BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations

Subject: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: meself
Date: 14 Jan 17 - 02:45 PM

Serious question, for those more knowledgeable of history than I am: are there any instances of those who had previous careers as entrepreneurial capitalists becoming successful presidents/prime-ministers/emperors/chiefs of nations? Successful in the sense of doing a half-decent job of things for their nations ....

(I got thinking about this because I had someone say to me yesterday, "It'll be good to get a BUSINESSMAN in there!" I can't remember what it was we were talking about ... !)

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 Jan 17 - 03:10 PM

The most influential businessman-turned-statesman of recent decades was probably Osama bin Laden.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: cnd
Date: 14 Jan 17 - 06:38 PM

Lots of early presidents (and some later ones too) were plantation owners and/or farmers, so that's sort of like running a business, but I didn't look too deeply into those.

Most recently, both the Bushes were businessmen (H. and H.W. in oil, and H. in baseball).

Warren Harding published and revitalized very successfully The Marion Star newspaper

Truman and a friend had ran a haberdasher under the name Truman & Jacobson, which was initially successful but failed after the Great Depression

Woodrow Wilson set up his own law firm in Atlanta Ga but quit after less than a year.

Those are the most recent ones. I'll let you decide how successful they were for yourself

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 14 Jan 17 - 08:22 PM

Yes, there have been several business people who have risen to the US Presidency, but not in a single step. They all served as governors, legislators, or cabinet members before running for President. Mr. Trump is the first to have gone directly to the top job without spending any time serving in any other governmental position.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 Jan 17 - 08:39 PM

The closest precedent to Trump is probably Silvio Berlusconi. He got to be prime minister from zero political experience in half the time it took Trump from announcing his candidature to getting the job.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Stanron
Date: 15 Jan 17 - 03:27 AM

In the UK the landed gentry ran their estates as businesses. They would have been horrified at the suggestion that they were in 'Trade' but of course they were. The Labour party's punitive tax regimes put a lot of them out of business in the 20thC. The politics of envy thereby killing lots of golden geese who subsequently laid no more eggs. The embittered looney left loosers on this forum will contest most of this of course but it should be noted that some of the landed gentry had enormous beneficial effect on this country's financial well being. One example would be Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater. He had a coal mine in a place called Worsley. In order to make it more profitable he built a canal from Worsley to Manchester. One horse could pull, on a barge, ten times the amount of coal it could pull on a cart. The price of coal fell, and this was at a time when deforestation was making wood rather scarce for use as fuel. It is suggested that the whole Industrial revolution was born from this. The embittered LLLs will tell you that the landed gentry were all parasites living off the backs of the downtrodden peasants. Possibly some of them were. The likes of Francis E were not.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 15 Jan 17 - 10:17 AM

Stanron - do you want to contribute informative facts to broaden and stimulate debate..
maybe even help educate...???

or provoke fights with 'LLL' which are mostly a bogeyman figment of your imagination..??

Bit of both... ok fair enough.... 🙄

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: akenaton
Date: 15 Jan 17 - 11:45 AM

it would seem to me that if change is to be implemented, political experience would be a negative. Just look at The legacy of President Obama, A man who served his time in the Chicago Democrat establishment.
In the end he was politically ineffective as the Rep/ Pub cartel made up his policy....including foreign policy like interventionism.
or "Obamacare" a licence for the health insurance corporations to print money.
"Yes we can"......."no you bloody didn't"

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 02:15 AM

Jack Campin - 14 Jan 17 - 03:10 PM

"The most influential businessman-turned-statesman of recent decades was probably Osama bin Laden."

Really?? I'd love to know when Osama bin Laden was ever either of those things, and he was never, ever a "leader of any nation".

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 02:55 AM

In the U.S., it seems that political leaders have been lawyers and professors. Some businessmen, but mostly lawyers and a few professors - and now and then a physician or clergyperson.

