No. Or: Britain is not Iceland. Iceland is the size of Coventry. Britain is the fifth-largest economy in the world (although it also has the third-largest current account deficit). The pound is still a reserve currency that people want to buy, despite the efforts of the speculators. We are bankrupt only in the sense that … Continue reading Is Britain really going bankrupt?
Category: Bit of politics
OK, so we appear to be in the early stages of a major recession, which may well go on for years. A whole load of people may well lose their jobs, pay rises will be a thing of the past for people who keep them, and overall incomes from working will fall substantially. Meanwhile, inflation … Continue reading Anyone who proposes a worse policy wins a prize
Andrew at LC on bloggertarians: Libertarians almost all seem to believe that they have achieved everything in life entirely by themselves, having struggled against mighty odds and overwhelming enemies to become moderately successful computer programmers, despite the horrible disadvantages of being born white, English-speaking heterosexual males in middle-class families. I admit this is slightly unfair: … Continue reading Epic political theory WIN
Parliamentary privilege, as traditionally viewed in the UK constitution, grants MPs freedom of speech on what they say within the House of Commons. It doesn't: a) give them the right to run spies in the civil service; or b) cover what they say or do outside of the House of Commons. Its relevance to the … Continue reading Constitutional clarification
In case anyone's wondering why Damian Green was arrested by 'anti-terror' police - it's because all investigations involving potential breaches of the Official Secrets Act are dealt with by Special Branch, which was renamed to Counter Terrorism Command when it was merged with the Met's Anti-Terrorism Branch in 2006. As with the freezing of Landsbanki's … Continue reading Terror police, arrest this man
BNP apologists frequently claim that supporters of the group aren't necessarily racist, they're just misguided working-class souls who've been abandoned by the mainstream parties and feel the BNP speaks for them. Non-apologists suggest, with equal frequency, that perhaps if people weren't racist then they wouldn't vote for a party whose primary feature was racism, even … Continue reading ‘How Racist Are The BNP?’
Two things are going to impair my analysis of this election: brennivin, and my landlady's inability to make the wi-fi work. On aggregate, however, I'd rather be spending it in Iceland than pretty much anywhere else. update: yeah, that pretty much worked. been liveblogging on lc, will link sometime. Yay Obama, yay the American people, … Continue reading Electoral impairment
5CC wins: At least the Daily Mail is doing its best to ensure this sort of thing never happens again. Its asylum coverage is working towards there never being any future Andrew Sachses by making sure they die in a war zone rather than be allowed in the country. Just like it tried in the … Continue reading Final word on Teacupgate
It only seems like a few months since the biggest "idiots failing to understand numbers" issue was that of crime... oh, for those heady pre-recession days when people had nothing more to worry about than lamenting that crime was a major problem despite it generally not being one. The latest row, which has unfortunately given … Continue reading Violence most horrid
If anyone uses the phrase 'the cupboard is bare' when referring to the UK's current economic position, this is an excellent indicator that they are entirely clueless about it. For one, it's an embarrassingly trite and twee metaphor, unlikely to be used by anyone literate; for two, it paints an entirely false picture of the … Continue reading Furniture, nudity thereof