Fun and games with ballot papers

[Joseph K]

Also the term "communism" as applied to the E Bloc, then China and Cuba in the Cold War era, would have been an oxymoron to Lenin, who put its establishment far into the future, after socialism had done away with the money economy. Arguably it's still valid to speak of "primitive communism" as a stage in early human social evolution between hunter-gatherer and feudalism.



I would say socialism is any a system of common ownership, whether partial within a capitalist system (eg a co-operative), whereras social democracy refers to the type of system known as mixed economy. One of the original ideas of public ownership was to "prove" companies could operate more efficiently than those in private hands and out-compete them; however the top-down Fabian mini-Stalinist way of running them was to their discredit and undoubtedly was part of their undoing; some of the unions facing mass redundancies in the 1970s and 80s collaborated with the Institute of Workers Control and came up with workers' plans for alternative socially useful environmentally safe products which were claimed to be profitably saleable on the market, and were turned down by the TUC, with the support of the Communist Party by the way, as outside the remit of trade unionism, ie to improve wages and conditions only - and rejected by the Wilson and Callaghan governments, with Tony Benn the only Cabinet member in support . People should remember all this when they talk about wanting "real" labour governments, but it is not of course on the history syllabus. Most of the UK's publicly owned industries and services were taken over as essential infrastructural back-ups to the private sector, having been nationalised in the first place because they were either badly run in private hands or near-bankrupt, and their financial operating criteria were indistinguishable to their workers from private firms, which made them easy ideological targets for the tories and their press - taxpayers' money funding inefficient businesses etc.



Quite.

[eighthobstruction]

Also the term "communism" as applied to the E Bloc, then China and Cuba in the Cold War era, would have been an oxymoron to Lenin, who put its establishment far into the future, after socialism had done away with the money economy. Arguably it's still valid to speak of "primitive communism" as a stage in early human social evolution between hunter-gatherer and feudalism.



I would say socialism is any a system of common ownership, whether partial within a capitalist system (eg a co-operative), whereras social democracy refers to the type of system known as mixed economy. One of the original ideas of public ownership was to "prove" companies could operate more efficiently than those in private hands and out-compete them; however the top-down Fabian mini-Stalinist way of running them was to their discredit and undoubtedly was part of their undoing; some of the unions facing mass redundancies in the 1970s and 80s collaborated with the Institute of Workers Control and came up with workers' plans for alternative socially useful environmentally safe products which were claimed to be profitably saleable on the market, and were turned down by the TUC, with the support of the Communist Party by the way, as outside the remit of trade unionism, ie to improve wages and conditions only - and rejected by the Wilson and Callaghan governments, with Tony Benn the only Cabinet member in support . People should remember all this when they talk about wanting "real" labour governments, but it is not of course on the history syllabus. Most of the UK's publicly owned industries and services were taken over as essential infrastructural back-ups to the private sector, having been nationalised in the first place because they were either badly run in private hands or near-bankrupt, and their financial operating criteria were indistinguishable to their workers from private firms, which made them easy ideological targets for the tories and their press - taxpayers' money funding inefficient businesses etc.

But how does this [your] assessment/system stand up when a schematic is placed above it that takes in [details/reflects] the society that is NOW [and for some time] is so marginalised and unequal....not just in money terms, but also education/intelligence/innovation/initiative/confidense etc etc etc. There has been talk of lack of mobility these last few years. What were the terms of this debate?To become a doctor /accountant/ engineer or to be a manager earning that £80k that has become so recently prominent as mark. Or to be anyone in 'commerce'/money making a heavy wadd; are these studies analysing mobility in that sense - in the sense of consumer mobility(2 New leased cars on the drive way of a lovely house, with garden, and a decent holiday abroadf) Or mobility from wage slave in a company [big or small] to a self employed plumber/accountant/pensions advisor/dog psychiatrist/scent/aroma specialist....Hows the assessment holding up now. Some of these Leavers in some senses can be/ are on the level of the American Survivalist in their liberally spread trenchant view of how society should be. Who should be helped, how much help and some punishment at the end if still wayward ( of course the reward is to be normal ahem). Sorry to go all JGBallard here - The Dialectic is shattered into thousands upon thousands of fragment - then add the Global fragments and now climate change....my question is , "Hows it all looking"....lol {sorry for any mistakes, my dylexia cocks up my concept}.....but since I have written it.....

