Green Gone

Over the last week or so, some bright spark, for reasons unknown, has decided to completely destroy a nearby field. This field has not been 'developed' or managed in any way since I can remember, and that's several decades. I remember playing there as a kid, amongst the tree trunks, stinging nettles and grass. That doesn't sound appealiong, but it's nature; wild and free! In all seriousness, while such places might not sound appealing, I like how they look. It is how they were meant to look; not manicured and manufactured artificial environments. 

It saddens me to see someone come along and tear it all down. Now it's a muddy field, the treeline that has demarcated this environment around me like a swaying comfort blanket has been torn down. All that remains is a grotty brown field, left for purposes unknown. There was no consultation or even information. I rang the parish council but they seemed neither to care nor know. All they could say was that there are no official planning applications involving that field, but I doubt anyone would go to the expense of demolishing a field were it not worth their while. 

I have no idea who the landowner is and no idwea what their plans are. Perhaps they intend to plant grass and trees anew, though that would be even more expense. Unfortunately this has come at a cost to the wildlife that flourished there. But nobody cares about these things. The only valid fauna these days is a tractor and a thresher.

The area looks exposed and vulnerable. This is not unlike how I feel these days. It is sad to see the land constantly subjugated in this way. It is not, I feel, necessary. The council are quick to respond, and make a fuss, when land is threatened by housing developers, but here they didn't seem to care. It's just a patch of unused field, it doesn't matter.

Well it does to me. It has character. It was a window into another world. A place of timeless natural beauty with a wonder all its own. A realm one can refresh oneself in a world gone mad. A place free from judgement yet with a charm and a depth unmatched by the artifice of society, with its stage managed show gardens and shrubbery. This is how the world is meant to look even if stinging nettles are a pain in the arse. But that pain is a good thing (perhaps!), it is humbling. We are not meant to be masters of all things, we are meant to have a place within the ecosphere of this planet, yet all we do is destroy it.

In other news, the Paris climate change talks seem to be indicative of these attitudes: so much hot air. Nothing will change, we are too far gone to turn back from the brink. With a world dependent on fossil fuels and little desire amongst the leaders of the world to change this, despite the rhetoric of the talks it is clear we had best prepare ourselves for the climate that is to come. 

Here in Britain we are experiencing what I can only describe as the warmest December I can remember. Further north the country is under water. Floods are threatening to become the new winter and yet what is done about this? People will be forced to spend Christmas in temporary accommodation fighting not the cold weather but the insurance industry while the Tories and their capitalist chums cluck their tongues and sit on their hands. Winter isn't coming.

PCT Phone Call

In the dim and distant past my GP said she'd write to the CMHT regarding...whatever. At this point, I'm running on fumes with regard to mental health. There's not really any support and the people you speak to who claim they are there to help either lie or make claims they then deny. For example, the Aspergers clinician who diagnosed me said she'd speak to the ADD people in the same building. When I chased that up she denied she'd said that.

So this morning a "PCT liaison" rang me in respect of the aforementioned letter. Apparently the ADD people recently said (in respect of my GP contacting them herself) they couldn't diagnose me because they think I have anxiety issues severe enough to taint the diagnosis - maybe they are right.

To be honest, the liaison may well have good intentions, but what can they offer? They can't unseat this government that is ravaging social care. They can't depose the exploitative economic system and the feudal hierarchy and it's brutal system of privilege. Will they offer a seat on the same merry go round that begins and ends with the Positive Step organisation who offers a simple CBT course and then...nothing. In fact the liaison mentioned that they offer talking therapies (something I've engaged in before and found useless), I tried repeatedly to tell her - based on my own experience - they don't. They offer a service for all manner of issues, but it all ends up with the same CBT course. When I tried that it was called 'Beating the Blues' and it was no help.

They are going to ring me tomorrow to book an appointment (because apparently the diary wasn't available this morning to the person calling me - bizarre). I guess we will see where that leads, though I suspect my frustration will be difficult to conceal. I don't want to come off as aloof or disinterested, but it's hard not to be; they tell me they will help draw up an, wait for it, 'action plan'. So it's the same old bollocks by the sound of it. People like action plans they think drawing one up is doing something; it's an element of the whole objectionable world of self-help. Action plans won't effect change in the world, society or economy.

My Brother Hate

It's very depressing watching the decline of our society. I see it everywhere: the malaise mixed with a frustration that borders on malevolence. Everyone, as human beings, senses there is something amiss but few seem to understand what it is and fewer care enough to want change. People are all too comfortable with divisive TV rubbish, binge drinking and jingoism.

It's sa to see this affect people I know. Ever since my friend, who isn't even someone I'm desperately close to, got with his current partner I've perceived a change. It's not that she's the root of all evil, but she's just that kind of ignorant: she spends her time glued to Facebook gossiping while some god awful rubbish is on the TV - such as Benefits Street. She also reads the Sun!

People like this don't seem to bother to criticise what they read, they just consume. They passively interact with the information that is beamed into their consciousness and rarely question it, and that is very dangerous. As a result they become defensive when questioned, which leads to a divisive mentality mixed iwth a persecution complex. As a result I find it very difficult to quesiton the resulting values: I do not want to be seen as arrogant or patronising, but when you have someone that, when their kid asks who got booted off the Apprentice, refers to that candidate, being Asian, as 'poppadom', you have a problem.

Unfortunately he, my friend, has picked up on this kind of intolerance. His attitude towards muslims is troubling. For example reference was made to a muslim that his partner works with (she's a 'raghead' apparently, because...foreigner innit). This person is apparently demanding and unreasonable because of her religious values, but in the context of who is telling me this I have to wonder where the real intolerance lies.

Recently he got into a, thankfully non-serious, RTA involving a lad who he inadvertently hit. It seems there was no injury and, from what he tells me, the kid wasn't watching where he was going. That's entirely believable, but when the N word is used, in reference to the ethnicity of the kid problems arise. He now seems comfortable using that word and was dismissive of the kid and what he perceived his background to be.

This is casual racism and it is something I find desperately difficult to confront. I do not want to be a guest in someone's home and then find myself in a position where I'm telling them how to behave, but racism is unacceptable. I call it casual because it isn't a conscious attempt to hate on people and stir trouble - like Hitler proselytising from the Reichstag. Instead it's an attitude bred by divisive simplistic and ignorant media putting the blame for the ills of a complicated fast pressured society on the minority groups within. So his attitude toward Muslims comes from his perceptions surrounding immigration; they are getting all the new houses. It's nothing of course to do with the fact there aren't enough houses being built.

It's sad to see this happening and I don't know how to deal with it, but I sure as hell do not want to associate with it. I can't be around people like that long term.

No Vote

Second time's the charm?

It looks like we'll be back in the middle east before long. Cameron wanted us in there a couple of years ago, to fight alongside the rebel groups against Assad. Now he wants us in to fight against what those rebel groups became - Daesh - but also we still hate Assad, boo hiss!

This will be the death of Corbyn. I like the guy, but he's still the leader of an exploitative pro-capitalist political entity. He has born torn into by the media since before winning leadership of the party and now faces the mutinous warmongers within Labour that, along with the resentful Blairite portion, will strike hard to unseat him. If that happens Labour will be lost for generations, but they don't care because they have power as capitalists if not in government. 

I remember watching, once in the period Merely Bland was Labour leader, the state opening of Parliament. Both parties, behind their leader like kids in school assembly, filing into the house. Merely Bland and Cameron were walking beside each other chatting and smiling like old friends. In a way they are: comrades in capitalism. Never forgot that image, and neither should you. That's what it's all about. Apparently Mrs Merely Bland went to school with Mrs Osborne and remain chums. Besties!

Corbyn is done for: if he goes against the wishes of his party and forces a whip he will either stuff Cameron and be relentless torn again, portrayed as Jihadi Jez forever more. If he loses he will be targeted as a weak leader, likewise if he allows a free vote. He is, simply put, damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.

So why do we even bother voting any more? This is a system akin to domestic violence - and, like the poor wayward victims thereof, we go back for more, mistaking thuggery for liberty in this case. (I'm sure that was a horrible analogy). We know these parties are all the same, we know they establish hierarchies over us, we know they don't listen (tax credits anyone?) - and we know they need us to be complicit in our own exploitation. To that end, they will tell you that "grandad died fighting t'Nazis so you could vote"; that's just bollocks. He died because the jingoistic propaganda deployed by the ruling elite (whose blood isn't that which gets spilt on the foreign fields and shores) convinced him to take up swords and guns, or because he felt his home was being threatened. It had nothing to do with future generations voting or not.

