Is anybody actually watching?

[MrGongGong]

You don't have to read this if you find criticism of how politicians use their families distasteful
BUT this woman does know what se is talking about

http://www.mamalewis.com/2015/04/06/the-shocking-truth-about-samantha-camerons-interview/

[Tevot]

I think even the most fervent pro-Union Scot ... and, yes, there are still plenty of them, including myself .... will share Mangerton's sentiments about some of the 'yelping' south of the border about how unfair things are suddenly turning out for the poor English. Dearie me, after all those decades of reading about 'whingeing Scots'. And we still read about the 'English Taxpayer' propping up those ungrateful natives north of the border as if those huge oil and whisky revenues syphoned-off to London had not been happening all those years. And, of course, Scotland is one heck of a lot more than just oil and whisky. There is even talk of the English wanting our water now.

More seriously, I am deeply worried about the way things are going for this country, and I mean the whole of the UK. Scottish Nationalism has always existed and every Scot worthy of the name has at least a bit of it in him or her, but it has been regularly trumped by the realities of the modern world and the common interests of all the people of these islands... until now, apparently.

Though I was relieved by the result of the 'Independence' referendum I was also struck by the relatively close result ... it was never 'decisive' as the pro-Union media claimed. Instead, it just made matters more uncertain and all because David Cameron (like Thatcher before him) thought he could use the Scots (of all people!) for political advantage. The Complete & Utter Fools.

Cameron may have had a Scottish granddaddy or whatever but he obviously hadn't read his history books properly and learned what a stubbornly proud and determinedly bloody-minded lot we can be, and, sadly, that has not always been in our better interests.

The dangerous thing for me is that people now seem to be voting for things about which they haven't really a clue as to what it will actually mean in reality, whether that be for the SNP or UKIP. Oh yes, just break away from our close friends, neighbours and even relatives in the rest of the UK or Europe and it'll suddenly be Paradise Gained. Jus' like that ... pure Tommy Cooper Magic. Oh dear, it's not just Cameron who hasn't learned the clear and often bitter lessons of human history!

Personal evidence exists for this voter ignorance. I have four dearly-loved female siblings who are all pro-SNP, two of whom voted 'Yes' in the referendum, the other two being unable as one has lived near London for half-a-century and the other lives in the USA.

When I asked one of the two actual voters why she had voted 'Yes' the answer ranged from 'well, I like Alex Salmond, he stands up for us' to 'I think it's high time for a change'. The one in England said she would have voted 'yes' because she is an active member of CND and believes in scrapping Trident. That's clear enough, at least. What would happen to a non-Trident Scotland (and the rest of the UK) after 'independence' is slightly less clear. The one who lives in the USA said Scotland should be 'a free country'.

Bizarrely, the remaining sibling who voted ''Yes', and who didn't reveal her reason for doing so, has since been spotted on television, sporting a red-white-and-blue hat, and flaunting a huge Union Flag in support of Andy Murray and the UK Davis Cup team last month in Glasgow ....

Sometimes I honestly don't know whether to howl with laughter or to burst into floods of tears, but up until now, at least, I have opted for the former!

Happy Easter, everyone!

Well put PG... Coming from what would appear to be an increasingly obsolescent British background ( late dad a Yorkshire man, mum born in Glasgow but to this day has an Ulster brogue - went to school there and it sticks despite having lived in England for the past 60 years) I also don't know whether to laugh or cry at the choices posed in this election or its potential outcome...

Unintended consequences indeed. I do feel that over the past 30 to 40 years there has been a widening disconnect between Westminster and the rest of us. Representative democracy has - I fear - been sold out...


Tevot

[teamsaint]

Do most people really think that there is a little pot somewhere with their NI contributions in it?

I wouldn't have thought so. I would think most people think they are building an entitlement.

I was also under the , perhaps mistaken , impression that with the "pensions guarantee", NI contributions are pretty meaningless at the personal level.

But then again, its hard to stay awake when NI is being discussed.

Unless you are self employed, and paying 2 kinds of NI for no tangible benefit, which is pretty scandalous.

"Esoteric Chamber Music Composers of the world, Unite and take over....." as Mozzer said, I think.

[ahinton]

You don't have to read this if you find criticism of how politicians use their families distasteful
BUT this woman does know what se is talking about

http://www.mamalewis.com/2015/04/06/...ons-interview/

Yet no one, including the various commentators on the piece, seems to have thought for one moment to ascribe blame to - or even question the motives and intentions of - the Mail on Sunday for agreeing to conduct this "interview" with a view to printing this stuff; it might also be enlightening to discover the precise circumstances that brought it about in the first place - i.e. who motivated / pressurised whom and in what particular ways in order to set up and bring about the "interview", if indeed that's what it actually was. And, while we're about it, the party political capital that anyone might be daft enought to think could be made out of this is surely undermined when one remembers that something similar had earlier happened to Gordon and Sarah Brown (the death of their disbled child, that is, not the menace of a Mail on Sunday "interview" about it)...

[ahinton]

Do most people really think that there is a little pot somewhere with their NI contributions in it?

Well, I would find it surprising if they did, yet it's hard not to arrive at such an assumption given that so few have sought to question the quasi-Ponzi nature of the scheme into which almost all of them have participated with their wallets.