[Bryn]

Just signed this.

[MrGongGong]

Just signed this.

[Andy Freude]

Just signed this.

I think I signed an earlier version of this a couple of years ago, but I signed this one too.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I think I signed an earlier version of this a couple of years ago, but I signed this one too.

[LMcD]

I've just signed.

[Serial_Apologist]

But how does this [your] assessment/system stand up when a schematic is placed above it that takes in [details/reflects] the society that is NOW [and for some time] is so marginalised and unequal....not just in money terms, but also education/intelligence/innovation/initiative/confidense etc etc etc. There has been talk of lack of mobility these last few years. What were the terms of this debate?To become a doctor /accountant/ engineer or to be a manager earning that £80k that has become so recently prominent as mark. Or to be anyone in 'commerce'/money making a heavy wadd; are these studies analysing mobility in that sense - in the sense of consumer mobility(2 New leased cars on the drive way of a lovely house, with garden, and a decent holiday abroadf) Or mobility from wage slave in a company [big or small] to a self employed plumber/accountant/pensions advisor/dog psychiatrist/scent/aroma specialist....Hows the assessment holding up now. Some of these Leavers in some senses can be/ are on the level of the American Survivalist in their liberally spread trenchant view of how society should be. Who should be helped, how much help and some punishment at the end if still wayward ( of course the reward is to be normal ahem). Sorry to go all JGBallard here - The Dialectic is shattered into thousands upon thousands of fragment - then add the Global fragments and now climate change....my question is , "Hows it all looking"....lol {sorry for any mistakes, my dylexia cocks up my concept}.....but since I have written it.....

I would think pretty badly, were one to imagine or dream up some happiness index with common read-across criteria: those at the bottom having difficulties getting onto the bottom rung of the ladder can't feel they belong to mainstream society and safeguarding into old age; those in the middle are more insecure in material terms than they have ever been as regards long-term career prospects and that sense of loyalty once always been instilled as the main bequest and reward for early effort, education and character-building; those at the top who were made to feel pride in achievement and material legacies to pass onto their offspring or spirit away in safe foreign trusts, who in their heart of hearts know deep down that they are as much at the mercy of ecological degradation as their lessers. The latter could now prove the clinching factor, rather as the enforced social togetherness of WW2 temporarily levelled out pre-existing feelings of exclusivity born of privileged background, thereby creating the conditions that allowed for the founding of the NHS among other progressive reforms. Certainly a less unequal, exclusive and more involving society would slow things down; but it's not down to nature (surely?) that aspirations differ according to what you are born into; and it could all be to the good if it leads to a habitable future.

[eighthobstruction]

....indeed couldn't have said it better myself....i'm hoping for a habitable future....I've booked a cruise....Leeds Liverpool Canal.....


....hoping to make a lot of money with the new Happiness Index App I've just invented [it's got a common read-across criteria (but you can turn it off if it offends)]

[Globaltruth]

In fact the Conservative who won in Bolsover to replace Skinner is Mark Fletcher, a former director at Synergix. They are a private healthcare company that serves the NHS. Just pause a moment to allow the irony to register then move on. Nothing to see here.

[Dave2002]

This might interest you Dave





(I tried to make a more nuanced election results map. It runs from blue (100% Conservative) via grey to red (100% non-Conservative, ie Lab + LD + SNP + etc).

The UK is more complex than the bright, bombastic, winner-takes-all maps show. Much of it is literally shades of grey. Obviously this still isn’t nuanced enough: ‘non-Conservative’ is a rather broad category, and I left off Northern Ireland which was just a bright red block given the lack of Tories there!

