Fiscal republicanism?

This article by Paul Krugman in the New York Times is worth a look. I'm not sure if I'm qualified enough to agree with Krugman's conclusions about the likelihood of Greece dropping out of the Euro and devaluing, but the notion of contagion is an interesting one.

His comments on California - a gross example of poor governance, thanks to Direct Democracy - in comparision to Greece bear some thinking about.

How long will countries accept an unorthodox or idiosyncratic approach to fiscal management from their neighbours? Tax avoidance is, after all, not just a trait of the rich and the right-wing as it is in the UK. It is also a marker of long-standing distrust of government (Spain, Portugal and Greece all have huge levels of tax-avoidance, and are all countries where democracy is relatively young and government in the public interest is a fairly new concept).

Or, taking this one step further, does this make the case for a more republican approach to taxation in general? By republican (I've got my own definition of this word - it means that you set your policies by a rational process rather than honouring the compounded errors of history).

I mean ideas such as the replacement of Council Tax with Land Value Tax - a Lib-Dem policy, as it happens.

As far as I can see, it makes the case for more purposeful government - one that can't be batted aside by single-issue pressure groups and wealthy media interests. They're the ones that are indulged too much when they hiss.

The Tories: Id v Super-Ego. The Ego needs to master the Id.

While I won't vote for them, I can identify with the Conservative Party this weekend. I'm a bit like they are. My Id is a bit shouty and sweary. It likes the sound of it's own voice and it likes to try the odd outrageous argument. It prefers drinking with other similar Ids. And in my career-concious moments, I'm constantly aware of the verbal side-swipes that I've thrown at the people who could have hired me.

Like me, senior Tories know that they have to keep a lid on the Id. And I don't know how it will affect short-term poll ratings, but this has been something of a watershed weekend for the Tories - in a bad way. Nothing significant has happened on its own, but lots of little chinks in their armour have widened. It's not my job to feel sorry for the Tories when things aren't going the way they want them to, but if I were one of them, I'd be a bit worried at the moment.

In 1994, Tony Blair laid the groundwork that he thought was needed to secure an election victory a few years later. The 'Clause IV moment' was an important one strategically, whatever you think to the outcome as a political manoeuvre. By 1997, I don't think anyone seriously believed that - in voting Labour - they were going to get some Maoist dystopia imposed upon them by the back door.

More to the point, I don't think many people believed that Labour was going to govern even an inch to the left of the position that it fought the campaign on. Two friends of mine wrote what I think was a very under-rated portrait of the opportunity that Labour were passing up to do this.

Few of us had real expectations that Labour would run much further than the key pledge that it made to us as members - that it would deprive the Tories of power (on the 'First, do no harm' way of looking at things, this as an achievement in itself). We may have wished for more, but we'd been read the Riot Act in 1994 and we'd swallowed it.

The Tories have done no such thing. OK, they've raised £72m to fight with this time, but above the line campaigning has never been as unattractive as it is today.

Like New Labour in the 1990s, the Tory Ego knows that it needs to be able to hang on to it's existing voters and appeal to people that are soft supporters. The Tory Id, however, wants to make the minimum number of concessions needed to get into Downing Street, and then it would like to row back on as many of them as possible once it has it's feet under the table.

In 1997, Labour, with it's massive majority, had a coherent Super-Ego in the driving seat. It had all of the power that Machiavelli attributed to people who had proved themselves in recent battle.

With the Tories, the Super-Ego is nowhere near as coherent and it is unlikely to have much of the honeymoon that Blair enjoyed. What is worse (for the Tories), this is all glaringly obvious. In an election, the voters are very likely to tumble this fact. The contrast between Labour's downbeat 1990s left and the rampant Tory blogosphere couldn't be more pronounced.

Like Blair, Cameron has had to fix his backwoodsmen with a steely glare and tell them that they don't get any omelette unless they let him break a few of their eggs. The Tories are already treading on broken shells and they're doubtful that even a thin pancake will be forthcoming. In terms of party unity, this is not a good place to be. The moment the poll-lead dips below the 8% level, the big story will be who gets to inherit the corpse.

Now, it seems that Cameron's whole whiter-than-white card is going to blow up in their faces thanks to Lord Ashcroft's dodgy tax-status. In an election fought against the backdrop of economic mayhem caused by the opaque dealings of billionaires, the Tories will be spending a lot of the campaign defending an opaque billionaire to the voters.

In a remarkable article, soft-Tory Julian Glover seems to be saying to people who are not natural Tory voters that they have a duty to vote Tory to save the party from ..... er... most of the party.

Meanwhile, Cameron has been walking a fairly tight line on issues like climate change. His party are about as rational on this subject as they are on Europe. Cameron, however, knows that the only position to you can credibly take to the voters is the 'Pascals Wager' one that I outlined here recently. For years, the public told pollsters that they wanted hanging brought back. History shows that they weren't prepared to buy the whole hanger package though.

