ON THE Blackpool Gasjet comments you will often see a commenter named fib-dem who posts banal anti-Conservative slogans on every topic, however relevant to the subject matter the comment is. “Same old stories, you can’t trust the Tories” and “Welcome to Planet Cameron” can often be observed and are regularly given the thumbs-down by other commenters on the new Gasjet commenting system.
The thing is, though, the views of fib-dem are starting to represent not just the views of the opponents of the Conservative Party but also those who backed them in the 2010 general election. Today, the Telegraph are running a story that confirms this, stating that according to the Tories’ own research – by Lord Ashcroft, no less – voters who backed the blue team in 2010 are turning away from the party and in particular Call Me Dave.
I had a family gathering on Wednesday night and being the exciting bunch we are we brought up the subject of Cameron. As a family with a history of self employment and no public sector, state dependant aspects it should be true that the traditional meritocratic values encompassed by true Conservative ideology are those that gain support from us.
What actually happened was that Cameron was dismissed as “a waste of space” by everyone with respect to his reign as Prime Minister, with everyone stating that they would either not vote or vote for a no-hoper like UKIP.
Cameron has done a couple of good things: the academies programme for schools is good and so are the pension reforms within the public sector. I know Labour don’t think the latter is good (even though they themselves would do it), but remember this is written by someone whose politics lean to the right.
However there’s an overwhelming about of bad, including;
- Promised EU referendum but refused to give one once elected
- Stupid, out of touch taxes – pasty tax, caravan tax, pensioners tax, charity tax
- No action on fuel duty
- No action on tax havens and tax dodging by individuals and companies
- No action on bankers and bonuses
- Tough action on Big Six utility firms is a press release telling people to use less energy if they want lower bills
- Tax cut for his rich champagne guzzling mates, tax rises and inflation for the poor
- Still printing more money which banks are stashing, not lending
- Guilty by association with dodgy phone hacking media moguls
- U-turns breed lack of confidence
- Olympics security balls up and arrangements for multinational sponsors to pay no tax
Cameron is neither representative of grass roots Tories nor people in general. In 2010, people voted Tory, not Cameron, whereas in 1997 people would have voted Blair regardless of the party he led.
Tories are burdened with a stereotype that they are all top hat and tails toffs who live in an ivory tower and are members of an old boys club. It’s a stupid stereotype, but one exploited (sometimes unsuccessfully) by opposition parties. Unfortunately David Cameron and George Osborne fit that stereotype, and are not helping themselves by firing tax hikes down to the poor whilst they and their cronies are perceived to be avoiding paying any.
Originally the wealth of MPs was important because it was believed that it offered a resistance to outside influence, for example bribes. It’s no surprise then that many leading politicials, regardless of party, are millionaires. Miliband is, Balls is, Clegg is, Harman is, and so on. Even Lord John Prescott probably is by now, and the only interesting things he did were punching a member of the public and knocking off his secretary (in his grace and favour apartment, no less).
Dave and George are of course millionaires, too.
Now, I am not saying this doesn’t apply to any of the Labour lot but the main problem with Cameron and Osborne is not that their bank account has a larger number at the bottom of it than mine, but that they are from a privileged elite who have never had to live amongst the great unwashed. Because of this, they look out of touch, they act out of touch, their policies are out of touch and they don’t seem to give a toss.
This year’s budget of U-turns gives the impression that George Osborne is cluelessly tinkering in real-time with the national spreadsheet:
George: “Hmm, Dave, what happens if we change this …chocks away old boy!”
<public outcry>
Dave: “Quick, George, the peasants are revolting! Change it back!”
This amateurish, blasé management indicates a total lack of confidence in their own policies and a total lack of leadership. Not only that, it shows that rather than coming up with innovative measures to stimulate the economy – a topic of primary importance for all voters – Cameron and Osborne would rather meddle with triviality, like debating whether a pasty that has been cooked but allowed to cool constitutes hot food.
For their entire lives, Osborne and Cameron have been segregated from the hoi polloi and have associated only with aristocratic Eton alumni. In part due to wealth, neither has ever had a real job. How do you identify with people like that? We can’t empathise with them, and they can’t empathise with us. Does Cameron deserve to be Prime Minister?
In the feudal system the rulers fought with the footsoldiers. Even going back to classical times they did. This created unbreakable respect, camaraderie and support for the ruler regardless of his or her policy. But in 2012 Britain we are ruled by two buffoons who are unaffected by any of the actions they take, have never lived as one of us, are not making sacrifices with us, and never will. They claim ‘we are all in this together’, but they don’t eat pasties, they don’t own caravans, they don’t baulk at the cost of fuel at petrol stations, they don’t think twice about how much their gas bill is, etcetera.
As fib-dem says so often on the Gasjet, it is as if David Cameron does live on a planet all of his own.