Direct action is the only solution. We must not legitimise this system. We must not become complicit in our own exploitation.

(PS: I use the term Daesh for two reasons: firstly they hate it, secondly I do not recognise a tyrannical bloodthirsty theocracy as a legitimate society)

The Arrogance of Power

There can be few instances, now, of Tory behaviour that can really come as a surprise; that can be considered shocking. However to witness Phillip Davies, the dishonourable 'gentleman' for Shipley - a place I can only conclude is run by cunts - filibuster a bill whose sole purpose was to ease the cost of parking in hospitals. 

For ninety minutes this inhuman misogynistic piece of utter shit spoke - with the sole purpose of shutting down the vote. 

This is not democracy. This is the politics of the ruling elite at its most venal; a select cabal of Tories who's sole purpose is to sabotage bills they don't like. The rules - inexplicably - do not prevent this. Private members bills have no time limit for talking and so it is quite permissible for one of these scumbags to decide that, instead of having a civilised democratic discussion, they will take the piss. In this case there was a little gang of them and, like the school bullies they no doubt were, they saw the opportunity, and not for the first time, to stomp around and assert their assumed authority.

If this isn't enough to demonstrate how broken are democratic processes are and how exploitative and abusive its agents are, I don't know what it will take. Anyone that can defend this doesn't deserve to live in a civilised society.

Mr Davies is quite happy for the taxpayer to pay for his parking, and his expenses. He is quite happy to waste taxpayer funded Parliamentary time behaving like a petulant child (as most of them are) just to get his way. But what is worse is that he's not alone: people like him don't get to have that power by themselves. He got elected in that constituency - he has support. In fact I bet he has a lot of people who share his evidence-free spiteful politics. That's the shape of the world we live in today; it has lurched painfully to the right thanks to a drip by drop poisoning of the public consciousness thanks to the incessant whining of the media and the dog whistle politics they espouse. Whether it's the muslims, the EU, the scroungers, the foreigners (in general), the red tape, the lefties, the climate, this or that, there is always something held over the necks of the masses that they believe not only to be actual, but to be deliberately set up to trip them up and take their 'hard earned' cash.

Unlike the disgusting Mr Davies.

I would love to believe this could change, but I don't think there's much hope. Unless people rally together, for real, with genuine single minded purpose and refuse to be stopped - as they did during the Poll Tax riot - I don't think the Tories and the likes of Mr Davies have anything to fear. Jeremy Corbyn hasn't got a chance, he will succumb to that same poison as the media will not relent in their assault. Eventually they will be joined by his own party members who will be the ones most willing to stick the knife in finally.

There are plenty of Philip Davies' out there because this system and this society breeds them. They are like ticks that feed on the blood of animals; parasites bred by the system for the purpose of feeding on it. Capitalism continues to convince everyone else this is in their best interests as they are 'encouraged' to work harder while being told to blame any of the above perceived bogeymen as the reason they have to do so. But they receive no extra benefit for doing so and indeed face losing out, which in turn feeds more acrimony. The means of production are still out of their hands and the capitalists make more and gain more power off the backs of their unwitting compliance.

Just as the likes of Davies, and his scummy ilk, want.

Raw

I feel raw. I feel vulnerable, in a way I never really expected.

For a long time a tooth has been bugging me -  one of mine that is; not the errant molar of a neighbour for example. Today I had the offending article removed. I have been dreading it, absolutely dreading it. But as the day wore on that feeling has sublimated into a deep sense of vulnerability; a part of me that has died and is with me no more. Even though it was just a fucked tooth.

Oddly I was expecting to feel better and relieved a lot quicker, but the list of post-extraction requirements, and the repair time, are a great deal more onerous than I imagined. 

It's ridiculous really; right now there are children undergoing chemotherapy, facing cancer and loss of a more profound and painful kind. Why am I complaining?

It is because I am alone. 

No matter the procedure, the company of another makes all the difference. The presence of someone to assure and reassure. A hand to hold. An ear to hear. That is the sense of loss I feel. That, as parts of my body begin to falter (a trend that can only surely increase as the years inevitably and inexorably pass), life starts to diminish. Where once it began with a sense of promise in the flush of youth and opportunity, as purveyed through school and upbringing, it calcifies into missed opportunity and loneliness. Will the world get better? Will society ever really reject the oppression that is sold to us on a daily basis? Will technology save us?

Is this all there is?

I had a call yesterday from my GP having heard back from the ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) people at the Mental Health assessment unit in Bristol. They decided I couldn't qualify for an assessment because they felt I had an underlying anxiety disorder that would, one assumes, skew the results. Perhaps that's true. She was disappointed and asked me how i was doing; "I've been better I told her". 

I didn't have the heart to tell her the tooth.

Bad joke. What can she do? All there is locally is the CBT-peddling ATOS-partnering first port of call known as Positive Step, of whom I have mentioned before. They are the place everyone is sent that isn't an immediate danger or a severely afflicted soul. They are who you are meant to see if there is no one else, and there is no one else. 

The simple reality of a society where people are raised to be there for others is an illusion. Lucky are those that have that in their lives, but if we were to invest in so simple a means of support a great deal could be done. This is the simple free medicine of human contact that will do more for anxiety sufferers than a thousand pills potions and bandwagons like CBT (if it helps you, good luck to you, but it's not the be all and end all).

I guess it just costs too much to care.

Protesting Protest

Last weekend, and into the middle of this week, the People's Assembly, and various affiliates most notably some of the trade unions, visited Manchester with the notion they would somehow send the Tories a message. I wish this were possible. I would love to think that all it took to dethrone the wicked of Westminster was the voice of comfortable protest in the form of the People's Assembly and it's talking shop commentary carousel. Of course the Tories weren't instead, haven't stood down, and have, within their comfortable champagne drenched enclave, pointed, predictably, to their mandate from the election. 

I agree that mandate is paper thin, but it is a mandate and it's going to take more than a few well meaning student union dreamers organising another anodyne march through town. I watched the speeches on Youtube and it's the same faces saying the same platitudes, interchangeable with every speech made previously at other 'protests'. This is ridiculous. I despair of these people, even DPAC are starting to see through this as their cause - some of the bravest people in our society - is not being represented. 

Now I am not saying that Own Jones or Mark Steele or Mark Serwotka or Charlotte Church don't care about the disabled - far from it. I think they do care; more fundamentally I think they - vitally - the attendees are concerned with the issues of austerity.

But it's not fucking enough. 

Four years the People's Assembly Against Austerity has existed and in that time it's been one meeting after another, one comfortable little protest after another. The reason this is a problem is that it's offering false hope and is, in reality, nothing more than a talking shop. 

Don't get me wrong there's a place for this, but we need more precisely because the Tories are not listening. They don't care: look at IDS's performance, doubling down more on his crusade to disenfranchise the disabled under the guise of 'support', look at Jeremy Hunt's treatment of junior doctors, look at Osborne's desperate bid to reduce the state via austerity (he's setting his stall for the job of party leader and, he hopes, next PM). Look at what all these filthy scumbags are doing across the country and ask yourselves if a few shiny student faces, the same token though well-intentioned speakers, and the same speeches, are really cutting the mustard.

The tragedy of it all is that I agree with their speeches. I agree with the sentiments. I am pleased that people attend - it would be way worse if no one bothered. My problem is that it is simply. Not. Enough. The Tories will concede nothing, it will have to be taken; and by doing nothing the opposition to this madness has allowed the media to position protest in the public consciousness as something to be rejected outright. People have come to believe that strike laws are necessary, even though the Tory proposals (which very likely will become law) are obscene. People have been convinced that it is unthinkable to stop work, even for a day, and the longer this goes on, the more difficult it will be to organise a general strike, which I believe is the necessary first step toward taking back the power.

The week before Class War in the east end of London organised their Fuck Parade where they accrued some notoriety for chucking paint at, and intimidating, the people inside and working for the Cereal Killer cafe. I'll be honest, I don't think this was the right move, I think it smacked of ignorance and bully boy tactics by pushing the notion that a cafe selling bowls of cereal is somehow different from, and thus more ostentatious than, a cafe selling a traditional working man's bacon butty or fry up. This is ignorance. 

