On 10 Nov 2023 at 8:00pm Nevillman wrote:
I don't want to make a point about brexit. I am trying to accept we are out of the EU but can only see negatives. It would help me if someone who is happy with it or even just aspects of it would tell me what they are for them or in their opinion.
On 10 Nov 2023 at 8:44pm Green Sleeves wrote:
I had at least hoped it would make Nigel Farage finally go silent. Sadly not to be. That guy will forever be in the spotlight. Wouldn't surprise me if he became a tory MP and challenged to become PM one day.
On 11 Nov 2023 at 9:53pm Tom Pain wrote:
As we are still following the same general international policies that Europe and most of the world are, I'd say that it's impossible to answer your question. The West is being deindustrialised and impoverished with net zero regimes so there's not much difference between anyone's chances.
On 13 Nov 2023 at 4:30pm Nevillman wrote:
I'm disappointed that no-one has been able to slightly cheer me up or make it easier for me to accept our leaving the EU. There really must be someone who voted leave who is at least slightly happy with it.
Of all the ridiculous and wrong reasons given for voting leave it sounds like yours was the craziest of all Tom as you voted leave so that we could have more lax environmental policies. I don't recall even the most rabid brexiteer promising that Tom so it sounds like you voted leave for something that wasn't even promised. How do you feel about it all now anyway Tom?
On 13 Nov 2023 at 5:08pm Tom Pain wrote:
My reasons for wanting to leave were on here at the time, I presume you completely misinterpreted them as successfully as this effort.
On 13 Nov 2023 at 7:19pm Nevillman wrote:
Why did you bring it up then in relation to a question about the benefits of brexit?
On 13 Nov 2023 at 9:12pm Tom Pain wrote:
Because you asked!
On 14 Nov 2023 at 5:50pm Green Sleeves wrote:
Aren't you both thrilled to have Lord David Cameron back in power? The self proclaimed "heir to Blair" and the architect of the referendums that have further divided the nation and caused political and constitutional chaos, he is back in as foreign secretary.
I'm trying to recall his previous foreign policy "wins"? Brexit and Libya don't seem much to boast about but Rishi obviously wants to roll back to those halcyon days of the early 2010s....
On 15 Nov 2023 at 9:05am Nevillman wrote:
Thanks for the news green. Exciting indeed. You must be thrilled that things are getting so bad that very soon now the people will be taking to the streets to overthrow our oppressors. Comrade Corbyn will be rightly installed as the only one who can help us shake off the chains of capitalism.
On 15 Nov 2023 at 12:32pm Green Sleeves wrote:
I'm afraid, for all of us, that we will be stuck in this cycle a lot longer than Corbyns life will extend to. Interesting that you should bring up Corbyn, as he was one of only 13 MPs who voted against Camerons failed intervention in Libya. Still, at least Gaddafi got his comeuppance and got dragged across the streets by a pick-up truck. Who needed a plan once they got rid of him? Sounds frightingly familiar....no contingency (rather like when he lost the referendum, just disappear)
I do wonder what Cameron will offer the country though now, as foreign secretary, at least he can't be pushing "Austerity 2.0". It just seems an odd choice, since most of Europe blame him for Brexit, and his middle-eastern foreign policy was standard disastrous as is the case for Britain and America. He has at least stated in the past that Gaza was an open air prison, so he may not be entirely useless, but i don't expect his position on Israel to be any different from the status-quo/Sunak/Starmer. So lets keep on giving Netanyahu the wink to continue bombing those hospitals and schools and a population of mainly children.
On 15 Nov 2023 at 4:38pm Nevillman wrote:
I'm sure you're not seriously expecting me to defend Cameron who I hold even more responsible for the brexit disaster than your pal comrade Corbyn. Looks like a last desperate throw by a desperate prime minister who is hoping to have at least one friend in the government. He is hoping that Cameron will at least be grateful for a house in the lords and a job and might appease Tory remainers.
He should at least have a more positive attitude towards Europe but he can't make much difference I hope to the ultimate fate of this government.
On 15 Nov 2023 at 9:09pm Tom Pain wrote:
Unsurprisingly sleeves still believes the propaganda about "sitting on our oil" Gaddafi. He was a bit too socialist for our forum fireball I suppose, and he was a block on African migration. Will he ever get it that Corbyn never made PM because he didn't have the making of a war criminal like Blair or Cameron. If, by some accident he had made the job, he would have disappeared as quickly as Truss did.
On 15 Nov 2023 at 10:16pm Tom Pain wrote:
P.S. I'm told that Ynet has reported that the Netanyahu has approached blair to be a "humanitarian" co ordinator for Gaza!!!!!
