To submit material for publication to the Libertarian Alliance simply email it to the Editorial Director Nigel Meek at nigel@libertarian.co.uk.
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Here is something for the L.A. blog.
A Critique of a Critique:
An examination of Kevin Carson’s “Contract Feudalism”.
At the recent Libertarian Alliance conference I recieved a buff coloured folder, when I finally got around to reading the contents of the folder (on the train going home) I found, anongst other things, a pamphlet by Mr Kenvin Carson (“Contract Feudalism: A Critique of Employer Power over Employees”), the following is what I thought of it.
On the front cover of the pamphlet were the words “Liberty, Equality, Cooperation” and a symbol the letter “A” is a circle. The symbol is, historically, the sign of compulsory communal anarchists, the people who want to rename the state “the people” or “the community” but still want a collective power to order individuals about. As for the words “cooperation” and “equality” – liberty allows people to cooperate or not as they so choose (they must accept the consequences of their choice).
If people choose to cooperate by some people accepting wages from other people that is one way to cooperate, it in no way violates the nonaggression principle. And if people choose to cooperate by being members of a coperative (such as the John Lewis Partnership) that is another way to cooperate which also in no way violates the nonaggression priciple.
Whether employer-emplopee firms or cooperatives prosper more will be decided by the market – i.e. by the prices and quality of goods that they they offer and the choices of customers (the choices of customers are all the term “market forces” actually means).
As for the word “equality” this can mean equality under the law (the real law – the non aggression principle) in which case a person who is starving to death is the equal of a billionare, or it may mean material equality – i.e. equality of income or wealth.
If “equality” means equality of income or wealth this may mean either mean people voluntarily choosing to join an egalitarian community (whether religious, as with monks and nuns, or secular) in which case we can expect at most about 5% of the population in such communities (the percentage of the Jewish population of Israel in various forms of communal communities at the height of these highly subsidized and favoured communities), or it may mean some form of compulsion – as the symbol of the letter “A” in a circle would suggest. It is this compulsion (the desire to loot the property of the owners of the means of production and prevent by violence individuals owning the means of production in future) which is the reason why the symbol of a letter “A” in a circle should not appear on a Libertarian Alliance publication – it has historically been a symbol of evil. True anarchists (i.e. people who do not wish to rename the State “the people” or whatever, but wish to get rid of it altogther) have, as far as I know, no symbol.
As for the contents of the pamphlet: The word “feudalism” is used a lot, but it is not clearly defined anywhere. Normally when people talk of “feudalism” they do not mean the feudal system of government (a system that, for example, existed on the island of Sark till this year – when the the mega rich Barclay twins and their friends in the British govermment and the European powers-that-be insisted that democracy and “human rights” be introduced), they mean serfdom.
Serfdom, keeping people from birth to the land or other place of employment by the threat of violence goes back (at least – actually it occured in many societies before this) to the Roman Empire. The Emperor Diocletian (a man of peasant origins himself) ordered (to make the collection of tax less difficult) that all peasants remain on the land that they were born on, and he and later Emperors ordered that most people in the towns keep to the occupations of their fathers – both orders (like Diocletian’s price controls) were backed by threats of violence.
Although the Roman Empire collapsed the idea of serfdom did not die with it. Some have claimed that after the Norman conquest as many as 1 in 3 English people (or even more) were reduced to the level of serfdom, although this institution went into decline after the Black Death. As for compelling people, by the threat of violence, to undertake the occupations of their fathers – there were statutes past in England as late as the time of Elizabeth the First (although “Good Queen Bess” had no great administrative structure to enforce her statutes).
What all of this has got to do with agreeing to work for a someone in return for wages Mr Carson does not explain. I suppose that if a factory worker or household servant (or whatever) signed a contract to work for a certain amount of time and then did not turn up for work they could be sued for breach of contract – but, in practice, employers tend to take not turning up for work as simply a de facto resignation.
It is when a lot of money has been paid in advance for work that has either not been done or has been done very badly that be sue. For example, if someone paid to have a diamond cut and it was not cut (or was cut wrong) they might sue, but if someone said “come and work in my factory for X amount of money” and the person did not turn up or came for a while and then stopped comming the employer would take that as a de facto resignation (although a rude one – as the person had not bothered to say that he had resigned).