But as the Tory conference weekend pressed on it occurred to me that maybe, even though they'd targeted the wrong people (a pair of hipsters are not responsible for the gentrification of London, they are merely a soft target), they have the right idea. It's the notion that dare not speak its name: that protest needs to get tougher. I don't want to see violence, but we already have violence - the violence of sanctions, deprivation and destitution; the thuggery of poverty. These things will not be destroyed at their core through anything less than revolutionary struggle. Even the amiable resistance of the People's Assembly falls short of that which we need to transform society. We don't just need a soft shuffle ever so slightly to the left; we need a fucking charge!

Finally, even though the Tories do have power, i have already conceded the truth of their mandate; it is based on a thin majority. Even though, ideologically, they are highly resistant, and (more importantly) even though they have the media and the corporations (and the banks) on their side, they are structurally weak. The Tory membership is tiny and is actually smaller than the support that put Corbyn into the position of leader of the Labour party. When you consider this should be the honeymoon period for any government, the post-coital glow following an election, this is as good as it's going to get for this government. Therefore it is possible to defeat them, though it will not be easy. The problem is: does the People's Assembly have the stomach for Class War?

New Labour?

So Corbyn did it. He's now the leader of our esteemed opposition - at least until the Blairite element shaft him, or the newspapers make his continued leadership untenable and the knives come out anyway. Or perhaps he will make it through 5 years of hell to win the next election, at which point he will be in his early seventies. At that point he is likely going to face another Tory leader as Cameron will, most likely afterwards, make way for Osborne - unless that wiff waff peddling pretend-buffoon and class hater Boris pushes through. Then we could see a world where Boris the posh boy is President Trump's poodle. This of course assumes the Americans are stupid enough to elect that racist misogynist cunt their overlord.

And yet the rhetoric continues: the message of Labour's inherent financial incompetence abounds still, after five years of Tory mismanagement and austerity. Never mind the foodbanks, the dismal failure to restart the economy, to manage the housing benefit bill, to address unemployment (particularly in the young), to 'help' the disabled; people are still being convinced that Tony Gordon Blair Brown tanked the economy. This message was not challenged by Labour, and I'm not even sure John McDonnell is up to the job. Despite losing his job 'sir' (how the fuck did that happen) Vincent Cable is in the media, whining mostly, like an old stink that refuses to leave. Mainly haunting the Guardian like the spectre of a friendly deceased uncle that the family desperately wants to believe in. We'll ignore that he was at the heart of the coalition and, in particular, instrumental in the sale of the Post Office.

But are the cracks starting to show? John McDonnell's strained performance on Question Time the other week - the first time I have ever seen him appear - was heartbreaking as he was forced to apologise for misrepresented comments made over a decade ago. The selective prejudice of a troll in the audience wanting only to score points, ignoring the discussion entirely to focus on his own assumption that John is the sort that would think IRA violence acceptable. This fool clearly happy to entertain the notion that left wing thinkers and politicians would themselves entertain such notions. And so John was excoriated by the establishment; ritually scarred in order to be made ready for the public's approval. As a result he has now watered down Labour's pledge to restore the top rate of tax to 50%, not 60. It was even higher under the milk snatcher.

Meanwhile this morning Shadow Education Secretary Lucy Powell refused to argue in favour of restoring schools to local education authority, offering only a milk-thin sop to bring them under some kind of local 'oversight'. It is clear that the pressure from the right wing element in our society, via the media, has had an effect; the question is what will the cumulative effect of this mean come the next election and can Jeremy survive it? If he stepped down, would that mean John McDonnell takes over, or would that give the Blairites the chance to try and reassert power. There can't be that much gas left in that tank, Liz Kendall, their representative, couldn't even muster 5%!

I really hope that Labour can hold it together. They h ave a chance to penetrate the media barrage and get a socialist message across. If they aren't going to push that message or aren't able to then what is the point. Then who do we have? The Class War idiots who think having a snap crackle and pop at a couple of easy target hipsters running a novelty cafe?

Corbyn, what is best in life...

"Crush your enemies. See them driven before you. Hear the lamentations of the Tories."

Jeremy Corbyn, on the face of it, seems on course to inherit the poison chalice that is leadership of the modern labour party. I think one of two things will happen: his bid will be chewed up by the accounting process and he will fail, or he will win and find himself leading a party of traitors.

The evidence for the former is the disgraceful way the party has handled 'entryists', those people seeking to join solely to support Corbyn whom the party believes don't support it's 'aims and values'. This is patently absurd since Jeremy is a Labour MP of long standing, to argue that people are joining the party solely to support one of its members is as absurd as it sounds. If they do not believe these people are supporting the party's true values then what does that say about Jeremy? I have never seen such political dishonesty from any party - and I include the Tories. What Labour are doing to themselves is akin to punching themselves in the nuts with an iron fist, repeatedly and loudly.

The evidence for the second point comes from the comments - the shrill hysterical warnings of oblivion - portended by Labour grandees including the warmonger Tony Blair and the insidious Peter Mandelson. These spectres seem fit to continue to haunt the party, but that's what happens when you bury your dead in a troubled grave. We must either throw some sticky rice at these scumbags, or tell them they are no longer welcome. Neither will happen of course, Labour are on a direct line at unstoppable speed toward utter annihilation, and they seem hell bent on liking it. I don't think Jeremy has a chance.

So where does that leave us? It is possible that the violent dissolution of #JezWeCan will demand some release; the energy will need to go somewhere and that could well be the streets. If so I dare say I would welcome that. I'm not in favour of violence or vandalism, and I'm not condoning it (for the benefit of our friends in GCHQ...beep beep), however Labour would only have itself to blame. Should they end up picking Burnham, as I fear likely, they will fart themselves toward 2020 will all the grace of a deflated balloon spurting out it's remaining oxygen. Labour will exhale all that once made it good and die in a fit of inoffensive stupidity. They claim that Corbyn will make them unelectable despite doing the very thing they could not: attracting grassroots supporters: the very lifeblood of any party.

It beggars belief that a party would reject that in favour of an ideology that, on all evidence, cannot and does not work. They offer nothing more than a slightly lighter shade of debt and death. Austerity is a beggars bargain; if only we could peel back the "two for the price of one" sticker that has been placed over our society and see the truth. Fortunately some of us can.

Will Get Fooled Again?

More ridiculousness; this time from the human slime that is Matthew Hancock. This creature is already known to me thanks to his regular appearances as a Tory pundit on the BBC, talking bollocks. He tried to argue against Paul Krugman on the issue of austerity economics, but the former has a nobel prize in the field and Hancock has nothing but contempt; "you're wrong" he claims, on the basis that, being a Tory, he isn't.Yesterday he came out with the latest iteration of the government's viciously circular war on welfare. Another "intensive" work scheme, this time primarily aimed at the young - because after all they broke the economy didn't they!

If nothing else this is actually a tacit admission that everything the Tories have tried, all born of their hateful ideology, since 2010 has failed. Wasn't the work programme meant to be intensive? Wasn't the post WP service meant to be intensive? Wasn't every aspect of signing on meant to be intensive? Wasn't workfare meant to be intensive? Isn't the claimant commitment and it's 35 hour/week jobsearch (I defy anyone to use their website for 35 hours without going mad) meant to be intensive?

This would be laughable if it wasn't so tragic and so damaging. There won't be any intensive support; claimants will just be sanctioned at the drop of a hat as they are now. Where are these mentors going to come from; the same private sector cowboys that have run things so far? Whatever happened to Emma Harrison eh (I bet she turns up again)?  Will it be the already beleaguered JC+ staff - including those jobsworths that push sanctions on to claimants without a care?

This is just intended to play to the gallery: look it's the Tories being tough on scroungers. Except they've already tried being tough. They've already tried asserting there's a culture of dependency to crack...but the evidence doesn't support the existence of such a culture. Even if there was such, threatening people with and putting people through a regime of sanctions achieves nothing. It won't create jobs.

There will  never be full employment. There will always be more out of work, especially among the young, than in work. All this does is punish people for living in the world the Tories have created.

Won't Get Fooled Again?

Although the ascendancy of Jeremy Corbyn would no doubt be a positive for our archaic and corrupt political system, it seems Labour are beyond hope. Why do they continue to allow their politics to be dictated by the right. The centre ground has shifted so far to the right that we have the sad spectacle of the other leadership candidates arguing against Jeremy because we mustn't upset business.

