BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 10:24 AM

"We need to find a sensible controlled way of redressing this imbalance before the status quo collapses and the environment goes to pot."

I was under the impression that I was saying much the same as this Lox, but the destruction of the Capitalist System, without having first some clue as to what will replace it, is neither sensible, nor controlled.

This has to be done with reason and compromise, or it is certain that what results will be much, much worse.

One good move towards a solution would be to give the UN much greater powers to set parameters, and the level of force needed to ensure that nobody overstepped those limits.
And all members of the UN should have equal say, with no vetos permitted. Majority rules...LIVE WITH IT! That should be the bottom line.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 11:19 AM

UN doesn't work, as Russia and others veto anything that seeks to cramp their spheres of influence.

G

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 04:00 PM

There are so many straw men in these arguments.

Don I made my sarcastic-free point because you don't explain and haven't explained how come capitalism does distribution - food, cement, ink, cars, vcomputers, paper , cosmetics - yet when it comes to food, all of a sudden governments have got to step when capiralism fails to deliver to the starving.

One straw man - nobody said or suggested that politics and economics were interchangeable; that's just misreading lox's post.


You can carry on saying capital and labour mus work together (in many ways they already do) after we've pointed out on what ways those two forces are in apparently irreconcileable opposition, one of many, many points you and teribus have simply ignored, or maybe don't have an answer for??

You both so 'forget the past'. I wish the right did when it keeps banging on about how everything went wrong with the 60s, or with things like the NHS.

"Those who forget their history will be condemned to repeat it."

It is impossible to deal with the humungous problems we have without grasping how we got here.m That's how the Imperialist Powers dealt with 'foreign parts' - never mind you history, we're going to divide it up with a 1-foot ruler.

I don't really think in the end these arguments are really at the lkevel of facts, theories, history ot knowledge. Alas.

It is no wonder that the punchline of the immortal Python Parrot sketch was, (talking of England/UK), "You've got to argue till your blue in the mouth if you want to get anything done in this country."


   Ivor


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 04:28 PM

Don, there is nobody saying that Capitalism can be destroyed overnight, but we should be making a start on dismantling it.

All the environmental damage which is now becoming evident, air and sea pollution, destruction of rain forest, starvation in Africa, brought about by organised overpopulation, can all be laid at Capitalism's door.
We need to start telling people the truth about our economic system.

There are also the social problems. Many people now see making money ...being successful....as the main goal in life. A society of haves and have nots cannot survive for long when the divide becomes so obscenely wide, in fact society seems to be in the process of disintegration right now, with gangs of feral youth terrorising whole areas of our cities.

Saying that we have nothing to replace Capitalism with is simply wrong.
The problem for the Capitalists is that any workable alternative will mean the beginning of the end....and not before time.

What makes Capitalism so utterly virulent, is that it is based not on need as Teribus says, but on demand and in most cases that demand is artificially created by Capitalism itself.
To satisfy that demand,we squander scarse resources, poison the water and air around us, create a moronic, vicious, uncaring society, while the real things of value in human life start to fade from memory.

Any alternative to the current system will of course mean huge changes to the way we live, and we should be under no illusions that we can continue doing as we do now and that a bit of tinkering can solve the problems. Change cannot take place until the Capitalists loosen their grip on our throats, but unlike the Communists, our leeches will adhere until until we rip them off with our bare hands.

If we are to survive as a species, it is not just the ideology of Capitalism which must be abandoned but the whole structure which has been constructed to support and service it.   The great cities, the technology, the financial institutions and ultimately all the funtions of "organised" government. It will be a long painful journey, but we have absolutely no alternative....Ake

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 05:49 PM

In my last post,

governments have got to step when

Should have read, "governments have got to step in when...."

You both so 'forget the past'

Should have read, "You both say 'forget the past'".


Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 07:04 PM

""You can carry on saying capital and labour mus work together (in many ways they already do) after we've pointed out on what ways those two forces are in apparently irreconcileable opposition, one of many, many points you and teribus have simply ignored, or maybe don't have an answer for??""

Thanks for your permission. I have every intention of carrying on saying it.

Neither Teribus, nor myself have ignored the "apparently irreconcileable opposition". We have repeatedly stated that it will require compromise.

I will say again, there is a point where labour is getting the maximum pay for its work that Capital can cough up without going bankrupt. That point can never be found unless labour and Capital TOGETHER go looking for it.