Here's a demographic study of a recent U.S. Congress that gives information about members' professional and educational background.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 07:45 AM

The landed gentry consists of people who do very little actual work themselves but who derive their income from the labour of others who are generally kept poor enough to keep them in line, even though they are working land that was stolen from the ordinary people by the ancestors of the gentry in question. On the surface of it, that may appear to work smoothly and quite well, but the principle (or lack of principle) behind it is one of exploitation by inherited wealth. Completely acceptable to the expedient, self-serving right. Slightly more indigestible to us on the loony left. I'll pick my side on the basis of morality if you don't mind.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 08:56 AM

""Obamacare" a licence for the health insurance corporations to print money."
Well - there we go - a supporter of Trump's 'pay up or die' approach to the people's health
http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2014/07/health-care-poor-race-bottom.html
There's no depth to your "socialism", is there Ake?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 11:20 AM

Do you know anything about "obamacare" in practice Jim.
I get plenty of information from my friends in America.
Apparently people who are destitute are still taken care of through the "Medicare system?", but those on low to medium wages have seen their private health insurance bills soar, so much so that many people have no medical insurance at all and are earning too much to qualify for the free service.
The legislation is universally disliked, hence the lack of protests over its abolition.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 11:58 AM

Steve Shaw - 16 Jan 17 - 07:45 AM

Stereotypes again Shaw? All complete and utter unsubstantiated twaddle

1: "The landed gentry consists of people who do very little actual work themselves"

And you "know" this for a fact how Shaw? Or is it just left-wing quasi-Marxist/Communist crap you were force fed in your youth. I think in real life you will find that they work very hard at it and employ others to assist them - if they don't they don't remain "landed" for very long.

2: "who derive their income from the labour of others who are generally kept poor enough to keep them in line"

What actually does happen is that quite legally, with the agreement of both parties, tenant and landowner agree a rent or an amount for a lease that is fixed and that is not tied to any profit (This point has been put to you before and you have studiously ignored it - could the reason for that be that you cannot refute one single detail of that?). Now then please explain to us all exactly how all these tenant farmers are kept poor and kept in line? Complete and utter idiotic "leftie" hogwash.

3: "they are working land that was stolen from the ordinary people by the ancestors of the gentry in question".

Really?? When did this theft take place? What proof of ownership exists that all this land was EVER owned by those you refer to as "the ordinary people"? I think that if you actually look into it you will find that ALL land is owned perfectly legally, the majority of it by purchase these days.

4: "I'll pick my side on the basis of morality if you don't mind."

What "morality" Shaw? The "morality" of envy? The "morality" of "You have something, I don't, I want it so I will take it from you?". You will pick the side who build their case on baseless, supposition and lies and you know what Shaw? that does not surprise me at all.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 12:07 PM

Not again, Teribus. You go legal, I'll go moral. For Christ's sake turn the record over and talk about something else. Or preferably nothing at all.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Stu
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 12:12 PM

" I think that if you actually look into it you will find that ALL land is owned perfectly legally, the majority of it by purchase these days."

Er, not true dat. I'm willing to bet a whole swathe of enclosed commons is being squatted on. Just because it happened a while ago doesn't means nowt.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 12:15 PM

You're quite right Teribus, I work/worked for all of the big estates in this area, and now they are all hock deep in debt, many with huge outlays on property maintenance, many cannot even get rid of their white elephants as they are tied up in family trusts.
They cannot afford to pay staff on upkeep the properties and are selling off the cottages to pay bank charges.
I was talking to one the other day and he said he envied me my wooden semi and no money worries......a first class bloke, a bit of a celebrity in his day, known one another from childhood.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 12:21 PM

"Do you know anything about "obamacare" in practice Jim."
Yes I do and I prefer to go with what I know rather than someone who blames British people for ruining the NHS - your record goes before you as far as supporting the less well off, social work, etc.
"And you "know" this for a fact how Shaw?"
Pretty well a historically established fact
FORMER BISHOP OF DURHAM
Still sucking up to the landed gentry Teribus
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 12:26 PM

Don't the
ENCLOSURES feature in your history book?
And you are joined by another cap-doffer
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 02:18 PM

Akenaton alleged:

The legislation is universally disliked, hence the lack of protests over its abolition.

