In the mind of a conservative voter

Conservative voters should really be encouraged to live in gated communities, far away from the rest of the population.  I propose that we fence off Essex and the home counties and send them all there.  Or perhaps we could use all those nice tax havens for them.  In any case, people who are more concerned about themselves than about the welfare of their fellow countrymen are not people that I would recommend living next door to.

 

Why?  Well, as someone with a very progressive attitude to economics and a couple of Tories amongst my friends and family, I naturally have a lot of conversations about politics.  My Labourite and former Labourite friends tend to think I am a bit right wing, and my Tory friends just think I am stupid for caring and possibly a bit rebellious and over emotional.

 

It is very simple.  If you are interested in the nation state, and when I think about issues, I tend to think at a nation state level, rather than how things affect me, then Conservatism makes no more sense than Socialism.  When dealing with people over the long term, you become very much aware that people’s politics are determined by their self image.

 

The hospital issue in the West of Scotland, that I was discussing yesterday is a case in point.  When I informed my Tory friend about it, his first reaction was how this affected him. It did not cross his mind for one second that thousands of people were suffering and potentially dying as a result.  This is typical of the Tory voter.  It is all about you, the money, legally obtaining the money whether it is fair or not, and everyone who does not think like this is simply stupid.  Such people need a lot of bombs, weapons, policing and laws to protect them, because they, at heart, just aren’t very nice people who do not care about others.

 

Socialism, on the other hand, is in a sorry state in the UK.  It is divided, it is still hampered by this Blairite hangover of Thatcherism, and the genuine socialists wait to be told what to say and then repeat it ad infinitum.

 

Here is my perspective – running a country is no different from running a tribe, in much the same way that running a multinational is much the same as running a market stall.  There may be more components, but the basic transactions are the same.  If you want to run a country well, you make sure that all sectors of the community are treated with a basic level of human dignity.  If you cannot manage that, arm yourself because sooner or later the rest of your tribe will turn on you.

 

Conservatives like to think that there is a rule book for life, that nothing bad will happen to them, and if it does, the money they have squirreled away will solve the problem.  Try replacing an absent arm or leg with a pile of cash and you will see that this idea is false.  Enjoy the sensation of that pile of cash dwindling because you do not qualify for benefits if you have too many savings. Pay out some more cash on people to do what you cannot because of your absent limb. Nobody will help you, in a conservative world, because nobody can survive without working, just like you. Life is not fair, and the only thing you can do is decide that if you prefer not being murdered or robbed, it is really better if people do not starve to death or commit suicide.

 

Likewise, in Scotland we have the case of the Unionists.  Unionists, whether Conservative or Labour, are a little bit thoughtless, a little bit selfish and they have little imagination or vision.  They have their house, they have their pension, everything is very neat and the question of independence is too far fetched for their tiny brains.  Having ‘eaten their cereal’, they are now constipated and their movements are hampered as a result.  They do not wish to consider the matter of morale, of a rebuilding of a system that does not work and they fail to realise that Scotland is actually an occupied country.  It may not be occupied by military (so far) but it is certainly occupied by the media and the crippling influence of Westminster.  It is entirely beyond them to consider that they could create something much better, that works for everyone and makes it much easier for people to progress and enjoy their lives.

 

I have earned astonishing amounts of money at different times in my life, in my various careers, and it has never crossed my mind to begrudge my taxes to people who either should not be in the workforce, cannot be in the workforce, or who are taking a few years out to have children or take care of the sick.  I had a Tory mother and a very strong tradition of Socialism on my father’s side.  I count myself lucky to have experienced a great deal of debate in my family household.

 

When I visited America playing backgammon in 1998, I was asked several times whether I wanted to move there, and my reply, a surprise to me as much as anyone else, was that I could not possibly live in a country that allows people to starve to death or deny people healthcare on the grounds of money.

 

The primary reason for fairness in a society, and this ought to be understandable to all, is safety. Your pile of useless cash and friendless, money funded life of luxury is far more assured by treating everyone with a basic level of human dignity, than by having an armed policeman outside your door. In a corporatist world, people are learning not to trust government.

