Off Topic Political Debate

I cannot find the % info.... maybe it will turn up or someone else can help. I was impressed with it

as for cartoons etc ... they are satire and all sides of all arguments use satire..... look at the brilliant, spitting image the news quiz have i got news for you, private eye etc....

I think it is different than personalising politicians and ourselves with stereotypical comments on these threads.....

Don't we have a virtually similar national debt after x years of Tory rule as when they came in? So I am not very convinced by their economic policies

I thought you were middle ground Leo? I think you dress to the right

I think if we went by facts rather than ideology our arguments would be more convincing

 

On economic policy I am on the right. No Labour government has ever left power with the economy in a good state. I wondered when you would use the right left point if it suited your cause - which to my view is very left wing. I make no claim to be middle ground - read my posts - I cannot find a party or a wing where I can sit hence I support none of the parties as a loyalist. I go issue by issue and have no truck with governments that bankrupt the country. As it happens I vote Labour when I trust them - as I did in 1997 and 2002 as I believe in a controlled welfare state. I vote Liberal more times than others and occasionally Conservative - and make no bones about it. (I have in the pst also voted Green and Paid Cymru (a Welsh left wing party).
Spitting image lampooned all parties - as does HIGNFY and the Last Leg. I recently have stopped watching Russel Howard as he has stopped lampooning all parties and now concentrates solely on attacking the Conservatives. I am not interested once I see there is no balance. Politicians are fair game - and that includes on here - Brown was a terrible PM and Miliband was a totally ineffective and ineffectual leader. Look at that ridiculous Moses Tablet of his. He was truly mealy mouthed trying to win votes by not being clear on his policies. All politicians do that to an extent (Cameron on benefit cuts) but with Miliband it was central to his style. One person's stereotype is another person's truth. You always jump in to the defence of the left - as I expect from someone who prefers their policies -why shouldn't you?
What I try not to do is to abuse other posters on here. I can disagree with your (anyone's) views and say so, I can give my views on how I understand their arguments - but that is not personal criticism - if I have misjudged a person's stance they can easily state where they really stand. I find you the most difficult person to debate with on here as you claim to not "sit" where the views you consistently espouse sit. What is wrong with being left - or right wing -if that is how you feel. I cannot think of one area where you have posted in support of the Conservatives or against Labour. You defend Corbyn but attack Cameron. All that is good.

 

You overlook the simple fact that we were heading down into a hole in 2010 and the mess needed to be sorted out before improvements could come from a growing economy. The Liberal brake on the Conservatives up to May 2015 meant that correction took longer than it otherwise would have. I blame the Liberals - seems I am not alone.
The Conservatives role is to make the economy healthy so that Labour can do the "kinder" things a society needs.

 

They've been at it for a while now and it's worse than before they started

 

Figures tell a story, during easy times labour messed up during difficult times conservatives fixed the mess.. http://www.economicshelp.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/economic-growth-unemployment-600x477.png

 

Well that just is not true is it? For a start 2010 to 2015 was slow progress as it was a coalition. Secondly Labour and others who do not like "austerity" keep criticising slowness but then argue for "austerity light" of no austerity which would be slower still. Thirdly if a plane is at 30,000 feet and in a nosedive that takes it down to 15000 feet is it surprising if it takes time to climb back upwards? The economy in 2010 was in a nosedive yet now GDP is higher than then. Borrowing is taking longer to tackle as first the Conservatives had ropes tied by the Liberals and now by the Lords etc who seem to want slow progress which comes with less austerity but then want to criticise slow progress. You can't have it both ways. The UK economy has recovered further and faster than other major western economies.
Despite what Yorkie thinks I am no apologist for the Tories. I do not like their social policies or lack of them, I think they are totally at sea on education, I loathe their defence and Trident policies, they are confused on the NHS - what more can I say? I doubt many would read that and invite me into the Conservative Party. BUT - and it is a big but - I have to admit that it is Conservatives not Labour who understand modern economies better. If your economy is failing then all the good things you might want to do cannot be done. The last five years would not have happened if the economy had not been wrecked. Closing libraries etc etc are the result of lack of money - not anything else. People can try to blame it on the international crisis but Labour sure made it a lot worse. Of course there are things the Tories do that help their own supporters -like inheritance tax - which they should have left till later - but that is part of their philosophy so it is hardly surprising is it? I lived through the messes made under Wilson (twice), Callaghan and Brown. There was a time when our economy was overtaken by Italy and we were the sick man of Europe.

