Can I just check what proportion of the US and British banking systems are currently nationalised?

Of course you can …..please, go ahead.

You also seem to be ignoring the fact that there is another possibility apart from deregulation and nationalisation.

Not at all, I am fully aware that there are of course other options. After all, under Old Labour strict regulation was applied to a private banking sector. That arrangement however, was firmly rejected Thatcher and a substantial minority of the British electorate.

Of course under New Labour we now have an interesting new arrangement – massive government intervention without any democratic control, ie, privatised banking profits, and nationalised banking losses.

An arrangement which incidentally, the neo-conservative Bush administration found particularly attractive. Which is surprising. Because if you passionately believe that the only way to achieve economic stability and prosperity is through deregulated free markets (and the neo-cons certainly argued the case) then the obvious solution when faced with an economic crises, would be further deregulation and to ride out the storm by allowing the 'free market' to run it's course without any government interference.

The obscene haste in which the New Conservatives abandoned everything which they had been arguing in favour of for the last thirty years, and the speed in which they were prepared to embrace the socialist solution of government intervention, betrays the fact that they never actually believed in their own rhetoric – despite the fact that they were able to so effectively fool Sun readers.

They were of course right. The banking sector is far too important to be left to the mercy of the free market. It is for that very precise reason that it should be removed from the whimsical fancies of the 'free market' (and it has) and brought under democratic control so that it can serve the best interests of the nation. And why Michael Foot was right.

west kipper – Its WHAT they say that should be taken note of

have to disagree slightly, i think foot said what he thought and believed in what he said. i think brown and cameron say what they think we want to hear and don't sound like they believe any of it 😯

just a difference of opinion…. but then that's politics!

Ernie_lynch – some good points well presented!

Ernie, I have a go at you when you're not on form; you are on form now, well said.

Stu, we're not really disagreeing then, I should have clarified with " Its what they MEAN" rather than say.

…mentioned earlier in the thread already, but he was one of our best Argyle fans too. I feel the only way for the FA to recognise and remember his contribution to the Green Army (he was on the board for a few years and all) is to give them a season in the premiership. 😀

Wasn't he a bit of an HG Wells scholar as well?.

WK – Yes he was, and Swift and Bertrand Russell and a few others. There is no disagreement that he was a man of extraordinary talents and deeply held views.

I listened to his "Last Word" obituary on Radio 4 this evening and it brought a tear to my eye.

In an age when the term "socialist" has become wholly perjorative, it gives me strength to reflect on the life of a truly great man who never deviated from his principles of compassion and fairness. He may well have been the first victim of the modern age of politics where one is judged by what one looks like rather than what one has to say. I was a teenager when the Gang of Four split the Labour vote in 1983 and I didn't understand the significance of the rift at the time. Nearly three decades later his oratory abilities are to be admired and I hope that his legacy is a world where the "inveterate peacemongers" prevail.

was he the last of the great orators, killed off by the sound byte hunger of the media? Or the icon of the "Loony Left" image that nearly killed off his party?

Well, he was too centrist (for the time!) for the Militant tendency but he certainly had the Loony Left image thrust upon him and either didn't know or care how to correct it, and preferred to explain his ideas and beliefs instead. In this respect, he displayed a great deal of integrity but also showed poor judgment in politicking and winning elections that might actually have let him put his ideas into practice.

Bumped into him once at Westminster tube station, he was very apologetic and wished me a good day, a great man imo when Tony Benn goes it will be the end of an era, a time when politicians seemed to have honesty and integrity, even if you disagree with the thinking you could resspect them. I dont think you can say that now.

Pigface, Tony Benn has very intelligently reinvented himself as everyone's favourite grandfather.

What everyone seems to forget is that he was one of the people largely responsible for the rift between the hard left and moderate wings of the real Labour Party, which made them unelectable for a generation and allowed that bloody woman and her disgusting cronies into power.

Michael Foot's true legacy is that he managed to keep both factions of the party together, which, despite a few deserters meant that there still was a Labour Party when John Smith took over after Kinnock had drunk deeply from his own poisoned chalice.

There is a brilliant excerpt from one of his speeches on iPlayer from Radio 4 this week:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00r3423/Pick_of_the_Week_07_03_2010/

Starts around 27:40.

Very, very funny.

Wonder what he did with all the KGB money? Supose that went to continually support Tribune.

mt – Member
Wonder what he did with all the KGB money? Supose that went to continually support Tribune.

Clearly there is no evidence or even a suggestion that he took anything from anyone. However, had he had a relationship with the Communist block it would have been born of the same idealism that saw many young men of his generation sign up with the communists as the only people standing up against facism prior to WW2. Like most of them it would have been idealsim not money that attracted them to do it.

In my book its a great shame there weren't more like him.

Have a look in Olag Gordievsky's book. It reckons he was being paid by the KGB, from the late 40's till the early 70's when Foot became a cabinet member. His KGB name was Boot? Perhaps Stalin had a sense of humour. The Sunday Times was sued by him and he won but he did not try and sue the book publisher or Gordievsky. I do agree though that he was an honerable man but does not mean that I agree with the way he looked at the world or did what he thought was right. The above is matter of record and like many a committed person did things that would sometimes suprise us. On the face of it you would think that his close association with Lord Beverbrooke looks very odd given his political views.

Do agree that more principaled politicians of all types are needed.