The same is true of climate change. People may be sceptical of a science they don't understand. They may have had distrust pricked by climategate. But they also know that no government could simply pretend to be certain that there is no potential catastrophe in the post because it is certain that the whole concept is a forgery. The Tory Id, however, does believe climate change to be some kind of smart ass budget-maximising conspiracy and this tension won't survive the heat of an election.

The Tory Id is already locked in a growing civil war with the urban metrosexuals that have the potential to reach beyond the older, whiter constituency that voted Tory in 2005. Illustrating all of this, this article (and the comments beneath) about Cameron's Cuties shows what is at stake here.

No-one who reads their newspapers and listens to their backbenchers (never mind their frontbenchers) thinks that they'll not seize the first opportunity to dish the BBC up to it's rivals. In the European Parliament, they're in bed with a shower of nutters, foreshadowing a potential period of government in which they have to kowtow to Unionists, Bloggertarians and Thatcherite fruitcakes to maintain a slender majority if they can win one. Does this ring any bells?

The Tory Id will be exposed over the coming months as an out-of-control force that will elbow a weak leader aside as soon as it gets a toe over the line. This has become apparent the weekend.

I'm not saying that they can't win in May. But it became clear over the last few days that it will be a lot harder than they had hoped.

Carve his name with pride

I didn't think the roundup would start this quickly. Nosemonkey was the first one to smuggle out news. He even managed this detailed transmission before he breathed his last.

Reflections on Tory Conference weak

How to behave like a 'government in waiting' - three steps;

1. Leave political grouping in the European Parliament to form a new one based on Euroscepticism in general and having a bit of a fit about the Lisbon Treaty in particular
2. Get joined by a shower of goosestepping fruitcakes
3. Find out that the new leader of this group you've set up is in favour of the Lisbon Treaty

It's a good job that no-one who knows anything about it thinks that the Tories might completely fuck up the economy, innit?

Eurosceptics

Nosemonkey sez:

"Every time you make such wild claims – and they turn out to be unfounded – you are alienating potential allies. When Lisbon comes into force and life in the EU continues much as before, proving all the claims that this treaty is in any way significant to be objectively false (because no matter what many eurosceptics claim, Lisbon *is* just a tidying-up exercise) – when member states continue to run themselves, when the threatened abortion clinics and enforced involvement in military campaigns fail to materialise – then anyone with half a brain will be able to see that the claims of the eurosceptics were false, and so stop paying them any further attention."

With the greatest respect to him - and he is one of the best political bloggers around - he's really underestimating the willful mendacity and stupidity of of the large majority of Eurosceptics.

The same lies will just resurface next time and the same fuckwit journos will repeat them and the same idiots will believe them all over again.

Berlusconi bollixed

Good news.

Now this question seems to be a perfectly sensible on to me, but I never hear it asked by any mainstream political grouping, or by the media:

If you have to achieve standards on human rights, corruption and democratic practices to get in to the EU, what happens when your country dips below them or fails to keep pace with the standards required by membership?

When will Italy be expelled from the EU?



From here.

Election advice

From Irish Election.

A united Ireland?

Not any time soon, it says here:

“The Republic is engaged in a major struggle to maintain, within the EU and the euro zone, its economic viability and sovereignty. It is hardly the moment to press claims to the North which we have renounced, and, it has to be said, the advantages and flexibility of joining up with a small sovereign state in the present global turmoil are for the moment a lot less compelling today than they were two or three years ago.”

Let the people decide!

About Lisbon. But not about electoral reform.

Libertas? Nein Danke!

Libertas? Nein Danke!

Wow

Will Hutton: (my emphasis)

"...there is a budget deficit next year of £118bn, which may have to increase again - with another big Obama-style fiscal stimulus - if the recession deepens. My view is that the financial markets will accept actual spending only if Britain pre-announces that after financial stabilisation has worked, it intends to join the euro - otherwise we will find ourselves in the same position as Iceland.

These are the grimmest economic circumstances since the 1930s. Lives and businesses are being wrecked as I write. There will be little appetite for my proposed measures; how much better to hope that we can muddle through, looking for "green shoots" of recovery and doing little radical.

But after last week the government - and the opposition - have to get serious. Britain is on the edge."

Anti-EU = know nothing about the EU

... on average, anyway.

Everyone should know this:

"Those (across the EU) who had an objectively poor knowledge of the EU’s role split 33% good thing and 19% bad thing (with 32% neither and 16% don’t know).

Those who had some knowledge of the EU’s role split 51% good thing, 16% bad thing (16%/3%).

Those who had an objectively good knowledge of the EU’s role split 62% good thing, 13% bad thing (23%/2%).

In the same survey, it’s worth noticing that the UK is the only country where those distrusting EU institutions outnumber those trusting them. Can’t think why, though."

Ignorance is a political instrument. Pass it on.

Civic renewal and decentralisation

This is a good post. Go and read it.