I was inspired to do this after making a similar map of the EU referendum. Maps of brightly-coloured regions were part of the toxic polarisation of that issue, with whole regions which were only 52:48 one way or the other labelled ‘leave’ or ‘remain’. Reality is again greyer.

With this election, while headlines focus on a massive landslide (which in reality is just over 10% of seats changing hands), the country is a mush of grey. All those complex, fascinating, sometimes-crazy opinions, swirling round, reduced to soundbites and narratives.

The election map didn’t entirely confirm my preconceptions: I was expecting it to be slightly greyer like the referendum one, and was surprised at the intensity of some blues and reds. (The localised bright reds are of course why the Tories needed the fewest votes per seat won.)

But, for deflated liberals, remainers, lovers of the social safety net and those of us simply baffled that anyone could vote for a racist, homophobic, womanising, lying, policy-vacuum fridge-hiding coward, look at how grey that map is and take some small comfort. Unfortunately our electoral and parliamentary system means that that’s enough to ride roughshod over the majority of voters’ wishes, our constitution and more. But at least the views of the UK are a bit more complex than ‘WOO! GET IT DONE BORIS!!’

This will take time, and it will be exhausting, but you’re not alone.

We’ve got this.

Long live shades of grey in politics.)

From Andrew Steele

Interesting indeed - but unfortunately we have to live with the outcome, whatever the interpretation - most probably for a minimum of five years. Will the Conservatives change their spots? Probably not. Survivial of the party (and maybe what's behind it ..) too often seems more important than taking the whole country forward in a sensible way.

To return briefly to comments about Blair - whatever his faults - and there were undoubtedly some (quite a lot ...?) - he did suggest that the climate change issue was really much more important than most of the other problems we all face. I am beginning to think (I have done for some time ...) that he was not wrong about that. Yet even with the modest proposals for ameliorating the effects of man made emissions and the consequent impact on weather systems etc., I don't think these go anywhere near far enough.

Unfortunately, even if the UK does modify behaviour to zero carbon, or preferably even negative carbon, other large countries are going to continue to have an impact.

[Pulcinella]

I've just signed.

Me too!
I think I signed a similar previous one, too.
Rather oddly worded though: for those who voted remain?
How could you prove it?
Surely better as 'for those who would like it' or some such statement.
I'm still hoping that someone of an entrepreneurial bent will design red covers/holders for new blue passports.

[LMcD]

Me too!
I think I signed a similar previous one, too.
Rather oddly worded though: for those who voted remain?
How could you prove it?
Surely better as 'for those who would like it' or some such statement.
I'm still hoping that someone of an entrepreneurial bent will design red covers/holders for new blue passports.

Just out of interest ... is it illegal to carry a British passport encased in its own additional red cover of as tasteful design of choice - after all, the information in the actual passport will be the same and the blue cover could readily be revealed for inspection?

[Pulcinella]

Just out of interest ... is it illegal to carry a British passport encased in its own additional red cover of as tasteful design of choice - after all, the information in the actual passport will be the same and the blue cover could readily be revealed for inspection?

I guess it might not easily fit into scanners, but if you could slip it out of its cover easily enough I don't see why it would illegal. I look forward to seeing all sorts of covers for sale, rather like for mobile phones.

In fact, many already exist:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=passport+covers&adgrpid=52652387709&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI29D3wZ285gIVS7DtCh1_bQqpEAAYAiAAEgJtufD_BwE&hvadid=259090170865&hvdev=t&hvlocphy=1007266&hvnetw=g&hvpos=1t2&hvqmt=e&hvrand=17973581545417831939&hvtargid=kwd-296460967839&hydadcr=28150_1821051&tag=googhydr-21&ref=pd_sl_2qtu676d09_e

[LMcD]

I guess it might not easily fit into scanners, but if you could slip it out of its cover easily enough I don't see why it would illegal. I look forward to seeing all sorts of covers for sale, rather like for mobile phones.

In fact, many already exist:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=passpor...l_2qtu676d09_e

I was thinking of having 'Civis Europe(an)us Sum' embossed on my red outer cover.