ne...
There's things to fix in this country but they won't be fixed because too many people want their stuff cheap.
We've seen it a lot in Agriculture. You get these campaigns which say that the Great British Public will pay for better welfare or whatever.
No, between ten and twenty percent of the GBP will pay, the rest will buy the cheaper imported stuff.
One 'success' is free range eggs which have just topped 50% but to achieve this they've redefined free-range to get the costs down and most of the eggs used in catering are produced under the old system because people buy on price
'Work Like The Chinese' say the Tories. (Jeremy Hunt)Did you know that many Chinese workplaces now have anti suicide nets fixed to the buildings?
Yes, let's import that shall we?
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Geoff (G. Robbins) (merda constat variat altitudo)
(last edited Oct 07, 2015 05:28AM)
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Will wrote: "'Work Like The Chinese' say the Tories. (Jeremy Hunt)Did you know that many Chinese workplaces now have anti suicide nets fixed to the buildings?
Yes, let's import that shall we?"
Apple do fine, after all one of their suppliers factories has just such netting.
It's not that they mind suicide, it's just that productivity drops due to other workers rubber necking.
Anyway Will, you're wrong. We can't import something we already exported successfully.Children under the weaving machines anyone?
Judging by the popularity of apple products people in this country don't seem to have a problem with other people working under those conditions. :-(It's not as if people don't know. We've known of the conditions in the sweat shops that produce the cheap clothes people demand.
And the fact that some stuff was actually made by prisoners to keep the price down
cognitive dissonance holds sway where consumption/consumerism is concerned
Cognitive dissonance holds - period.
I've just read Cameron's speech, who writes them? It's awful, it really put my back up.
Lynne (Tigger's Mum) wrote: "I've just read Cameron's speech, who writes them? It's awful, it really put my back up."Agreed - it was complete and utter bollocks.
Cameron's big ideas:
1) Affordable prisons by 2020! :)
2) Transform generation rent to generation buy. Sounds like somebody's praying for a housing crash.
3) No more passive tolerance to those who eschew British values...erm does that mean this Scottish Nationalist is heading for prison? :)
I could go on, but as far as speeches go, this was a shambles.
"That being black, or Asian, or female, or gay doesn’t mean you’ll be treated differently, " (to who?) As if anyone should be. It stinks and I'm further right than our Will.
I'm incensed by his attack on Corbyn. To base it on half of a sentence is disgraceful politics.(For those who missed the full thing, Corbyn said that the Killing of Bin Laden was a tragedy because he should have been taken alive and made to stand a fair trial. Boris Johnson publically argued the same thing at the same time.)
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If the protesters wanted to attack anybody, the people who are heart of their problem are those who fly Ryanair or Easyjet. These are the people who have taken the decision that the flight and groundcrew of Air France are not worth employing.
It's a bit like the fuss about uber. You get a taxi when you want it and undercut and get it cheaper.
Or shopping in a supermarket rather than the corner shop because it's cheaper. But whilst you keep the money in your pocket, you're screwing somebody else