If you'd said "widely disliked", you just MIGHT have been in the ball park, but "universally"? No way, Jay. "Universally" is such an extremely broad expression that it is wiped out by even ONE liker.

And "the lack of protests"? Hardly. But then, you say you get "plenty of information from my friends in America." Two things to point out there: Your source is "my friends in America". From long context, it's clear that your friends in America (if there really are any) are the nutty right. And what you call "plenty of information" is really "plenty of agreements with what I want to believe".

That really means that "my contacts" (again, if there really are any) "in America tell me what I'm ready to believe."

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Stanron
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 03:49 PM

Little is known about land ownership in Britain before the Romans. We do know that the pre Roman Brits were good fighters. They saw off Julius Ceasar a few decades before Claudius invaded. They probably got that good by fighting amongst themselves which would suggest that land ownership was based on the ability to fight for it.

After the Romans left, waves of Angles, Saxons and Jutes came over and took land to settle on simply because they could. The Romans had sent all the Britons who joined their army abroad as a matter of policy. An occupying Roman army was always made up of foreigners. and after they left there was no culture of training for combat so the country was wide open.

Another 400 years later and the Viking invasions began. Alfred the Great sorted that, improved law and made the first steps in developing towns or cities in four hundred years. Again land was fought for. Another two and a half centuries later we get Billy the Bastard invading from France.

Our current Aristocracy was founded then. Billy owned all the land, because he said he did. Who was going to argue? People who were able and prepared to fight for him got control of parts of it. They built castles, wooden stockades at first, and raised armies and took over control of any existing infrastructure. The suppression of the Saxon culture was deliberately brutal and more or less successful. I have wondered if the deep seated hate that socialist Britain has for the aristocracy is some kind of racial memory of this time. The conquerors conquered. Oh how unfair! The legal structure was maintained and developed. The church was a common factor and gradually became richer and more powerful. Over time possession became ownership, the power of Royalty over Aristocracy was eroded, slowly, slowly a middle class of merchants and independent farmers developed. Some of them got to own property. At no point was any land owned by 'ordinary people'.

Common land was not owned by the commoners. The commoners had rights of use. Acts of Parliament were used to repeal those rights. All very legal, if inhumane in its application.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 04:18 PM

There is no racial memory. There is the rational conviction that you can't own land because you didn't make the land. Any land that was forcibly fenced off by powerful people was removed from the common good in order to exploit people as tenants and make themselves even more powerful and wealthy. You may argue that that is more efficient (it isn't - we end up with huge holdings planted with monocultures, devoid of wildlife and growing either inferior food that wouldn't grow at all but for massive chemical inputs, or, worse still, crops for biofuel). It is moral to enjoy stewardship of your fair share of land. If you do, you are likely to look after it by improving its soil and draining it so that it will produce the best quality food. Large holdings, over which the landlord may occasionally drive his Range Rover but have little clue as to how the land is being used, are run for profit only. They are regarded as open-air factory floors. That way we get soil degradation leading to erosion, silted-up drains and rivers, deforestation, polluted waterways, dustbowls and desertification. The evidence is everywhere if you open your eyes.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: akenaton
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 04:50 PM

I accept your point Dave O and withdraw "universally".....There are "Liberals" everywhere quite prepared to cut off their noses...and everyone else's to protect what they imagine to be left wing ideology.

"Obamacare" has been a failure. A political trade off which did not work.

For your information and in spite of your patronising ignorance, my friends are not of the "nutty right" and they do exist.
One I have known since childhood.