Of course some governments do not allow an employer to hire a new worker to replace someone who has decided not to turn up for work (this is a matter of the concept of a “strike”) and many governments do not allow an employer to clear people who are obstucting the entrance to their place of business (the military term “picket” is used in relation to this). But I do not see how these weird regulations are the fault of the employer.
The regulations are created by people who are under the delusion that there is or should be something called a “balance of power” between the buyer and seller of a good or service, and that if there is not a contract is “unfair”. Some (by no means all) of the Schoolmen of the Middle Ages held that a “just” price or wage might be somehow different from a free one, because of such “unfairness” (see the first volume of Rothbard’s history of economic thought for the many Schoolmen who did NOT fall into this error). “But Mr X will starve to death unless Mr Y employes him” – first of all Mr X will NOT starve to death, and secondly it would make no difference, in economic principle, if he was going to starve to death – there would still be no economic case for a regulation (not that Mr Carson supports government regulations – he has other ideas in mind).
Overall I am led to conclude that Mr Carson’s use of the term “contract feudalism” does not mean anything – he is just using the word “feudalism” as a “boo word” and trying to transfer the dislike people have for the word “feudalism” with serfdom (although in some feudal lands there was no serfdom) to a dislike of the practice of some people paying other people money to work for them – either on their farms, or factories or homes, or whatever.
However, Mr Carson does make other claims. For example, he claims that governments sometimes subsidise business enterprises either directly or indirectly (for example building roads is a subsidy for auto companies like G.M.) – this is true, but in no way relevant. Say company X gets a million Dollars from the taxpayer, very wicked, but this in no way gives the employees of company X any rights over the company – all it gives them is the duty (like that of all other citizens) to demand that the subsidy to company X be stopped (even if it means lower wages or unemployment for them).
On page 6 of his pamphlet Mr Carson “land and capital” are “artifically scarce”. This was my first real indication of what he “was on about”. Neither land nor capital are “artifically scarce” – they are just scarce (period). There are billions of people and only a certain amount of land and machinary. True, indusrial capital can be increased over time, and it is even possible that the amount of land will be increased (say by the use of the seas, of by the settlement of outer space), but the idea that land and capital are only scarce compared to the billions of people on the Earth because of either wicked governments or wicked employers (or both) is false.
Also on page 6 of pamphlet Mr Carson quotes Benjamin Tucker as saying that if the government allowed anyone to set up a bank, interest rates would fall to “less than three fourths of one per cent” (this is somehow connected with the “labour cost”).
In reality interest rates are determined by time preference i.e. the price that people will charge to lend out some of their income (rather than spend it or hoard it) – the price they will charge for not having this money for a certain period of time (and the risk, in the case of default, that they will never get it back).
Other people borrow the money, either for consumption or for investment. And depending on how long they want the money for and what the chances are they will pay it back they pay various rates of interest.
Banks (and other financial institutions) are middle men in these transactions. Of course banks and other such do try and lend out more money than really exists (via fractional reserve games) and governments support them in this (seeking the old dream of investment being greater than real savings – i.e. the dream of “lower interest rates”), but this just leads to the boom-bust cycle which is not exactly good for the ecnomy (see Murry Rothbard’s “The Panic of 1819″ and “America’s Great Depression”, or Ludwig Von Mises’ “Theory of Money and Credit” or “Human Action” – along with many other works by these and other writers).
The idea that if only one did not need a license to lend out money interest rates would fall to some very low level is false. In fact “false” is to mild a word, it is (to use a word supported by the Yale university philosopher Harry Frankfurt) “bullshit”.
Of course, as a libertarian, I support people being allowed to use as money anything they choose to use (and support contracts being honoured). If people choose gold (of a certain purity) fine, ditto silver or any other commodity – even bits of paper with designs on. If that is what people agree to use in a particular contract (as in “I agree to give you X number of pairs of shoes of a certain type in return for Y number of bits of paper with certain designs printed on them”) that is fine. But none of this alters the fact that (silly, and eventually destructive, games aside) interest rates are a matter of the time preference of savers and borrowers (no more to do with “three forths of one per cent” or “labour cost” than they are to do with the tooth fairy).