""Saying that we have nothing to replace Capitalism with is simply wrong.""

If you go back through this thread you will find that the only alternatives suggested were as follows:-

1. Anarchy.

2. Dismantle everything, do away with all organisation, and go back to hunter/gatherer days. Or to put it another way, Anarchy.

You would think, would you not, that if there were a better system, that someone among all the haters of Capitalism on this thread, would be able to tell us what it is.


The only suggestion I am seeing is that we reverse the course of human evolution and revert to the primitive beginnings of humanity, and if that IS genuinely the only way for the human race to survive, then the whole damn thing has been a waste of time, and it isn't worth saving.

Fortunately, I will NEVER subscribe to that notion, because I truly believe that we are capable of better things, once we stop reacting out of hate, and envy to any who show greater talent, or ability, or intelligence.

In YOUR world of equals, WHO WILL DO THE DIRTY JOBS, when there is no incentive offered? WHO WILL TAKE CARE OF OTHERS, when it is easier to take one's own share and sit back?

Like it or not SOMEONE will have to organise, and manage, and that someone will seen as a boss, hated and envied. So there WILL have to be some incentive to take on the job, and here we go again.

Say after me, UTOPIA is fictional! UTOPIA doesn't work!

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: autolycus
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 01:43 AM

My point about distribution ignored.

It's the specifics of how capital and labout are irreconcileable that you continue to ignore e.g. the conflict between keeping down costs versus the need to raise wages to consume more to keep profits rising.

Et Cetera.


   Ivor

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: akenaton
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 03:32 AM

Don ...I don't need to repeat your words, I know there will never be a Utopia and that remark was unworthy of you.
I am talking about long term survival not Utopia.

Please explain how Capitalism can be made sustainable, when all the evidence suggests that it causes untold damage.
Surely compromise is unacceptable to Capitalism, any attempt to put the brakes on causes the Capitalist to withdraw and move on to easier pickings.

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 04:56 AM

""My point about distribution ignored.

It's the specifics of how capital and labout are irreconcileable that you continue to ignore e.g. the conflict between keeping down costs versus the need to raise wages to consume more to keep profits rising.""

Not ignored, Auto!! Already answered.

In every equation there is an optimum balance point. Cost versus pay is an equation. Ergo:- solve the equation and you have the best available outcome for both sides.

""Surely compromise is unacceptable to Capitalism, any attempt to put the brakes on causes the Capitalist to withdraw and move on to easier pickings.""

In my lifetime, Ake, labour has never tried compromise as a way to achieve a better result.

A flat out demand for insupportable increases, coupled with demands for job demarcation, and pay differentials which meant everybody moved up a step but nobody was satisfied. That was the history of pay negotiations in the sixties and seventies, and if the boss refused to bankrupt the company by agreeing, then the labour force bankrupted it for him by strike action.

You see I DO have a long memory, too long for the comfort of some here, who might prefer to forget the days when a factory could be shut down for weeks because the wrong employee changed a light bulb.

There have, however, been many examples of (usually, but not always, small) companies where boss and workers HAVE negotiated compromise solutions which have led to those workers receiving more than the current union rate, and they have traditionally been vilified for it by the workforce at large, and been called traitors to their kind.

Much more sensible, IMHO, to have emulated them.


You can talk to me about Capitalist intransigence, but you need to recognise that intransigence has been, and still is, a two way street, and the meeting point IS in the middle of the road.

Don T

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 05:56 PM

Subject: RE: BS: UK local elections: here comes poverty
From: GUEST,Albert
Date: 10 Apr 09 - 08:33 AM

I see in today's paper the Labour party are running scared. Harriet Harman, who is also leader of the Commons and the Party's chairman, said: "The BNP are a bigger threat than they have been before."

Labour is waging a campaign at local level to prevent the BNP from winning its first seats in the European Parliament.

In areas where there is heavy BNP activity, Labour is using the slogan, "fairness not fear", instead of its national banner "winning the fight for Britain's future".

She added "The party is focused on the BNP in this election in a way it hasn't been previously," she said.

You can't blame the British public for voting for the only party which appears to care for those who built this great country into what it is today only to see it flooded with every Tom, Dick and Harry walking into it and milking it for all it is worth.

She has a right to feel scared.