[Closed] introducing the Ed Milibandatron 5000

This was posted last week. And 2 years ago when it happened

Its easy to mock, but I'm looking forward to Ed seizing the political initiative today, and delivering a speech to stir the soul, and lift the spirit, mapping out a bold vision for the future of the nation, as he marches us to the sunny uplands of equality, social justice, and a fairer society, a true meritocracy

Oh... wait... hang on a minute... he's going to deliver a timid, uninspiring load of old waffle, so as not to upset his city and corporate paymasters, that absolutely fails to address any of the countries problems, and signal that whatever happens, the same old failed neo liberal consensus just carries on unchallenged. Yawn.

**** off Ed!

[img] [/img]

Can't imagine Ed Balls announcing an effective cut on child benefit will be too helpful for him either. 🙂

It's a sad reflection of how news media and politics works that you know you have to opportunity to insert one 10-second soundbite onto every BBC bulletin, so you are forced to repeat it robotically to make sure your 'line' sees the light of day.

Ed could make anything look clumsy and forced, though. The trick is to chat away non-stop but leave no pauses after the lines you don't want them to use.

Also looking forward to his big [s]sixth-form debating society[/s] conference moment :-).

I thought the mansion-tax-for-NHS-funding stunt was the most blatant and cynical vote-buying I've seen for a while.

Aside from the fact that it would be a nightmare to actually enforce and that no one seems to have calculated what the likely revenue and costs would be, it seems to pander to the worst sort of small-minded envy - the thinking that says, "sod trying to bake a bigger cake, let's just squabble about who gets what out of the crumbs we have".

The sort of man who needs to send in that utter f***wit Gordon Brown to inject a bit of pizazz and charisma into the fight for the Union is the ideal Labour leader for me.

@ digga:

That's spot on. The problem has been that people are always happy to believe in the Labour Party's fairy story about the free money tree. The NHS provides "free" service, you can get "free" housing, "free" school meals and so on which is, of course, complete nonsense.

I sense that former believers in this nonsense are waking up to that fact that Keynsian economics don't work.

Grow the pie. Vote for a party that enables that, which at the moment (whether you like it or not), is best fitted by the Tories although far from perfectly...

I will see your Milibot and raise you [url= ]Johann Lamont[/url]

Just the Gal to inspire a new band of Scots Labour voters.

Private Frazer voice >>>"We are doomed"

[i]Grow the pie.[/i]

The biggest problem I can see with public services is that by the time there's a big enough pie to pay for them at the tax rate people seem to want either Labour or the Tories will have sold off, contracted out, decided it's not worth doing anymore or otherwise destroyed the very things that that the tax was supposed to pay for.

Surely the one thing that the past 10 years has shown is that the pie tin is a fixed size?

'Grow the pie' as a reason to vote for someone is about as facile an argument as you can make. It sounds like something straight out of the Thick of It

[img] [/img]

I agree with Woppit, lesser of the evils, though my view is still unclear as to which that is. Like a forum big hitters spat, extreme headlines on all sides, when common sense goes out the window.

Cranberry made me laugh with his post!

Wow are people still claiming that trickle-down economics is actually a thing? Grow the pie! 😆

Lifer - Member
Surely the one thing that the past 10 years has shown is that the pie tin is a fixed size?

'Grow the pie' as a reason to vote for someone is about as facile an argument as you can make. It sounds like something straight out of the Thick of It

There are a lot of very good ways to look at GDP growth and wealth (see Luwig von Mises or Friedrich Hayek, or more recently and easier to read is Peter Schiff) and while I admit that focusing purely on "growth" is no, necessarily, the whole answer, it is not "blue sky thinking". Not like the Keynsian pretend-and-extend nonsense which is currently delivering ten years of stagnation.

Grow the pie

Grow the thing as big as you like it still only gets shared out among the fat cats who get fatter and fatter

Be grateful for getting a few scratty pie crumbs from underneath the table.

John Harris described Milliband and the present labour party perfectly

A Book Club who's political antennae don't pick up signals outside North London.

I don't know why they bother with the ridiculous charade of having the conference in Manchester. To try and pretend for a few days that they know where the north is? It must be a scary and disorientating experience for the poor little lambs. * off back to Islington you patronising Tory-lite *s!

grum - Member
Be grateful for getting a few scratty pie crumbs from underneath the table.

No society, empire or political system - even uber-Socialist USSR - could ever manager to deliver anything markedly better than current western standards and most were a whole deal worse for those at the bottom.

Whether we acknowledge it or not, we're all competing daily in a global market place and sadly there are no rules to say we - the west, or the UK - are entitled to any particular share of global wealth.

Mr Woppit - Member

I sense that former believers in this nonsense are waking up to that fact that Keynsian economics don't work.

Keynsian economics have never been tried.

in summary: tax and save during the 'good' times, cut taxes and spend (borrowing if needed) during the bad times.

we've never tried the 'tax and save' part.

@ahwiles
To an extent, you're right, all we've seen is neo-Keynsianism, a.k.a. Harvard-Keynsianism.

No society, empire or political system - even uber-Socialist USSR - could ever manager to deliver anything markedly better than current western standards and most were a whole deal worse for those at the bottom.

Some Scandanavian countries seem to manage a bit better.

Thanks Binners, the Dwayne Dibley thing finally nails him down for me!

"Grow the pie"

In the 21st century this cannot be the only goal, it is how you grow the pie that matters.