Here they all, including, sadly, Corbyn, on LBC engaged in a leadership debate. The problem with this is that, again, they are letting the tail wag the dog. Iain Dale, the host, is another tedious right wing attack dog; people like him don't give a toss about the rights of workers and exist only to reinforce that same central position of business, quite literally as usual. He even asks Jeremy why he thinks he's qualified to be PM, asserting that Jez hasn't run a business or a bank or a corporation (a bit like Cameron, Howard, Hague and especially Iain Duncan Sauron). In fact there is a banker in government, Lord Fraud. He wasn't elected, he has no idea of life on benefits and yet is integral to teh creation of hideous policies such as the Bedroom Tax, and the notion that disabled people should be patronised by employers instead of treated well.

By participating in this farce Labour not only allows itself to look like a group of squabbling kids, which is no doubt what Dale and the right wing want from this, but allows the right, through Dale, to dictate the terms of the discussion. As he's the host of the show he has complete control - which is the sad nature of living in a media dominated society - he has the power of the button and can thus control what's said and when. If someone, in this case a prospective labour leader, speaks 'out of turn' he can interrupt and accuse them of being difficult or obtuse. In fact this is what made Jeremy's recent interview with Krishnam Guru Murthy so odious, on C4 news: KGM asked long winded questions that demanded a longer answer than time would allow, by trying to answer Jeremy then runs out of time and looks stupid. Or the question takes so long to ask that only a simple short response can be slotted in; couple this with provocative subject matter (such as perceived support for terrorists) and the interviewee is made to look foolish.

This is what happens when the opposition allows the right to dictate the terms of the debate. This is why I would have counselled against going on LBC. Inevitably, with four labour candidates arguing for the same job, there will be disagreements. This is the very definition of airing your grievances in public. Instead they could have held a private hustings. But their idiotic advisers thought this was a good idea, in a particularly Thick Of It fashion, and so they appear, to a right wing audience (as I imagine Dale has, most radio phone ins seem to) like a bunch of petty schoolkids. This only reinforces the notion that Labour aren't fit to run anything.

What is the logic of a party that claims it opposes austerity appearing on a debate controlled by adherents of austerity?

The Nature of the Bully

What's worse: the nasty bully or the one that pretends he's your friend?

After the election I felt utterly bereft; alienated. These people are not just in control, but in control of an ideology that makes people believe that, despite how little they get, they must never ask for more. These people believe that the nation's riches - it's assets and income - is their personal property; that it is for them to use to dictate how others must live and what others can or can't have. They believe this because their class has historically held that position, originally by brute force. Now that brute force is the one's and zero's of financial sorcery.

Knowing that the Tories were not likely to transform from bastards I had hoped Osborne, under the aegis of a Tory majority, overreach himself. That he might deliver a budget of such brutality it would shake the confidence of those who created that, admittedly thin, majority. Of course that's just my naivete; what we got was very much the bully pretending to be your pal. Essentially this was a budget that robbed 'lazy' Peter to pay for 'hardworking' Paul's pay rise in the form of the mirage that is the new living wage.

This is who Osborne is, a scam artist. During the election campaign fought by Cameron who both promised Child Tax Credits would not be touched and refused to define the terms of the welfare cuts the Tories were promising to make. Cuts that, depressingly, did not cost them the election either. Two months later and here we are, having elected a party that treats the truth with as flagrant a disregard as I have ever seen. Promises mean absolutely nothing to them anymore; it is no wonder the times we live in are so insecure where people feel unsure of what's right or wrong. Not only that, but they steal from Labour, making the latter's dismal performance seem all the more stark; Labour promised to increase the NMW to a laughable £8/hour by the next election. Osborne offers a little more, albeit with caveats hidden in plain sight against a backdrop of propaganda.

One of the more irritating aspects of this budget is how it seems to have caused those who should be speaking out, and even those who are, to couch their criticisms in complimentary terms. You hear statements to the effect of  " while it's right/great/lovely that the Chancellor is focusing on growth/building an economy/a thin hateful stick insect" proffered as sweeteners to the criticisms that are necessary to be heard. But all this does is dilute those criticisms and make them seem as the speaker is equivocating - almost conceding their argument before it's made.

One of the nastiest policies is the removal of a third of the income received by those that will follow me into the Work Related Activity Group claiming ESA. What message does this send when you set the rate of payment for such people - who will have been found unfit for work by the government's own already onerous testing process - as the same as those merely (so to speak) unemployed?

On Newsnight, David Gauke, Tory treasury shitehawk, said this was perfectly acceptable because the government was planning additional support to get these people into work. Once more we see the Tory attitude toward disability; if you are in the WRAG you are not fit for work. The only difference is that your condition is believed to be transient and that you will heal, eventually. What help from the likes of the Work Programme is going to accelerate that process? This is simply the Tories saying "you are faking it, pull yourself together, stop feeling sorry for yourself" - and if they can come after people in this grloup then it stands to reason they will eventually hit the Support group. This is a profoundly dismal attitude suggesting there is no escape, not even through ill health, from the lot of the modern day serf. it is your duty to toil in the modern day information sweat shops and money making salt mines, to make the ruling elite more powerful, more sure of themselves, and of course richer; even if you are not well. That your worth in life is diminished if you dare to feel sick. Don't forget people in the WRAG will have already gone through and passed the government's own strenuous and incompetent Work Capability Assessment. So as far as the government should be concerned, by their own terms, you cannot work. But now that still means you are to be treated as a mere jobseeker. This is utterly wrong.

Other people have calculated the price effect of the cuts in tax credits to people with families or on low incomes, suffice to say that in closing I will leave this here, as evidence that we are living under the stewardship of the most mendacious government I have ever known. Truth is merely a commodity to leverage for these filth where they can and will lie to get power and then do anything, throw anyone under the bus, having done so - all just to shore up the vote that gave them power. Bribe those 'shy Tories' that voted for them to make them feel as though they made the right choice, and use the poor - those that are never going to vote Tory - to pay for it. We already live in insecure times, where truth is subject to popular opinion and facts are ignored to suit agendas; this only makes it worse.

Experience

This morning, on my way to the butchers, I took the long way as it's a nice day. 

Don't really enjoy feeling ill though. It's hard to accurately describe the weird hypoglcyemic/metabolic problem that I have, but I know when it happens, and it did then, as bad as any other. I suspect that whatever mental health issues I have, as yet still undiagnosed, they play a part in creating some unholy bizarre synergy.

Consequently it's like experiencing a kind of sensory pressure. Stimulus becomes intense, noise merges into one monotonous experience that threatens to overwhelm while the already bright summer sun threatens to take me out of my skull. All the while I'm walking and my legs, which occasionally are feeling a little wobbly, feel like they are walking a treadmill; as if I'm being walked, not that I'm walking. In a weird way I feel that, if I stop, I'll collapse.

My thinking goes into overdrive and I'm drawn inward, my heart quickens as does my breathing in a stress response type scenario. So introspective do I become that I experience a form of tunnel vision. Occasionally I lose myself in this not particularly pleasant experience before catching awareness of the fact where my head feels like it is about to turn upside down. It's an unsettling sensation; a feeling of complete discombobulation where you catch yourself 'phasing out'. I have had this labelled 'de realisation', but, as with all these issues, I am no expert and no expert seems keen to lend a diagnosis or explanation.

I make it to the shop, which, fortunately, is empty, and I get what I need. I wanted to go to the Post Office, but the queue was such I would have struggled considerably (we will never know). I manage to assuage some of the feelings with a scotch egg. It's not ideal and these experiences are not marked by traditional hunger pangs, but with a rising sense of physical urgency as described that culminate in a need to eat. Were I to deny myself food I dread to think what would happen and consequently I have never sought to put that to the test. I don't think such speculation helpful, in fact I do not care to see people play games with their health. There really are people for home starvation is an issue; this is not a subject for navel gazing or masochism. 

It takes a good hour or so, and a sandwich as well, for my body to calm down. After which I feel pleasantly tired. This is how it always works. I do not know what causes this or why. It is simply how my body functions (or doesn't). I do not post this to compete for the sympathy of those kind enough to give me the time of day. I don't do it to compare myself to others who may have greater needs and problems. In fact I post precisely to make that point; we are all different and what effects each of us might not bother the rest. Life isn't uniform and the biology of the human body is fragile.

