howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Button likes this
Button
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 22 Jul 2016
- Posts: 3,060
High-brow and with far too many syllables for the likes of me!
(Not my real name.)
Guest 745- Registered: 27 Mar 2012
- Posts: 3,370
it mostly means workers get shafted in return for a labour market with no regulations.
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Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
Keith Bibby wrote:it mostly means workers get shafted in return for a labour market with no regulations.
...and OUR belongings get privatised ... then we bail out the companies that apparently run these things more efficiently, allowing them to pay tax-payers cash as dividends to their shareholders.
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Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
As if my point in #4 need further evidence...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44142258 How many more times do the electorate need to have evidence of the ills of neoliberalism?
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,122
Bad Philosophy
For Jeremy Corbyn and his followers, it is as if the Berlin Wall never fell
Roger Scruton
For a while following the collapse of communism in Europe, it looked as though there might be an apology forthcoming from those who had devoted their intellectual and political efforts to whitewashing the Soviet Union or praising the ‘people’s republics’ of China and Vietnam. But the moment was short-lived. Within a decade the left-wing establishment was back in the driving seat. Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn renewed their intemperate denunciations of America, the European left regrouped against ‘neoliberalism’, as though this had been the trouble all along, and the veteran communist Eric Hobsbawm was rewarded for a lifetime of unswerving loyalty to the Soviet Union by being appointed Companion of Honour to the Queen.
The Labour Party Announce Their New Leader And Deputy Leader
The Manichean vision of modern politics, as a fight to the death between left and right, good and evil, has now been fully restored to its dominant position in intellectual circles. The term ‘right-wing’ is as much a term of abuse today as it was before the fall of the Berlin wall, and left-wing intellectuals and politicians have adapted themselves to the new world order with very little moderation of their oppositional zeal.
Jeremy Corbyn is a case in point. The Labour leader believes that Britain will not be governed properly until war is declared on the wealthy, the corporations and the toffs. Once again we are being invited along the path of socialist resentment, encouraged to hunt down success wherever it shows its ugly head and to present it with an exorbitant tax demand.
Corbyn claims to be something of a Marxist, led by a vision of social justice that includes all oppressed groups within the scope of its compassion — not merely Irish republicans, Palestinians, immigrants of all stripes and the battered remnant of the old working class, but animals too. All are the victims of corporate greed and upper-class oppression, and the purpose of good government is to rectify this by establishing equality in the place of domination.
As with all socialist visions, I ask myself what is hiding behind Corbyn’s catch-all idea of equality. What institutions will exist in his socialist future, and how will they be reconciled with the rule of law and the inheritance of free association, free opinion and the right to close a door on an intruder?
It is useful to refer to Marx, as Corbyn does, since Marx was a model of dishonesty in this respect. ‘Full communism’ was to be the outcome of the historical processes that made revolution inevitable; hence it was not necessary to describe it. Marx says only that it will involve the ‘withering away’ of the state and the law. In other words, a society without institutions. Marx’s ‘full communism’ embodies a contradiction: it is a state in which all the benefits of legal order are still present, even though there is no law; in which all the products of civil society are still in existence, even though nobody enjoys the property rights which hitherto have provided the sole motive for economic co–operation.
Like Marx, the left in Britain has been short on giving a positive account of the future, while never withholding its negative view of the ‘neo-liberal’ present and the ‘imperialist’ past. By taking from the rich and giving to the poor, Corbyn tells us, we will punish those who are responsible for the ‘crisis’ (there is always a ‘crisis’ and it is always the wealthy, the privileged, the successful who are to blame). Thinking on the left is dominated by a kind of zero-sum illusion. Those who succeed do so at the expense of those who fail and the purpose of politics is to rectify this injustice by reining in the successful. And the result is what we see in Greece today: an economy in which there are no successful people left to tax.
