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Archive for the ‘Economies’ Category

Whilst I could never understand the economic rationale behind setting up the Eurozone which was always a total nonsense to me, the political case was obvious for those who believed in a “United States of Europe”, another nonsense if ever there was one. But whilst I have no love for either, I certainly wish them no harm because the UK is outside the Eurozone and hopefully in due course we shall be outside of the EU too.

The Media is full of stories about the economic crisis in Greece which is in the Euro but in deep shit because of the way it ran its budget therefore the question is: “Will the richer Eurozone countries bail Greece out ? Is this the first test for the Euro and will the currency fail if they can’t or don’t do so ?” To be honest the real problem has nothing to do with this in any case in my opinion…

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I often comment via the readers pages to articles in the Press and likely these often motivate to expand my thinking on any particular topic in this blog and particularly when you have ‘companions’ who although they may have different political views, share a common interest in looking for current answers or solutions.

One such person who I met via the Independent is called John and we were discussing an article by Andrew Grice last Saturday when he posed some interesting questions, this blog entry is an attempt to answer those: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/andrew-grice/andrew-grice-bad-case-of-jitters-on-tory-bandwagon-provides-a-test-of-nerve-for-cameron-1838772.html

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With the usual hilarity that surrounds most things to do with EU Summits, over dinner and behind closed doors, the new EU President and High Representative (Foreign Minister), were chosen and announced to a waiting world… Rompuy and Aston…Who, what, do either clean sinks better than Dettol ?

Belgian Prime Minister, Herman van Rompuy is the EU President which is quite funny because after the last Belgium General Election, no one could form a Government for months and months but I suppose they must have done so in the end to have a PM. The High Representative is a British Quango person called Baroness Ashton but the point is, nobody has heard of either of them and thereby hangs a tale….

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After some 12 years in power, to hear that useless Muppet Brown talking about “caring for OAPs” makes my stomach churn. When people ask me as a full time carer about me having a “Respite Care Break”, I stare back at them blankly and think to myself, “You really don’t understand what this is all about, do you ?”

And the truth is, they really don’t and in a large part wholly due to a “Legislation and Rights” approach to this and most other problems. Pass a Law and regardless of whether you have understood the issue, everything is now fine, it has been “seen to”. How Harmon, how Labour and all this talk about the taxpayer stumping up vast sums of money to create another sacred cow like the NHS and calling it a National Care Service, one thing is being overlooked and perhaps it is the most important of all, Dignity because I can assure you that there is precious little of it in old age.

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Today Bruce Anderson wrote a really interesting article in the Independent in which whilst touching upon David Cameron’s changed policy following the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty, took a slightly different view and partly through the prism of the Euro. It is a good piece of journalism and whilst anti-EU in tone offers a rational insight which could be debated on many levels, again, well worth a read whichever side of the debate you are on:

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/bruce-anderson/bruce-anderson-the-eu-battle-isnt-over-for-cameron-1817278.html

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Today I watched Gordon Brown in answer to a question by Nick Clegg state that breaking the Banks up into separate Retail and Wholesale businesses wouldn’t work because “Northern Rock was a retail bank and had to be saved…” What a total fool Brown is, clearly he cannot tell his arse from his elbow, we all know that NR was doing the one thing no Bank should ever do, borrow short and lend long.

To be fair to the LibDems, they have come up with this before but what reignited it was that last night, the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King made some very robust comments. He described the regulatory system created by Gordon Brown in 1997 as “inadequate”. Then went on to say that wrongly motivated bankers had been “playing with fire”, and further that a central assumptions of the Financial Services Authority’s new approach was a “delusion”.

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I was amused to see a blog in the Independent by one Mr Ben Chu in which he was attacking Boris Johnson for Lobbying the EU concerning proposed legislation on Hedge Funds and all of this is set against the background of upcoming G20 Meetings. http://benchu.independentminds.livejournal.com/19057.html

Hedge Funds are neither here nor there in the story of recent events. Of course the French and Germans want to clobber the City of London any time and in anyway that they can, the EU is and always was run for the benefit of France and Germany and on the basis of “bugger my neighbour”.

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Lord Turner was formerly a Banker of sorts, currently Chair of the FSA but his background can be looked up here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adair_Turner,_Baron_Turner_of_Ecchinswell

I had never heard of the man but ever since whatever work he did on UK Pensions, to my mind the man was a total prat who clearly didn’t grasp the basic and two fundamental problems with pension provision: Firstly, Pensions as an idea have to be “sold” to the individual and secondly, they have to be mandatory. After his latest outburst as Chairman of the FSA, it is clear that man should be wearing his underpants on his head, a pencil up each nostril being optional.

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