Given your history here I thought you would have learned by now that I never knowingly lie on this forum.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jan 17 - 05:09 PM

One would have thought that any friend of yours who's been a friend since childhood is considerably more likely to be nutty than someone who's consorted since childhood with more rational people.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 02:20 AM

Steve Shaw - 16 Jan 17 - 04:18 PM - More idiotic left wing twaddle.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Joe Offer
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 03:16 AM

I have to say that since the U.S. election in November, I have noticed an ugly air of triumphalism in Teribus and akenaton and bobad and some others. I used to have sympathy for them because they were the downtrodden underdogs. Some even accused me of supporting them.

But now, now I don't know. They're not so nice, now that they're no longer underdogs.

So, I dunno....

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 03:27 AM

"There are "Liberals" everywhere quite prepared to cut off their noses"
Infinitely preferable to having people like you cut off their noses for future reference, when we elect our own Trump into office.
Can't help noticing we've moved on from the cap-doffing to the landed gentry
Maybe a reminder of the enclosures did the trick!!
"They're not so nice, now that they're no longer underdogs."
"Rednecks rule OK" to borrow a term from the past
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: BobL
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 03:34 AM

"There is the rational conviction that you can't own land because you didn't make the land."

Not particularly rational - you can't make land but you can buy it, inherit it, settle on it if uninhabited or conquer it by force of arms if not. I dare say most claims of ownership, if you trace them back far enough, depend on the last.

Besides, without ownership, what gives one particular person or group the (necessarily exclusive) right to farm a particular piece of land, build on it or mine it for coal or minerals?

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 03:48 AM

Strange post Joe for someone in your position within this forum to make. But I do have to ask as you level the accusation without giving any substantive evidence to back it up - What "triumphalism"? - unless of course you view pointing out what are established facts as being triumphalist? Since November? You mean since Trump won the election in accordance with "your" (US) electoral system? As you can see from my posts I most certainly am not a fan of Donald Trump, so what exactly are you wittering on about?

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 04:08 AM

Pity you didn't read that article on the Enclosures Jim, or anything else on them for that matter. If you had it would have struck you that those who did the most "enclosing" were not the aristocracy or the "landed gentry" but their tenant farmers who naturally enough wanted land of their own. So as in most successful "revolutions" it was not the "working classes" who started it and carried it through in the cause of equality, it was the ambitious, grasping, "middle-classes" in the cause of self-advancement.

From your article though there is a perfect parallel for what is happening now with regard to Europe. The fact that useless, unproductive, waterlogged common land was enclosed, drained and recovered for agricultural use meant that an agricultural revolution did take place in time to match the population explosion that took place so that people could be fed. Your link states that the same sort of thing MIGHT have occurred in time under common tenure but it would have relied upon the unanimous agreement of all and as we know from the EU how long that takes to achieve don't we? Because of the "enclosures" and the agricultural revolution that occurred in England and Wales, by 1707 English and Welsh farmers were at least 50 years ahead their Scottish counterparts.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 04:40 AM

I read the article and know who the enclosers were historically - the land owners of which the gentry were a part.
The seizure of common land is many centuries old and historical rights by the great families played a part of that.
Keep on cap-doffing - always good for a smile
"What "triumphalism"
Do you really have to ask?
Your strutting and talking down to people has always been a feature of your postings - your pompous superiority is a standing joke
I have to say I'm surprised it took Joe to notice it - far to tolerant, I suppose.
"You mean since Trump won the election in accordance with "your" (US) electoral system? "
As did the Nazis with Germany's system - a hard lesson for both
Hopefully America will do better next time, if the Redneck in the White House and his "Free Russian" friends allows there to be a next time
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 05:46 AM

Joe, its not triumphalism, I think reality is beginning to intrude upon this section of the forum......But you are a big enough fella to accept that and make your own points.