Looking back on what has happened since 1989 — or, rather, what hasn’t happened — I am forced to recognise that this zero-sum fallacy, which was the animating force behind Marxism and the intellectual origin of all the destruction released in Marx’s name, will never lose its hold on the human imagination. It is hard to make wise decisions for the future and impossible to predict the long-term effect of radical policies. But it is easy to feel resentment towards the powerful and the successful, and easy to believe that, by depriving them of their advantages, we will benefit the remainder. That way we can turn a blind eye to our real motive, which is not compassion but resentment, not creation but destruction.
"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Weird Granny Slater
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 7 Jun 2017
- Posts: 3,076
I don’t need my spellchecker to explain why it wants to substitute ‘scrotum’ for ‘scruton’. Not resentment, scrotum, justice. Doh! Go read some proper philosophy.
P.S. I was once rebuked for quoting 4 lines of Hegel’s Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts with fewer than 4 lines of accompanying analysis (I was fed up with his bloody triads). Post #7’s a fail.
Guest 1881 likes this
'Pass the cow dung, my dropsy's killing me' - Heraclitus
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
Pent Valley School in Cheriton, Folkestone was sold last year to the Turner Academy Trust - a trust that has the Conservative MP for Folkestone, Damian Collin's wife on its board of trustees (under her maiden name) - for £1. That is the buildings, the land, the lot. That belonged to me, you and everyone and was sold without my opinion being considered. THAT IS NEOLIBERALISM IN ACTION IN OUR LOCALITY.
Guest 1713 likes this
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
https://www.southeasternrailway.co.uk/about-us/performance-results. Worth reminding ourselves of how marvellous these franchises are. The recent rail fare rises for 2019 of over 3% must be music to the ears of those that are appreciating 48.1% punctuality of their journeys.
Neoliberal consequences...
ray hutstone and howard mcsweeney1 like this
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Captain Haddock- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,122
The Bishop wrote:Pent Valley School in Cheriton, Folkestone was sold last year to the Turner Academy Trust - a trust that has the Conservative MP for Folkestone, Damian Collin's wife on its board of trustees (under her maiden name) - for £1. That is the buildings, the land, the lot. That belonged to me, you and everyone and was sold without my opinion being considered. THAT IS NEOLIBERALISM IN ACTION IN OUR LOCALITY.
You sure? Normally with academisation (dread word) the land is on a 99 year lease precluding any trust from, for example, closing school and flogging off land for housing. I presume also that board members are unpaid as is normal in cases like this. This is certainly the case with the proposals for the primary schools in Deal which seem to have a number of parents (though not governors, senior management or staff who actually understand the education system) in such a tizz.
"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
#11 Land Registry verbatim
Title Number : K942270
This title is dealt with by HM Land Registry, Nottingham Office.
The following extract contains information taken from the register of the above title
number. A full copy of the register accompanies this document and you should read that
in order to be sure that these brief details are complete.
Neither this extract nor the full copy is an 'Official Copy' of the register. An
official copy of the register is admissible in evidence in a court to the same extent
as the original. A person is entitled to be indemnified by the registrar if he or she
suffers loss by reason of a mistake in an official copy.
This extract shows information current on 15 MAY 2018 at 08:07:46 and so does not take
account of any application made after that time even if pending in HM Land Registry
when this extract was issued.
Title Number : K942270
Address of Property : Pent Valley Technology College, Surrenden Road,
Folkestone (CT19 4ED)
Price Stated : £1
Registered Owner(s) : TURNER SCHOOLS (Co. Regn. No. 10084743) of Martello
Grove Academy, Warren Way, Folkestone SW1P 3BT.
Lender(s) : The Secretary Of State For Education
Sarah Collins, the wife of Damian Collins (Folkestone & Hythe) MP, formerly the Managing Director - she resigned on the 13th December 2017, once rumbled.