You might say this applies to all Tory MPs. Many were, like many Labour and Liberal Democrats, born into incredible wealth, went to a fee paying school and then Oxbridge, but this did not stop them getting proper jobs and conducting a normal lifestyle. Yes, they might have had a bigger house or a bigger car, but their lifestyle was that of a person who got up every day for work and had to associate with and accept as colleagues people from different backgrounds. Cameron and Osborne have never had to do this, and unlike Labour they still don’t because most Tory MPs are from privileged backgrounds.
Some people say Tony Blair was little different from these boys. No, he’s not descended from royalty like Call Me Dave (although many Labour voters thought he was descended from a higher being), but he still went to a fee paying private school and then Oxford university. Blair was never part of the elite, though. He was a bright kid that got into Oxford but he really wanted to be a rock musician. He left university with a second class degree and got a proper job as a barrister.
Tony Blair could identify with people, and vice-versa.
David Cameron says he identifies with people, but nobody believes him.
It’s too late for Dave, he’s had his chance at driving HMS Britain but he’s wrecked it like Captain Schettino. He should now either call that EU referendum or start preparing to watch Miliband and Balls run the country into the ground in 2015.
It is no wonder Tory voters can’t say, “…but I don’t support Cameron” fast enough.
Nothing on immigration either and borrowing increased this month,the conservatives conserve nothing,UKIP all the way!
This country has been bad and so unequal for a very long time. In fact it’s now almost irredeemable. But Camercon has actually produced the most Marie Antionettesque society ever in just over two years. Even worse than at the height of Thatcher with the Big Bang and Yuppieism. Let them eat cake!
Firstly thank you for not tarnishing me with the same brush as fib dem I do like to give my opinion as we all do and I believe I at least put forward a reasonable argument for debate however badly worded at times. As I have stated many of the Tory policies I do agree with (benefit caps etc,) however these are being implemented to harshly and should be brought in over a period of time so they dont come over as draconian. People who have a family may rely on benefits but if we restrict future generations to a limit on child benefit they can then at least have the choice of being skint and paying for their own kids to do it now will just punish the children. Its time we stopped paying for Illegal immigrants something the Torys want to achieve I also agree with doing away with our relationship with the ECHR something many working class people would happily vote for same goes for the EU. If Cameron is using this as a vote winner and does not come good on this he will not be forgiven by the working classes and will be derided far more than Thatcher ever did.
Cameron hasnt helped himself with his vile tongue we expect more from our PM than someone who has to stoop as low as name calling. As for Osborne he hardly smacks of confidence and the recent times poll which shows 45% of people who took the poll want him sacking say what you like about Brown he always came across as assertive and knew which way he wanted to take the economy. As a contractor I have seen first hand the effect of the cuts on the private sector and still believe they are to drastic a friend of mine was employing 40 men not so long back all locals he is now down to 3 this cannot be good for the economy we desperately need growth hence the increase in spending we are now seeing and the extra borrowing the worry is we are not getting the growth from that borrowing something labour did manage to do.I cannot foresee Osborne lasting the duration and if Cameron wants to last he needs to be brutal and get rid of the dead wood in the cabinet who are letting him down (including May).
Immigration is necessary for continued growth whilst all parties might say they want to cut it the reality is none do anything about it. I don’t expect this to be different this time.
Trouble it whatever it is they do they cannot get that growth. This is not a Tory thing any party currently in power would be in the same position.
It finally has come down to a race to the bottom.
What we experienced through the early years of this Century up to the Lehmans crash was a bubble, a debt created bubble nothing else. We will never again see the economy reach the dizzy heights it did then unless they can pull off the main feat of inflating that bubble again.
This what we are experiencing now is the new normality…… Get used to it folks..
http://www.economist.com/node/21555564
As this article hints, people were sold a dream. A dream of retiring at 60, so they could go windsurfing next to their second home. While the dream was being peddled, the exact opposite was happening to their reality. Credit helped to smooth things over.
But that’s all changing now.
You’ll work until 70, receive almost no pension, struggle to get decent medical treatment and leave nothing for any of your children. Because someone, somewhere else in the world is prepared to live that way.
Again as this article mentions, it’s been going on for decades. How come no politicians or economists spotted this sometime around say 1997 when the dot com bubble – the first of the recent bubbles – was being inflated?
Perhaps it’s because the cheap credit usefully masked the unpleasant effects of globalisation, which as the article points out, won’t be going away.
They replaced a job for life with affluence for life… then they took the affluence for life away, but the job for life isn’t coming back.
The net effect is that people have been left with less than they started with.
Only the most naive among the population would imagine that this happened by accident.