On page 4 of his pamphlet Mr Carson quotes from Albert Nock. Mr Nock does not mention any real industrialists (at least not in the quote given) there is no mention of (say) Mr Wedgewood or Mr Arkwright, instead Mr Nock mentions Mr Bounderby, Mr Gradgrind and Mr Plugson – all of whom were characters from Dickens (not real people). I suppose this is done to generate hatred of factory owners and their “starvation wages” (which were, in fact, higher than general wages had ever before been in history and saved the rising population from real starvation – even almost 60 years ago this was known, see T.S. Ashton’s “The Industrial Revolution” 1948).
Mr Nock also mentions that the land in England was stolen from the peasants. This may be true (although the story is a bit more complicated than that as even in Anglo Saxon England a lot of land belonged to big landowners rather than peasants), but it does rather miss the point.
Take the example of Norway – a nation of several million people, just over the North Sea from England. In Norway the land was never stolen from the peasants nor were they ever reduced to serfdom. This did not alter the fact that over time (and with an expanding population) most people became employees of industrial and service enterprises (and, of course, there had always been farm labourers, domestic servants and many other employees). Indeed wages in 19th century Norway were LOWER than those in England or the United States.
I think that the centre of Mr Carson’s pamphlet is to be found on page 5, where he quotes Claire Wolfe.
First we are told that the Luddites who smashed machines “may not have understood why they needed to do what they did”. Of course they did not “need to do it”, hand loom weavers had benefitted from a bottle neck when spinning got mechanized and weaving was not (before that they were poor) when weaving got mechanized most of the hand loom weavers got out competed (apart from a few who carried on specialised trades – mostly for wealthy customers). This was not a plot by nasty industrialists (anymore than the mechanization of spinning had been) – cheaper prices attracted the customers (most of whom were poor) so the handloom weavers lost out. Should the poor have forced to carry on paying higher prices just to benefit the hand loom weavers?
As for workers in general smashing up machines, the only way this might lead to an increase in wages is if so many attackers are (quite rightly) killed by people defending their property that a labour shortage results. More likely the smashing is going to lead to a fall in wages (due to the damage done to the economy) over what they otherwise would have been.
Overall wages over the long term can not be increased by smashing machines, any more than they can be “stikes” (with employers being prevented from hiring other people), “pickets” (obstruction) or minimum wage statutes or other regulations. Such actions can only make overall wages and conditions lower than they otherwise would have been – as well as increasing unemployment (over what it would have been). This is basic economics which is taught by such works as Ludwig Von Mises’ “Human Action”, Murry Rothbard’s “Man, Economy and State” or even works such as Henry Hazlitt’s “Economics in One Lesson” (although the “Strike threat system” by that old enemy of the colour bar in South Africa, W.H. Hutt, is well worth a look).
Claire Wolfe goes on to say (with Mr Carson’s clear support in the rest of his pamphlet) that “Jobs suck. Corporate employment sucks. A life crammed into 9-to5 boxes sucks”.
Well YES. I would be the last one to dispute that it “sucks” – life “sucks”. It “sucks” even for those “noble savages” the hunter-gather bands that Prince Charles goes to see and praises to the skies (before heading back to his Palace). It even “sucks” for Prince Charles and other people of great inherited wealth – they still age (in body and mind) and go through all the pain and humilation that this means. And if they live long enough they get to see all their closest friends (as well as their parents and other relavtives – sometimes even there own children) die.
As for people who are born without wealth and can think of no way of making a lot of money, their lives tend to be even worse than the lives of people who are either born with a lot of money or who think of way of earning a lot. This is all true – and in no way relevant.
There is no hope in life and, if the athiests are correct, no hope after it either. This is true (but yet again) in no way relevant. So life is shit – so what? Unless the claim is that if only it was not for the nasty owners of the means of production life would be less shit – but this claim is false, indeed action against the owners of the means of production will make life even more shit than it is now.
