George Orwell Would Be Proud

EU budget increase can be a 'tool of economic recovery'

This needs no further input from me.

Euro Nutters

The Mail on Sunday has a piece outlining the "political guerrilla warfare tactics" used over Cameron's defeat on the EU budget last week:

A rebel Tory MP had secret talks with Ed Balls as part of the plot to defeat David Cameron in Wednesday's shock Commons vote on the EU budget crisis.

Harwich MP Douglas Carswell discussed the rebellion with a member of Shadow Chancellor Mr Balls's entourage to make sure the rebel Tory-Labour ambush was carried out with deadly effect.

Not much there comes as a massive surprise, but at the end of the article is this quote from a Labour MP:

'The warm glow of defeating Cameron won't last long.

'To see us trashing everything we have ever said and done on Europe for a few good headlines was not edifying.

'Walking through the voting lobbies with a bunch of wild-eyed Tory Euro nutters was a repulsive experience.

'It would never have happened in Tony Blair and Peter Mandelson's day – and I won't be doing it again.'

This on a vote by Parliament of how much more (or less) of our money should go to the EU. When reading the above quote note the words missing; "taxpayer", "constituents"...

A Slow Death

The bad news in the Eurozone keeps on coming; France is in trouble and is likely to be another Eurozone country to go pop, Greece unsurprisingly is still buggered and Eurozone unemployment swells to a record high:

In latest confirmation that the eurozone crisis is far from relenting, unemployment in the 17-country bloc reached a staggering 18.5 million in September, according to the European Union's statistical office, Eurostat.

The figures showed a marginal increase on August’s rate of 11.5 per cent, with the number of those out of work increasing by 146,000. But in comparison to last year’s September records, when unemployment was at 10.3 per cent, 2.2 million more Europeans find themselves out of work.

Similarly, youth unemployment (joblessness under the age of 25) recorded a 2.3 per cent annual increase on last September’s figure.

Across the whole 27-nation European Union unemployment reached a rate of 10.6 per cent, increasing by 169,000 since August.

Unemployment rate spiked in countries at the epicentre of the crisis. Spain posted a September-to-September increase from 22.4 per cent in 2011 to 25.8 per cent in 2012, with Portuguese unemployment swelling from 13.1 per cent to 16.7 per cent over the same period.

But it was Greece that recorded the most dramatic surge in joblessness, as unemployment figures shot from 17.8 percent in July 2011 to 25.1 per cent in July 2012 – the most recent month when figures were available. August data will likely be posted next week.

Overall, the record high in unemployment paints a bleak picture of the eurozone, plagued by declining consumption and waning business confidence.

Much as it is desirable for us to wish that the whole stupid project would just collapse in a big bang, it's more likely that it will suffer a slow and protracted death, thus taking us all down. Instead of making Europe a major player on the world stage, as puffed up unelected EU politicians like to reassure themselves with, it will instead do precisely the opposite - a kind of self inflicted industrial strength dose of Rohypnol - the rest of the world will take what they want and move on.

We are chained to a corpse, and no amount of pathetic arguing of semantics over the EU budget will change that.

Still, a little schadenfreude can be had that Ted Heath's other legacy - leaving his house to the nation - is up for sale because no cares about visiting it:

Charity closes Ted Heath's house after it flops as a tourist attraction with less (sic) than 40 visitors a day

I particularly like this quote ( my emphasis):

A charity is set to close Ted Heath’s house after it failed to be a lucrative tourist attraction because the ‘memories of Sir Edward Heath receded into history’.

God moves in mysterious ways...

Power!

"History repeats itself" is one of those clichés that resonates with truth but its lessons are often ignored in practice, akin to "never believe what you read in newspapers" - people still largely always do precisely the opposite.

Conversely many myths are believed as gospel, for example that the line "play it again Sam" was said in the film Casablanca, "Bambi was shot" in the Disney film and that the Tories are Eurosceptic. Thus we have the ungainly sight of Tories tonight getting themselves worked up into a lather by claiming that freezing or cutting the EU budget is some kind of victory for Euroscepticism. Paying the EU billions instead of 'billions plus a bit extra' is a victory it perversely seems.

The other enduring myth is that politics is divided vertically - left & right - whereas in truth it is divided more horizontally - us & them. Politics, a point that is self-evident, is ultimately about power not ideology - who has it and who controls it. In theory democracy is supposed to give power to the people in the form of a threat - the threat to remove those from office if they fail to listen to us so in effect concentrating those who govern us minds. What is apparent is that 'threat' has now become impotent, if ever it indeed existed. And nowhere is it more obvious than tonight's vote on the increase of the EU's budget.

Parliament's historical and ultimate purpose is to control the King's spending - control the money and you control the King. Parliament is supposed to do that on behalf of us; after all it's our money not the Government's. It was on this very toxic issue of power we had a civil war - over control of the King's purse. Yet over time Parliament has morphed from a controller of the King's purse into the King itself with no adequate control on it, apart from a paltry election every 5 years where we the electorate get ignored on the very day after a General Election.

Thus we have had MPs' expenses scandal with the ill-disguised contempt for our money that ensured and the utter failure of Parliament to do its primary job...to scrutinise the budget. The abolition of the 10p tax band was a classic example. A nasty little trick by Gordon Brown that effectively taxed the poorest in society to give a tax break to those better off to win an election. And despite it adversely affecting Labour MP's constituents (and the tax con being picked up within in an hour of the announcement), Labour MP after Labour MP walked through the aye lobby approving the budget without a murmur. Parliament thus failed in its job spectacularly.

Tonight will be yet another example. Despite Parliament's vote we will still pay huge amounts to Brussels, the taxpayer will still be ignored and should Cameron wish it he can ignore Parliament's vote anyway. It's no longer fit for purpose, a film set is all it's useful for.

The Harrogate Agenda is more important than ever. There is a tendency (almost an arrogant one) with modern technology to feel superior to those that have gone before. But the same fundamental issues have always been present - we had a civil war once we can have one again...all it takes is an arrogant disdain for us by those who govern and the old age question of money.

History has a nasty habit of repeating itself.