So what about the Ukraine and Crimea...

It’s quite plain to see that the crisis in the Ukraine has nothing to do with the rights of the people in the Ukraine. At present, it’s more akin to a 19th Century style land grab or Cold War style governmental posturing for places on the podium of the global political world stage. Of course, that’s hardly a surprising really, after all, what world event is ever really more than power play when we get down to it? Despite living in the age of seeming modern enlightenment, it seems very little has changed over the last few hundred years. This posturing has little to do with the protection of people at all, but rather political power and global influence.

The sad truth of the matter is we have two crappy things protecting us from a conflict on a catastrophic level. First is our fragile and interlinked global economy, which for all its inequalities means countries are far more reliant on one another to function. Secondly is the fact that certain countries have weapons of mass destruction, so powerful they could wipe us all off the face of the planet in the blink of an eye, leaving nothing more than an ash covered wasteland. Again, for all their evils, they are weapons that keep us in, at present, a stalemate. It’s probably more this than anything else that keeps us covered in that veneer of peaceful enlightenment.

I find myself constantly amazed that journalists and politicians seem to show no consideration for the history of the region when weighing in on the subject, and it’s the word consideration I’m focussing on here. Sure, they might have some knowledge on the history, but I question how far they go or how they process this information. So, in response, I’m going to try and provide a brief history based view of the conflict and the area.

Whose land is it anyway?

OK, so now we have two claimants battling it out over this little peninsular of land – namely the Ukrainians and the Russian - but originally, this land belonged to neither. Rather, it belonged to a long displaced group, ethically cleansed from the area during the Soviet purges, particularly under Stalin.

Up until the late 1700’s, this region was part of a state known as the Crimean Khanate. Its rulers (or Khans) were decedents of Genghis Khan, that infamous Mongolian warlord, and it was primarily inhabited by Crimean Tatars, ethically Turkic and primarily Muslim. It’s no surprise that this state had close ties with and was a vassal state of the Ottoman Empire for around 300 years.

It wasn’t until 1783 that this area was annexed by Catherine the Great’s Russian Empire under the terms of the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca. The two centuries that followed inevitably saw repeated conflicts between the competing factions, often over this disputed land. The most bloody and costly of these was during World War One, the Ottoman Empire’s first major operation aimed at regaining the Caucusses and Crimea from their long time foes. It wasn’t until after the First World War, which saw the complete dismantling and carving up of the Ottoman Empire amongst the victorious Entente Powers, that these competing claims to the land ceased.

(Interestingly, Turkey was the only nation of the central powers to be completely occupied by the Entente Powers after The Great War. Russia wasn’t included in this, having pulled out of the war in 1917 during the Russian Revolution, which saw the execution of the last Tsar (Emperor) and the establishment of the communist, USSR)

By the time of the 1897census many Ukrainians and, especially, Russians had begun to move into the area. Still, the largest group still remained the Crimean Tatars. This remained the case until the Soviet purges saw the starvation and systematic murder of hundreds of thousands of their community. By the time of the 1959 census, Crimean Tatars are recorded to have made up 0% of the population.

Now, however, some of those that did survive have moved back to the area. They were not granted the land they lost by the USSR (nor later by the Ukrainian authorities) and since the re-annexation of the area by Russia, it’s been reported that Crimean Tatars fear introduction of repressive and discriminatory laws. It’s now been reported that the Crimean Tatars are to be ‘moved on’ from their homes, with Crimean authorities using the excuse that the land must be used for ‘social purposes’. Where to, exactly, is unknown.
Not much has been reported about the plight of this ethnic minority during this mess, who were once the overwhelming majority in the area. While it has been reported that the Crimean Tatars are more in favour of Ukrainian rule, it’s not so much of a case of the good against the bad, but rather the bad and the worse. Since many Crimean Tatars haven’t been issued legal documentation for the land, they are being told they are legally squatting, meaning they can be forced to move on.

The point is that this is a conflict between governments over land which is, essentially, colonial land. It’s the same as all the lands around the world that European settlers occupied, ransacked and called their own, wiping out the indigenous populations. So, the problem here is it does actually put it on par with our own, British dominions, like the Falklands and Gibraltar.

Self-determination

The point I’m trying to make is that self-determination of a population by referendum, or by demonstration, will never be entirely democratic, but the same goes with voting too. A majority can quite easily vote for a government that represses a minority, if that is the will of the people, a sad state of affairs in a world where there are so many amongst us, thinking and self-aware beings, that are so adamant to focus on and ostracise difference.

Although the demonstration and removal of Ukraine’s former president does seem to have been a popular move, there are naturally people that are unhappy about it. However, the west hasn’t stepped in to protect those minorities. Rather they have moved in to support this new, interim government. This is fair enough, since a nation’s people have the fundamental right to self-determination, and majority rule is fairest in the state systems that we are subject to.

The problem is you then can’t decide one group is entitled to self-determination, and one group is not. The current demographic in Russia lists ethnic Russians as overwhelmingly the majority in that region. You have to also take into account that the land mass making up the Crimea, having passed hands so many times over the centuries, was given to Ukraine in the 50’s, so it’s attachment to the country is only very young.
The current demographics in lands colonised by westerners are always granted the right to self-determination. Two obvious examples would be the Americas and Australia, along with for Spanish decedents in South America. Two other good examples can also be found in the two Crown Dependencies of Gibraltar and The Falkland Islands. Now, while the Falklands were essentially found as a set of barren rocks, fought over by British, Spanish, French and Dutch colonialists, Gibraltar has a very mixed demographic, though with British as, minorly, the dominant one.

Gibraltar has twice in recent history chosen by referendum to remain a British dependency, over Spanish sovereignty. This is despite Spain claiming the land itself is its territory. This is no different to the Russian inhabitants of the Crimea saying that they want to be part of Russia, over Ukraine’s purely territorial claims.
Self-determination must win out.

Self-determination at the barrel of a gun

Now we come to the argument that this whole referendum is a farce, forced by Russia at the barrel of a gun. Well, that is a very hegemonic western position to take, and obviously too. It’s not hard to see that Russia would see external interference in a referendum in much the same way the British government would see the Russians conducting a referendum over sovereignty of The Falklands. Our government would fear it’d be rigged and a deal struck between the big wigs in Argentina and Russia.