 

This is serious stuff, we are moving out of the period of political economy financially, and everyone is aware that artificial growth figures are sustained only by inviting more rich people into the country and selling them luxury goods, by using our tax havens to get 3 percent of something rather than 23 percent of nothing, and by putting thousands of students into debt, hampering their growth in a way that would have been unthinkable a few decades ago.  Yes, students, your debt counts as growth on which the political class get themselves voted in.

 

As a result, nation states are going to be phased out, unless we find a way to make our governments trustworthy, unless we stop feeding the giant companies that influence them, and unless we stop getting bound up in issues of who has the biggest pile of cash and whether that makes them more worthy than us.

 

It is very simple.  Nobody is more worthy than you, and your pile of cash is meaningless to anyone but you.  If you employ others to work for you, the likelihood is that you are paying them less than yourself.  It does not make them a less essential component.  It just makes them impermanent. And so you can continue to draw the analogies.  Everyone in a society is worthy, and whether you are a nasty little boy that went to Eton, or a paraplegic from Cardiff, you deserve a basic level of welfare.

 

Lining your friends pockets with public money because you managed to get your hands on the public purse is not smart, and it isn’t funny. Neither is pretending you are something you’re not. Honesty is a basic requirement for running a country and there is nothing funny about putting one over on the public.

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Your capabilities versus Toby Young

Your capabilities versus Toby Young

Continuing on my theme of public cooperation and the lack of social cohesion we have all experienced in the last few decades, this morning I briefly lost my temper with Toby Young.

 

Toby Young, for those who are unaware of him, is the Conservative sponsored answer to ‘celebrity’ journalists such as Julie Birchill and Tony Warren.  All three of these people have had sparkling and very easy careers thanks to their expressed views and the people they court.  I remember when Toby’s book ‘How to Lose friends and alienate people’ came out, wondering why someone in my peer group had effortlessly made it into the mainstream with a mediocre piece of work, useful only as a present for family members you do not particularly like.

 

It is a very English sensibility, the idea that a sector of the population somehow deserve an easy life, on the grounds of a few connections, a lot of massage oil, and a nice dinner.  People are quite prepared to accept their lack of importance.  There is a kind of safety in sitting in your house, complaining and doing absolutely nothing whilst someone else takes money to do something simple very badly.

 

Toby has defended the indefensible several times on behalf of his cronies.  He has a very nice house, a very nice life, and a mealy mouthed appreciation of everything he has been given.  In short, people like Toby represent why taxation is unfair, why people like you are unlikely to ‘hit the big time’ without agreeing to something you don’t want, why a sector of the population who prefer money to morality continue to use their incompetence and greed to ensure that you have an utterly miserable time whilst they take their lovely dogs for a walk and laugh about what a scrounger you are.  He even displayed his incredible ignorance of what socialism represents in his Twitter feed.  Sorry Toby, but I was so irate by the time I got to your stupidity on health that I could not continue.  You are a moron, of the lowest order.

 

This week, I discovered that the entire West coast of Scotland are expected to use A and E in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Glasgow. If you break your arm in Campbelltown, you are told to go to Glasgow for treatment.  If you hurt yourself in Oban, you also go to Glasgow.  I can only assume that someone sitting in England made this decision, which has also had the side effect of devaluing already cheap property right down the coast. In addition to this, I have been told that the new hospital cannot take patients like my mother, and if she requires a drip or extensive healthcare, this will still be managed at home, and I as an untrained person will be expected to take on the duties of a trained nurse.

 

Labour sold you all out, so that Helen Liddell could sit on your television set and smirk about the 42 new hospitals she was so proud of.  Under PFI, these hospitals will be unaffordable in ten years, making privatization of an essential service more attractive to the population. The only people who benefit, are the builders that presumably donate to Labour and got the work.

 

My heart broke ten years ago, when I discovered what a shitty, corrupt little country run by very average idiots I live in. Sometimes a broken heart is a good thing, because you have to recover somehow.

 

If you allow things to continue the way they are, you only have yourselves to blame.  You are just as talented, if not more talented that the people you sit and complain about.  Do something about it. Your country is already infested with scum like Toby and his cronies.  Get motivated, and get your lives back.

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New Scottish Culture

After the referendum last September, the Scottish National Party became the most popular political party in Scotland.  The reasons for this may seem unclear to people who do not understand Scottish culture.