You have always been extremely fair as far as I can see and I hope you are not becoming defensive.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 05:57 AM

Ah but it wasn't just, or even mainly, useless, waterlogged land that was seized, was it? If only! Good land was usurped that could yield a profit without too much work once the newly-tenanted workers had been subdued and controlled. The upshot of your wonderful "agricultural revolution" was the conversion of thousands of small holdings into much bigger, "efficient" ones which did away with crop rotation and made way for big machinery and which had the horrible consequence of depopulating the countryside, a phenomenon from which it has never recovered. Thatcher may even have seen that as her model for closing down industries and wrecking communities. Even worse, the twentieth century saw the inexorable rise of the use of chemical inputs and hedgerow removal to make way for even more industrialisation of farmland. If your grass looks a bit yellow, don't worry too much about the soil: just whack on a bit more cheap artificial nitrogen, won by one of the most polluting industrial processes ever invented. And if it moves, competes with your crop or causes a rot, there will be a "-cide" to deal with it and you needn't worry too much about outdated and inconvenient methods such as rotation! Just ignore nature's lessons in diversity and "specialise!" No need to worry about quality too much either - those "-cides" will have made your crops LOOK perfect even though they now lack nutrient value and have the texture of wet cotton wool! Some revolution. Huge tracts of UK farmland now grow grain crops that can be used only for animal fodder (poor buggers) or for biofuels, and the rivers and drains just carry on silting up as whst used to be soil in good heart washes into them by the millions of tons every year. Oh yes, we've made such "progress" since those powerful "landed gentry" started to run things!

BobL, there is no moral or rational right for someone to arbitrarily put a fence round common land and say that from now on this is mine. There is the moral and rational IMPERATIVE to allow everyone a fair share of land which he or she can have unconditional stewardship of. It's rational because if you have your fair share, and no more, you will have to work it as hard as you can, drain it, improve the soil, whatever it takes,to make a decent living. If you improve land or build a house on it you have the "ownership" of your improvements and yiure entitled to profit from thstbifvyiu pass the stewardship of the land on. If I buy an empty shop in Bude for fifty grand and, by my enterprise and hard work, turn it into a thriving and profitable business then sell it for half a million, I'm selling the goodwill and the products of my labour. I haven't increased the intrinsic value of the bricks and mortar very much except via a bit of decoration. Tests how it should be

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 06:00 AM

Ake - you know that as much as we disagree on certain 'things' we tolerate each other in a good humoured nature..

But Teribus is a very unpleasant sociopathic character;
and it's his kind of loathsome sneering dismissive attitude that is becoming established as a norm
amongst the miniscule majority vote winning brexiteers...

A vile culture of bad winners.... 😣

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 06:13 AM

Pressed the wrong button! To continue, I meant to say that's how it should be with land, except that I can own the bricks and mortar because I bought them from someone who had MADE them. I can't own the land but I can own the improvements I've made and I should be able to sell them on if I like.

All the other unedited glitches can stand! 🤓

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 06:29 AM

"I think reality is I think reality is "
The reality is a fortress Britain policy and a thug in the White House
Nothing to be proud or pleased about, except those who wecome such things
It's heartening that those who do haven't grown in number but just become more noticeable in their strident strutting.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: akenaton
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 08:04 AM

Oh Come on PFR,I know what sort of person you are and would never fall out with you here   BUT......surely after all these years we must be allowed just a teeny wee bit of spite?   :0)

There are folk here who use much worse language than Teribus, but they do not see how abusive their language is. on this thread alone we have been called all manner of things, homophobia, racism, fascism, my friends referred to as "right wing nut jobs", people with conservative views referred to as "rodents" and now Joe whom I respect tremendously alleging "triumphalism".
I think Joe felt sorry for the "underdogs" but that is rather different to being confronted by the fact that the "underdogs" were right all the time and the ideology of the bullies rejected by the electorate.   I think that is what bothers Joe....I suppose it's a natural reaction.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 08:33 AM

Uncle DaveO referred to your friends in America, if there really are any, as the nutty right. He did not say that your friends are "right wing nut-jobs." Clearly, you are taking lessons from the Keith-on-Wheatcroft school of meaning-drift. At this juncture I'm extremely tempted to suggest that the appellation you incorrectly allege was made, were it to be applied to you personally, would be entirely appropriate.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 08:40 AM