 

mmm...... well I do not take easily to be stereotyped or pigeon holed. I actually believe and I have said it on a number of occasions that I want a world where all are valued and there is opportunity for all. I have also said several time I do not buy the left-right dialectic. That is not to say you or superorns ( with much less respect) will not categorize me as Left. I cannot abide by bigotry, dishonesty or injustice... obviously as I perceive them to be.

I said I respected Corbyn and I have defended him and others here from the abuse and stereotypical comments made of him.

I cannot think of one area where I have posted in support of the Conservatives or against Labour--- agreed. I wish I could in a way but sadly no.... ( dare I put a )

The left-right splitting means one is right one is wrong, one is demonized one is virtuous. I favour a world with a place for all. I have said all this before too.

 

LEFT WING FANTASY?


"Paying all UK citizens £155 a week may be an idea whose time has come
Introducing a basic income guarantee would be costly, but it could be the answer to a lot of different problems

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More time for reindeer racing: Finland is considering paying all citizens a basic income Photo: EPA/KIMMO BRANDT

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By Jeremy Warner



The “basic income guarantee” - under which everyone would receive a certain minimum level of income from the state, regardless of other earnings - is one of those ideas that attracts support from both left and right, and for good reason; it’s both a neat answer to the potentially devastating problem of “technological unemployment” and it theoretically deals with many of the perverse, anti-work incentives created by modern welfare systems.

To date the idea has been confined largely to an eclectic mix of utopian and libertarian thinkers. Certainly, it has been easy to dismiss the concept as costly, unrealistic idealism. But now it seems that Finland might actually introduce one, set at a level of €800 (£576) per citizen a month, or just enough to live on.

But hold on, you might say. If everyone gets €800 a month, won’t a significant minority stop working altogether? Well, perhaps, but in a country where unemployment already tops 10pc, it scarcely seems to matter. It’s unlikely to be much higher.

In any case, the hope is that it would have the opposite effect, by encouraging the unemployed to work part time to top up the basic income guarantee.

What about the costs? This is certainly where it gets tricky. A quick back of the envelope calculation reveals that paying the equivalent of the UK state pension – a little bit more than the basic income proposed in Finland - to all over 16-year-olds in Britain would have cost £413.6bn last year, or around 55pc of all UK Government managed expenditure.


Cancelling all other overlapping welfare entitlements - which is part of the point of the basic income guarantee (it would do away with means tested benefits) - would pay for some of the costs, but by no means all. In most advanced economies, paying a basic income guarantee would mean either higher taxes or big cuts in other forms of Government spending.

The other fly in the ointment - which the Finns do not seem to have thought about very much - is that the provision of such plenty would provide a magnet to those parts of the EU for whom €800 a month is a good wage. Pretty soon, Finland would be swamped by riff-raff, and the whole thing would become unaffordable.

As David Cameron, the UK Prime Minister, is fast finding out with his own,stalled renegotiation on the terms of EU membership, the only sure way of avoiding EU non discrimination laws on entitlements is to leave the Union altogether. Come to think of it, the Finns already have a motion before parliament suggesting just that.

Yet none of these obstacles is insurmountable. And if it is true that robots will soon make many forms of employment obsolete, some way of dealing with the consequences has to be found. The basic income guarantee may be an idea whose time has come.

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Finland is known as the "land of a thousand lakes"And just in case you are tempted to dismiss the idea as socialist nonsense, this is what Friedrich Hayek, intellectual godfather to the Thatcher revolution, had to say about it in Law, Legislation and Liberty.

“The assurance of a certain minimum income for everyone, or a sort of floor below which nobody need fall even when he is unable to provide for himself, appears not only to be wholly legitimate protection against a risk common to all, but a necessary part of the Great Society in which the individual no longer has specific claims on the members of the particular small group into which he was born”.

Amen to that."


In the Daily Telegraph............

MMMM.....

 

Just one point there Leo.....Our economy was less prepared to deal with the Worldwide crisis because the Tories had left us with an unbalanced economy too heavily dependent on financial markets - Germany did not suffer in the same way because it still had a manufacturing base !

 

Does it? The left right split to me is just a convenient way of showing the sort of stance you take - neither is correct or incorrect as all views are personal. I see myself as right on some issues, left on others and disinterested on many. However it is easier for people who are more committed to a cause than me as they can point to a raft of either left or right wing views. As I say there is no demonisation amongst sensible people as unless you are intensely arrogant then you cannot say "I am correct and you are incorrect" - you can only say - "this is what I believe in and clearly if I believe in it then I claim it is correct IN MY OPINION ONLY" In a democracy you have to hope others hold different opinions or there would be no true democracy.