But the main reason I post this is because it struck me that my experience, intense as it was for me, is mine alone. I cannot persuade the Tories and the DWP and the Duncan Smiths of the world of my experience. They would not even address that experience as presented; their prejudices and assumptions would prevent them from taking me at my word.

It is a curious and unsettling fact to know that I live in a society where, as intense and uncomfortable my experience was, to others it is nothing, because that society is conditioned not to take me at my word.

...

In other, and sadder news, the passing of a legend. The masterful and creative and intelligent god of thunder, Chris Squire, bassist and singer for Yes, has passed away. Gone but never forgotten. A true inspiration.

 

After the March

I'll be honest it all seems pretty hopeless.

A government comprising some of the most ideologically challenged market obsessed and incoherent lunatics I've ever known has gotten elected. They claim they have a mandate to kick us all in the teeth because we've asked them to - despite a quarter of the electorate actually voting for them. 

How is that right? 

We have an minister for equality who believes marriage should be allowed to people on the basis of their sexuality.

We have a minister for disability issues who not only votes against the interests of those he represents, but recently applauded a court decision not to allow compensation to those his government had treated unlawfully. Denied PIP for a year these people were driven to utter desperation, including food banks and loan sharks, and yet will these 'fine upstanding people' put their hands up and apologise? Will they put their hands in their pockets and offer due recompense? Will they fuck!

We have an employment minister who believes in the death penalty and supports the most virulent behaviour of the free market; who distributes awards to businesses that pay less than the minimum wage under the guise of workfare and apprenticeships. A woman who cannot string a coherent sentence together and sounds, quite literally, like a child. Frankly, it's embarrassing. More embarrassing than listening to young William Hague speaking at the Tory conference back in the day.

But people just tolerate all this.

Despite 250,000 people marching on Saturday nothing has changed. And nothing will until those people, and the rest, do what is necessary to bring society to a stand still. The government aren't going to give a damn about the People's Assembly and it's talking heads. They haven't for the last four years, what makes those marching - with the best of intentions - think they will this time?

People talk about how good natured the march was and how friendly it was. That;s great; I want inclusiveness, I want camaraderie and mutual support. That's how society should function. But it's not going to stop the Tories. They simply don't care. They want a compliant society, and, ironically, a good natured march works in their favour, offering a safe and thus ineffectual release without being a real threat.

That's the tragedy of it. I hate to criticise the People's Assembly. I hate to criticise the march. I feel like a complete heel for doing so, sitting here at my keyboard pouring scorn on people for acting with the best of intention. These are the right kind of people, who care enough to do...something, but I despair that they are being given false hope by a group that's not prepared to do what I fear must be done. A few well organised events here and there will offer nothing but false hope and make those who, like me, want a better society and who believe in a better politics and a better economics, feel they are achieving something when, in the cold light of day, they aren't.

A quarter of a million seems impressive, and in a way it is. I cannot and do not criticise anyone who took part. They did so for the right reasons and with the best of intentions. But they have to know that marching alone isn't enough and will never be. Perhaps this is the start, and if that's the purpose then fair enough. But I do not see anything from the People's Assembly or the TUC that hints at a prolonged campaign of direct and purposeful action. The TUC is likely to roll over as it did before and comply with the government for the slightest of gains. The People's Assembly will hold talking shops where good natured commentators will state the obvious, preaching to a choir of people desperate for change.

All of that is great. But it simply will not achieve anything. A quarter of a million is a drop in the ocean compared to the size of our society. How many people don't care? How many people spent Saturday doing other things and not really caring or taking an interest in the issue of austerity? How many have yet to feel the pinch? Compared to what's coming, if the Tories aren't stopped, we have had it easy thus far! 

Next month Osborne will unveil his 12 billion £ worth of welfare cuts. We all know these were coming and only a fool expects anything but the worst. The march has done nothing to dissuade the Tories from making these cuts. In fact I would argue it only galvanises them to believe, perversely, they are doing the right thing. In their twisted ideology they think they are mandated to deliver this pain; that it's not just what the people need, it's what they want.

There is no time for dialogue anymore. We've heard all the speeches. We all know what's at stake, and if you don't then I have to assume you agree with the infantile ideology of the idle rich. We are divided and we are at war. I have tried engaging with these people, it doesn't work. One tries to be reasonable - that is what mature reasonable people do, isn't it? But it gets you nowhere. Commentary following the march was filled with bitter indignation and ad hominem attacks - from right wing trolls who downplay their outrage by saying marching is a waste of time. They can't have it both ways.

There is no point engaging with these people, we have to treat them, as melodramatic as it sounds, as the enemy. This government, this economic system, this broken media, it all has to be stopped. We cannot survive five years of this. Things have to change. The time for talk is over.

It's Corbyn Time

Jeremy Corbyn has been nominated to stand for Labour leadership, the greatest poison chalice of our time. He won't win of course, this is just an exercise in Labour trying to appeal to disenfranchised supporters in the wake of their rabid, post-election, right wing frenzy as the prospective leaders attempted to outdo each other in their love of Big Business. A shameful and wretched display.

Curiously the Tories seem to have a Twitter campaign going to support him.

You might think this is because they think he's a risible old socialist who's values will clearly further doom us all. Further? Labour, in government, weren't remotely socialist. Yet the Tories can't wrap their head around this and so we had the disgraceful spectacle of the red top press hysterically trying to portray hapless Ed Milliband as the Red Menace, in league with Lucifer's own, Nicola Sturgeon. In response Miliband rolled over and gave the Tories the key to the door by proclaiming he'd rather lose the election than ally with the SNP!

There's nothing socialist about labour, but in this right wing ideological shitmire anything to the left of the Tory position, even by the merest hair's breadth, is seen as screaming loony left Michael Foot-ina-donkey-jacket-on-the-picket-line socialist. Kelvin MacKenzie (that well known philanthropist) proclaimed, after the 2010 election, that we've had 13 years of socialism. How can these people say this with a straight face; do they even believe their own words?

I suspect that the Tories would rather someone like Corbyn, because they fervently and fundamentally believe his values are utterly anathema to what the people want (despite their mandate being predicated on a quarter of the electorate). Rather him than another Red Tory, like Andy Burnham or the awful Liz Kendall. I suspect they feel more threatened by the latter than the former knowing that their majority isn't rock solid and that Labour has strong support in the cities and the north.

Ironically it's the politics of someone like Jeremy Corbyn that Labour desperately needs. Another five years of a lightweight carbon copy of the Tories, even if slightly softer, is not good enough.

The Self Indulgence of Mental Health

One of the most pernicious aspects of poor mental health is how others don't understand. How can they? Unless you live with these feelings, for example, you cannot know what it's like any more than I can know what it's like to be born a fish. People tend to think, in my opinion, that the sufferer is merely feeling sorry for themselves; at worst they are being selfish.

It isn't like that at all. For example, though I'm not entirely, sure I believe two people I know are planning on getting married. My friend, who would be the groom, doesn't know about the issues I face (even words like that are misconstrued, though what else can we use but words). We have never spoken about mental health and I have never raised these issues; it's not something one blurts out in conversation and, while he's a nice guy, he's not the sort of person who'd really understand. That of course is a judgement, but then, again, what else can we do to negotiate our way through the world? We have to judge situations, current and future. Sometimes we fail, sometimes we don't. Unfortunately poor mental health affects that success rate.

I'm assuming that, depending on the nature of the event (i don't see it being a church do, but then it's not up to me), he will invite me; either to the full thing, or to some kind of reception. To most people this is an exciting proposition and a kind gesture. To be invited to share someone's special day is what most people regard as an honour. I accept all that.

Unfortunate it also stirs up an inner tumult of dread. While I care about his special day and wouldn't under any circumstances want it to be anything but perfect - I'm not a monster nor, in my opinion, am I selfish - the thought of mingling with people leaves me utterly cold. I don't feel I have anything in common with the other people (to be brutally honest, I don't really think much of his partner, she's rather small minded and even a bit racist, but that's a subject for another day). The idea of sitting in a party room full of people I don't know except for a few, expected to perform the usual social role intended and generally be 'normal' sends me into a complete panic. 