As far as Russia is concerned, the international community is already in collusion with the new Ukrainian government. To us, the referendum is being conducting down the barrel of a Russian gun. If the UN were to conduct the same referendum, to Russia it would be conducted down the barrel of a US gun.

We also have to remember that harping on about international law has, by our own fault, become something of a joke. After conducting two illegal wars in the Middle East, we have long lost our mount on that high horse, no matter how good we might look on it – like a knight – if we ever really had it in the first place.

Not so simple

I don’t want to give the impression that I support Russia, because I don’t. I think that Putin is a swine, without a doubt one of the worst scum in international politics. Mr. Putin, inevitably, makes me feel lucky that we have Cameron, and it make me feel ill to say I feel lucky to have Cameron in charge. All I’m trying to get at is how wrong this has been played by our diplomats.

The long and storied history of the landmass in question makes a sensible end to this problem all but impossible. In reality, the land is neither Russian nor Ukrainian, but rather belonging to the Crimean Tatars. This is simple squabbling over lands mass by two groups of colonialists. Also, by granting the Ukrainian people internationally recognised self-determination; we can then take that away from ethnic Russians and come out looking sensible.

The best we can do is help Ukraine through this transition. If they are to join Europe, then we need to help them assimilate properly on a social and economic level, and any extremist elements, such as those that attacked the director of their national broadcaster, need to be dealt with before they can join a community that is supposed to promote co-operation, tolerance and freedom between peoples and nations (though Britain is actually doing a great deal to ruin that).

We also have to do something to help the Crimean Tatar people, which the international community have abjectly failed to do for so long. I don’t doubt that they will face awful repression under Putin’s Russia, and so something must be done to support and, most likely, resettle them, probably elsewhere in the Ukraine. We must ensure that they are given rights to land, are given homes and are allowed to live free and to thrive under protection of Europe and the European community.

We also need to stop being so blinkered and so closed minded. We have to stop ourselves from focussing only on the white majority part of Europe and remember there is another European nation that has been associated with and trying to join Europe for decades. This is a country that has helped, for all the incredible and criminal ills of that intervention, in the Middle East, and has been on the front line in the humanitarian side of the Syria crisis, far more so that anyone else. It’s also where there are ongoing popular demonstrations against the government and plenty of violent clashes on the street, all washed down by police brutality and unlawful killings, yet it’s a place that is rarely reported on and that gets no European Union intervention, despite being part of our community. That place is Turkey.

If we are now a world that acts for the rights, the safety and the betterment of the people in it and not solely for material or political gain, then surely foreign policy shouldn’t be a faddish as this.

The Budget – The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

I thought that this title would work best, since it basically forces me to write something that attempts to be – or at least looks like it’s attempting to be – a balanced blog article. Just look at the title there, covering all the opinion positions, forcing me to be both nice and scathing in the same piece - very nice.

It also steals a film title, which automatically makes something as uncool as a budget review cool, right? That’s how it works, isn’t it? You know, a bit like Buzzfeed? C’mon guys, I have long hair and play guitar, that saves me, right?

No? Fair enough. I’m still going to throw in my two pence as the ever perplexed progressive, still failing to find that perfect purveyor of a rational existence anywhere in that spikey little palace of privilege.

The Good

There was good in the budget. It’s  ultimately damaging to attack everything an opponent dishes up, manically waving that sword around until the opponent you are duelling with just stops and looks at you with a look of disgust and bemusement – who is this clown? – and there’s nothing worse in this game than cold, callous condescension. So, let’s start by giving this some props.

The Personal Tax Allowance

Probably the most well publicised pre-budget announcement was the raising of the personal tax allowance. Well, naturally. It’s the Lib Dem’s baby, and essentially the only one of their babies that is going to amount to anything in this world (to take a metaphor from the lives of those in the cabinet), so in their dire position, they obviously want to shout about it.

Only the problem is the two parents are now arguing over this baby. The Tories didn’t even want the baby to start with, but since the baby grew up and started making connections out in the big, wide world, famous flash photography daddy decided the baby might be worth loving after all. No longer cold and distant and denying its existence, now the baby is born purely from the spunk of Blue. My baby, screams daddy!

Meanwhile, the parent that loved and nurtured the little baby, sitting up, feeding it, burping it, changing its shitty little nappies, going in to school to complain about bullies and generally knackering itself out is being shunted out. Because it doesn’t have the same fame or opportunity for the five second pose, it’s pleas for recognition of parenthood have fallen, largely, on deaf ears, meaning gold digging daddy gets most of the glory.

It’s a shame, because it is a Lib Dem policy, 100%, and was a major part of the Lib Dem manifesto in 2010. It means that, essentially, we keep an extra £800 per year – good times.
The problem is, during the televised debates, Cameron actually said that it was not affordable. This is while the abolition of the 50p tax rate was, seemingly, always part of the plan. Now both policies have come into effect, which means the shortfall needs to be found elsewhere.

What with all the business rate cuts and cuts on employer’s national insurance, this has to come from somewhere else, and it’s not going to be the richest that are paying the majority of the bill. It will mainly come from dragging more people from the top end of the 10p tax band and into the 20p tax band. Plus, the money we save through this new raise in the personal tax allowance is going to do little to help with the rising cost of living, which a cut in VAT would undoubtedly help.

Drop on the duty of beer

Good for selfish reasons. I like beer and I like the pub culture that exists here. I like the fact that when it’s sunny, the first port of call is a beer garden rather than the grass for sports or other recreation; I can do my sports inside, anytime. And even if I do decide to fake duel someone in a park on a sunny day, I want post-match refreshment in the form of a pint at the pub. Basically, fun.

Dropping duty on fun, and in a way that should help the pub industry, is good and I’m not going to think any more about it. Life is inherently miserable, working for the scraps off the table of our overlords, so why should I remain perpetually healthy and immortal for them? I know you health campaigners are trying to save me from myself, but I really don’t want your help. Go away.

Air Travel Taxation

To many of my green compadres, this is going to be a rather controversial position to take. I’m not one for raising fuel duty on flights and I’m dead against Green Party plans to do this. Why? Well, simply because such a policy only penalises the poor. Those people that work in soul destroying jobs five days a week for relatively low pay deserve at least one break a year in the sun. Raising this means that you’ll only find rich Brits abroad in odious gold medallions with bloated guts and leathered skin – ew. Meanwhile the rest of us will be forced to make do with the garden shed city down in Jaywick.

