Well I guess I wasn't far off the mark :(
Well, the cobbled together government has had their 100plus days to show what they want to do with the situation.........
And bugger me sideways if they aren't putting sense to one side and letting their outdated and ill conceived ideologies run rampant across the country!
Who saw that one coming eh?
Conservatives riding roughshod over the science and facts of the situation to satisfy their ideals and unfounded hunches of what will be best for their own self interests.
And the Liberals throwing their most basic principals overboard on the off chance that the Cons will honour their most flimsy of promises.
Don't bother Clegg, they may give you a vote on Alternative Vote (which won't do you any good as you've destroyed an awful lot of your support with the coalition) but they will do everything in their power to stop it getting through. And for this you've shown yourself to have 'occasional principals' Bring them out when folks visit but easily hidden when the racist old aunt comes around for tea because you might be in her will!
As for the 'opposition', why form an effective counterattack and try to fight the systematic destruction of the country's finest qualities and services when you can just spend the time slagging each other off in the name of finding a new leader, that's what the people who voted for you and pay your wages would want you to do surely!
Nigh on 4 months have gone past since the election and in a time when positive action and new ways of doing things and countrywide restructuring are somewhat pressing and the opportunities for creating a sustainable and fairer structure that the country can improve and build with we've got a leadership that has come up with 'cut 25% of everything'?
Really?
No really, is that the best you can do? Because if that is then please be ashamed of yourself and let someone else have you seat, really, because the country can't afford you right now.
The Global debt is still there (the 25+% drop in the US property market last month shows that it's still affecting that market) the governments may have shifted the numbers from the private to the public sector but the debt is still there and will take decades to pay off/settle up.
And It's there on the public balance sheet because we were trying to avoid a full blown depression,
This is not something to forget!
The current gov' may complain and slag off the previous gov's for leaving this mountain of debt but would they have preferred the depression to deal with instead?
After the second world war the UK was screwed. We had a mountain of debt from paying for the war and a broken country to deal with.
We now have a mountain of debt but despite many faults and decades of mismanagement the country is not broken! (but could easily be if the wrong policies and decisions are taken)
After the war we did not decide to cut expenditure but we took on more loans and used the money to build the country in to a better place for all. We set up the NHS and the welfare state so that the poor would not die and suffer from easily prevented ailments or misfortune, and that made the country a better place for all of us, we improved the schooling of the majority of the populace and that made the country all the richer, both monetarily and culturally. We rebuilt the damaged housing stock and created whole new towns that despite some misjudged schemes made the country better., even in our worst slum areas now, folks don't have to go outside for a wee and that wee is washed away by clean water via reliable sewerage systems.
This was done with loan money! Good can be done with government debt!
This time the greatest good done with this debt was saving us from another great depression! A depression doesn't just mean you can't have that new frock or phone because things are a bit tight. It means people will die because they can't afford food and there is no work to do to earn money to buy the food. This is what the debt saved us from! This was a good thing!
There may have been better ways to save us from the depression but this was the one that has done it so far and this is what we are left with.
Now we have to work out a way of paying it off.
To do this we need to keep the economy going as strongly as we can without losing track of why we have to. And that is to look after people when life takes a dump on them from on high.
Sounds hippy dippy but you can see it from any way you like, you can see it as purely a nice thing to do for your common man and that makes you a nice person. :)
You can see it as your duty to look after folks when you're doing well and they're taking a hit, and that makes you a noble person, You may not like doing it but you have your sense of duty to get you to do the nice thing. And that's enough. :)
You can think of it as benefiting you in the long run, keeping someone alive or educating them means you can sell them more and they're less likely to stab you or your family for you phone! This makes you mercenary, and you may hate them but in a roundabout way it gets you back to the nice thing.
Or you can say fuck 'em and let 'em starve cos you'll be alright because you're higher up than them. And this makes you scum. And as you're watching the underclasses starve beneath you you won't notice the richer guy push you off your ivory tower.