"The upshot of your wonderful "agricultural revolution" was the conversion of thousands of small holdings into much bigger, "efficient" ones which did away with crop rotation and made way for big machinery and which had the horrible consequence of depopulating the countryside, a phenomenon from which it has never recovered." - Steve Shaw

More ill-informed twaddle Shaw. When do you think the agrarian revolution happened Shaw? In England, depending upon who you read, it took place in three phases:

Phase 1 - 1550 to 1650
Phase 2 - 1650 to 1750
Phase 3 - 1750 to 1880

So according to the omniscient Steve Shaw the Agricultural revolution did away with crop rotation. Utter bullshit of course it not only retained crop rotation but introduced new beneficial crops to improve the land (Clover and Turnips are the two that immediately spring to mind).

What big machinery are you prattling on about in the period 1550 to 1880 Shaw? Who built it and how did the manufacturers deliver it round the country? How was it powered?

Any idea what impact the Black Death and the subsequent plagues had on the countryside Shaw? I'll give you a hint:

"Plague was present somewhere in Europe in every year between 1346 and 1671. The Second Pandemic was particularly widespread in the following years: 1360–1363; 1374; 1400; 1438–1439; 1456–1457; 1464–1466; 1481–1485; 1500–1503; 1518–1531; 1544–1548; 1563–1566; 1573–1588; 1596–1599; 1602–1611; 1623–1640; 1644–1654; and 1664–1667. Subsequent outbreaks, though severe, marked the retreat from most of Europe (18th century) and northern Africa (19th century). According to Geoffrey Parker, "France alone lost almost a million people to the plague in the epidemic of 1628–31."

In England, in the absence of census figures, historians propose a range of preincident population figures from as high as 7 million to as low as 4 million in 1300, and a post-incident population figure as low as 2 million. By the end of 1350, the Black Death subsided, but it never really died out in England. Over the next few hundred years, further outbreaks occurred in 1361–1362, 1369, 1379–1383, 1389–1393, and throughout the first half of the 15th century. An outbreak in 1471 took as much as 10–15% of the population, while the death rate of the plague of 1479–1480 could have been as high as 20%. The most general outbreaks in Tudor and Stuart England seem to have begun in 1498, 1535, 1543, 1563, 1589, 1603, 1625, and 1636, and ended with the Great Plague of London in 1665.

Now as it wasn't just the "townies" that died Shaw what do you think happened to the land that had previously been farmed and now had no-one left farming it? No-one left to "inherit" it. Depopulation of rural areas started long before you seem to think it did. Plentiful coal, water, mineral ores, the arrival of Dutch influence in the late 1600s all combined with a population explosion during the 18th century that allowed the industrial revolution fuelled by the agrarian revolution and the establishment of the British Empire - none of it would have happened had it not been for the departure of the Stuarts and the arrival of William of Orange. The rest as they say is "history".

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 08:50 AM

" the "underdogs" were right all the time and the ideology of the bullies rejected by the electorate"
Garbage
Populism is mob rule writ large and, as last night TV program showed, put a thug in the White House who has been involved with gangsters and killers for decades, including The Russian Mafia.
What can be possibly "right" about that?
Not addressed to you Ake - you don't bother about such things \s political criminals
We're getting more and more information about this monster and he's not inaugurated yet
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 05:46 PM

Aaaaaanyway, getting back to the subject on the subject line. The Bin Laden family were hugely wealthy builders and developers, who made their fortune through contracts in Mecca and Medina; Osama Bin Laden was a road builder on a big scale. I wouldn't personally see him as a statesman.
Nicolas Sarkozy, ex-president of France, ran a legal practice specialising in business…
Binyamin Netanyahu, prime minister of Israel, was an economic consultant with Boston Consulting. His predecessor, Shimon Perez, was a shepherd and farmer (who spoke Polish, French, English, Russian, Yiddish and Hebrew).
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe worked for Kobe Steel.
Former US president Barack Obama was an attorney specialising in civil rights, and served on the boards of directors of several organisations.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jan 17 - 08:11 PM