Easy access to air travel also promotes good international relations. So long as the peoples of the world are regularly meeting, mixing, stoking up friendships, relationships and ‘bumping nasties’, then relations between regions are only going to get better with each passing generation. I think any sane person is going to hail anything that will weaken nationalistic feeling and make the probability of future major wars less likely.

What with the mixing of people, cheap air travel is also needed so families can better keep in contact over long distances. With a brother over in Hong Kong teaching boxing, I’m happy that we can still conceivably afford to visit each other once a year, rather than once a decade.

Of course, the CO2 emissions do need to be offset in some way, which is why I disagree with pretty much every other cynical energy policy announced in the budget, , gambling with apocalyptic repercussions as the stakes, but I will talk about those later in the ‘ugly’ section.

We also need much more encouragement and investment in creating cleaner and renewable fuel sources. Of course, this means ignoring those sweaty, uncomfortable looking people – actually demons shifting around in an ill-fitting human suit – lobbying for oil companies. Anyway, repression is very short-sighted for the oil companies themselves. If you look at electric cigarettes, the tobacco industry initially lobbied against, now they are gnawing on the product with all the gusto of a rabid dog. They are doing well from a market they once wanted sunk.

The bad

The bad is an inevitability. In this world, no government with all its vested interests sticking out from it like tubes from a life support machine is able to deliver a budget that actually caters to the regular people (no matter how much it professes to be a ‘people’s party’ or ‘worker’s party’). Rather it simply serves to placate us while catering to those that have the real power. So now let’s look at the bad, the stuff that has been given to us with one hand while slapping in the face us with the other. Remember, shiny happy people, there’s another level of hell to follow in ‘the ugly’.

Cutting Corporation Tax

According to our ever egalitarian Etonian chancellor, this is a tax to promote the creation of jobs. Rather though, looking at how companies are acting at the moment, it’ll rather lead to more money for directors, other senior staff and shareholders in general.

There has been no evidence of kickbacks recently. Pay has risen inconceivably for the upper quartile, around 12% in 2012 for the bosses of top companies, which has continued since. This is while the rest of us have been floundering on pay freezes, despite sky rocketing prices. As those at the top feast evermore on suckling pig, they find ways to develop better bibs and catch more and more of the crumbs that are supposed to fall from the table to feed us, the mice that scurry by their feet. Seemingly we’re only good enough for the several day old stale crumbs now.

A sensible route to take would to offer substantial cuts only to small to medium, developing businesses, in order to encourage them to grow, create new positions. Much like curing the housing crisis, this can create new ‘homes’ for workers. The shortfall could be made from effective policing of tax for actual corporations; a splitting of the tax policy.

Growing companies generally grow their employees to come to feel part of a business, rather than a replaceable component that can be replaced once worn out – a home rather than a house – unlike cooperate structures. Further encouragement for employee share schemes would also be a sensible way to give Britain’s shat on workforce feel more of a vested interest in the British business and the British economy, of which the recovery only seems to benefit the few.

The tax revenue that is lost here follows in the same vein as the revenue lost from the 50p tax rate. Seeing as the deficit still exists, the revenue must come from somewhere, and inevitably the brunt will be borne by us in some way, despite cuts to things like the personal tax rate.

Low wage rise for public sector workers

So our public sector workers will get a raise, though it seems those nurses and teachers that do so much for us are worth nothing more than a pitiful 1%, not even close to the rate of inflation. The argument that none of us are getting pay rises either is kind of sick. Just because some of us aren’t getting what we deserve, doesn’t mean that should apply across the board.

If one section of society is shown to be getting what they deserve, maybe that will shock others into demanding what they deserve too. If bosses can pay themselves millions in pay raises and bonuses, there is surely money there to share amongst the work force. Whether it’s a failure of education or of parenting, some people need re-education in what it is to share.

ISA Saving Limit Raised to £15000

OK, so this is good for savings. However, £15000 is a rather unobtainable sum of money for most. This is a policy that is solely aimed at the moneyed. It has been deemed a policy to undermine UKIP’s acquisition of the moody ‘my home is my castle’, isolationist middle-England.

The weirdest thing about this is it seems exactly like a give with one hand, take with another situation. More and more people are being dragged into the 40% tax band from the 20%, and a hell of a lot more from the 10% to the 20%, to pay for the tax cuts elsewhere. A number of the savers who are meant to benefit from this will be pulled into this swirling vortex too.

Ultimately, this benefits the very high-earners, mainly because it makes their job easier. Already, you can open more than one savings account, meaning you can simply spread your money around to get around this tax already. Now, the moneyed won’t have to do this so much. They can have fewer accounts. Now they have more time for other things, like golf, or getting better than me at fencing... I know, I find it weird that I do fencing too.

Encouraging everyone to spend less is also a terrible strategy for recovery, when increased spending is needed to make all businesses more profitable. I know we need to be sensible and save for the future, but we will also all die one day. The message should equally be ‘enjoy it while you have it’.

The Ugly

Welcome to the third level of hell. Don’t worry, you won’t want for things to see, there’s plenty to peruse in this gallery. My only fear is you’ll get bored before you get to the end. The stems of your eyes will ache from balancing on them too long and you’ll redirect them at the flashing box in front of you, which is the oracle version of sitting on a sofa. Incidentally, this is probably what you’re doing when watching the TV anyway... or a beanbag, if you like feeling 70’s and dream of Heather Graham.

Statement on inequality

Inequality, or equality for that matter, is seemingly not a word that is taught at Eton. If you look in any dictionary in that establishment, you’ll find the word scrubbed from its pages. In more recent years, a clever virus has been installed on the Eton network that corrupts any computer that connects to it. Now any use of the word ‘equal’ or ‘equality’ on web pages become simply a mess of pixels.

Apparently, according to Osborne, inequality is at its lowest in 25 years. However, a study released by Oxfam suggests that Britain’s five richest families are materially and financially richer than the poorest 20% of the country (12.5 million) put together. The tax breaks for the rich and powerful are, according to our government, supposed to trickle down to us, when this study suggest something quite different.

Promotion of Financial Services

No British government will ever be willing to challenge the dominance of the financial sector, and this is despite all the devastation it caused with the financial crisis. Supporters of the financial sector like to blame Labour for our troubles, but it’s insane to believe that our little island’s government could cause a global economic catastrophe by hiring too many nurses and teachers and paying them a little better. That is a ludicrous position to take and is the equivalent of a dog barking repeatedly at the door when no one is there.
Still, the biggest ambition of the budget is to further promote its growth. It is an industry that provides nothing for anyone except for those that are part of the club. They make froth, money from money, or money from nothing. In fact, I honestly wonder what the fuck it is they actually do all day.