I would think most people think they are building an entitlement.

I don't know if that's the case but, if and to the extent that it might be so, "most people" have allowed themselves to be well and truly hoodwinked.

I was also under the , perhaps mistaken , impression that with the "pensions guarantee", NI contributions are pretty meaningless at the personal level.

I do not see any way in which either pensions or state benefits can be "guaranteed".

But then again, its hard to stay awake when NI is being discussed.

Perhaps that's why successive governments of various hues have so successfully gotten away with propagating the myth of "National Insurance"!

Unless you are self employed, and paying 2 kinds of NI for no tangible benefit, which is pretty scandalous.

No payments of NIC by anyone - employer, employee, self-employed or others - lead directly to any "tangible benefit" to anyone other than those entitled to state benefits various as they are paid out by government to those people within a fortnight of so of receipt.

"Esoteric Chamber Music Composers of the world, Unite and take over....." as Mozzer said, I think.

I cannot speak for any other composers on this, but I have no personal wish to "take over" responsiblity for any of this beyond merely drawing attention to its shortcomings and the sheer dishonesty of all governments in perpetuating it.

[P. G. Tipps]

According to the latest opinion poll in Scotland more people apparently believe it it is more important for the government to increase spending on public services than to reduce the deficit ...

[Tevot]

Nothing wrong with that imho ... And we shall see the outcome in May

[ahinton]

According to the latest opinion poll in Scotland more people apparently believe it it is more important for the government to increase spending on public services than to reduce the deficit ...

Never mind opinion polls on this in Scotland, the more that spending on public services decreases, the more repercussions there inevitably are in the private sector and one obvious consequnce of both is that tax revenues do not go up as they otherwise might; the more that's cut back, the less the taxable earnings and profits that are made. Does that strike you as amounting to a positive move towards solution of a national deficit?

[ahinton]

Nothing wrong with that imho ... And we shall see the outcome in May

Or not (by which I mean lack of conclusive outcome, not lack of any outcome, of couse); I daresay that some Scots and Welsh living in England who are at least as disaffected by Westmonster government regret not having the opportunity to vote for SNP and Plaid Cymru respectively and, if they did have it, the absence of any conclusive result would surely be a foregone conclusion rather than the mere likelihood that pertains now?

[P. G. Tipps]

Never mind opinion polls on this in Scotland, the more that spending on public services decreases, the more repercussions there inevitably are in the private sector and one obvious consequnce of both is that tax revenues do not go up as they otherwise might; the more that's cut back, the less the taxable earnings and profits that are made. Does that strike you as amounting to a positive move towards solution of a national deficit?

If you are asking me whether I'd much prefer to continue spending money on myself on borrowed money than reduce my debt then the answer has to be 'yes'. Of course carrying on spending is 'positive' and paying it back an undoubted 'negative'. I think we'd all agree on that.

However, in the real world, Mr Hinton ... in the real world ...

[MrGongGong]

If you are asking me whether I'd much prefer to continue spending money on myself on borrowed money than reduce my debt then the answer has to be 'yes'. Of course carrying on spending is 'positive' and paying it back an undoubted 'negative'. I think we'd all agree on that.

However, in the real world, Mr Hinton ... in the real world ...

Nations are not people
Sometimes you need to invest in infrastructure and people
In your "real" world you will have to spend the money anyway regardless

The idea that somehow we will all benefit by making the most vulnerable worse off is a lie.

[ahinton]

If you are asking me whether I'd much prefer to continue spending money on myself on borrowed money than reduce my debt then the answer has to be 'yes'. Of course carrying on spending is 'positive' and paying it back an undoubted 'negative'. I think we'd all agree on that.

However, in the real world, Mr Hinton ... in the real world ...

Should I assume that you couldn't think how to end that incomplete sentence?

Anyway, I wasn't asking you about your personal spending and borrowing habits or your wishes in respect of either. While you ponder on the remainder of your unfinished sentence, why not also ponder on the sheer amounts of money paid in salaries to employees out of borrowed funds rather than corporate profits? Should no companies ever borrow. Should individuals not borrow? How would some people fund their university education, costs of transport to and from work, housing costs without borrowing sums that they can have little idea how well or soon they can pay back, especially when government cutbacks damage their ability to do so?

Furthermore, you mention "debt" whereas what was under discussion was the national deficit, which is not the same thing.

[ahinton]

Nations are not people

Indeed not.

Sometimes you need to invest in infrastructure and people

"Sometimes"? Many times, surely?!

In your "real" world you will have to spend the money anyway regardless

The reality of Mr Tipps' world is something of which I remain to be convinced...

The idea that somehow we will all benefit by making the most vulnerable worse off is a lie.

It's also an absurdity - and a gratuitously patronising one at that.

[MrGongGong]

The reality of Mr Tipps' world is something of which I remain to be convinced...

Folks who go on about "the real world" (and aren't talking recording studios ) always make my hackles rise

[ahinton]

Folks who go on about "the real world" (and aren't talking recording studios ) always make my hackles rise

More often than not, they make my pupils dilate (and I am not a teacher); we all react in different ways, though! - which is all prt of life's rich Tippestry, I suppose...