Ah yes, Teribus, your agricultural revolution seemed to turn into a golden-age "agrarian" revolution all of a sudden. Well your 19th century phase drove people in their millions out of the countryside towards those dark satanic mills, where they could be exploited in semi-slavery for almost all their waking hours except for chapel on Sunday, where they'd damn well better be seen praying by the bosses or else. Meanwhile the squires carried on bleeding their tenants not quite dry but just short of making them squeal. You're a bit of an Archers country life man, aren't you? Well look around at all those monocultures that are the end-products of your agrarian dream world. Two-thirds of barley grown here is too poor to be used for malting. Over half the wheat goes for animal feed, too weak for flour production. Thousands of acres of elephant grass which gives farmers a yield for biofuel - not food! - that enables them to do very little work at all. Thousands of acres of maize that denudes soil, robs it of nutrients and and allows it to wash into rivers to silt them up, all for cattle feed. Oilseed rape as far as the eye can see that causes plagues of flea beetles and pollen beetles, a little for cooking oil but mostly for feed, industrial lubricants and biofuel. Neonicotinoid insecticides which are ravaging bee populations. All of this is profit-driven and it's big business, and, if that isn't enough, the "landowner" can get forty thousand a year for each monster wind-turbine that someone else paid for to put on a tiny patch of his land. You can go to the pubs round here and hear those same "landowners" whingeing about immigrants and blaming benefits claimants for all the ills of the country. The "contractors" they can affford to hire instead of doing the work themselves cause chaos all summer on our roads as they trundle along for miles, instead of a few years ago when farmers with their own machinery just had to cross roads to get from one field to another. Ah yes, Teribus, the economy of scale, the benefits of gigantism, never mind the quality feel the width! The fruits of your agrarian paradise! Now why don't you toddle off and find out for yourself just how important bees are to life on earth, then, when your agribusinessmen land-barons have destroyed them all, tell us a bit more about "progress!"

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 03:27 AM

Cliched "socialist" stereotypes again Shaw. Is that really all you can come up with? Agricultural Revolution and the "agrarian revolution" are exactly the same thing, but then you would have known that if you had read anything about it. You were asked some questions about the last load of twaddle that you trotted out, but I see as usual you have ducked those. And let's see what was introduced by way of deflection - Maize, Oilseed rape (Apparently growing feed for livestock according to Shaw should now be a crime) Bees, Wind Farms (Thought that the Labour Party were big fans (pun intended) of Wind Farms - it was after all they who started this latest bonanza). Liked your take on the "contractors" and harvesting - your suggestions would beggar practically every arable farmer in the country.

In researching for these little exchanges I was amazed to read that as much as the EU Commissioners have fucked up this country's agriculture British Farmers still are capable of supplying the country with 60% of everything we need.

Thompson:
Thank you for responding on behalf of Jack Campin, thought that he'd gone awfully quiet on the subject. As for your response:

"The Bin Laden family were hugely wealthy builders and developers, who made their fortune through contracts in Mecca and Medina; Osama Bin Laden was a road builder on a big scale. I wouldn't personally see him as a statesman."

While the Bin Laden FAMILY might have made their money from civil engineering, Osama bin Laden was never ever part of the family business was he?

Mohammed bin Laden {Osama's father} divorced Hamida {Osama's mother} soon after Osama bin Laden was born. Mohammed recommended Hamida to Mohammed al-Attas, an associate. Al-Attas married Hamida in the late 1950s or early 1960s, and they are still together. The couple had four children, and bin Laden lived in the new household with three half-brothers and one half-sister

Osama bin Laden:
1968 to 1976, he attended the élite secular Al-Thager Model School
He studied economics and business administration at King Abdulaziz University. Some reports suggest he earned a degree in civil engineering in 1979.

In 1979 he went to Pakistan to assist in the fight against the forces of the USSR in Afghanistan

In 1988 he formed Al-Qeada

He returned to Saudi Arabia in 1990 and offered his services to the King to protect the country against Saddam Hussein's forces, an offer that was rejected.