If Mr Carson wants a life that “sucks” less, well he could think of a way to earn a lot of money, or marry a rich person (or whatever). Or, of course, he could kill himself. (the great way out for those who who do not wish to tolerate the shitness of life anymore – as long as they can find the courage for the misnamed “cowards way out”). As long as he does not violate the nonaggression principle I wish Mr Carson luck in his efforts to make his and other people’s lives “suck” less. However, I believe him to be operating under a basic error.
This error is that life is “naturally good” (or words to that effect) and that if it “sucks” it must be someone’s fault. Perhaps those nasty owners of the means of production who keep us (say) as “wage slaves” or in a state of “contract feudalism”.
The trouble with this is that it is nonsense. Life is not naturally good, it is naturally shit. Nasty, brutish and short (to quote Hobbes, although I oppose Thomas Hobbes on most matters), and if one manages to survive for a few decades one has the experience of physical and mental decay. Some people decay quicker than others, but all people (even the richest) decay and undergo (if they live long enough) all the other pains and humilations that make up “life”. Certainly life is not all bad – but the idea that the bad in it can be reduced by some plot against the owners of the means of production is false.
Indeed (as argued above) “false” is much too mild a word for the ideas expressed in Mr Carson’s pamphlet. The whole work is part of that legion of works that offer false hope to suffering people. “Hit these people [in this case the owners of the means of production] and you and your loved ones will suffer less”, “follow my cunning scheme and interest rates will be virtually nothing and both land and capital will no longer be scarce”, “life is naturally good – and it is only because of the evil THEM than it sucks, hit THEM and all will be well”.
Let us say that, for example, in 1874 government in Britain had been abolished. Let us also assume that the claims of anarchists (real anarchists – not compulsory communal anarchists who wish to rename the state not get rid ot it) that chaos would not have resulted are correct.
What would have happened? Well people would have been a bit better off – but not much (as government only amounted to a few per cent of output in 1874 and there were few nonaggression principle violating regulations).
Most people were poor in 1874 not because of some wickedness of employers, or even because of big government – they were poor because that was the level of economic development (no great “artificial scarcity”). And this was also true in the United States – in spite of the dreams of Tucker, and (rather later) Nock.
Today getting rid of government (as long as it did not result in chaos) would improve matters much more (as government is much bigger now than it was in 1874 – so the gap between what our lives are and what they could be is much bigger), indeed even radically reducing government would greatly improve life (because government is now vast and its taxes, spending and regulations extend into almost every aspect of civil society). However, life would still be imperfect – it would still “suck”.
It might be bearable for some of us (I suspect that I would have a job I could live with – rather than not have one, which is my present situation). But I am sure that Mr Carson would still be able to find things to complain about.
“To buy my own space ship, I have to work on this bloody base on Mars for a whole year – and it sucks”.
This is not really an argument about economics. Mr Carson is a man who compares life as it is to what he would like it to be in an ideal utopia – real life does not measure up, so some group of people must be to blame. Like many people before him Mr Carson has chosen employers.
“Some employers even demand that their employees do not express opinions that they do not like – otherwise they fire you and you have to go and work for less money” errrrr yes and Mr Carson’s point is?
What you say, how you dress and so on are part of the “conditions of employment”. Some employers offer you better conditions (for example they do not care what you say outside work), but less money – and some employers offer a lot of money, but want you to be a “credit to the enterprise” and not (for example) go around calling black people “niggers” (even when you are not at work).
Some people are lucky and find employers who offer them a lot of money and do not care how they dress or what they say (at least when they are not at work). Or they manage to be self employed.
However, self employment is a hard life for many people (it depends on what sort of people they are, and many other factors – for example your CUSTOMERS may demand that you do not call people niggers, or they may demand that you do). And even if there were no government taxes and regulations that hit self employed folk hard (and I admit there are many) it would still be a hard life – a life that most people would not choose.
Good luck to Mr Carson if he seeks to be fully self employeed (in any enterprise that does not violate the non aggression principle) and good luck to him in opposing any taxes and regulations that make it harder for people to be self employed.
But please do not let him think that it is just these taxes and regulations that lead to most people working for wages.
Question.