Before I go into that, here is my own position.  As a former interviewer for a research organisation that formerly worked extremely closely with national government, I was initially a no.  I just could not permit myself the space to consider whether Scotland could afford the number of disabled, long term sick, or unemployed people that we support without the ultimate insurance of the UK.  When I finally discussed it with a friend who is a lot more interested in domestic politics than I am, I made the decision to take the risky, yet positive Yes route.  Why did I change my mind? Certainly not because of oil revenue.  Oil does not really affect Glasgow, it barely affects most of Scotland.  The chattering classes on the east coast would tell you something different, but the chattering classes on the east coast are not really considered to be very pro-Scottish by most of Scotland.  There are logistical reasons for this that most Scots, never mind anyone else, do not really understand.  There is also a strong sense of rivalry between east and west, which historically far outweighs anything as mundane as the price of oil.

So, first, the east-west divide:

When you drive to Scotland from England, you have three main options – the A1, which takes you up the east coast,  the M6, which takes you up to a fairly straightforward artery to the formerly industrial zones in the west, and a wee road that we like to send the English tourists through Galloway, via Moffat.  The Moffat road allows you to delude yourself that you are seeing pretty parts of Scotland, whilst gently directing you towards Edinburgh.  It never fails to make me chuckle, this idea that we are keeping the best bits for ourselves, and directing the tourist traffic away from Scotland’s actual capital, Glasgow.

I have lived in both cities as well as a considerable number of other areas in Scotland, and contentiously, I can tell you that it is a lot easier to live as a single person in Edinburgh.  Like Kent, it has a steady through traffic of incomers, and an arguably more cosmopolitan atmosphere generally.  Like Kent, although people are generally less friendly, they are actually a bit more tolerant of strangers.  I have shocked many an Edinburgh native, when asked about the two cities, when I have said this, as they assume a natural rivalry exists.  No, we in Glasgow are quite happy for Edinburgh to accomodate all the tourists they want.  It keeps the place tidy for the extended clans that prefer to do Scottish business and shopping in Glasgow, from most of the rest of Scotland, including places that are actually nearer to Edinburgh. Glasgow is designed for mercantile and domestic business, central Edinburgh is designed for something somewhat more genteel and anglified.

So what implications does the information I have given you so far have for the new Scottish culture that has developed since the referendum?

What do Euan McColm, JK Rowling, and  ‘what about my pension?’ Historywoman, all aggressive Unionists have in common?  They are all residents of Edinburgh.  They genuinely believe that their self-hating and often ill-informed opinions reflect the views of most of Scotland, because they are assured by their positions that the masses really care what they as individuals think.  JK, as it turns out, is a titanic egotist that believes the slavish followers that hang on her every word, without any alternative information to her apparent dislike of the country she is choosing to throw her money about in. They are apparently unconcerned who they are bombing, and whose house gets fracked, as long as they are right, right, right. Euan even tried to tell me that the SNP were at fault for the activities of SEPA, an organisation that I am familiar with from my days working for the main utilities companies in Scotland.  Sorry, Euan, but SEPA have never done what they say on the tin, it is nothing to do with the SNP, a party somewhat fettered by its own democracy.

As a result, many unthinking no voters believe that the question of Scottish independence is akin to a primary school exam question.  It is multiple choice, and all they have to worry about is getting the answer right.  They do not like the couthier elements of the SNP, or the devotion shown by some supporters (particularly those who are formerly left wing activists) and they do not trust that anybody in Scotland has sufficient wit to run a country. When you consider that Scotlands upper working and lower middle class are often heavy drinkers, who work extremely hard and have limited time for information gathering, never mind thinking, it is less surprising that they take the views of these people seriously and write the entire argument off as ‘lefties dreaming about oil.’

As the Scottish voting public have demonstrated since the referendum, the question of independence for yes voters is not at all about oil.  Whether you are left or right wing, it is about your idea of what a nation is, your level of self confidence as a person as well as a nation, and your opinion of how well the UK functions for you as an individual.  I am sure that if you are a mean-spirited academic worrying about your pension, a fearful author worrying about your house getting burgled by poor people, or a minor journalist who just wants to be in with UK bricks, the idea of independence is very frightening.

