Do leapords chane their spots?

The BBC was talking about the government papers released from 30 years ago, Riots, austerity and a royal wedding AND the Tories in power.

  Note that in all the years of Labour rule there wasn't a riot. It is always the same the Tories screw those who are worse off and then claim the violence that ensues is nothing to do with them!



  Why do so many people fall for their propaganda, is is just the press that keeps telling them things or is it the simple belief that things will get better. I wonder how many public sector workers voted for them or their cheerleaders, the lib-cons. They must know that the Tories are out to destroy the public sector, they firmly believe that if you work in the public sector you are useless, but still so many public sector workers vote for them. Can someone explain the contradiction? Why would turkeys vopte for Xmas. 

  My only conclusion is that they want to believe that leopards can change their spots but they don't, anything to get at the workers. Mrs Thatcher blamed all our problems on Trade Unions, that was why are industries were so bad. So she set about trying to strangle them. She has almost done that in the private sector and see how wonderfully British industry is now doing.

   Almost everything that the Tory governments have done since Thatcher has been a failure, it often sounds good but doesn't work. The latest positive sounding move was the proposal to restrict "excessive" charges for credit and debit cards.

  Of course large firms will get ground it and probably the only winners, once again, will be lawyers as firms challenge any ruling. To defeat such things the law must simply state that whatever method is used the charge is the same! Some people might lose but the cost of something will always be clear and they will be no way to challenge such a law in the courts.

  The firms might be able to argue that it is unfair BUT by doing all their business over the phone or internet they save a fortune, if you operate in that way their is no way to pay other than by cards. So the argument about administrative costs is just rubbish!  It is just another way to rip us off and the Tories don't really want to tackle the problem.

On last comment, don't believe the greens are any different, their leader in Norfolk has just come clean and joined the Tories, he is so impressed by them.

Xmas Presents

 Anyone looking for a Xmas present for a bridge playing friend? Let me recommend  "The Essence of Defence" by Martin Camina.. A short but useful book to help any bridge player.

Available from m-camina@o2.c0.uk.

It will be  a nice Xmas present for him, my big bruvver!

The curious case of the veto

  It is very odd that a right-wing politician tries to stop a very right wing piece of legislation. If one examines the plans of the treaty for fiscal rectitude the only possible descrition would be that it is anally retentive.

   As Larry Elliot in the Guardian on Saturday has argued, these proposal will probably condemn Europe to 10 years of stagnation, if not of recession. It would make sense for a left wing government not to sign up or even to seriously try to halt the plans but for a right wing government being lead by Cameron & Osborne it makes no sense. The limitations on deficits will destroy any governments plans for growth or for helping the poor without massive levels of taxation.

  It would be interesting to check with current members of the European Union satisfy the restrictions being planned. Perhaps a more educated reader than myself could elucidate this fact. There is also the issue of fiddling the returns, games which both accountants, politicians and economists seem to be masters of. The whole PFI fiasco, invented by John Major's government and adopted so enthusiastically by Blair & Brown is such an example. It pretsens public expenditure id prive!

Unilever

I have just discovered, the guardian, where else, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/09/unilever-hardball-with-striking-workers, that there is a national strike at Unilever. 

  We must boycott Unilever products. Guess what the strike is about, doing away with the final salary scheme for pensions. I wonder how many directors have such a scheme.

Please support this activity

many things

  There are so many things that seem to be going wrong it is hard to focus. But let me pick one issue, what do Jeremy Clarkson, Tony Blair, George Osborne and Nick Clegg have in common, apart from being wrong most of the time. They all went to Public School. What do public schools teach people, arrogance, perhaps to put it more politely, over confidence.

  It doesn.'t occur to them that they might be wrong, so they go ahead with their plans despite the fact that they are wrong and will probably lead to disaster. Remember they and their friends won't be effected, they have their inheritances to protect them. Almost certainly in nicely set up trusts which will pay no tax.

  How can we break out of our love affair with the 10% who go to public schools. Why as a society can we not look behind the facade and see how empty most of these people really are. Perhaps it goes back to when rhetoric was an essential part of education. The point of rhetoric was not to be right but to win the argument, using any "rhetorical" tricks you can find. We still vote for those who present their case best not for those who have the best case. 

  Look at the the issues that the Tories want to claw back from the EU, they are all about workers rights. They present it as giving the UK more powers and bringing control back to the UK parliament. But that is just for show, it is is about giving employers more power. It was the EU, for example, that gave part-time employees the right to pensions, who gained, largely women who had worked part-time for some or all of their careers. Do the Tories want to give the UK power to scrap that right?


  But they do not presnt the case as being about taking rights away from workers, which is what they plan, but about taking rights away from employees

On the rich man's side

 Once again the judiciary have shown that they support the rich against the poor. The recent decision to allow the government to cheat the public over pensions and benefits just reinforces all one's prejudices about English judges.

 If you are an employee and have a contract with your employer how cam they can just change the rules.  If the government wants to change a contract, let us say over PFI, I am sure the judges will find against the government. How could they possibly change a contract. It would be illegal and unfair, but who would lose out, the rich and powerful, have a change that will screw the workers and somehow that is OK.

The only times judges fin for poor people is when there are no financial consequences for the poor. The trouble is that they only mix with the rich & powerful and have the same set of prejudices as all their public school mates. Is it surprising taht they get cases like this wrong almost every time.

  We need to get a system where judges no less law and more about the world and how things really happen. Are there any penalties for judges who get things wrong?

Shooting people is fun?

 I think Clarkson has done us all a favour! He merely reinforces the view that he and his ilk don't care for anyone. We see David Cameron and his big society supporting him. He was only joking, only in the sense that he would actually shoot them. Though I ma not so sure, he would probably enjoy a day of peasont shooting. You could just see the stuffed trophies in his hall.

   Would Cameron think I was just joking if I said that we should shoot all Tories, it would be a much more useful activity. About 20% of the population voted Tory in the last election, that would cull the most useless and the most dangerous members of the population. This would leave a stronger and less populated country.

   Or an even more pleasant thought, one that has often occurred to me, how about castrating anyone who went to public school. Think of the benefits this would have, do you think there is any chance of getting one of those government petitions up, we would only need 100,000 people to sign it!