In the Libertarian Alliance pamphlet “The Belgium State Versus Home Schooling: The Persecution of Dr Alexandra Colen and Dr Paul Belien” by Professor John Kersey, we (the readers) are asked to link to the pamphlet when we write e.mails of complaint to various politicians and officials (whose e.mail addresses Dr Gabb kindly includes).
How would we link to the pamphlet in our e.mails?
“emplopee”
Sounds like a sewerage expert.
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What a pathetic website. It’s full of wild conspiracy theory about how the evil ‘Commies’ are trying to destroy all freedom and replace it with a super-evil-Nazi-fascist-socialist-liberal-conservative-communist dictatorship (no paradox there eh?). Although how exactly they will achieve this isn’t quite clear (with them being such a marginal political group you wouldn’t have thought they would possess the actual means or ability to influence governments). Clearly Stalin must have raised from the dead with an army of orcs and trolls hell-bent on enslaving you brave libertarians to the power of the one ring.
But seriously though, do any of you contributors realise how silly and ignorant it sounds, when you brand everything that disagrees with you as being ‘Fascist’ (for the record, the term ‘Fascism’ denotes a specific political doctrine, albeit a very broad one).
This site also seems to contain alot of screaming “Nazi! Nazi! Nazi!” at the countless groups that you don’t like, including feminists (how dare they ask for equal rights!?). Not only is this incredibly childish, but somewhat odd considering that there don’t appear to be many surviving members of Germany’s N.S.D.A.P (1919- 1945) left anymore. If my words offend you, then feel free to reciprocate the favour by calling me a “Fascist-Commie-Feminist-Conservative-Stalinist-Nazi”.
I’ll leave you all be now to continue praying to the metaphysical deity that you call the “free market” or masturbating to Ron Paul speeches, or whatever else it is that you libertarians do.
P.S. Friedman and Hayek are dead…so get over
Here eis something you might want to consider, its from my blog. http://www.hostileopposition.blogspot.com
I Have No Pity for The Poor
There it is. I have uttered those words so contemptible in modern society that the mere allusion to such a sentiment is beyond reproach. Please forgive me, but I no longer have the patience to deal with those who wish to remain mired in the lowest depths of the social order. Are there not means available to these people who perpetually contend for the scraps from the table of those of those who actually contribute to the betterment of our world? This is not to say that I have no compassion for those who are infirmed, whether it be in a mental capacity or those suffering permanent injury to their persons, or those who, now beset by the ravages of old age have fallen into poverty. No, it is not these poor souls of which I am speaking of when I condemn the poor, it is those amongst this division of society who crave not advancement or a better life for themselves but are content to permanently siphon wealth from the upper reaches of the ladder. These dregs are, in my opinion, to be held in the highest form of contempt….
More at like above.
“Pots” and “kettles” come to mind…
Tony
Your riches will be your down fall as others come and take what they don’t have.You better start saving your guns and ammo now. No compasion is a sin and your judjment will be judjed on you. This is what we who have nothing pray for in your life, you will see your kingdom fall and you will be held in the highest form of contempt. Oh you say this can’t happen to me, well I tell you it can and God will tell you the same when you come to him and he knows you not because of your greed, corrupt way that you take from others to make you riches. I would say people like you make me sick but I love all who love and it sounds as though you don’t even love. Spread the wealth is what God will say and teach and so many like you have failed in all ways other than your own greed and corruption. if people need to siphon wealth it because people like you have no compasion for anything but greed and corruption.. Good luck with your condemnation because you will be condemned
Dear Fellow Libertarian,
I’d like to invite you to listen to the Bob Zadek Show on Talk 910 KNEW (http://www.910knew.com/main.html) every Sunday at noon (3pm EST). Bob’s show is new to the Bay Area and he stands out as the only Libertarian talk show host in the region.
This Sunday (12/1) Bob Zadek plans to talk to Health Care Futurist Joe Flower about the state of health care in America.
Here’s a link to Joe’s website for more info. http://www.imaginewhatif.com/
Bob will offer the audience a comprehensive overview of the Libertarian solution to healthcare in America while debating Joe Flower on the need for government controlled healthcare in this day and age.