On 17 Nov 2023 at 1:08pm Green Sleeves wrote:
Send in Britain's "big guns", with "call me Dave" Lord Cameron and Sir Tony of Blair. They are the stereotypical plum Hugh Grant style Brits that the world expects us to churn out. Tedious, entitled slime/windbags that you wouldn't trust. A mild upgrade on Boris Johnson. At least Johnson is comical though.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 2:19pm Nevillman wrote:
I would find your total political naivety utterly charming green if only it hadn't lead to you believing that Corbyn could ever be a credible choice as prime minister and so hand the job to Johnson with the resulting catastrophic implications for this country.
Whether you like it or not and whether you like the individuals or not, political experience and nous does count for something.
I'm afraid you are the most stereotypical of all.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 3:13pm Green Sleeves wrote:
Boris Johnson becoming Prime Minister was an inevitability, a formality, whoever was in opposition. Plus brexit was his and the tories mess. Every clueless idiot loves to blame corbyn for everytjing and hes their bogieman, but that's because they fail to offer alternatives other than bland, corrupt centrists that do nothing, but wage foreign wars and increase debt while enriching themselves. Even Labour offer the same establishment garbage now. I welcomed the earlier choice rather than same old arguing semantics and doing nothing.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 4:20pm Nevillman wrote:
We'll never know for sure but a proper labour leader might have:
-persuaded labour voters to vote remain,
Or
-not lost to may in 2017
Or
-supported the may deal and not forced her out to be replaced by Johnson.
You claim to remember the Blair years but it was a lot more than waging foreign wars and increasing debt. I understand that you don't agree but most voters don't want extreme governments of either side.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 4:56pm Tom Pain wrote:
How can either of them do anything about debt when money is created as debt to third parties? You can argue politics till the rats leave the ship and nothing will change; that's what the game's there for. If you would consider looking into the question you would see the answer.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 5:45pm Green Sleeves wrote:
All wild speculation, its not as if Corbyn took power while Labour were on the ascendancy or the tories were in freefall like now. Corbyn was a "proper" leader, hence why he won the two labour leadership contests he participated. He may be a divisive figure, but he remains popular, where as I don't think anyone likes Blair now or Cameron. The reason being that Corbyn at least stuck to his principles and wasn't trying to say whatever he could to have an easy life with the establishment media or trying to further his own political career.
Labour's previous stint in power was extremely mixed, but they left office deeply unpopular and tagged with failed foreign and economic policies as well as being dogged with expenses and other scandals. Tories made it worse by doubling down on austerity, but we never got much alternative to that until Corbyn and now we are back at square one with two parties operating in identical policy spaces with minor tweaks in domestic policies. This is enough to get elected but not enough to prevent the countries demise. We have seen this movie before time and time again. But let's keep blaming the evil bogieman Jeremy Corbyn. Who isn't even likely to run again as an MP, but people obsess over him out of lack of imagination or critical thinking.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 6:36pm Nevillman wrote:
I feel like we've been through this before green but Corbyn got to be leader because the stupid labour election process allowed lots of left wing entryists to decide on the leader. It was a self selecting electorate. He may be popular with these people still but would never get elected as prime minister in a million years. If we had a decent electoral system with proportional representation then these people would not be supporting the labour party at all.
From your extreme standpoint I'm sure that all the parties do look the same but it is not true however many times and stridently you say it. The electorate don't want an extreme party in power. Blair won 3 general elections and didn't lose any. We don't know how labour will do if they win the next election. It will not satisfy you whatever. I'm not obsessed about Corbyn but I am annoyed by the damage he caused to the labour party and the country.
I really can't be bothered to even begin trying to work out what you are saying Tom. I'm sure you think you know what you have said but it is nonsense.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 7:42pm Green Sleeves wrote:
Corbyn got a higher percentage of the vote than Blair did in 2017 compared to his 2005 election, and hundreds of thousands more votes. Blair would have been electorally shunned in 2010 because of Iraq, the financial crisis and numerous political scandals within his party. He only scraped by because the tories had no one to vote for, and were voting for Blairs right-wing policies anyway, and Iraq hadn't been fully investigated by then.
Corbyn was never extreme, you just like to use language such as that to make your point without any evidence to back it up - typical. There was nothing extreme in either 2017 or 2019 Labour manifestos. Blair squandered 5m votes as a result of his actual delivered policies, and you can blame Corbyn all you like, but Blair is by far a bigger stain on the Labour Party than Corbyn could ever be. Just try to avoid snake-oil salespeople in future, for goodness sake.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 8:04pm Nevillman wrote:
Tom. A business or individual needs money. They ask the bank who lends it to them if they think they will get it back. As the money the bank lends them does not exist anywhere really you can say they have created money if you like but hopefully it will be well used and returned. That seems to bother you but I don't know why.
The debt that we have talked about is the national debt which is the accumulated difference between what the government gets in tax and what it spends. The government finances that in all sorts of ways, usually bonds which people buy. Other than the word debt, I don't see the relevance of one to the other.