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/officers/ZVwBvLzGF_whwBZoqcAM9kTFwbY/appointmentsJust because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Keith Sansum1
- Location: london
- Registered: 25 Aug 2010
- Posts: 23,932
I have always tried to follow our North Deal Councillor
but the latest lot well say no more.
I, and many like me are not in envy of those earning millions but want some kind of justice.
Many working struggling on employers who pay the very minimum they can, in order to maximise there own wages.
Why wouldn't people complain when a company is making billions in profit, which chief officers and those below them earning over £200,000 a year whilst they struggle on the minimum wage.
It goes further of course when you see from mr bishop with pent valley school, did d Collins ever declare an interest?
was this the plan even when the school was first muted to close?
The NHS wanted to be as free as possible, we have MP's who deal in private medicine, some even directors of private medicine, no problem in that, but they vote on NHS issues,
some even push for more private medicine whilst saying thy support the NHS
I could go on,,,,,,,
ALL POSTS ARE MY OWN PERSONAL VIEWS
Captain Haddock- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,122
The Bishop wrote:#11 Land Registry verbatim etc,
Thanks Your Grace. All very odd. Seriously surprised about change of ownership. Why would it be in anyone's interest to give away ownership of land when, as they say, they are not making any of it any more? Not my patch Folkestone however. As I hinted busy checking that changes in Dover District (and Deal especially) are all for the greater good.
A couple of my offspring have decided to annoy me by either impregnating people or getting impregnated so should take a bit of an interest again in education matters.
"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Keith Sansum1- Location: london
- Registered: 25 Aug 2010
- Posts: 23,932
Oh dear
more from North Deal to come,,,,,,
ALL POSTS ARE MY OWN PERSONAL VIEWS
Captain Haddock- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,122
Keith Sansum1 wrote:
I, and many like me are not in envy of those earning millions but want some kind of justice.
Here's a graph showing the Gini Coefficient for the UK historically ,from the excellent Our World in Data, the Gini Coefficient being a measure of income spread varying between zero (equality) and 100% (one person has everything)
The coefficient remained fairly stable over hundreds of years with even a game changer like the industrial revolution making very little difference.
The changes [U]towards[/U] equality have come with the two World Wars where, for the very survival of the nation, Parliament was able to authorize taxation to support unprecedented levels of wartime expenditure (The standard rate of income tax, which was 6 per cent in 1914, stood at 30 per cent in 1918 - and much the same happened with the 39-45 conflict, and when you tax people you tend to tax those with money)
One could argue that with the lack of serious conflict since 1945 inequality is generally rising towards a more normal level.
One could also argue that professional workers have become a lot more productive than people in the same profession even 20 years ago with the use of technology so should be rewarded better - whereas the unskilled overweight tattooed morlocks are no more efficient at serving me coffee or cleaning my house so don't deserve any more.
On a happier note, if you look at the Gini coefficient for age at death it was about 50% in the mid nineteenth century. It's now 10% so at least more of us are living to roughly the same ripe old age.
"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Weird Granny Slater- Location: Dover
- Registered: 7 Jun 2017
- Posts: 3,076
What exactly does this statistical phantasmagoria tell us? The lords is still lords and the serfs is still serfs. Oh bondage, up yours!
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'Pass the cow dung, my dropsy's killing me' - Heraclitus
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-45240742
"The inertia that seems to have gripped both those monitoring the contract and delivering it on the ground has led to one of Britain's leading jails slipping into a state of crisis that is remarkable even by the low standards we have seen all too frequently in recent years," Mr [Peter, Chief Inspector of Prisons] Clarke wrote.
More consequences of neo-liberalism.
Anyone heard the one about Virgin and Stagecoach handing back their rail franchise because they weren't making enough money only for the government to run it at a profit?
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Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/11/28/nhs-pays-virgin-threatens-sue-losing-contract/
'Outsourcing', 'Free markets' and 'Invitation To Tender' - The taxpayer gets sued when things don't go the neo-liberals way.
ray hutstone likes this
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