Please let me know if you are interested in covering the topic for your blog.
Feel free to contact me with any questions you may have.
All the best,
Frances Stark
Producer
The Bob Zadek Show
Talk 910 KNEW
http://www.910knew.com
As passed, will President Obama’s economic stimulus be inflationary? It is massive, well beyond our ability to pay without borrowing or printing more money, so I’d say that, in isolation from current context, it would be inflationary – even dangerously. But it’s not isolated; banks are lending less. Considering that reality, we risk deflation. That, if uncorrected, could dangerously deepen. Correcting deflation needs, otherwise inflationary, counteraction.
What’s so deflationary? Banks’ lending curtailment reduces money’s availability. That increases each dollar’s ability to buy, reducing prices per dollar.
What’s wrong with that? After a business buys inventory, those goods’ retail values can drop. If receding below the wholesale rate paid out, money’s lost, so jobs are cut to meet expenses. As we lose our employment income, even those lower prices may get too high. We’d buy less and less, sacrificing more jobs. It can self-perpetuate in a downward jobs/price spiral, leading to hyper-deflation – that is, 1930′s style, depression.
Economic stability requires some inflation, if it’s mild. Ignoring the frequent admonitions against that helped power our long post-World-War-II prosperity.
Of course, careful attention’s needed to avoid hyper-inflation’s wage/price spiral: Once we’ve brought enough re-inflation, and recovery returns then, to keep inflation mild and compensate for today’s investment increases (unlike the late 1970s’ inattentive floundering into double-digit inflation) occasional measures can ease-it-off, such as reducing government investing, deliberate lending restraint, or tax reform.
That may be an important strategic reason for the President’s continued bipartisan emphasis: Most Republicans, and a few Democrats usually prefer knee-jerk INflation-control to intelligent DEflation-control, assuring moderation’s support as needed.
Now is hardly a time to restrict inflation though. For now, with depression’s prospect looming, the stimulus plan is probably not seriously inflationary, on balance. This President’s record shows enough intelligence to avoid fighting deflation long enough to risk hyper-inflation.
As promised in his campaign, and so, what voters elected him to do, the President has proposed cutting income taxes on the middle 95% of the population, giving some to the poorest who have no taxes to cut. He much more than replaces that lost revenue by letting expire, his predecessor’s, existing tax cuts on the top 5%. The value of goods that upper 5% buys isn’t affected much; it already buys whatever it wants, whenever it wants it.
The rest of us, in that remaining 95%, who now merely long for some of what we want, will then be able to buy more of it. Does the reduced amount the “investor class” has for investing, cut back on how much value they invest? Presumably some, at first.
But as middle class purchasing grows, it shows accurately where demand is going, directing investing into the most profitable directions.
That increases prosperity all across our population – a very good, healthy, thing to do!
This should make interesting reading. I was surprised that your organisation was not mentioned in the diatribe.
The Far Right’s Plot to Capture New Hampshire
By PAM MARTENS
http://www.counterpunch.org/
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(Others pending)
Oops, sorry… I did this in the wrong place.
Far right plot to capture New Hampshire, you must be joking?
I live here and I can assure you it hasn’t happened yet. One young libertarian woman was stopped by police in Keene for going topless on the main street in hot weather. The notable fact was she had a glock strapped to her belt. That is about as exciting as it gets.
I will let you know when the “FAR RIGHT” takes over New Hampshire.
Give me a break! With Taxachussettes 6 miles south of here, we really do need to “Live Free and Die”.
Hi ’tis me efgd
I sent an email, with attachment, to ddaviseducation@aol.com, does it still exist?
“To submit material for publication to the Libertarian Alliance simply email it to the Editorial Director Nigel Meek at nigel@libertarian.co.uk.”
Nigel emailed me to say he is not connected with the blog.
Cheers
Hmm, sorry I am confused, what’s new now days!
I thought the contact numbers were for LA: Blog
Apparently not? They are for material for LA site itself – or am I wrong? DOH!
Anyway, anybody interested in this, I sent it via email to DD in an attachment.
All in a days work.