I don't know why I am this way, I can't reasonably articulate it, and that's why I say people who have no experience of this cannot understand it. You either get it or you don't, and, thanks to the popular ignorance of mental health, which has persisted for far too long, most people don't. Consequently my need to consider my own well being will be seen as self indulgent at best. Since I will be seen as not having any physical - that is to say 'genuine' - restriction my behaviour, should I bottle out, be seen as totally selfish. But it's not like that at all. How can anyone convey the crushing weight of intense feeling? No matter how smart or 'grown up' you are, you cannot know this without experiencing this. 

You cannot reason it away. This is my biggest problem with treatments like CBT: the idea of using reason to de-construct negative mental health sounds rational and practical. But in practise it is a catch 22: my experience was that, in order to use reason one must separate oneself from the effect of negative thinking and feeling. If one could do that then there'd be no problem in the first place!

Ironically, and to conclude, what could be more self indulgent than a large blog post where one person whines about fearing a social event that may or may not happen. That of course is the problem. I could waffle on for page after page about this, but if you, dear reader, do not understand this by now, then you never will. Of course that sounds equally arrogant and horrendously narcissistic. I can't help how mental health problems are perceived; we live in a society where, still, depression is seen as a lack of self discipline and a well of excuse making; not the black dog those who've experienced it know it to be. 

It is like trying to explain colour photography to a person who cannot see except in monochrome. Even then, all the analogies in the world are a poor substitute for the lived experience of mental health. Given the desperate state of our austere society there is little hope of this changing.

Britain's Hardest Grafter

Apparently not a joke; this is, as I'm sure most now know, a TV programme to be aired on the BBC. Clearly another divisive poverty porn exercise in the obscenity that is the Christian Work Ethic and rooted firmly in capitalist notions of winners and losers. Literally in this case, because those poor saps who aren't awarded the title, at the end of what will surely be a plug for some grubby gangmaster's business, won't be seen as winners.

I'm betting that business will belong to someone like Charlie Mullens the millionaire plumber who has surfaced in recent years with his 'common sense' view of reality - or what passes for reality in his gutter press programmed mind.

Britain's Hardest Grafter - and what happens to Britain's Second Hardest Grafter? He or she will be treated no different than Britain's Least Hardest Grafter. This is a sick fact of our striver and skiver society: close only counts, as they say, in horseshoes and hand grenades and so you're either the best, fulfilling your potential, or all your effort is for naught and you might as well not have bothered. What does that say about self worth? How does that foster a healthy cohesive society? But we don't have a society, we have a pyramid scheme where you're either a failure or you're the Pharaoh.

Of course the programme will be dominated by the personal stories, carefully edited into emotional bite size mental comfort snackfood for the masses. Dave, with his gaggle of one-too-many kids-and-an-xbox, will be pitted with Steve who Works Really Hard After Losing His Mum To The Big C. Dave's inadequacies and failures will be exposed by comparison to Steve and thus Steve will be the hero and Dave the villain. Toss in a few token 'foreigners', a Pole and a Muslim, for good measure (because, you know, them Asians have a good work ethic innit) and the great British storyline will unfold, under the auspice of a bunch of coke-addled 'meeja' Jack Whitehall lookalikes.

There is nothing real about this. It's intended for the same audience as Benefit Street; the same prurient armchair moral forecasters and curtain twitchers. People that have a huge hole in their souls that they are willing to fill with this kind of manipulative rubbish. What possible insights can an edited docudrama offer into today's labour market? It's victim blaming; they will set up Steve to triumph in a series of ridiculous workplace environments and use that inversely suggest that anyone who fails, like Dave, will be the author of their own demise. There will be no real examination of the nature of these workplaces, just the rewarding of Steve and his struggle against adversity - in fact the harder the job, the shittier the workplace - the sweeter his success and the more powerful the message of autonomy. No questioning of the policies of rich business owners like Mike Ashley the billionaire who keeps everyone at Sports Direct on zero hours, for example, or the dungeons of Amazon where people are forced to run marathons in unlit warehouses to fulfil ridiculous quotas only to be subject to a body search at the end of their shift (because the working class are all thieves).

It's misdirection in the guise of self development. The same crap that American lifestyle gurus peddle in order to live in opulence while telling you that your struggles on unreasonable wages are of your own making. 

Poverty Porn never seems to get old. Britains' Hardest Grafter: because if you can't live on £fuck all and you aren't willing to work in shit conditions for a millionaire EU whining plutocrat tax dodger you aren't working hard enough. At the end of each week Moloch decides whom to eliminate from the show (sorry, I meant to say 'experiment', because the BBC would like us to believe this exploitative shite is insightful); the least productive worker in the faux-factory they intend to create will be eliminated. Presumably they will have to shuffle off to the suicide booth in order to become Soylent Green for the rest. Nothing is wasted. This is after they are forced to explain their lack of productivity to the programme's chosen Work Council; justifying the last few miserable seconds of their unproductive lives before being reduced to something useful at last. I imagine that, along with Charlie, the board of the Work Council will comprise the latest iteration of Emma Harrison (we haven't heard from Hayley Taylor in a while), that Welsh twat from the Call Centre, and Joffrey Baratheon, first of his name.

What will they make in this factory? What fake products? Or perhaps this is some satire so elbaorate and so pernicious that I have failed to grasp its true subtlety. Maybe they make, in the manner of Dr Evil's modern empire, miniature models of factories. 

Slouching Onwards

Tomorrow it's another trip to the GP to probably waste my time on the fruitless quest to get a diagnosis for a condition that I don't even really understand. There seem to be so many 'neuro diverse' (and I'm probably misusing that term) conditions that diagnosis is impossible; I suspect most such people probably have bits of all different conditions - different being the issue. These, like me, I feel, are people that just feel permanently and detrimentally out of sorts. It's difficult to explain, like trying to imagine what it's like to be a cat for instance, but it's been there throughout my entire life. Unfortunately the one time I try to get this recognised I'm forced to deal with a system that is prejudiced against recognising anything that might be seen to inhibit one's productivity; one's ability to fit into the mainstream mass production line.

I don't really think I have the energy to get into it with her tomorrow. She'll most likely keep me waiting; this GP has a habit of keeping people waiting for at least 90 minutes if not longer. I'm sure that can't be permissible, but, despite complaining, they never do anything about it. "She likes to take her time with her patients", that's commendable in principle, but it's not her time, is it.

I haven't heard a damned thing from the Work Psychologist since before Christmas, if I recall correctly (I probably don't, to be fair, but it feels that long). I've emailed her twice to no avail. Where could she be? Perhaps she's been moved on, shunted to a different department, or a different office elsewhere in the country. The emails didn't provoke an automated response of any kind so I assume it's still active. She could be dead, or abducted by aliens for all I know. More likely is that the department has been shrunk to the point of (even more) uselessness. Regardless I'm on my own now. There's no real interest in providing any support, and in this new era of dispassionate conservatism, I don't imagine mental health services are going to be bolstered any.

I have other issues as well, equally ignored; a metabolic problem that is labelled as 'functional hypoglycemia', but I don't think it is. It could be a simple allergy, but there's no real interest in finding out. I would have thought, having participated in a number of blood tests to find out over the years, they would have found out. I have been repeatedly, alarmingly so in fact, told I'm NOT diabetic. Maybe I am, maybe they are wrong, though that would be a staggering level of incompetence. All I know is that I have a short fuse when it comes to hunger and that, when I get hungry, it needs to be sated or I feel very dodgy. The frequency with which this happens during the day can vary quite considerably. The upshot is that, in the workplace, I would struggle. If I were my own boss or working for home in some capacity (no help with that of course) it would be easier. These subtle realities are lost on all concerned. 

Short Sighted

It's frightening how brainwashed people are.

I hate to use that word, 'brainwashed', because it makes me sound like a conspiracy theorist. I'm not. Capitalism isn't so much a conspiracy as a system that powerful people endorse out of simple self interest. The tragedy is how that self interest causes misery for everyone else - and people don't care.

But people refuse to believe that this system is as broken as it is - yet the Tories have a majority government with only 24% of the electorate. Yet nobody really complains because nobody likes a sore loser and capitalism promotes the winner/loser mentality in everything it does. This is essential because it's easier to marginalise dissent by branding such voices as belonging to losers - people who have some character flaw of their own making (also important - everyone is the author of their own misfortune).