Geez I have never equated immigration with growth quite the opposite,In my opinion it creates unemployment and a strain on the economy. I could never understand labour and tory mps trying to justify our mebership in the EU. Forget waiting for the EU residents collecting pensions what about all the working/family tax benefits they can claim even if their kids are not in this country.The family tax benefit is easily exploited just how do we know that the children being claimed for are actually part of the claimants family a few white lies and they get the benefit. Then there is the cost to the NHS should the NHS created for curing peoples ailments be providing translators for people who have not contributed? Lets get out of this money pit and create our own growth.
Geezer wont immigrants want to retire have pensions etc, is this not a vicious circle just deferring the problem for the next generation: its surely unsustainable and a recipie for a meltdown?
Thers no party with a view on the population (optimum) of this country,we can only grow enough food for 50% at best,god help us if we were cut off.
Its time for radical control measures and then means dealing with the underclass, and pseudo disabled who rely on immigrants to pay taxes to keep them in benefits!
Of course they will mate the ones that choose to stay in any event….
People need to understand that the fiat monetary system that is in widespread use throughout the world is nothing more than a glorified ponzi scheme. Of course for any pyramid scheme to work it needs new entrants in at the bottom to pay out for those at the top.. As the birthrates of the UK has been falling over recent decades the decision was made to allow immigration to be able to allow the growth to keep the ponzi afloat. Closer EU integration and economic migration across member nations borders is just another extension of this.
The social problems which have ballooned in recent years are a consequence of this. An example would be that economic migrants have taken all the low paid work in the UK. Subsequently young people here are forced onto the welfare state and this is now becoming an intergenerational problem with whole family’s reliant on the taxpayer.
When I left school (Mid 70′s and at 16) it wasn’t like this, everyone walked out the school gate on a Friday and into work on the Monday.
Putting this into context of the 3 party electoral system in the UK is meaningless. None of the parties have the cojones to be able to fix this. If one were ever even to attempt to fix it they would be out of power for a generation. On that basis it is fair to say that all of them know what needs to be done but know they are toast if they ever tried to do it. On that basis it is meaningless to debate party politics any further we are way past that.
There is simply not the understanding in the UK population on how bad the situation has become.
There is a chap called Chris Martenson he is a former vice president of Pfizer and a respected ‘trend forecaster’ who has put together a series of videos on the challenges facing the World from here on in which also go a long way to explaining why the World is in the situation it is in today.
This video is a condensed version of his full series and will provide some valuable insight as to why we are where we are today.
http://youtu.be/eidQTDjQ5gw
Chris Martenson and the Crash Course for people who would want to google it….
That’s a very bleak view Geezer but sadly not unrealistic one.
The PM of Luxembourg said something similar with respect to the ‘financial crisis’;
cheers Geezer, you are the man!
Below is a link to a short clip featuring a UKIP MEP by the name of Godfrey Bloom. Well worth watching. Makes anyone wonder why all politicians cannot accept the simple reality of today’s situation. Pity politicians like Godfrey are rare.
http://sorisomail.com/email/238743/o-politico-que-representa-realmente-a-populacao.html
what a top guy,please please we must get ukip mps in this country or we are truly fucked.
Just how desperate is Clegg already thinking of dumping the Tory’s for labour after the next election?
I can’t see the Tories being too bothered, and I think the Lib Dems would think twice anyway.
The Tories have lost core support because of the Lib Dem noose around Cameron’s neck, and the Lib Dems have been whittled down to almost extinction following their alliance with Cameron. You would have thought Lib Dem voters would be happy to see some of their policy being implemented as part of a coalition rather than none of it as an exiled third party, but their support has nosedived. Even the “I agree with Nick” campaign before the general election didn’t work, with the Lib Dems losing seats.
The coalition has been bad press for both Tories and Lib Dems, but then people were hoping for an instant fix and return to the borrowing ‘high’ that Labour created. But we have to go cold turkey. There is no cash to spend. We all remember what former Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liam Byrne said, after all.
I think if nothing else, the coalition will bring out more Tory voters who want Tory only government without the Lib Dem burden, and will see the Lib Dem leftie support – who blame the Tories for the dire Lib Dem support – switch to Labour in order to get the Tories out. The result will be a return to punch and judy politics rather than punch, judy and sausages.
Labour isn’t a viable alternative to the coalition. Ed Balls was a party to the economy meltdown, and Militant Miliband is a union puppet. Even if Yvette Cooper takes control of Labour, they will shift further left as she is an ultra left fruitloop. Another ‘Labour lite’ leader like Blair would give them better results in the polls. What’s that? Blair wants to come back you say?
…
Just how desperate are the Torys to lose the next elections? After turning the benefits bunch and the public sector against themselves they now turn on the private sector in the form of contractors. Have this Government not realized that most people are not multi millionairs and as such they need to be trying that bit harder with the remainder of society. Sadly for Cameron the days of bullying people into voting for you have long gone so his name calling and persistant assaults on the economy are doing his party no good. At least Thatcher was memorable the same wont be said of Cameron
I hate them all, tory = labour = lib dem = shite,unless the sheeple wake up we will be in this rut for ever.