For you it should be easy to place yourself on a spectrum - be proud of where you stand.

 

and in the 12 years or so leading up to it what did Labour do to balance the economy then?

 

But Left and Right are terms with ascribed meaning ... and what if i don't ascribe to that meaning??

As soon as i take a stance then that meaning is projected onto me.... that is what our recent friend enjoyed doing wasnt it.... and since I didn't inhabit that position he wasn't seeing where I am at....

As I like you are not committed to a cause in that way I wont identify myself in that way.

IMO Global concerns are and should be shared by all regardless of their Left/Right stance. Out of such principles different views will emerge on to how issues are addressed and goals are met...

That does not equate to me with the farce we see in the Houses of Parliament week on week.

 

Agreed, Labour did nothing or rather could do nothing because most of the industry was already gone by then - Blair's biggest mistake was buying into the idea that Thatcher had been economically successfull - which she wasn't.

 

I wonder if anyone will pick up on this? I like it......

 

Exactly, it's the usual Labour lack of accountability, not my fault guv!!!!

 

There mistake was misuse of the funds in the good times. They had the best of the world economy to drag them along but didn't do anything to close the defecit or provide the right market for non FS growth.

 

This reminds me of one A. Scargill, who has a policy with his really left wing bunch to give everyone a wage, then let them decide if they wish to work or not. If it means that all benefits are removed for everyone, no matter what special problems they have, then I can hear the howling of those who are getting far more already. By all means let's have a minimum standard which makes life tolerable for everyone, but let's not make everyone reliant on the state.

 

I imagine it is taxable.... so in reality is a personal allowance for tax purposes.
I also imagine those with special needs would get additional allowances.

The potential downside as you allude to is that for some there would be no incentive to work to earn more. But I guess there are always people like that.

The Telegraph writer saw some benefits and that the most vulnerable in our society need to be supported.

 

Does it matter to you what a person thinks of you whose opinion you do not value? If my friends thought badly of me I would care - but a stranger? - especially a stranger whose views are anathema to me- - not at all. Gay was a term of abuse until it was adopted by gays to good effect;the same could be said of the "n" word if political correctness allowed it's use. To me the Left signifies someone who cares about society and does not associate with people they consider greedy and grabbing. It is an honour to be considered a Lefty. However I also respect those on the Right who are there because the genuinely believe in freedom and self determination, personal responsibility and not living off others. I do not respect those on the left who just want to take from society and not pull their weight, nor do I respect those on the Right who have everything they could want and do not understand what true hardship means. Many, many years ago I was a Samaritan and talked to hundreds of people who were genuinely desperate and who tried so hard to do things for themselves but no matter what did not succeed. The most heart wrenching were the homeless. People who had nowhere other than the street to sleep in the freezing winter - quite a few slept rough in Cassiobury Park. Yet here I am neither Right nor Left because I see the flaws in both camps. I loathe the attacks on the rich and bankers because they are wealthy and so not considered to be humans who also have problems. Wealth is not the be all and end all people think it is and to hate someone because they are wealthy is in my book as awful as to hate the poor. Man should have compassion to all mankind - rich and poor. It is unkind to ascribe evil motives to people simply because they represent one sector of society.

 

Agreed...... and that is beyond left or right etc.....

I did a VERY radical University degree as a mature student .... but was more concerned with humanitarian issues and how society caused mental illness etc. I was very influenced by R D Laing.

My fellow students and several of the lecturers had extreme views on all sides of the spectrum....

I used to hang out with the Quakers in the course meetings etc.

The professor was a man called Adam Curle who wrote a book called Mystics and Militants. He believed you could work towards change in the world in many different ways.... not simply by political activism. He himself had another unpublicised role as an international mediator and worked mainly in Africa with opposing factions and governments in helping resolve division. There was significant subsequent work with the different sides in the Northern Irish conflict and the truce and ongoing collaboration which was fashioned there

I set up a radical therapy centre in Bradford... the second in the UK... and since then have worked through working with abused and damaged kids and adults and later in University into developing an empowering approach to health and well being.

I have an avid interest in how society in all its forms causes mental distress and illness... and working with people to help them discover their natural inner health and vitality and in an existential sense find an inner freedom. The whole approach is about empowerment which of course is political.

As Sartre said when talking of the occupation ....... people could choose to live in 'bad faith'.... or live authentically.