People have also been conditioned to believe that negative thinking - criticism - is to be denied. No one wants to hear someone who feels sorry for themselves; self pity is for losers and one must pick oneself up by one's bootstraps, no matter how miserable their lot. Of course this is absurd, the misfortune of someone like Donald Trump, who made his 'fortune' off the back of hundreds of millions inherited from his dad, are quite different from someone facing eviction because of the Bedroom Tax. Yet the former will be among the first to advocate the bootstrap mentality to the latter, despite having no clue as to the reality of the latter's struggle. Sickening really.

This feeds into the idea of low wages. If you want the most obvious example of how capitalism is so pernicious and so broken then consider how it uses the state, via welfare, to subsidise wages. The fact that people are seemingly content to put up with this situation is telling, and yet the idea of living wage should be the very heart of all social contracts. If one cannot afford to live a decent standard of living on their income then something has gone, and is, very wrong. Not only this, but by allowing

the state to subsidise employers you are subverting your own winner/loser (aka striver/skiver) mentality.

A society where it is the norm to earn less than it costs to live. That is the ideology of capitalism.

Even worse it feeds into the idea that everyone can be an entrepreneur. This is the age of dragons - capital D. The five predators sat in a gangster's hideout with conspicuous piles of money sat next to them. Now the DWP (capital D) are in on the act, advising people to become self employed without telling them that doing so could jeopardise them financially if they start claiming tax credits without a credible business.

But the capitalists don't care about that. Instead they get to make claims regarding a rise in the number of businesses starting up (they won't of course report how many failed nor the personal consequences of failure). This all looks great for the system and the government who can say Britain is booming. Look at how free people are to chart their own course in these difficult (boo! Labour! Boo) times. But this apparent freedom is deceptive; we don't have a strong economic foundation - why else is Cameron issuing forth another 'emergency' budget in July? That's unprecedented, although one of the reasons is to catch Labour on the hop while they are still rudderless. These are not fertile times, even for experienced business types, and you can hear people in discussions talking about how they can't pay their staff a living wage and about how they are themselves, as directors and owners, having to live on the breadline. 

This affects the whole world; capitalism has allowed the population to increase where reasonable considerations would have prohibited this. I don't want to be telling people they can or can't have kids, that isn't the point. But people, particularly women, are sold the idea that having children is part of the complete human experience, part of being successfully; like buying a house or a car. One must have a family. Capitalism doesn't seem to care how many people are on the planet, and, as with self employment and the love of business, it doesn't care if it's sustainable. This is the fast route to poverty, just look at places like India where squalor seems to surround rich enclaves in cities.

This is a house of cards and sooner or later the wind is going to blow hard.

Shit

What the hell happened?

I woke up Friday morning hoping the exit polls were just speculation. In fact I was up at 5-30 remembering that was the time they announce the results for Wirral. That turned out to be the only real light (along with Farage) in this black night descending. The first voice I hear is the capitulating tones of Ed Miliband as Labour's rescue boat crashed onto the rocks with a great many casualties. 

We are now looking at a Tory majority in the house of about 330 give or take. I suppose that isn't huge, but they have around 90 seats over Labour. As far as I can tell any vote where we need the opposition to win (in other words all of them) we are likely to lose - that is after all the point of having a majority.

This is shit. I have never been so scared in my life. I have spent the last two days in a daze, bereft. It's been a funeral for the soul where the only comfort is that I'm not alone. Yet now we are all more alone than ever before given what is likely at stake that I cannot even bring myself to mention. It's too much to consider what we stand to lose - and with very little political opposition as Labour are now looking to move even further into the Tory shadow. This will be confirmed if their choice for the next leader is someone like pro-capitalist Chuka Umuna.

It is clear that a combination of five years of toxic propaganda, lies and media manipulation has brought us to this point. The average Tory will not admit they voted for a party that supports the persecution of the poorest and the weakest - despite that being exactly what happened from 2010 (and I'm sure will again as Duncan Smith is hardly likely to shift post). They instead will point to how Cameron has led a recovery out of Labour-created doldrums and economic depravity. However there is and has never been any evidence that Labour were profligate, or that they spent all the money - despite Cameron desperately waving that note around. In fact that image says it all: a child waving around a lollipop stick with a funny joke, because that's all that note was. And anyone could have written it, but isntead the faithful saw the image of a piece of paper with some scrawl on it and a Parliamentary header and thought "yes, that's clear proof of Labour's financial incompetence", despite all evidence to the contrary. (hint: Paul Krugman wins nobel prizes for his knowledge of economics, David Cameron, to date, hasn't).

Unfortunately Labour comprehensively failed to get that fact across. Like startled rabbits, caught in the headlights, they found themselves suddenly unsure of where to go and what to say. For five years they floundered under a man who, to all intents and purposes may well have been a reasonable sort, but couldn't and wouldn't defend himself. A man without the charisma and presence and message necessary to counter the Tory onslaught which was backed up by enormous amounts of money (profligate, you might say) and enormous amounts of media. 

Labour, since 1997, had positioned itself further to the right pandering to big business and, through Blair, gaining the approval of the arch-demon, Murdoch, himself. Then that all changed; the banking system fell apart under its own avarice and lack of self control. Everyone turned on Labour who, since then, have been left wondering what the hell happened? Prior to that Osborne had called for lighter touch financial regulation than Brown, and promised even more public spending.Labour has since offered a concessionary version of the Tory austerity, with slightly less pain, yet pain nonetheless. It is bitterly ironic that that was the best alternative in our broken electoral system. A democracy that isn't representative enough and has reinforced the two horse race it always was

The point here isn't to defend the dismal modern iteration of Labour but to recognise that, on their own standards, the Tories fail. Unfortunately they won by spooking the electorate about the SNP - as if the Scottish were somehow terribly alien and dangerous in their values. A week before the election and Labour sought dreadfully to distance themselves from the SNP, and all the media snark, by saying they'd rather a Tory government than ally with the SNP. Well, you got your wish Ed.

In 2010 many people, myself included, were swayed by this newcomer, Nick Clegg, and that he, and amiable Uncle Vince, who seemed economically pure of heart like an avuncular fiscal Merlin, offered a genuine alternative. Sadly that proved to be an illusion as they failed to gain anywhere near the result 'Cleggstasy' conjured as a promise, and they got into bed to prop up a coalition that has wrought havoc on society. This coalition, in reality a Tory government with quisling Libdem legs, has kept the economy in the toilet, stagnated the labour market, rewarded the rich for their failures, turned the NHS from a reasonable prospect (despite the likes of Patricia Hewitt) into a nightmare of waiting times, privatisation, more debt, closures, and an A&E crisis of the like as yet unseen - not to mention the nightmare of catastrophic welfare reforms. Universal Credit ready by 10/13 anyone? Instead we have a regime of willing stormtroopers under Fuhrer Smith's command while he refuses to examine the corpses.

Now the Libdem vote has collapsed. Onlay 7 remain. Perhaps the most telling aspect of all this is that they didn't lose their seats to Labour, but to the Tories! That's the nature of right wing politics: you thought you were all doing the right thing, that you were acting in the national interest? Congratulations, a knife in the dark is your reward. 

So what happened? It seems the Tory vote didn't increase - as you might expect from the surge the results imply. Instead the libdem vote collapsed, as predicted, but with Labour's failing inertia and lack of a leftward message, people remained disillusioned. Consequently the Tories filled this vacuum - but not with an increased share. Instead their numbers, while no different than before, were enough to beat the collapsing opposition result; the bar had lowered.

I won't be sorry to see the back of the likes of Steve Webb, the most Tory of them all who supported the Bedroom Tax as much as his coalition conservative colleagues. But it is a bitter victory indeed when his replacement is another Tory! At least the Witch-in-charge McVey is gone. That's more than schadenfreude, but it's not enough to compensate what I dread is coming.

Now we're on our own. Like the Tories, who now have no excuses and no one to hide behind when their policies continue to fail, it's up to us. True democracy and politics lies within our communities, wherever they may be on or offline. The streets are where things will have to be decided. This country looks set to be more divided than ever; the Tories exist in the rural/small town areas (like here, unfortunately), while Labour is strong in the metropolitan areas that the Tories will simply not care about. This is why many Tory voters do not see the misery their favourites have caused; how many Bedroom Tax cases or benefit sanction victims or WCA veterans reside openly if at all in the wolds and shires? Out of sight out of mind is the mantra as a compliant media simply refuses to report on these stories, furthering the notion that only the loony left believe in these things.