There's always a richer guy who will think less of you than you do of the guys you hate.
All you have to do is move up one option and you win, along with everyone else!
Just try not to be scum.
So back a bit, and how does a 25-40% cut in government spending help the situation?
That government spending makes the world better for everyone, from the cleaners stopping you from contracting unpleasant diseases and then paying off their mortgage that helps pay off the debt to the consultants buying the fine single malt that keeps the small rural community going and then paying lots of tax that helps pay off the gov's debts. When it get's cut then we all lose.
So what do we do then if we can't cut wildly like a blind man in a ribbon shop?
Tricky........
But not impossible.
As a country we can currently service our debt at the moment, but if the economy shrinks (as it will if you take out a quarter of the public spending budget) then we're stuffed, possibly forever if the economic power shifts too far to the east while we are struggling to resurface from under the debt.
You could sit tight and do nothing, eventually you'll pay it all off, but one problem and you're slipping into the above.
So you kinda have to grow out of it, to shrink into it is to doom yourself to longterm hardship, but to grow out of it in a sustainable way so that you don't make the same mistake in the future.
And that means ideas, new ideas, improved old ideas, ideas that improve efficiency, ideas that make things better for everyone.
And that means education, and the support of ideas that will make things better.
It means not cutting the education budgets, particularly in deprived areas, as we need every last person on board to sort this problem, It means not cutting your scientific and research and development budgets, and investment in your ideas. It means supporting ideas and the people who have the energy and drive to carry them through and helping them to avoid pitfalls as they try. Don't throw away people with knowledge and experience, it cost a lot to gain those things, use them to their fullest!
If this is allowed to happen then we can grow our economy out of the debt, it won't be overnight (it took us 50 or so years to pay off the war and post war loans!) and we won't all be wonderfully flush and able to afford everything we want. But when it works this country will be able to look after itself and produce ideas that will help not just us but the whole world
And you know what?
That will be good, and worth the effort.
(turned out longer than I expected! oops!)
And bugger me sideways if they aren't putting sense to one side and letting their outdated and ill conceived ideologies run rampant across the country!
Who saw that one coming eh?
Conservatives riding roughshod over the science and facts of the situation to satisfy their ideals and unfounded hunches of what will be best for their own self interests.
And the Liberals throwing their most basic principals overboard on the off chance that the Cons will honour their most flimsy of promises.
Don't bother Clegg, they may give you a vote on Alternative Vote (which won't do you any good as you've destroyed an awful lot of your support with the coalition) but they will do everything in their power to stop it getting through. And for this you've shown yourself to have 'occasional principals' Bring them out when folks visit but easily hidden when the racist old aunt comes around for tea because you might be in her will!
As for the 'opposition', why form an effective counterattack and try to fight the systematic destruction of the country's finest qualities and services when you can just spend the time slagging each other off in the name of finding a new leader, that's what the people who voted for you and pay your wages would want you to do surely!
Nigh on 4 months have gone past since the election and in a time when positive action and new ways of doing things and countrywide restructuring are somewhat pressing and the opportunities for creating a sustainable and fairer structure that the country can improve and build with we've got a leadership that has come up with 'cut 25% of everything'?
Really?
No really, is that the best you can do? Because if that is then please be ashamed of yourself and let someone else have you seat, really, because the country can't afford you right now.
The Global debt is still there (the 25+% drop in the US property market last month shows that it's still affecting that market) the governments may have shifted the numbers from the private to the public sector but the debt is still there and will take decades to pay off/settle up.
And It's there on the public balance sheet because we were trying to avoid a full blown depression,
This is not something to forget!
The current gov' may complain and slag off the previous gov's for leaving this mountain of debt but would they have preferred the depression to deal with instead?
After the second world war the UK was screwed. We had a mountain of debt from paying for the war and a broken country to deal with.