They create nothing that is of benefit to mankind. They develop nothing. They provide nothing that makes life better or more enjoyable or easier for anyone. As far as I can tell, spend their days playing an amped up version of roulette. Yet it gets the miracle grow, while the other growing industries only get a few spades of manure. Industries that could provide concrete worth, such as technological, software or renewable and clean energy for our species as a whole play second fiddle to the phantom money.

Making work pay

I’d say this was probably the most ridiculous statement of the entire budget. Of course, it’s one that’s been parroted by both parties of the coalition for the last few years when referring to welfare caps. Well, how does simply worsening conditions actually make work pay?

I suppose the strategy they are going for is similar to osmosis or conduction, as in the movement of solvent molecules through a partially permeable membrane into a region of higher solute concentration or heat from hot to cold. Only, instead of ‘heating up’ or ‘increasing the concentration’ of work, making conditions better and the entire situation more attractive so it comes to engulf everything, instead they drop the ‘heat’ or dilute the solution further on the other side, causing a forced movement.

After that incredibly trite description, basically what I’m saying is they haven’t made work pay. They’ve just made sure conditions outside of work are so intolerable you have to work. I know most people will say that’s fair enough, but my problem is the wording. They have not improved wages or the benefit conditions companies provide their workers. Work still pays poorly in most cases, and the government rewarded the architects with tax cuts. If they want to say ‘making work pay’, that should mean forcibly improving remuneration for all, if they wanted that statement to be true that is.

Dropping energy taxation

So, I support the air travel taxation announcement, which I know won’t please some, but I have given my reasons above. I believe such policies need to be fair, and a rise in air travel tax, like VAT, effect mainly the poorer in society. I believe tax should be progressive, not regressive.

Cutting tax for energy intensive industries, however, makes no sense at all. Companies that blast out carbon and other chemical emissions, covering the entire area in ugly, noxious clouds are being rewarded for pollution. This comes from the government that claimed it would be the greenest every - what a joke.
We are not promoting or investing anywhere near enough in clean and renewable energy sources. Instead, fracking is taking centre stage, and when people protest against it, they are pounded on by the police. Of course, when a few country folk in tweed stand in the wind farms in the Tory heartland, those plans are scuppered without more even a murmur.

I’m afraid, if we want to continue on this energy intensive road, we have to force these clean energy sources on the public, much like the government have forced fracking on so many of us. The lobbyists must be ignored and, in this case, progress must be forced. I believe in freedom, but it’s impossible to be free in a world of scorched earth; a wilderness reminiscent of the Eastern Front of both World Wars.

So...?

The economy is apparently to grow to pre-crisis levels in the near future, yet we’re all worse off than we were before. Well, not all of us, there are some in society that have profited off people’s suffering. But this is typical of the society we live in. During the First World War, many industrialists grew obscenely rich of weapons, shell and chemical weapon production. Same goes with World War II, profit off the suffering off others that continues today.

So, the budget for working people (according to Osborne), is really a budget of ‘be happy with what you’re given’. Of course as prices rise elsewhere, our gains look more and more pathetic. Those that have grown more bloated fill themselves to burst on ever growing profits, continuing to use the falsities of the economic crisis as cover for our poor pays.

During the opposition’s response, Ed Miliband demanded that Osborne and Cameron rule out more tax cuts for millionaires. Naturally, they couldn’t. That’s because we’re not all in it together. The budget gives the illusion of serving us, when really it’s the same as always. The rich pay no more, the powerful shirk their societal responsibilities, and our ‘savings’ find their way back into the system and back in to the pockets of the ‘deserving rich’. Cheers, guys.

Democratic Imperfection of Referendum

This week’s Question Time got me thinking. The issue of Switzerland’s referendum over free movement was raised and much applauded by the older, more reactionary members of the audience. Of course, I’m not saying it was just them, there were some short sighted members of the yoof too, but generally, this is a pattern followed by the older members of the society; aka the ones who will dies off much sooner.

Sooner or later, we will be having a referendum on our membership of Europe. I must say, this worries me. Not because I’m against democracy, far from it, but rather because this, much like most referendum, doesn’t seem incredibly democratic.

It’s very easy to see a referendum as the highest form of democracy, giving a decision to the people of the country, as opposed to allowing those suit wearing manikins in parliament all the power. But is it really?

A liberal democracy should, in its highest form, allow any member of that society to live to the best of their ability, free to do as they please, so long as they do not directly harm another. In a democratic society, so one person should not control another, nor should the majority oppress the minority.  Via referendum, we allow just that.

When the anti-Europe camp tries to drum up mass vitriol towards the institution, they call about all the red tape the Continent creates for us; all the freedoms they take away. But on closer inspection, the parts of Europe they seem to hate most of all are exactly those parts that extend to us our basic rights and freedoms; such as the working time directive that prevents us from being abused by our employers, or the European Convention on Human Rights, which safeguards so many of our basic freedoms it’s impossible to list them here. Somehow, some of our politicians have twisted the issue, successfully turning us against our own basic freedoms. It shouldn’t be so easily achieved, but they’ve done it by citing plenty of the few detriments of the convention, like deporting terror suspects while casually ignoring all the benefits. It doesn’t help that the right-wing press pedal the same swill that so many people happy lap up from the troughs.

What the referendum seekers wish to do is extend to people the ability to make a decision that will essentially take away fundamental freedoms of everyone else, based on carefully selective information and propaganda. The main aims seem to be to take away people’s ability to travel freely around Europe, to work where they like, and to start relationships and families with who they like without state interference. In the void that will follow, the government will be able to rewrite our freedoms, and pick and choose what fundamental rights we deserve – something I am not comfortable to hand over to our political overlords of today for a quick brainstorming session. I say this especially during an economic downturn, where giving a business the freedom to squeeze you dry, since it’s best for the economy, must seem mighty attractive. And quality of life be damned, because we have to compete with emerging economies like China and India.