If you are a cultural observer, however, it is more of a question of how one would go about making the country work for people who have been forced to accept a culture of loss,  historically, industrially and in terms of the lose-to-win social housing rules. What Scotland actually needs is a generation of factories, in order to achieve future generations of bankers, engineers and designers to move the country forward.  Are we likely to achieve that by ensuring that we are under Tory rule from the over-populated England?  Many middle class thinkers in Glasgow apparently think not, going by the referendum results.  Despite an engrained class tension, exemplified by a friend of mine from Pollokshaws, who despite a £50,000 a year job as a builder, cannot imagine owning a house ‘because he has no capital like the middle-class c****,’ Glasgow apparently has the confidence that Edinburgh appeared to lack at the time of the referendum. What my friend requires, apparently, is an injection of morale that people like Rowling and McColm cannot find in their hearts to provide in the country they choose to live in.  Good luck with that stinking self-hatred you are punting.

Meanwhile, the English media would have the snarling chavs believe that the Scots are whinging cowards, milking the teat of English supremacy whilst complaining about their lot.  They have been trained to think this by enthusiastic misinformation, and they are very good at hating whomever they are told to hate.  Hating is apparently much easier than thinking, or hoping, or building anything new.  It requires no energy at all.

What the #SNPbad crew do not understand is that the SNP are a conduit.  They are not just one party.  Many of us in the party detest the couthier elements, but it does not mean that we will cease to support the SNP for as long as it takes to rebuild our country and create a new basis for healthy discussion.  No, we do not sit over a brazier discussing the good old days of scraping a living off the croft, people working in mines or tales of shipbuilding. Yes, we are aware that there will be decades of hard work, just to persuade people that it is OK to think, OK not to hate, Ok not to rely on past wounds for guidance. What we all have in common is this dream of self determination, unchained to the desires of public schoolboys lining their pockets with backhanders, defence spending and welfare pensions which relentlessly punish people who are without hope due to a lack of strategy from the top.

My view comes from one of the most stratified cities in the country.  Nevertheless, unlike the impoverished No voters, we managed to agree on one thing – Scotland needs to be Scottish in order to progress.

 

The post New Scottish Culture appeared first on Ina Disguise – Author.

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All that Eco fair trade bullshit

As those curious enough to bother investigating will know, I am;

pro natural health (on a civil liberty basis)

pro ethical business (even pretending is a step forward)

pro social capital (on an neo-socialist basis)

pro nationalism (on an anti USA dominated globalism basis)

pro diversity (on the basis of leaving people alone unless they attempt to interfere with your life)

pro action on climate change (this ought to be obvious unless you are demented)

 Unlike most people, my confinement at home due to my caring responsibilities means that I have some limited time to actually find out before making decisions on such things.  My vision for the future is of individuals investing in developing nations from their own pockets.  Setting up a rural business in Africa obviously requires significantly scaled down investment on setting up a business in central London, which is apparently how our delusional spoilt brat government in the UK thinks.

A chance conversation with a nice chap from Yorkshire on Twitter today alerted me to the fact that most people do not realise why they are under threat of being fracked.  It is part of the war effort and strategy for the period after conflict, when Saudi, the USA, and to a more limited extent European countries including the UK will divide the spoils in terms of contracts issued to rebuild countries such as Syria and Lybia.  To achieve this, puppet regimes will be put in place in much the same way as they have been put in place in the Ukraine, Iraq and Lybia.

Oil prices are artificially low at the moment.  There is no actual glut. Sensible countries should be withholding their reserves for the future, but the few individuals that benefit from defence spending, loans taken out by people maintaining appearances, inflicting poverty (which affects the rest of us by causing a proportion of the population to take up a life of crime eventually) on the lowest income brackets and new immigrants alike, are making sure that no reserves are held.  This is to ensure that the nation funds the biggest economic heist in history.  As I have explained in several previous posts, your only chance is to redirect your money.

I have already suggested that you move your money to ethical banks, who do not invest in fossil fuels, defence producers, GMO and chemicals.  I have suggested that you avoid chain supermarkets.  I have suggested that you feed the smaller companies to encourage competition in the fields of media, finance, food, chemicals and health.