Public sector employment fell by 33,000 to six million between last June and September, while the number of private sector employees remained unchanged at 23 million.
Long-term unemployment – those out of work for more than a year – rose by 15,000 to 836,000.
http://www.24dash.com/news/central_government/2011-01-19-UK-unemployment-up-nearly-50-000-to-2-5-million
It seems the beloved private sector, the mythical provider of jobs, has proved yet again that it is not there to provide jobs in industries that are people orientated and not profit orientated. When will the boys learn this fact of life? Private does not provide public facilities that do not make a profit or give the shareholders a bonus or a reward. ‘Tis not in their nature.
As for the boyos saying: “These figures serve to underline the scale of the challenge we face. We inherited the largest budget deficit in peacetime history and high levels of worklessness, which we are determined to bring down by rebalancing the economy and supporting private sector jobs growth.”
What private sector jobs are the government supporting?
There are none, certainly not enough to make a dent in the number of employees axed from the public sector.
“We are already seeing some improvement in the number of vacancies in the economy.”
We are not.
“More personalised support for jobseekers will be on offer through Jobcentre Plus and for the long-term unemployed who need extra help we are introducing our Work Programme in the summer, which will offer support tailored to individuals’ needs so that they can get into jobs and stay there.”
So says Employment Minister Chris Grayling – well he would wouldn’t he? What else could he say – the truth, “We, err, screwed it up”.
This is the same old same old – I know because I used to be a provider of such services. Nothing being proposed is really any different to what schemes by any other name have been provided. What is more the schemes make little very little inroad into the unemployment figures. Rehash after rehash.
What is needed is, well would you believe it, what is needed is real jobs for real people. Not made up part-time short-term employment that lasts a few months if you’re lucky. There are quite a few of those types of jobs about and they are part of the statistics of vacancies available that Chris Grayling quotes. If all the vacancies were taken up there would still be mass unemployment as most a short-term means just that, would you believe, that one is only employed for a short amount of time and then, guess what, unemployed again!
Paul Kenny, GMB General Secretary, said: “This rise in the number of people unemployed at a time when the economy is recovering from the bankers recession is linked to not filling vacancies right across the public sector and to people of working age volunteering for redundancy being added to the dole queues.”
Not filling vacancies across the public sector? What vacancies are there anyway – most public employment is being downsized, a euphemistic for being sacked. Like I said, “We, err, screwed up!”
“The Government is in denial that it is deliberately creating unemployment but the fact is that it is driving up the level of unemployment.”
Quite, and I quote, “But the unemployment or the loss of income which will always affect some in society is certainly less degrading if it is the result of misfortune and not deliberately imposed by authority.” F.A. Hayek from The Road to Serfdom, Routledge Classics 2009
Bored now so:
Nick Robinson states about the Iraq Inquiry, you know, the inquiry as to why the Nu-Labour leader Tony Blair wanted to blow Saddam out of the water, proof of WMD or anything else for that matter notwithstanding. Saddam was after all not a very nice bloke, and Mugabe is? Why did we not blow him out of the water as well? OIL and, err, OIL. Any way what Nick states is: “What is emerging before our eyes is a clash of cultures between a politician who believes governing is, in the end, about one man’s judgement and the Whitehall classes who believe it should be about official papers, formal consideration of the evidence and collective decision making.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2011/01/addicted_to_lab.html
I cannot believe that it has taken this long for someone to say it, Blair was a autocrat. He looked for and found the adoration he so badly needed in1997, thus he fell in love with himself and hiss [not a spelling mistake] buddy Alistair Campbell. All it needed was a war to make Blair a hero so he could emulate Lady Thatcher and then he could convert to Roman Catholicism, change the Catholic rules so that married men can become…and then we have POPE BLAIR!
Please the man could not tell the truth now if he wanted to. Stop giving him centre stage and give him credit for being was he was, a warmongering, power crazed pillock.