Some have claimed this government's majority is narrow, weak. I'm not so sure; I don't see how, though I'd love to be wrong. 90 odd seats over Labour seems pretty strong to push through all they would want. The coalition managed to use all sorts of Parliamentary necromancy and sorcery to get its way; didn't IDS use such tricks to animate his now-discredited ideas?

Perhaps these 'soft tories', some of whom maybe in Parliament now, will come to see the truth of what they have caused when the effects of what is certain tyo be a vicious government, affect them. A housing and rent bubble (favouring landlords) cannot sustain. Jobs may fall apart as people are forced out due to the iniquities of Universal Credit, foodbanks may finally be overwhelmed, the NHS...and so forth. In fact not two days before the election the Mail ran a front page about the scandal of waiting times for GP appointments. Yet come Friday it was hailing the rejection of 'Red Ed' (a sock puppet image of Miliband created by the press) as the right result. Can this government really survive when it is built on an illusory foundation?

As for Red Ed, I don't know which is worse: that people believe he's a socialist, or that politics has lurched so far to the right that anything to the left is a discredited remnant of an equally disingenuous image of the seventies. 

All I can say for now is that I'm fearful; I'm not even angry, it's more anxiety when I see people around me and I think "are you who I thought you were or seemed to be?". These are people who must be among those, to some degree, that voted Tory. Politically programmed Pod People. This isn't melodrama to say that I feel I've woken up in a different world. It looks, smells, feels, sounds, and even tastes the same, but something has shifted. Beware of Vulcans with goatees, and Tories making promises.

Good Cop Bad Cop?

So i'm walking back from the shop armed with a box of Shreddies (my breakfast of choice currently) and I spy with my little eye the local Tory doing the rounds, accompanied by a couple of goons. Unfortunately for me the road to hell is paved with good intentions and I decide I'd like to try and 'corner' him on the issue of foodbanks and sanctions, albeit briefly because i don't really want to be talking to these people. 

Now I'm worried he'll 'recognise' me, somehow (I've never met him before so why should he) and that, stupidly, I didn't calculate he might come a-knocking later on. I rather hope he doesn't and have put a notice on the door saying, politely, no Tories. 

The problem is that he's all very charming and polite. He tries to explain that, given the Trussell Trust is a relatively recent enterprise, we can't assume that the foodbank crisis (which only a fool would deny) is a product of the current austerity plan and the headbangers in cabinet. He says he is "quietly horrified" by the situation. But he's still a Tory?!? How does he square this with reality? Is it just not on his radar? Is it not an issue locally? I suppose that might be possible, even though Weston super mare has a foodbank and, according to a recent local paper headline, is the debt capital of the country! That can't be good.

You see this is the problem: in Parliament the Tories are headbangers. They are swivel eyed goons who think the right to rule is theirs by blood and that the land is their divine inheritance. Yet I suspect the local Tory, and our sitting MP, is typical of constituency Tories. He says all the right things, is very polite and charming so somewhere there is a disconnect. I asked him about sanctions and he said again it wasn't something people were bringing to him as an issue. Again that may be true - locally. But what about the evidence that's been collected by the likes of the CAB and the Church - and everyone else from the Guardian to even the BBC? There is definitely something happening and sometimes two plus two equals four: a government hell bent on austerity, punitive welfare reforms, and policies as crazy and nasty as the bedroom tax (which I didn't raise) cannot not be prime suspect at least. 

I think these Tories are not part of the inner circle. They may subscribe to the ideals of capitalism and believe that, if the market functioned properly, and if public finances were used responsibly, everything would be fine. But the reality is, despite what they have been led to believe, they are members of a party who's leadership, in government, is deliberately causing untold mayhem. He can be as friendly and as charming as he likes, he is a politician after all, and I've no reason to assume he's a genuinely nasty person (unlike, say, Iain Duncan Smith), but he works for a party that is wrecking people's lives and, presumably, subscribes to an economic system in capitalism that has comprehensively and axiomatically failed. 

The danger is that it is off the backs of people like this that the Tories come to power. The cabinet MP's will be insulated from the problems they cause by their circle of supporters and will have enough votes from among that section of the community they have nothing to worry about. Iain Duncan Smith doesn't even live in his constituency! As an example there is an issue locally with housing developers wanting to build all over the place. It has a lot of people up in arms; the Tory MP is the only politician who has put his face to the campaign. So voters will see in him someone who supports them and listens to local issues - rightly or wrongly. No other party is perceived to be listening. Therein lies the problem: the Tories play good cop on the doorstep, coming across as affable concerned community leaders, but in power it's bad cop all the way.

And no, there's no way in hell I'll be voting Tory. No matter how charming you are. What this society needs you aren't prepared to give.

Graham Nation

The never ending capitalist carousel continues: for some reason I tune into 5 Live every morning. Like a child with a scab I can't help but 'pick' at it, listening to the 'debate' for as long as I can stand. Usually not very long as it's a haven for desperately media brainwashed curtain-twitchers and cliche-spouters regurgitating a series of almost non-sequiturs of connected slogans and soundbites. Ultimately meaningless and completely non-progressive. This morning someone called 'Graham' who apparently runs an agency recruiting for warehouse staff lamented the lack of ambition across the nation in native folk wanting to work in a warehouse for, presumably, as little as possible - after he takes his cut, of course. Across the table from him was Nigel Farage trotting out his greatest hits; I don't think that man has said anything new in the last year.

So that's two wealthy (one assumes - unless that guy is just shit at recruitment, which is entirely possible since i have no idea who he is) opinion peddlers claiming representation of facts and truths. This is how we are to be governed. No one has asked my opinion, at best I'd be entitled to ask a question if I was 'lcuky' enough to be in the audience. A spectator watching two wealthy captains of industry talking and telling us what to think. Is this real? Have we really allowed ourselves to be robbed of the ability to govern our own destiny and determine how we live?

Apparently, according to 'Graham's' wisdom, British people are implicitly lazy; outsiders have to be brought in to work in our warehouse because no one here wants to apply. This 'fact' is of course not challenged; Farage's purpose is to explain why (ie to blame everything on the EU/immigration/open door, etc). How can 'Graham' possibly know this? Has he spoken to every single unemployed person in the neighbourhood, or is it more likely he's assumed this based on his own experiences finding staff for clients - whomever they may be. How do we know these clients are decent employers or that their needs are reasonable. If there was no option to hire Johnny Foreigners then what? You'd presumably have to offer more money? Would that work? Who knows because the one thing these capitalists are sure of is that they really don't like loosening the purse strings.

Immigration ;policy may well have a part to play, but ultimately the choice about whom to employ comes from the employer. 'Graham' is just a parasite: he has seen what capitalists like to call a gap in the market. They think this is clever, that they are providing a need. Except they are taking money that could go directly to workers...just to find workers, something I don't imagine would be difficult for the employer to do. There may be some circumstances where farming out the job to a specialist could be worthwhile, but for menial jobs in a local warehouse? Maybe there just aren't that many people available. We don't know, but is it reasonable to jump to the conclusion that it's because local people are lazy (and also unemployed since that's essential to be considered).

To me all of this is insane: we are the ones being told we are lazy for not wanting to work these jobs. Yet we are not listened to by those making these complaints. This is the future we want to build for ourselves: a world dependent on a paucity of creativity and interest. A society where saying that you want self determination, to be given opportunity to do what YOU want, is selfish and must be sublimated to the needs of rich people in charge. That the only people who can get a decent education that might waft them beyond the reach of the likes of 'Graham' are those that can afford it - or who's parents can? This seems fundamentally wrong. Why am I not allowed a say, why am I not listened to? Why is it assumed that what I want is unreasonable and overly demanding?

Our futures are determined by the needs of wealthy people to become more wealthy. Knowledge for anything else and of anything different is deemed either irrelevant or a privilege. I don't agree that these people should dictate to me my options for how I'm to spend the majority of my life - this isn't about a few hours' chores here and there. It's how you are going to be spending at least half your day at least 5 days a week for your entire life, until you become too feeble to continue (and even that's no up for grabs).

We are entreated to participate in an election through the propaganda that claims if we don't vote we have no voice, when in truth we have no voice either way. George Carlin was closest to the truth when he said that those who do vote bear responsibility for the misery caused by those in power - not those that don't vote. That said I think it's fundamentally important to oust this not-really-a-coalition-but a Tory government, but that's a temporary matter. It doesn't address the future and how we create a society that give everyone a voice and an opportunity. I do not agree that my life should be dictated by /Graham/.