Since the 70s we have given the trickle down Thatcher/Regan neoliberal economic model a good go and it has failed. While western economies have grown, most of this growth has only gone to the wealthiest top few percent, at the same time earnings for those on low and middle incomes has barely kept up with inflation, massively increasing economic inequality. In direct contrast to the real term post war income increases for low and middle income earners.

This post 70s growth has also been driven by unsustainable deregulation of financial services which created a false economy. The deregulation of financial services also meant easier access to credit which has been used to supplement low wages, this indebtedness has further increased the movement of wealth from those on lower incomes to the wealthiest few.

The Clinton Whitehouse in the US and New Labour in the UK also failed to break the Thatcher/Regan political consensus. Instead they introduced sticking plaster policies such as tax credits that in affect subsidised employers to underpay workers in our economy. At least New Labour introduced the minimum wage but that was simply not enough.

We have 13 million people in relative poverty and 60% of those are from working families.

62% of children living in poverty have at least one parent in work.

Over 90% of new housing benefit claimants are in work.

Clearly we have a broken socio-economic model, working people cannot afford decent lives without state subsidy. It is time for us to move forward and forge a new political consensus. We need to increase wages not state subsidies, we need to build enough social and affordable houses not pile billions into the pockets of private landlords and developers, we need publicly owned independently ran essential services not private monopolies.

fr0sty125 - Member
"Grow the pie"

In the 21st century this cannot be the only goal, it is how you grow the pie that matters.

fr0sty125 - Member

We have 13 million people in relative poverty and 60% of those are from working families.

fr0sty125 - Member

Clearly we have a broken socio-economic model, working people cannot afford decent lives without state subsidy.

As an aside, I've no idea why we set a minimum wage and then remove part of it in tax.

grahamg - Member

Thanks Binners, the Dwayne Dibley thing finally nails him down for me!

people would vote for Dibley if he had some good policies...

No Ed, a mansion tax is not a good policy.

Agreed. In very simple terms 'we' - us and our governments - are spending not only beyond our means but also those of future generations and it cannot continue.

Yes, because it's important that we make sure that an ever-increasing share of all the available wealth goes into the hands of a tiny minority. Seems the best way of doing things.

Would love to see them (or anyone actually) announce that they're going to overhaul the way we tax companies, so that if they do business in the UK, they actually pay tax on it, rather than the avoidance that goes on just now. Would surely be a vote winner.

[url= http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/21/miliband-memo-britain-social-order-bankrupt ]What Milliband should be saying, but most definitely won't[/url]

Yes, because it's important that we make sure that an ever-increasing share of all the available wealth goes into the hands of a tiny minority. Seems the best way of doing things.

Depends what they do with it?

I read somewhere that after accounting for overheads etc, Bill Gates has given far more money to poor people than Oxfam...

ninfan - Member
Depends what they do with it?

I read somewhere that after accounting for overheads etc, Bill Gates has given far more money to poor people than Oxfam...

**** me backwards! Because Victorian philanthropy is the social progression we need....

and Bill Gates is a great example of typical billionaire behaviour...

binners - Member

What Milliband should be saying, but most definitely won't

chuff me, even the Grauniad hates Ed and Ed.

digga - Member

grum - Member
Be grateful for getting a few scratty pie crumbs from underneath the table.

Call me a cynic, but I reckon that's the best most of us can ever hope for...

....and more than some deserve

The ability to misapply Keynesian and neo-liberal is breath taking. Pity the speech wasn't.

To his credit at least balls has the balls to admit that he forgot his Keynesian teaching.

What speech?

Oops foretelling and misreading the BBC website over lunch - pawn to e6 😳

I thought the mansion-tax-for-NHS-funding stunt was the most blatant and cynical vote-buying I've seen for a while.

Yes, heaven forfend that the wealthy pay a tiny bit more tax in order to provide essential public services.

The rich paying more tax will not ensure essential public services.

Which public services would you say are essential, BTW? Just out of interest.

ahwiles - Member
and Bill Gates is a great example of typical billionaire behaviour...

binners - Member
What Milliband should be saying, but most definitely won't

chuff me, even the Grauniad hates Ed and Ed

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2011/jul/01/ed-miliband-interviewer-shame-strike-soundbites

ransos - Member
Yes, heaven forfend that the wealthy pay a tiny bit more tax in order to provide essential public services.

The rich paying more tax will not ensure essential public services.

No society, empire or political system - even uber-Socialist USSR - could ever manager to deliver anything markedly better than current western standards

Cuba has better literacy rates than us for example.

The rich paying more tax will not ensure essential public services.

Well turning Britain into a [url= http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-27187398 ]tax haven[/url] most certainly won't! But at least if the Rich paid the same level of tax as the little people, which they presently don't, and multinationals trading here paid any tax at all (other than the odd token gesture) there might be some degree of fairness to proceedings.

Do I expect Millibean to address this gross injustice? Of course not! The labour party are as complicit in this as the Tories, and just as keen to give corporate lobbyists everything they ask for, and more

Junkyard - lazarus

Cuba has better literacy rates than us for example

[i]Do I expect Millibean to address this gross injustice?[/i]

Someone asked him about this once;

[img] [/img]

The rich paying more tax does not require higher marginal tax rates or wealth taxes.

We know what happens (broadly) when MRT moves to 50p. Do people deliberately forget the lessons of history? At least this time, labour are announcing this upfront rather than a "scorched earth policy this time."

"Fairness", eh?

Do you mean that everybody should be more "equal"?

"Communism will never work because people like to own stuff."

He's stuck in a "friends" loop.