Whilst I agree with you Cardy, if you want the millionaires to stop tax dodging, contractors have to stop tax dodging as well by taking cash in hand, although I don’t know why the government have focused on contractors when the spread of cash in hand businesses is a lot more diverse.
On a lighter note Mitt Romney has been in the backside of Downing Street I hope Cameron enjoyed himself!!!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-18966729
Blackpool is the pits!!!
http://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/news/regional/15-town-centres-to-share-1-5m-1-4770804
Blackpool loses out again, surprised? I am not, with public sector pimp shitbags like ormand in power the govt must see Blackpool as a money pit.
Off topic Harold!
Although on that one, Blackpool didn’t even bother to apply for it.
there you go, sorry about off topic mate, most angry,this should be with my imminent article, cheers.
Another Tory showing just how to lose the faith of the public Aiden Burley, Having a pop at the olympic ceremony claiming it to be “leftie multi-cultural crap”, the same person who dressed up as a Nazi officer. Another Tory MP claiming to be misunderstood,fancy slating the olympics something Cameron and Osborne are banking on turning round the nations economical crisis. I often wonder about the intelligence of some people do they think people dont read items placed on a public domain like the internet?
He wasn’t slating the Olympics, he was slating the opening ceremony.
As Harold says, it was leftie multi-cultural crap. What’s more, the Olympics was a Labour project that was signed and sealed by the time Cameron took over. So it’s rich to slag him off for much relating to the Olympics (aside from the G4S stuff which quite frankly should have been the straw that broke the camel’s back and got rid of Theresa May).
If Osborne thinks the Olympics is going to be the magic bullet that solves the financial crisis, he should go and burn Danny Alexander at the stake, and then burn himself at the stake. Who would take over though? Labour are certainly not the answer on the economy after doubling the national debt. Dr Cable is an economist and is the business secretary but he doesn’t understand the tax system, so he would be no good.
The government need to cut taxes to stimulate the economy, but not VAT. That won’t create jobs. Neither will niche ‘enterprise zones’; they only benefit industries like aerospace that require government spending in order to exist. The government needs to cut income tax to create jobs. It needs to make it cheaper for firms to employ people, and needs to give people more disposable income. If they make it cheaper for firms to expand, they employ more people, take on more business, and pay much more tax.
Why not cut VAT as well, or least return it to the 17.5% level..
You comment doesn’t make sense. If VAT was cheaper or non existent then consumption of all items on which it is levied increases.
This surely would have the opposite effect of allowing manufacturers to employ to produce more to meet the demand! Lets not forget industry and manufacturing are already shackled with a 20% tax on their energy use anyway as they pay VAT at the standard rate.
As for the Olympic opening ceremony I never realised Isambard Kingdom Brunel had so many culturally diverse assistants. Yes without a doubt it was ‘lefty’ influenced why I don’t know but it did lose something because of it turning it from something what could have been truly breathtaking into something with an underlying statement.
Boyle’s intention was to describe the history and culture of Britain. He had the opportunity to add the diverse bit after the ships arrived post 1948 from the Caribbean. This after all is as much a part of our combined history now as The construction of the Iron Bridge.
If it was truly an accurate demonstration surely it should have had reference to slave ships and the trade union movement which forged industrial relations all set into the timeline in the correct place. Mr Boyle was a bit selective.. All that said I did enjoy the show.
All this discussion about Tax bet not many of you realise what a great tax fiddle the whole Olympic movement is?
http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/commentanalysis/corporatewatch/thegreatolympictaxswindle.aspx
It’s a fair hypothesis geezer, but it only works if there is an increase in market demand for manufactured goods. I think at this moment in time when there is such chaos in the financial world and firms are struggling to afford their current staff levels, people are holding on to their cash in case the worst happens.
Giving people more cash in their hand every month and greater job security, however, might create new spending.
There is no reason why a happy medium of both can’t happen, but I think an income tax cut would be more effective.
cutting tax gives disposable income, simple as
Cardy it was leftie multi cultural crap,lol
“The government need to cut taxes to stimulate the economy, but not VAT. That won’t create jobs. Neither will niche ‘enterprise zones’; they only benefit industries like aerospace that require government spending in order to exist. The government needs to cut income tax to create jobs. It needs to make it cheaper for firms to employ people, and needs to give people more disposable income. If they make it cheaper for firms to expand, they employ more people, take on more business, and pay much more tax”
Phil for PM!
the olympics ceremony ws so PC I had to reach for the sickbag and my SS uniform,lol
where was enoch powell? lol