Tuesday, September 09, 2008
Toynbee is Almost Right
Since she abandoned her one time political god Gordon Brown and since I found myself drifting to the left, probably through thinking too much about America, Polly Toynbee has started to make some kind of sense. In fact, I find I agree with a surprising amount of this column. The truth is, I think, that the right has abused its three decades of ascendancy in economic thought (especially in the New Labour years) just as the left abused its previous ascendancy. The 1979 Winter of Discontent was the climax of the left's abuse and it now looks as though the Credit Crunch will be the climax of the right's. This analysis suggests a new Thatcher figure will emerge in about 2038 to break the power of corrupted organised labour. The same returns.
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A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
If the people got good government...they wouldn't like it very much. It's a strange kind of rightism that has left the UK with a public debt (when PFI and public sector pension liabilites are included) that is 100% of GDP. Curiously, conservative Major and democrat Clinton left their tenures with balanced budgets/surpluses. Their successors have squandered it. I don't see the left as providing any kind of soultion - particulaly idiots such as Serwoitka and Prentice. Obama is faring Ok in the US by tacking to the right (and McCain is pitching himself as an anti-Washington reformer) and Cameron is in pole position here. I can see a future where the Govt payroll gets smaller though and taxation is simplified.
ReplyDeleteTaking up cycling has done the lassie a power of good, perhaps if she moved to say Carlisle she would improve even further. The nail was very accurately hit on the head in her article and you are right Bryan, action and reaction, perpetual motion again, always the extremes. The poor, as ever, without a voice.
ReplyDeletePolly describes herself as middle class, thus identifying herself with the 72% of the UK population who also define themselves as middle class.
ReplyDeleteIf Polly is Middle class, I'm missing a Whippet. She just about scrapes into Upper Middle but is closer to pure Upper.
She is right about class though, but wrong about its application. It is her and her de haut en bas attitude that are the issue. Her let them eat socialism political viewpoint is the problem: 'my intentions are good and that justifies my over-privileged lifestyle and bugger the outcomes for those lacking the resources I was given at birth'.
Give me the caricatured reactionary Colonel any time. At least he's honest.
Is Polly Toynbee Arabella Weir's role model, do you think? Do either of them have any self-awareness at all?
ReplyDeleteIf you work for your living, how can you be upper class?
ReplyDelete>>This analysis suggests a new Thatcher figure will emerge in about 2038 to break the power of corrupted organised labour. The same returns.<<
ReplyDeleteYou really are drifting to the left with that bit of historicist nonsense.
btw, the credit crunch in no small part came about because Banks using those wonderful computer models (like the climate ones) misunderstood the REAL world of risk, and thus when you think its a safe bet more money piles in and to add to that lots of left wing politicos wanted the banks to stop be so "racist" a lend lots of cash to coloured folks.
"f you work for your living, how can you be upper class?"
ReplyDeleteOr in fact anything but working class, if that is the criteria. The Duke of Wellington worked, but I think he might have taken umbrage at being considered any part of the lower orders.
I believe we are talking social class, not economic.
Wellington worked, but not for a living.
ReplyDeleteI suppose only in England would a discussion about our future begin with who's been beastly about soufflé and then go on to imply that where someone lives is an indication of whether they have something worthwhile to say.
ReplyDeleteLife's a bit short for all this, isn't it? I suspect that too many people on both sides have a vested interest in perpetuating the class thing. If we really wanted to ameliorate it we could do a lot more, beginning with the abolition of private education which is one of the most potent class-drivers of the lot. But we don't, so we won't.
In the meantime, it appears that the electorate is ramping up to punish "right-wing" abuses - if that's the analysis of the mess we're in - by electing a Cabinet of Tory Old Etonians. Let's all take up gardening. It's so much simpler.
I was going to have a quick skim through her article, but then I realised I could spend the two minutes on a round of online Pac- Man instead.
ReplyDeleteYou're changing Bryan. Maybe it's the new diet thing; you're less cantankerous.
ReplyDeleteI think it was a German Christian Democrat who in 1997 said he had met the new hope of left wing politics (Blair) and found him to be more right wing than he was.In times of economic woe, we do tend to turn Government to bail us out, witness Roosevelt's New Deal, Attlee's Labour landslide and now Northern Rock and Fannie Mae. But Labour have screwed up left politics for the next generation - Outreach Workers, Equal Opps, ideologues who condemn religious fundamentalism (for Christians, but not Muslims). And folks also believe they are paying too much in tax (and they're probably right). David Frum in a thoughtful NYT piece last week suggested the Republican base is shrinking and the future looks to be Democrat. Can't see the same being the case here for Labour and Tory though. Like the Republicans, we're pretty fed up with big Government (and we have more of it than they do in the States).
ReplyDeleteIn case anyone wonders where all the Americans have disappeared to once the Obama Administration takes office, we'll either be in criticism/self-criticism sessions or undergoing sensitivity training. We shall in turn overcome any hint of class distinction within our society, marching forward together in perfect harmony. In consequence, we won't have time to get much work done, so you can forget about any further advances of neoliberalism. You might want to read up on economic nationalism, particularly the American System.
ReplyDeleteOur 47 million middle school to college age students will be busy toiling away for the greater good in a number of Obama's mandatory public service schemes
The other 250 million of us will be drafted into new or expanded service corps such under Obama's "Plan for Universal Voluntary Citizen Service." Thus far, Obama has announced plans for a Green Job Corps, a YouthBuild Program, expanding AmeriCorps and VISTA, an Experience Corps, a Senior Corps, a Classroom Corps, a Health Corps, a Clean Energy Corps, a Veterans Corps, a Homeland Security Corps, expanding the Peace Corps, and a Global Energy Corps. We are looking forward to Obama's appointment of his National Service Czar.
What Obama means here, however, is in some doubt:
"We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded [as the military]."
Wonder if they'll have uniforms, too. I'd stay away from brown or red if I were them.
(Source information: Obama's website)
It seems obvious that the denial of class is a very important ingredient in the success of consumer capitalism. It's just part of the grand illusion created by neo-liberals to disguise inequality, stifle dissent and suffocate democracy.
ReplyDeleteAnd it's working.
Labour arent rightists they are just in thrall to the super rich and big business...
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