He and his buddies did nothing for the Health Service – oh wait yes they increased the bureaucracy. More diseases became prevalent as nurse care was outsourced to admin clerks to check why people kept getting ill, of a different ailment as to what they went into hospital with, once they were in hospital. Look up the real meaning of nursing, then think about cleanliness, hand washing, wearing aprons, surgical cloves, wearing hair covers, then think about not wearing uniforms and operating theatre clothes out side the premises as on busses, never mind in a canteen, yep nurses do that, then there is eating a sandwich whist you tended someone’s wound in A&E – I saw it…You get my drift – but they [the nurses and the doctors] did fill out the paper work oh so well!
He and his buddies did nothing for Education – oh wait, I know the stats and lists of the goodie and baddie schools got changed so often, by meddling with the exam procedure and teaching methods, that even the teachers did not know what they were supposed to teach, never mind if they were successful in their job.
More money was spent on education – it sure was:
“The increasing administrative burden imposed by government reforms is also reflected in the burgeoning number of administrative and clerical staff. Primary schools now employ 29,500 office staff, compared with 19,400 in 1997, while the number of office staff in secondary schools has gone up from 17,600 in 1997 to 37,900 in 2009.”
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/mar2010/edu3-m29.shtml
However discipline and competitiveness went down the toilet as in we R all in the together, we R all winners, no one person won the race, or excelled or reached the top position. We are all dumbed down nicely now so you don’t have to worry about employment, taking responsibility for your actions, well Tony blames that French man for his actions so it’s not his fault, you don’t have to worry about politics or civics, just obey that nice grinning man and the other fellows with him, and when you get the right to vote, don’t worry about thinking about who to vote for, just do what that nice Mr Blair and his friends tell you.
He and his buddies did nothing about crime – oh wait yes he did ASBOS, well we know that was a larff, then the claim to fame, less crime under Labour M’Lord:
“The [Nu-Labour 1997 - 2010] Government has created more than 3,600 new criminal offences since it won power 11 years ago – almost one for every day it has been in office.
Critics blamed the frenzy of law-making on “posturing” by an administration keen to win easy headlines and addicted to pushing complicated legislation through Parliament.
In the past two years alone, it has become a criminal offence to disturb a pack of eggs without permission and to sell either a game bird killed on a Sunday or a piece of Japanese knotweed.
A total of 3,605 offences have reached the statute book since May 1997, an average of about 320 a year. They comprise 1,238 brought in as primary legislation, which means they were debated in Parliament, and 2,367 by secondary legislation, such as orders in council and statutory instruments.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/more-than-3600-new-offences-under-labour-918053.html
Violent crime up, drunken disorderly up, I know we have different stats for different caps, blue for Tories and Red for Nu-Labour, personally I go with crime went up. http://conservativehome.blogs.com/leftwatch/2010/02/the-real-statistical-crime-is-that-labour-is-making-it-harder-and-harder-for-anyone-to-compare-gover.html
However before the Blues and the Yellows get smug, just who in parliament voted for the Iraq war:
http://www.holdthemtoaccount.com/who-voted-for-the-war/
No Lib Dems then but:
“On 18 March 2003 the LibDems voted against the government motion that would start the war. But paradoxically, even as they voted against the government,they fell into line behind the government. It was that very day that they abandoned their previous talk of forcing the Prime Minister to prove the unproven case for war. There were no more LibDem conditions about a clear UN mandate and clear proof of a threat from Iraq. Kennedy’s view was now simply that the decision had been made, and the LibDems must give it their “genuine support.” (5, 6)
Effectively the LibDems were saying they didn’t believe the war was necessary but they would support it anyway once it started. I wouldn’t call that opposing the war”” Neither would I, a kind of if you must Tony babe.
http://www.greenparty.org.uk/articles/182.html
Enough already! Stop giving Blair the lime light to BS us again. And lets hope Dave & Nick are not so up their own…..that they fail to see the wood for the trees. I’m ever hopeful me. Doomed for disappointment.
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I have fun with, cause I discovered just what I was taking a look for. You have ended my 4 day lengthy hunt! God Bless you man. Have a great day. Bye
Hi Guys,
Do you think the following post attacking James Delingpole (which is pretty viscous and even drags his children in to it) is fair game, or those true Libertarianism mean we can say anything to anyone? Anyway I think the guy is a leftie loon:
James Delingpole is a CUNT