We now have a mountain of debt but despite many faults and decades of mismanagement the country is not broken! (but could easily be if the wrong policies and decisions are taken)
After the war we did not decide to cut expenditure but we took on more loans and used the money to build the country in to a better place for all. We set up the NHS and the welfare state so that the poor would not die and suffer from easily prevented ailments or misfortune, and that made the country a better place for all of us, we improved the schooling of the majority of the populace and that made the country all the richer, both monetarily and culturally. We rebuilt the damaged housing stock and created whole new towns that despite some misjudged schemes made the country better., even in our worst slum areas now, folks don't have to go outside for a wee and that wee is washed away by clean water via reliable sewerage systems.
This was done with loan money! Good can be done with government debt!
This time the greatest good done with this debt was saving us from another great depression! A depression doesn't just mean you can't have that new frock or phone because things are a bit tight. It means people will die because they can't afford food and there is no work to do to earn money to buy the food. This is what the debt saved us from! This was a good thing!
There may have been better ways to save us from the depression but this was the one that has done it so far and this is what we are left with.
Now we have to work out a way of paying it off.
To do this we need to keep the economy going as strongly as we can without losing track of why we have to. And that is to look after people when life takes a dump on them from on high.
Sounds hippy dippy but you can see it from any way you like, you can see it as purely a nice thing to do for your common man and that makes you a nice person. :)
You can see it as your duty to look after folks when you're doing well and they're taking a hit, and that makes you a noble person, You may not like doing it but you have your sense of duty to get you to do the nice thing. And that's enough. :)
You can think of it as benefiting you in the long run, keeping someone alive or educating them means you can sell them more and they're less likely to stab you or your family for you phone! This makes you mercenary, and you may hate them but in a roundabout way it gets you back to the nice thing.
Or you can say fuck 'em and let 'em starve cos you'll be alright because you're higher up than them. And this makes you scum. And as you're watching the underclasses starve beneath you you won't notice the richer guy push you off your ivory tower.
There's always a richer guy who will think less of you than you do of the guys you hate.
All you have to do is move up one option and you win, along with everyone else!
Just try not to be scum.
So back a bit, and how does a 25-40% cut in government spending help the situation?
That government spending makes the world better for everyone, from the cleaners stopping you from contracting unpleasant diseases and then paying off their mortgage that helps pay off the debt to the consultants buying the fine single malt that keeps the small rural community going and then paying lots of tax that helps pay off the gov's debts. When it get's cut then we all lose.
So what do we do then if we can't cut wildly like a blind man in a ribbon shop?
Tricky........
But not impossible.
As a country we can currently service our debt at the moment, but if the economy shrinks (as it will if you take out a quarter of the public spending budget) then we're stuffed, possibly forever if the economic power shifts too far to the east while we are struggling to resurface from under the debt.
You could sit tight and do nothing, eventually you'll pay it all off, but one problem and you're slipping into the above.
So you kinda have to grow out of it, to shrink into it is to doom yourself to longterm hardship, but to grow out of it in a sustainable way so that you don't make the same mistake in the future.
And that means ideas, new ideas, improved old ideas, ideas that improve efficiency, ideas that make things better for everyone.
And that means education, and the support of ideas that will make things better.
It means not cutting the education budgets, particularly in deprived areas, as we need every last person on board to sort this problem, It means not cutting your scientific and research and development budgets, and investment in your ideas. It means supporting ideas and the people who have the energy and drive to carry them through and helping them to avoid pitfalls as they try. Don't throw away people with knowledge and experience, it cost a lot to gain those things, use them to their fullest!
If this is allowed to happen then we can grow our economy out of the debt, it won't be overnight (it took us 50 or so years to pay off the war and post war loans!) and we won't all be wonderfully flush and able to afford everything we want. But when it works this country will be able to look after itself and produce ideas that will help not just us but the whole world
And you know what?
That will be good, and worth the effort.
(turned out longer than I expected! oops!)