When UKIP, the self-professed libertarian society talks about libertarianism, above is what they mean. A completely unmolested free market that does away with worker rights and human rights, as it’s those that get in the way of the unnatural system of market capitalism. It opens the playing field, sure, but on the playground, the biggest and meanest are sure to come out on top. And that’s the problem, in the world of material greed on such a diabolical scale, we live in a world where you are taught to be big and mean or you fall. To make it in the business world, we are taught to be ruthless.
Red tape, for the most part, is to protect us. Taxes, the welfare state, free healthcare are there to ensure that we can get on in the world, yet still have a safety net when we fall, no matter our background, upbringing or wealth. Some of us, when we fall, we are picked up financially by our parents, relatives or friends. Some people cannot, and need the rest of us to help; the welfare state is a collective kitty for our fellow being, which essential for simple common decency.

And the red tape, for the most part, involves keeping workers safe, ensuring they cannot be unfairly dismissed, ensuring they have enough time for leisure activities and a life, and enough pay. It ensures humans are not looked upon as mules or donkeys.

Socially, I do consider myself a libertarian, or at least an extreme liberal. I believe no one should interfere in my business, so long as I do not DIRECTLY harm another. It is not the business of the government, for instance, to threaten me with jail because I do drugs, which may harm me – already a contradiction in itself by countering a catastrophe with a catastrophe, a policy of guaranteed destruction, like the use of nukes. My health is my business. It is also, not the business of the government to blame me for the larger woes of the drug trade, which are brought about solely by their policy of prohibition. That arm of the government must be shortened, for it is not their duty to micromanage my life or anybody else’s.

On the other hand, it is their duty to keep the potential bullies in line. The rich, the powerful, the businesses we rely on for a living and for the goods and services that not just make life possible, but enjoyable too. Because if left to their own devices, the hunger and quest for increased profit can be catastrophic for those little people, of which 99% of us are.

If you want to climb to the top of that ladder, you can. But you cannot create a world where you have unequivocal power over everybody else, and that includes government and big business. Everyone deserves the same freedom, the same free time, for their own pursuits, wherever on the ladder they reach, because, believe it or not, not everyone sees their life as simply working in a job.
I know to the heavily regimented, this might seem absurd and idealistic, but we all only have one life, and we really should have the ability to enjoy it, not working every hour God sends. Responsibility in capitalism, as history has shown us, can only be brought about by political intervention, such as with the eight hour working day and child labour laws, and political intervention must always be for the people. Politics should only safeguard us from potential tyrants, and by that also never become the tyrant itself.

It perhaps relegates the government to the role of gigantic accountants. Of course, that’s not what I want. In an ideal world, we’d need no interference and we’d all work together toward a world that works for all, but that’s not what we have and that’s not what we’re taught. If wealth can’t be better distributed by business, doing away with the sneering upturned nose at the natural occurrence lower ability levels, then outside interference must occur. If business schools continue to teach the same models, then a humanising effort must poke around under the bonnet. I’m not saying that all tiers be done away with, which inevitably will affect striving in some way or another, but that the tiers do not need be so obscenely pronounced and far away from each other that someone at the top can earn thousands and thousands times what someone at the bottom of the ladder earns.

It may not be good business practice, but I don’t care, the world as it is is bad logic.

It’s not certain of course that the reactionary right outnumber the moderates; we may see a better outcome when the referendum comes. But they are definitely more vocal. By calling for democracy, what they really call for is their ability to stamp their view on everyone else. Their calls for more freedom are just call to stifle freedoms through protection that exist today. And they may succeed in doing it, not because there are more of them, but because they have nothing better to do in their twilight years than vote, leaving us with the mess after they’re gone (something I of course find sad being both young and obsessed by politics).

Something I wrote to a friend on Facebook

I'm sorry man, I have to say all this. What exactly is revolutionary about you position? Your position is as revolutionary as a Whig, only taken out of context and placed in the modern day. Because at least then, there was a power structure above the emerging business class that they could work to usurp as a first step toward social mobility, albeit, very small. Now, that class DO rule. Your revolutionary ideal is to give the people with all the power, more power.

We already live in a corporatist society. We have lived in a corporatist society for a long, long time. We DO NOT live in a socialist society. We, in Britain, do NOT live in a socialist society. You, in America, CERTAINLY do noy live in a socialist society. The rich rule. The rich permiate government; they influence policy and they influence policy in their favour. Only sometimes, it doesn't quite go their way. They have to make the odd concession due to some social campaign, or some research brought to the public consciousness by the 'liberal media' or something else. These AREN'T CONSPIRACIES. They are NO MORE conspiracies than influence of your business people for what they see as 'the better way' for them and those they represent. When it doesn't always go their way, the toys come out the pram and they demand more concessions. Freedom to do what they want.

Business is simply there to make a profit. It has no desire to better the world. This has been continually displayed throughout history, from the cotton mills in Britain in the 1700's to now, with Apple in China and Primark in India. The ONLY thing that has changed this has been regulation. Governments are NOT totally representative and they DO NOT always get it right. In fact, they get it wrong a lot. Drugs, being one and a minor one in a long list. However, they are supposed to represent us, as in humanity, and they do a better job of it than a bunch CEO. By this, I mean the interests of morality as opposed to the fowarding of a simple economic goal, or even the simple prevailing, hegemony. The one's that mainly fail in this task are those that fight for more freedom for massive corporations.

So, governments have overturned child labour in Britian, back in the 1800's. They overturned poor houses and other exploitative institutions that big business used to profit immorally. These would not have vanished in a Libertarian system, because the people, the class of people, it represented had no power. They were merely the workforce pool. It was philosophical developments, quite apart from the economic system, that pushed certain people into action which caused a ban to be enforced. Now, could that have happened by consumer pressure? Probably not. Because, to be honest, I expect the majority of the British middle classes would have prefered cheaper stocking to a fairly treated underclass. There is surely no way you could argue that this regulation of business was not right. Sometimes, within the system of greed we live in, there needs to be push. People have not stopped buying from Apple, despite their poor treatment of staff. In fact, some people almost worship them.

You see, your revolutionary thinking never thinks outside of the box that we built. You seem to treat the constucted world as the world in of itself. You believe that governments should be minimalised and muzzled as a power structure, yet you believe that ever other power structure must be allowed to flourish further. Business is pushing for ever more leeway, using the financial crisis as an excuse. Amongst other things, the rights granted to workers to be stripped bare. The ability to fire to be much easier and much more fluid. This doesn't bother me, I'm a contractor, I'm used to that shit and live very much on my own on the fringe. But others, for others, this is terrifying. This allows businesses to push their workforce to work all the hours that they, THE BUSINESS, deem necessary. For a simple, unchanging, non-overtime paying wage, you must work longer or face dismissal. Those at the top do not face that fear.