Today’s conversation indicated that most people do not have sufficient knowledge or interest to investigate reducing their reliance on fossil fuels.  As this is rather central to our current political situation, I shall now endeavour to explain the very real conspiracy you enable when you vote either Tory or (new)Labour, both end up with the same global result, in slightly different ways.

When I was still interviewing, it became apparent over several years that gas prices continuously went up.  When I investigated why, it was said that Russia was the main supplier to Europe, with some supplies coming from the Middle East.

We all know how hysterical the USA are about Russia.  They seem very fond of Saudi, however.  My Hindu friends hypothesize that Saudi has bought some favours, meaning that we are taught endless tolerance even as people fall victim to attacks which probably would not happen if we were not incessantly helping the USA with their encirclement policy against Putin.  Now we are also being asked to tolerate armed American guards in our airports.

Fracking is supposed to be accepted without question.  If pushed, they will probably tell you that it is part of the war effort, since Canadian and American fracking is lowering the price of gas. In the UK, the Tories are keen to exploit our rather fragile country in order to produce even more.  This is not to benefit the consumer at all, since once America installs a puppet state in the countries we are currently destroying, the preferred fossil fuel suppliers will move into those countries, making fracking the UK a luxury that will no longer be necessary.  Granting permission to do it, however, means that the same people who benefit from war, benefit from fracking your country when the war is over during the rebuilding process.  Therefore relying on gas, is effectively supporting endless austerity and perpetual war.

For this reason, five years ago I installed an air to water heat pump and system in the family pile.  This has saved us 66 percent on our huge fuel bills, and means that a 14 room house costs slightly less to heat with our constant hot water than my friends 2 bedroom flat costs to heat with gas. The system paid for itself two years ago in terms of outlay, and we are not supporting the corrupt and outdated fossil fuel business.  I am not quite brave enough to switch to an electric car yet, but I will be doing this also, when I am satisfied that I will still be able to drive all over Scotland without mishap.

Not for the first time, this story has been divided into parts, to make sure you are confused, and to make sure that you can only be bothered about one bit at a time.  ‘Anti frackers, anti science’, in much the same way as they have waged war on the alternative health ‘problem’.  This is in anticipation of TTIP TIPP and TISA.  Europe and the Asean countries are expected to play along with American corporate dominance, bought with borrowed American cash. (from China, who are laughing their heads off)

Likewise, it is relatively simple in America to present the argument as ‘Anti-war, anti-Jesus.’  We in Europe are not so simple, so instead we get some nice frictional immigration to foster a shift to the political right.  Your nervousness about immigration is likely to confuse you into supporting the welfare budget being spent on bombs from the Cameron friends and family.  The media has helped by doing a marvellous job on persuading you that poor people really do deserve to starve, so it is fine that thousands of disabled people die because of the policies of the poorly educated Ian Duncan Smith.  Add to this, the cheeky Jocks wanting to take your fossil fuel supply away, and we have a perfect storm of confusion.

The consequences of you falling for this, staying in a state of ignorance, believing that as long as you are in the home counties or London, paying your way in your relatively safe job, getting the rest of the UK to fund as many bridges and roads as Boris could wish for, is that your country is being set up to be sold to the USA hook, line and sinker, with the proceeds going to a very few already rich people.

Voting labour in its former form, simply meant the proceeds would go to alternative already rich people.  Under Corbyn, there is some hope that the structure of corruption changes somewhat, but not completely.  As I have said before, socialism and capitalism are mutually dependent.  Endless liberalism is not desirable either, since it simply leads to people being confused into agreeing to a different package of corruption.

So, in addition to my entreaties to move your money, to stop supporting large lobbyists, to encourage competition from smaller and more honest players, I now ask you to consider investigating ecological, therefore moneysaving ways of reducing your personal reliance on fossil fuels.  You support war and corruption to a degree beyond that of even the most hardened junkie.  There are many reasonably priced alternatives – solar, wind, groundsource heat pumps, air to water heat pumps.  The government would have you believe that this does not matter, despite European emissions targets.  Remember the day Gordon Brown signed us up to them, simultaneously ordering two more coal fired power stations?  That is the level of stupidity and corruption we the public are up against.

