The Economy Stupid

Well please bear with me on this one.

If the Government bails out the banks again etc it will finally have spent a decent proportion of a trillion pounds, that is a million million, on reflotaing the financial system. That equates to £18k for every man woman and child in the UK.

Er: If you did that it would give my family an extra £90 k in our pocket to weather the economic down-turn- This would put an awful lot of money back into the system but not into the hands of the banks who are morally and economically bankrupt. Businesses would prosper, manufacturers would prosper and the personnal debt mountain would be significantly reduced. People may put money into savings that could then be re-lent by the banks to business, in short a succesful bail out of the economy. (You may have to stop them from spending it on foreign goods as we don't make anything anymore).

By cutting out the stage where consumers are given the money to reduce debt, the Government have squandered the money on bailing out the banks for the dodgy (US ) securities thay took on without helping the UK taxpayer. Our personal debt mountain remains in play (as we are more likely to pay it back) whilst the US sub-prime mortgages are in effect paid off. This means that UK consumers, reeling under debt, will be reluctant to borrow any more cash (or spend it) until their long-term employment prospects improve. Something that will only happen long after the recession has bottomed. Without this return to confidence nothing will lift us out of the decline.

We can all see that this is madness but, like the cut in VAT, no one is prepared to say that to his face (that is Gordons').

Sadly I do not propose that we should give the money to the UK taxpayer but giving it to the banks who will use it to terminate or balance their books against debt overseas is the wrong choice.

If need be start a national bank. Pull the rug from the idiots who lost the money in the first place and start lending as a Government without the same profit ethic of the banks, this could be far more beneficial to the UK economy than the alternative of simply pressing the re-set button and letting the same wasters find new ways (is that derivatives?) of losing the money again. Cnuts.

The economy, Gaza or London Underground

Short post today- London Underground. Fucking hell how shit can they get?

I don't even need to explain.

What to do - the economy or the Israeli's or Gazprom

Its not too long ago that the western "democracies" of Europe were held ransom by the rising oil producing nations of the middle east and the UK and others vowed never to be so energy dependent again on one supplier. So when we now find that Europe, thankfully not including the UK, has tossed all of its apples into the Russian Gas basket and been royally shafted by the Russian government we can only look on incredulous.

Any argument that the former Soviet state has changed its ways or is now dependent upon the west for its economic success and will behave, or that we can do business with these people is madness. Thankfully the oil producing middle eastern states have turned out to be a far more honest broker than the Russians ever will. Russian actions and Russian diplomacy are no more than the machinations of the playground but on a far grander scale.

For contemporary examples of their values look no further than the BP conflict last year where in effect the state government intervened to pervert an investment in favour of Russia's finest bent oligarchs.

Look also at the invasion of Georgia, designed to prevent the "defection" of states to the Nato or EU umbrella.

Or perhaps look at the murder of Litvinenko.

We as a nation should not entertain the notion that Russia is a changed place or that Putin is a person you can deal with. He represents no more than the sick face of the same clique that has dominated Russia for the last 90 years be it under communism or the new model, the bottom line is a self interested cabal in power protecting only their own interests.

Even at a basic level the row with the Ukraine over the gas price, a year on year increase of 100%, is a direct state sponsored mission by a "private company" (a cash cow extension of the corrupt Russian leadership) to prevent the Ukraine from joining Nato. Putin has more in common with Mugabe than any other political leader as he and his cronies bleed the Russian state for all it is worth.