What's more, those at the top have prospered ever more since the financial crisis while the rest of us have floundered. By freeing up the market indefinitely, we are feeding this. The freedom to further exploit, to control workers by unfair rates of pay, and by setting their prices accordingly. Business groups can plan strategies to, economically, control behaviour if they so wish.

We need, currently, a government to act as a counter balance. REMEMBER, we live in a world, with people. Real people, real lives, real experiences. We are NOT disposable, regardless of whether market capitalism deems it so or not. It's this that needs to be defended, not a precious little system that was dreamt up by some farmers who like the look of someone's shiny nugget, that's gone completely out of control.

Ideally, we shouldn't have governments. Nor should we need taxes. We should have councils that run business on a democratic basis, syndicalist style, where the workforce has a say. Where all are represented and all work together toward success and a common goal. Where competition does exist, but in a far more friendly manner than it does now where you want to out do your peer simply for the braghing rights over a beer. Those in need are taken care of by their society, who are no longer chasing the goal of greed.

Currently, competition is ruthless and is cut throat. And the market will not right and the market will not reflect morality, not when no one has any money and people desperately clamber for the cheapest products and services in order to survive. Low prices are brought around by the suffering of others, and ethics are expensive in our system.

I agree on your socially Libertarian stance, but not the extreme nature of your right-wing economics. Unfortunately, the use of Libertarian here reminds me a lot of parties here in Europe. There are many parties that use the word Freedom in their name when they want nothing of the kind. Under your free market economy, Libertarianism extends to a few.

(Written on the fly, when I was supposed to be filling in a spreadsheet)

There’s a difference between incentive and no alternative: the benefit cap

The government have unleashed their latest and greatest ploy to get the unemployed back into work. It’s a simple procedure that involves the precision hacking away at the benefits of jobseekers everywhere, no matter how much you’ve worked in the past or where. This is supposed to incentivise work by showing that benefits will never pay more than employment.

Only there seems to be two problems with this. First off is the use of the word ‘incentive’, which implies an improvement somewhere, rather than just financial suffocation. This is the equivalent of taking away the oxygen tank from a diver and pointing to the surface. Second is, of course, the economic climate.

This new policy has received, seemingly, widespread support, both from the public and politicians, who see those on benefits as nothing more than a permanent drain on society. Despite the release of the ‘common misconceptions’ statistics last week, it seems no one has learnt. Politicians and the media continue to spin the numbers and now seemingly swallow them, happily and now consciously.
I already wrote a blog entry on those figures, but let’s recap – it would seem a recap is needed for those swimming around their bowls:

The perception is that capping benefits at £26,000 per household will save more money than increasing the pension age to 66 or stopping child benefit for those earning over £50,000. The reality is capping household benefits will save £290million, compared with £5billion for raising the pension age and £1.7billion for reducing child benefit.

In addition, the perception is £24 in every £100 spent on benefits is claimed fraudulently. The reality: £0.70 in every £100 spent on benefits is claimed fraudulently.

The most important set of statistics is the second one. For some reason we have and - despite information like this - continue to have an extremely warped view of those on unemployment benefits. The vast, vast majority of claimants are claiming legitimately and fairly.

People say they understand that the economy is in tatters, only sometimes it seems like their ‘understanding’ is merely the squawking of a very well trained parrot. Sort of like, ‘everyone is using that sound bite, so I will too’. But it seems even after finishing their regurgitation, they have absolutely no idea what economic crisis entails.

To most, it seems that a pay freeze or maybe a raise under inflation is what all this is about. Not the millions who are out of work because there just isn’t the work available. It’s not about the hundreds of people flooding each vacancy with hundreds and hundreds of applications. It’s not about the countless people, not just in the public sector but the private sector too, that have lost their jobs - not just the unskilled, but the highly skilled too who have been made redundant due to budget restrictions or decreased profits. It’s not about all those qualified, experienced and skilled people stagnating in part-time work. And it’s not about the Sword of Damocles that could well be swinging above almost every normal working person’s head, ready to drop when they least expect it. All this, it seems to me, is considered a myth by the majority of middle England.

I just heard an acquaintance lost their job. She was three years qualified at a top London law firm, where for all intents and purposes, she was very successful. However, due to budgetary cuts (and no doubt the partners’ reluctance to take pay cuts) she was made redundant. She was hardly one to stand up for universal benefits, but now she finds herself either at the mercy of the state or eating into the money she carefully put away for her future – a future the government seems less and less enthusiastic about supporting. This is the plight of the majority of those on jobseeker’s allowance.
But this is the real issue here. It’s not the cap at all. What the real issue is is that if the government want to incentivise work, then they have to make working conditions better.  It no good having workers worrying about whether their position could go at any minute, rather than just concentrating on the job in hand.

All the government have done in this area is make it easier for employers to sack their workers, cut the amount of compensation they have to pay to only 12 month’s salary, and cut consultation to just 45 days in the case of mass redundancies – and all this was put forward by Vince Cable, the ‘friendly face’ of the coalition. There’s no added incentive when the government so whole heartedly supports business, not the people they represent.

But this isn’t the only area where businesses get the blind support of the government. The fact is employment doesn’t always pay. There are millions of people who are so underpaid by their employers that they cannot make ends meet on their wage alone. It’s then up to the tax payer to make up the shortfall. Far more money goes on these kinds of benefits than on those who are out of work.
The argument that these are tough times and that businesses and corporations can’t afford it is, for the most part, utter bollocks. The average salary of a FTSE 100 chief executive was estimated to be 100 times that of a school teacher in 2011 or around the £3 million mark in 2012. They continue to pay themselves huge and rising salaries each year, along with their vulgar obligatory bonuses. Not to mention throwing away money on risky ventures like Tesco did with their Fresh ’n’ Easy gamble - something they dusted themselves off from pretty quickly. Meanwhile, the average working person’s wage (around the £25,000 mark) rises only 1% per year, if at all.

What’s more, the new jobs that these companies are creating are mainly part time work, which cannot satisfy the absolutely basic living conditions each human deserves. So is the money being widely invested in a few high-powered boardroom individuals?