You need to change your habits now.  Repeat after me,

We are not American, and we will not be conned any more.

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The True cost of Celebrity

The True cost of Celebrity

Piers Morgan, Tony Blair, Nicki Minaj, Taylor Swift, Gordon Brown, JK Rowling, Eddie Izzard.

These names alone will ensure that this blog entry will be read by several new readers.

The reason for this is much the same reason that people used to read tabloid newspapers.  They want to be shocked by something that doesn’t actually affect them at all.

Yesterday, Nicki Minaj’s many complaints about Anaconda not being given an award, despite her having followed some formula that she had seen in Marie Claire about nudity in pop videos, were very, very significant on Twitter, aided and abetted by Piers Morgan’s counter complaint that she had not realised how terribly important his children were once upon a long, long time ago.

May I remind you that none of the people in the first row of this article wish you well, or intend to promote you or your work in any way.  They are just generating  publicity to line their own pockets.

It used to be referred to as being a ‘lickspittle‘, back when the general population still had a decent education. You are welcome to look this up. They distract you from the truth, so that you continue with your lives and do not take any action to better or help yourselves. ‘Spokespeople for the establishment,’ who would like to make sure that everything stays the same.

Anaconda was not a particularly bad video, indeed for a song which must have taken Nicki Minaj all of 20 minutes to write, I am sure she put a great deal of work into it.  Her public image, only partially derived from that of Lil Kim, is, I am sure, positive for many people who think that buying makeup and clothes will somehow lead to a better life for all youth, not just the outraged black youth that were so keen to avoid reading Piers Morgan’s article yesterday, branding him a racist.  He probably is a racist, but that is not what his article was about, and it does not matter what you think, as long as you are sufficiently aroused to notice his name when you see it.

Do not be deceived, Piers Morgan is trying to revive his profile in America, because he would like to be on TV.  We in the UK, as with Russell Brand, are delighted to oblige you with as many annoying celebrities as you care to pay. Nicki Minaj is complaining for your attention, Taylor Swift, the current darling of the establishment, already has it.

Meanwhile in the UK, we have the same sort of illusion in politics.  Tony Blair is pretending to care about the Labour leader election, because he wants a right-wing acolyte party that closely resembles the Conservatives. He also wants to distract you from his charging  330,000GBP for appearing at an event for world hunger.  Tony, as you can see, cares about you, and you should listen to every word he says, as he takes every self-advantageous opportunity that comes his way.

Gordon Brown, a man now so hated in Scotland that he dare not stand in his own constituency, also thinks he will up his after-dinner speech fee by pretending to come out of retirement to save the Labour Party, a Party so hamstrung by the cult of personality that nobody can make a decision until someone else tells them to.

Even well established authors are not immune from this famewhore behaviour.  J. K. Rowling, an English author who chose to live in Scotland, invested heavily in trying to sway the Scottish referendum.  Since then, she has continuously complained that she is not liked in Scotland.  She has had many column inches, varying from how great she is on Twitter, to, em, how great she is on Twitter. She has done very well with her spare million, in terms of column inches, and potential placement on the honours list.Eddie Izzard, a rather faded star these days, also felt that Scotland was a good publicity opportunity, and so he and a few media friends came up to support Jim Murphy, a politician so dreadful that he tried to associate himself with a can of Irn Bru during his campaign.  Because Scottish voters are clearly stupid according to Jim.  Are we clear on this yet?

THESE PEOPLE DO NOT CARE ABOUT YOU AT ALL.

They do not care about your life, they do not care about politics, they do not care about bettering the world, they do not care what happens after they die.  They are not lofty, special beings.  They are here to make money and get ahead.  They do not care.

Almost all the news is just a distraction to make you think you are keeping in touch with reality.  You aren’t.  Let me give you an example:

During Gordon Brown’s term, a news programme came on TV.  Two stories were of note.

1. Children of women who stay at home do better at school.

2. Chinese people rescuing baby pandas from a flood.

Ah, I said, There aren’t enough jobs for everyone, and Gordon Brown has signed something for the UK to do business with China.