Osama bin Laden was stripped of his Saudi Nationality and banished from the country in 1992.

No mention at all of him ever building any roads.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Thompson
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 03:42 AM

The best known reference to Bin Laden's road building is Robert Fisk's 1993 interview.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 06:18 AM

BIN LADIN GROUP
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 07:10 AM

sigh... wouldn't we live in a much happier and creative utopian world if all nations were lead by artists.... 😎











...ermm.. oh.. hold on a sec.. Hitler.... 😬

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 07:13 AM

So why, Teribus, can't this country produce ALL of what we need? You can't keep blaming the EU forever, you know. It isn't EU commissioners who till the ground and sow the crops. It isn't EU commissioners who cause supermarket chains to force prices down so low that small farms are put out of business, is it? (Not "socialism," either, eh? Sounds a bit more like your pet capitalistic "blind workings of the market" to me). It wasn't EU commissioners who devastated the cattle industry by spreading foot and mouth via corner-cutting and ignorance of good practice, was it? (And, as with those silted-up rivers, it's the poor old taxpayer who pays the farmer the full market price for every cow that had to be killed, as it is with TB, blamed on badgers in spite of the bleedin' obvious fact that you're asking for big trouble if you keep your cows crowded together in filthy, damp, unhygienic barns for half the year). It isn't EU commissioners who have wiped out 75% of our songbirds and who are well on the way to killing all our bees, is it? Profit motive, gigantism, ignorance and bad practice steered by land-barons who don't actually know one soil type from another. Oh no, they'll look after the "books" while their "estate managers" are given free rein to do anything they can to maximise those profits. We don't produce more than 60% of what we need, in spite of having some of the finest soils and best climatic conditions for arable farming in the world, because we use perfectly good arable land for growing cattle feed, one-seventh as efficient as using it to grow food for people, or, even worse, growing crops for "biofuels" instead of conserving energy, all in a world of seven billion with billions of those malnourished. A lot of that forty percent shortfall is imports of cash crops from countries that can't adequately feed their own people. Capitalism and the "global market place" reign supreme!

And don't come back preaching to me about farmers "having" to grow this, that or the other in order to get their EU subsidies. Yes it's just about the biggest absurdity of many EU absurdities so don't bloody start. I hold no candle for the CAP and never have, but I've not exactly seen a farmers' revolt over it, a downing of ploughshares. The little farmers I know round here work hard, do the best they can and get little in subsidies. The big boys upcountry, the ones you champion, moan and groan, take the subsidies, get someone to stick up those lucrative windmills, then vote leave. They'll bloody regret that last bit, sure as eggs is eggs.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 07:14 AM

And Churchill while we're at it, pfr...

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: Teribus
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 07:25 AM

Thanks for the link Thompson, a nice piece of fiction. Perhaps you should look at the Official Khartoum - Port Sudan Road Project Report. The project {Project ID: P002626} was funded through the World Bank with actual funding coming from Kreditanstalt fur Wiederaufban and the Norwegian Government. The work was actually carried out by a company called RBPC {Road and Bridges Public Corporation} who awarded two contracts to a company called Salini-Impregilo. No mention of Osama bin Laden at all. Even Fisk could not name Osama bin Laden's construction Company, didn't you find that rather odd?

As usual the link provided by Jim Carroll actually substantiates what I have said - Osama bin Laden had absolutely nothing whatsoever with Saudi Bin Laden Construction.

Subject: RE: BS: Businessmen as Leaders of Nations
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Jan 17 - 07:28 AM

.. yeah I know a bit about Churchill the dauber [and his arty modern portrait painting burning antics] from history..

the mrs just box set watched the Crown on Netflix
and I caught a few scenes
while she demanded I brought in regular supplies of fizzy pop and chocolate.....

sigh.. if only Hitler and Churchill had staged a painting competition to settle who won the war...


Maybe instead then.. nations lead by piss artists...



...ermm.. oh.. hold on a sec.................. 😜