Perhaps if a few execs could forgo their raises or bonuses, or better yet take a pay cut, perhaps the wages they pay to their lowest drones wouldn’t be so low. But the ‘not enough to go round’ issue is what every corporation argues when the issue of the Living Wage comes up, yet they have enough stashed away to be used as a play-thing. A cynical person would say some at the top of the food chain have found a convenient excuse in the economic climate.

The biggest scandal we face as far as benefits goes is not that there are so many unfortunate people forced to claim them, but that so many people need them whether they are in work or not. It’s the product of irresponsible capitalism and individualistic greed that is so being pushed by the government and right-wing press and swallowed by the public. As an employee, we shouldn’t be expected to work as low-paid slaves, but rather we should expect inclusion and adequate financial remuneration. Most of us are ultimately working for someone else’s dreams of money, influence and power after all.

It’s the gap between the executives and the average people that is really tearing this country apart. However, it’s the weak, not the strong, we turn the cannons on. This is because we’re told to. And we swallow everything the media and our politicians have to offer. A real incentive to get back into work would be the promise and respect of a living wage and the feeling that one isn’t worthless when compared to those watching over us from their ivory towers.

The lies we’re told, the lies we believe and the lies we tell ourselves

This one is a lie I let myself believe, but it’s not one I believe anymore. This is a lie in the same vein as ‘I’m not racist, but...’, ‘I don’t dislike homosexuals, but...’ only it it’s on a much wider scale, a lie attributed to an entire society. It’s a lie that’s told by those leading voices and rehashed by those that follow. It’s the lie that goes ‘The British people are a tolerant bunch, but...’

It doesn’t feel good attacking our society like this. It’s something I slurred out to one of my progressive friends on a night out, only to find myself quickly rebutted. On the whole, she said to me, we are much better than most. A fair enough comment if we believe what we’re told, only I’m not sure what the source material for this is. We read all sorts of stuff that holds us up on the pedestal of tolerance in all sorts of publications, especially the Daily Mail. Only it’s usually written in a column that also drops some kind of anti-minority bomb or something against the disenfranchised in the same paragraph. The slur I made is the bomb I’m going to drop now. The British people aren’t all that tolerant at all.

I’ve often felt this after watching some political panel show like Question Time, listening to comments from the public on certain political issues like immigration or benefits, or even simple things like teenage pregnancy or recreational drug use. A placating statement followed by a spill of bile. I hear it so much that I think, maybe they are speaking the truth. I mean, this person is saying it, the slightly out of shape man with the thinning hair and glasses also said it, and the man in the all too padded, ill-fitting suit who’s trying so hard yet failing spectacularly at looking statesmanlike has also said it, so in there must be some truth here. Scroungers are stealing all the money from the public purse and the island is going to sink into the sea under the creaking weight of all those immigrants. If they repeat what they say, over and over, maybe it’ll be true.

Goebbel’s is attributed to saying something like that once, though I think that might not be strictly correct. However, it doesn’t sound too off what the mastermind of Nazi propaganda might have said. Say something enough and it becomes truth. The problem is this kind of truth is it can be smashed by things like facts and figures and statistics. You know, the pesky objective evidence thing that Locke and Hume so graciously gave us with that whole empiricism idea. And this is exactly what has happened to the great slew of Britain’s misconceived preconceptions.

Splashed all over all the newspapers recently are The Top Ten Common Misconceptions Among Britons About Britain. I first came across this in a rather right-leaning publication, so immediately thought ‘ah, it’ll be something about the length of rivers or about the species of birds we have here’, but instead it did actually list out the top ten of the list of countless items of crap we like to spill out on a daily basis. This includes all the fan favourites; immigration, benefits, overseas aid and – although it’s fallen slightly out of fashion recently – teenage pregnancy. I’m not going to reprint it here, but I would like to go into some specifics.

So, according to these stats, it seems capping benefits will not be saving us anywhere near the amount of money we thought it would, while 70p in every £100 is claimed fraudulently, not the quarter we all thought. Also, we’re spending much more on pensions than on job seekers allowance – fifteen times more.

The overwhelming increased demonization of those on benefits has come at a time when the economy has gone to shit. Many people in the public sector have lost their jobs and find themselves blamed for it – blamed (incorrectly) for causing the economic problems here in the first place and then for claiming benefits. In actual fact, it was the banking crisis that caused this, not the public sector and Labour. And people seem to forget those in the private sectors are suffering too, suffering from pay freezes and job losses while their company overlords thrive, both monetarily and in respect. It’s a sad and pathetic time where the weak maul the even weaker.

And what about immigration and religion? Well, today’s current, fashionable bogeyman is Islam. People talk about how it’s replacing Christianity and how 'soon Sharia Law will take over'. Well, 5% are Muslim, hardly the horde everyone talks about, while 59% of the people of this country consider themselves Christian. This is rather disconcerting to me because I don’t know where that puts the atheists and agnostics. However, it also show the ridiculous focus and obsession that people seem to need to need to put on something the consider 'other' in order to go about their daily lives. In the 21t Century, what does the representation of religious groups really matter?

As far as immigration and ethnicity goes, people of ethnicities other than white make up 11% of the population, not 30%. It’s more likely that if this country does sink into the sea, it won’t be under the weight of people mainly from the lands conquered by the British Empire, but rather from the descendants of those that conquered these islands between the end of the Roman Empire and 1066. It’s not race and immigration that we are buckling under the weight of, but just the number of people in general, whatever their colour or race. So now do we want to stop having kids entirely?

Of course, I do understand that people have to get their information from somewhere. Unfortunately, the media and politicians have been feeding us outright lies for years to fit their own agenda. After all, the erroneous figures must have some source. The problem seems to be, however, that no one bothers to think about them. No one trusts what they see and would rather apply themselves to a strictly abstract idea.

We, as a nation, are turning on each other. In our time of need, rather than sympathising with the jobless or those seeking sanctuary, we set them as targets. Rather than being inclusive, we shut ourselves off and try our best create moats and defences between us. We aren’t all in it together, and this is a myth that goes far beyond just the gap between the rich overlords and the rest of us. The citizens of this country are allowing themselves to become completely divided.

The problem is it’s the same new sources and politicians that deem us as a tolerant nation that come up with all the rubbish that we’ve let ourselves believe. It’s them that spout all the intolerant drivel that has been disproved by these latest, national figures and statistics. It’s another case of ignoring the evidence, only the evidence they are ignoring here is their own voice.