I went out, got into my car, put on Radio 4.  The news came on, the first two stories were:

1.  Unemployment has increased, and several thousand more jobs are to be lost shortly.

2.  Gordon Brown has signed a deal with China.

This is reality. There is no them and us.  There is you, and then there is the power hungry fool you voted for, bought a newspaper from, or bought music from. You need to take your wallet and give it a long hard stare.

As I have been telling you, it is all a distraction.  The only person who can really change the world is you.  Yes, all of you. Each of you.  If anyone were to stop and think about an ideal world, this would not be it.

#youmatter

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Learning from idiots

The recent use of idiocy in the USA to keep Donald Trump in the media, and overspill back in Scotland, is not the only thing which has caused me to ponder the value of being an idiot.  Given that in terms of my emotional attachment to Wolfe, I too am a kind of professional idiot, I am now pondering the value of idiocy.

Trump has taken some minor financial hits in the last couple of days, Oman and Scotland have reported third party business losses as a result of his shameless self promotion and moronic self-regard.  I wonder if he calculates this on a profit/loss basis?  For a person hailed as a business expert, if he has not done this, then perhaps he makes his living shooting his mouth off and having other people use the convenient pun of his name for their own purposes. It would make more sense if people were looking at each other across the boardroom table, rolling their eyes and signing away fortunes on the basis of having the word Trump on the side of a building.

The spectacular headline that Trump would have made more money doing nothing, makes me think that running your mouth is an outstandingly popular activity in the idiocracy that is the USA. Certainly the examples we are shown here in the UK indicate that the American rich are similar to the lower middle classes, in terms of the glorification of self interest and lack of perceived duty and humility, something which I have always felt made us much stronger as a nation in the UK.

Recently, of course, we in the UK have taken to inviting foreign money to bolster the luxury market and conceal the fact that economically speaking, our government does not even remember the simple economic principles of Maggie Thatcher.  Yes, she dictated that it was a good idea to kill off unsustainable nationalised industry, but nobody in the current government seems to have put this together with encouraging small to medium sized business, proportionately enormous employers, with enhancements to investibility and encouragement of the general population to risk everything replanting the economic garden by starting small businesses.

Perhaps we should have a Chancellor that can count, with a memory of thirty years ago so that he does not miss this crucial detail.  Instead he is starving the poor in order to fund crappy and equally corrupt Labour PFI policy damage and fund his cronies in the defence industry, whilst everyone apparently sits at home and wonders why their respective riots are not reported on the media.  We in Scotland are well aware that the media is suppressing information from little England.  For the benefit of the terminally stupid Conservative voters, sitting in their ‘Alright Union Jack’ properties – try looking up DEMONSTRATION SUPPRESSED BY THE MEDIA and you will find a list of unreported action by students, anti-war protesters, people protesting the starvation of the disabled.  We are being treated just as badly as the Americans in terms of the assumption that we are all too stupid to care that we are led by people too knuckle-draggingly dumb to be allowed out of the cocaine room at the private members club.

At this point in my life I am of the opinion that we should take this as a sign that no matter our history or our previous lack of confidence and motivation, we should take matters into our own hands.  We need to find ways around the problem in terms of making use of things like crowdfunding, social capital and our own good ideas to regrow our own gardens.  If you have harboured even the shred of a dream, have a look at how to make it work on a basis that the silly boys in Westminster cannot interfere with.

Likewise, my inability to make love work for me, no matter how much work I pour into expressing myself, should tell me that love is just not for me.  I should give up on drilling my way through a shell of self protective superficiality and forget that Wolfe is actually a perfectly functioning and rather frightened person wrapped up in a blanket of bullshit.  I should move on to someone that presents a facade of emotional competence, and wait for the inevitable conclusion that nobody knows what they are doing and it is all futile.  I should not waste my time recovering from bad experiences, instead being aware that life is short, and since there is no actual truth, I might as well role play my way through the traditional markers of age and time.  I should not make any effort to communicate.  I should make distinctions between global politics and the vagaries of my own emotion.  I certainly should not mix the topics, in case I confuse people determined to sleep their way through life and put full stops on it where none exist.

Perhaps what we should learn from idiocy, is that all progress is futile, because sooner or later, someone who prioritised money or power over knowledge decided that we just don’t matter.  Nothing matters at all in fact, apart from making sure that we get more jelly beans from life than the idiot next to us.

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