Redistributon

Usual "I'm not an economist, but..." caveat:

Wouldn't now be a good time to seek a pan-EU consensus that VAT should start to fall?

Only asking....

Meanwhile, as they would probably say on some poxy American sitcom, "The Witch is soooooooo dead!"

EU-Nazi latest

*facepalm*

I've made the mistake of commenting at Harry's Place. Funny what you find there; From the comments - one 'mettaculture' (6th November, 10.02pm)

"This concern to regulate both powerful corporate control of commercial media because it is seen as reducing pluralism necessary in a democratic, paired with an equal concern to regulate private and non-commercial commentary by citizens as they are perceived as potentially threatening society by the dissemination of anonymous and ‘polluting’ misinformation and malicious intent, seems odd who could hold such seemingly Stalinist views?"

Stalinist? We're back to the old 'democracy = totalitarian' charge, aren't we? Does 'powerful corporate control of commercial media' not reduce pluralism? Does a low barrier to entry that allows anyone to publish lies about anyone else with impunity not 'pollute' public discourse or serve a malicious intent?

Here's a newsflash: Collective action within the bounds of liberal democracy is not totalitarian. And, as such, I repeat, Hazel is broadly right.

Here's another: The witch is dead.

We've already had to bail out the banks because their failure poses a systemic threat to our financial system. A public service model of the media is under direct threat at the moment - and only collective action will prevent the systemic failure that the such a collapse would cause. And for a pittance by comparision to the hand-out that City fat-cats have been given in the last couple of months.

Here's the text of Labour's Clause four:

"....by the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more than we achieve alone, so as to create for each of us the means to realise our true potential and for all of us a community in which power, wealth and opportunity are in the hands of the many, not the few, where the rights we enjoy reflect the duties we owe, and where we live together, freely, in a spirit of solidarity, tolerance and respect."

Personally, I preferred the previous version, but to be honest, even Blair's anodyne replacement needs to be repeated again and again in days like these.

Not In My Name!!!?!!

I'd just like to translate what Andy Burnham said here, because I think that Guido is absolutely spot on - and he has put Iain Dale firmly in his place here.

Here is an account of Andy Burnham discussing his 'plans' for TV and Internet regulation:

"He said that perhaps the wider [TV] industry, and government, had accepted the idea that the Internet was "beyond legal reach" and was a "space where governments can't go".....

....Burnham said that he would like to "tighten up" online content and services and "lighten up" some regulatory burdens around the TV industry"....

.... "It is a new sign of our approach," he said. "It is not just about copyright or intellectual property but [things like] taste and decency in the online world. The time will come to say what are the direct interventions [needed, if any]"...

This is, of course, ZaNuLieBore-speak for the following.

"If anyone says anything that I disapprove of, they will be dragged before a summary tribunal, presided over by myself, and WHEN they are found guilty, they will be subjected to death by scaphism."

Absolutely deplorable!!

It's slightly odd that Iain Dale is still around to have such a conversation - after all, the EUNazis were supposed to have put him out of business by now if my reading of this post a while back was accurate?

Oh, while we're on the subject of Internet regulation, could I strongly suggest that if you ever do have any facts or content to add to Iain Dale's site - ones that contradict the self-serving nature of the post in question - that you make sure that you publish a copy of them on your own blog as well as in Iain's comments?

That post (link - previous para) was based upon a wilful misreading of an EU draft directive. I know a fair bit about the draft directive in question, and I explained in some detail why Iain's post was narcissistic drivel about how The Sword Of Truth was not going to be CENSORED by The Man at the time. I did explain, honest!

In the meantime, that comment has somehow ... disappeared! Perhaps The Man has hacked into Iain's site and deleted comments in the same way that John Redwood has been hacked by .... er .... REDS .... (that's enough witless paranoia - Ed)

Perhaps Andy Burnham could regulate to stop this kind of self-serving censorship of comments threads? In the meantime, I wonder if Tim Ireland's cleverness with Google Cache can rescue the comment in question?

The spEak You’re bRanes movement.

If the views featured on the spEak You’re bRanes site were ever to coalesce into a political movement, this would be their bulletin board.

Whooda thunkit?

"...while Italy said it would spend as much as was needed, without giving any exact figures."

And everyone else is linking to Tom Freeman's black day for journalism, so I suppose I should do as well.

"A culture of Fascism"

With it's dysfunctional legal system, the rampant corruption, the omnipresent criminality at all levels of society, it's disgraceful victimisation of minorities, and its police force with a 'culture of fascism', Italy would not be allowed to join the EU if it were to apply to join today.

It's time for Italy to be kicked out of the EU.

There's a Facebooky group thing you can join if you agree with this.

The question that the Irish should have been asked

While referendums are a hugely anti-democratic feature of public life, wherever they occur under whatever circumstances, you'd think that those who advocate them would at least have the brains to ask the question properly. For intance, why weren't the Irish asked ... "Lisbon .... or Nice?"

The answer is, of course, that referendums can only ever be used to ask stupid questions.