And even if we are more tolerant than some incredibly intolerant nations, it’s not a competition. Surely what we want to achieve is a harmonious and prosperous nation, which we cannot do if we aren’t working together.

When a Tory cabinet minister spouts something that creates misconceptions, they usually follow it up with ‘which the British public agree with’. So maybe it’s more their intolerance than all of ours, only we all get painted with the same brush.

Giving prisoners the chance of review, not the promise of freedom by any means, just the promise of review means we should let go of our human rights and allow this government to rewrite them for us – minus the Liberal Democrats. It’s what the British people want. Well, it’s not what I want and I’d thank you for not including me in anything you say. The British people you speak of are intolerant, but not all of us are the British people you speak of.

Read the source article here.

Paranoid about being paranoid: putting ourselves at the mercy of the state and Theresa May

Over the past couple of days, our TV screens have been awash with jubilation and victory speeches. The accolades of ‘calmness’, ‘sheer determination’ and ‘thoroughness’ have been bestowed upon a new British hero for what has been deemed a ‘stellar performance’. I wish I was talking about Andy Murray here, whose match on Sunday was a show of strategic and athletic perfection, having swiped the Men’s Singles Wimbledon title away from the world number one, Novak Djokovic in three straight sets. Unfortunately it’s not Andy Murray I’m talking about here, it’s Theresa May. And her accolades, unlike Murray’s, are not well deserved.

I’m not going to comment on the man, Abu Qatada here. I will freely admit that I do not know enough about the man to comment. Despite the pages and pages of media fury whipped up over the years, none of it gave me an insight into the man it demonised. None of it was informative. Instead, all I got was flat rhetoric on a caricature of evil; on a comic book villain.

I have little to no patience with the highly religious, whatever novel they like to adhere to. So where religion could be used as a tool to the damage a democratic and secular way of life, I’m going to take my place on the side opposing it. If he committed crimes against society, then surely he must be held accountable for them; that is common sense. However, it is the wider issues that have been brought up by these events that have stirred feelings not only of anger and disgust but, most of all, of dread.
Politicians often use periods of self-satisfied backslapping as springboards for policy. When the public are good and placated, politicians believe they will swallow anything, whether it be chocolate milk or razorblades. And whether it’s the sweet residue or the smear of blood around their mouths, they will smile after.

In tandem with the announcement of Abu Qatada’s deportation to Jordan came the Home Secretary’s firm resolution to remove Britain from the European Convention of Human Rights. To the public, this seems like the double toot of the victory trumpet. According to the right-wing press and their political allies, these are two ‘one-overs’ on the great controlling block of Europe and a victory in the war to return power to the British people.

Of course, this is rubbish. I have been constantly astounded at the reaction that this campaign has got from the public since the first rumbling started at the beginning of this coalition. I am absolutely stunned that one of the issues at the forefront of so many people’s minds is to relinquish their own rights as a human beings. The notion is absolutely insane.

The European Convention of Human Rights was written up post World War in the wake of the mass persecution, genocide and wide scale torture regimes inflicted on their own people and the people they conquered. The victors were shocked into finally providing the people they ruled over or represented - depending on your view - with co-operatively ratified fundamental freedoms, which all countries would uphold for people everywhere. These fundamental freedoms include such basic rights as freedom of expression, freedom from torture or servitude, the right to privacy, fair trials and to regular and free elections.

With the horrors so fresh in the authors’ minds, the images of death camps and slaughter on an industrial scale, what we got was comprehensive, and rightly so. As living, comprehending and self-aware creatures, these are fundamental rights that we deserve. And we deserve to know that all these rights will be upheld; with others watching over us as well should our own government falter. Our lives are short and stressful, in the most part in service of the dreams of those at the top, rather than our own. So this is the very least we should expect in return.

But it’s not just the recent history of the war that the Human Rights Act serves to protect us from. Look back at the previous centuries. These were times of political and social repression, and people were allowed to live in appalling conditions. Think of the factories of the industrial era, the poor houses, the near slavery of the working people, let alone the actual slavery of Europe’s colonial conquests.  That in certain stratas of society, a human was considered more like an animal than a human.

Now the government desires to take them away from us and replace them with a Bill of British Rights or UK Bill of Rights, which incidentally makes no mention of the word human. The reason they give for doing this is purely a financial one. What they want is to make it easier to deport people. Abu Qatada was in custody while he was here. He had no freedom to incite anything. All he was was a cost. He cost the taxpayer £1.7 million, which is a measly sum when compared to the trillions spent on bailing out the failed banks. However, our government is in no hurry to introduce legislation to take control of those. This is how it is in pretty much every, or if not every single, case.

I know it seems like a lot of money, but it’s probably a fair price to pay to know that your absolute and essential rights and freedoms are maintained. This comprehensive list was put together by a co-operative of nations and organisations, with Winston Churchill at the helm. It was the coming together of multiple bodies giving us the rights that we, as humans, are entitled to. This was done to ensure these rights weren’t just those a state or government were willing to give us - so long as it didn't infringe on their desires and ambitions. It’s exactly this danger that the introduction of this new Bill would present.

The problem now is the opinion of people has changed over recent years. Instead of casting doubt over our rulers, we instead cast the doubting eye over our own doubt. To question certain government policies or to suspect the possibility of some kind of malevolence, whether at present or a possible future infraction, is seen as paranoia by many, even with the evidence to suggest otherwise.
It has just been revealed to us that our intelligence services have already been engaged for years in mass data mining, that they have bugged fibre optic cables and it’s been suggested that they have found ways around the legal checks and balances we thought were there to protect us. Our government criticises countries like China and Russia, but they do exactly the same thing. Ultimately, these surveillance methods are the responsibility of the Home Secretary, Theresa May – the very same individual that wants to rescind all our rights, including our rights to privacy, and rewrite them.

Our country also doesn’t have the best track record with torture. We have sent our own citizens to the illegal Guantanamo Bay for brutal interrogations, with no one at all facing the consequences since the revelations. Many politicians even believed we should have sent Abu Qatada back to Jordan illegally, in defiance of the Human Rights Act, without the treaty with Jordan that ensures his protection from torture. A human is a human, regardless, and if we want to stand tall over those that do wrong, we cannot be hypocrites. Those that rule over us, for all their expensive educations, seem to have forgotten that. How can we trust a government that has so little regard for human life to rewrite our rights as human beings?