Please try to understand what I have written. Think whether I have missed out anything that is still bothering you or I haven't covered before your next reply.
Green. thank you for your post. I can't think of anything to say to it at the moment that I haven't already said in other posts and I've done enough repeating myself today.
On 17 Nov 2023 at 9:15pm Tom Pain wrote:
Do the government never borrow money?
On 17 Nov 2023 at 10:39pm Nevillman wrote:
I thought I made that clear that they borrow money to pay the interest on the national debt mainly in the form of bonds which people and institutions buy. They may borrow short term from banks. I don't know the latest figures for how the national debt is serviced.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 8:48am Nevillman wrote:
I've just read Corbyn 's 2019 manifesto and it just about stops short of promising sunshine everyday. Did he really think that enough voters are that stupid? Would I have liked a government to come along and do all that? Of course. Was there any chance of it being delivered? No. "The top rates taxpayers will pay a little more". "Fully costed". I don't think so.
Look at what Blair actually delivered on increased spending on health and education.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 10:44am Green Sleeves wrote:
LOL Boogieman Corbyn really does live rent-free in the heads of boomers and political centrist nomads who want change, but not really. Asking taxpayers who earn over £80k to pay 5% more tax after that threshold is hardly a wild and painful tax increase, and it raises billions. It doesn't cost billions like tax cuts such as slashing inheritance tax thresholds would. Its what progressive taxation is meant to do - take tax pressure off those that can ill afford it, and on to those that can. Usually works out nicely, as it gets re-circulated in the economy anyway, given that most poorer people tend to spend what they have, where as the wealthier tend to hoard theirs or simply unable to spend it.
"Promising sunshine every day" is the kind of lame boomer comment i'd expect from my tory relatives devoid of arguments. Next you'll be bringing back the old cliche of the "Magic Money Tree". Its trite nonsense and long since debunked as the magic money tree always appears when the tories or new labour needed it. Promising free broadband to all by 2030 is not "sunshine", its an investment in this country and highly realistic in that wide timeframe given the advancements in such technology already. What else did you almost have a heart attack with? Free tuition? Yeah, imagine living in a society where education is free, kind of like Britain before Tony Blair (that you personally received and took full advantage of), and like many other countries in Europe and across the world today. They must be in total desolation by now and ready for "regime change" by the good old West.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 11:24am Nevillman wrote:
What a wonderfully straightforward world you live in green. Full of stereotypical groups like boomers who all think exactly like me, top rate taxpayers who just need to pay a little more for the poor repressed working classes to be able to afford caviar. I would be very surprised if a 5 percent increase in tax and hiking of inheritance tax (both of which I am all in favour of) would yield anything like enough revenue for a quarter of the items on Corbyn s wishlist which he had the nerve to call a manifesto. It may have kept militants like you happy but really didn't do it for the electorate. I started trying to do some research into how much it would raise but came over faint and watched an old episode of countdown instead. I'm sure Corbyn's team of crack economists will come up with 'fully costed'.
We've discussed the 'free' higher education thing before and apart from once again objecting to your use of the term free I have nothing further to say. I refuse to feel guilty that I didn't have to repay my tuition fees.
Are 'lame boomers' a different group to 'boomers ' green or are all boomers lame anyway? Asking for a friend.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 12:43pm Green Sleeves wrote:
Eh? I never said you should feel guilty for having the benefit of free higher education, but you SHOULD feel guilty for making younger generations pay for it or be deterred from going because of fees - you never had fees at all, let alone the burden to repay them. Like I said before, its reversing a relatively "new" policy introduced by Blair, and its something many countries offer its population, as they see the long term benefits of education and training to its citizens. This is not some radical far-left policy, its a reality implemented here before and implemented elsewhere now, as were many of Corbyns policies. Privatisation policy failures cost far more in the long term, and i happen to think even in the short term, priority of the safety and health of our citizens should be given over profits for a tiny number of shareholders, many of which are linked to other state operated companies from other countries anyway.
Its not about giving working class people access to caviar (that ranks fairly high in the list of dumb things you have said), its about re-distributing wealth so that we don't have swathes of people relying on charity and food banks, including employed people and some in the public sector.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 1:06pm Green Sleeves wrote:
As for boomers, its a disproportionately large group of society born just after the war to the early 1960s. The good ones are progressive and open-minded, but sadly there are many that think young people should stop buying Ice Lattes, Mochas and iPhones, and instead pay for their education, and then they can save up to buy their first home for twelve quid from their savings just like they did in the 1970s as good responsible citizens they are.
Of course i jest, there are many traits of the "boomer", but there are many boomers that think like me as well and aren't totally myopic middle-england tories. Just not as many as I'd like. One does wonder how voting patterns will change as boomers die off, as research is showing that due to many social and economic factors, the stereotypical shift to Conservative values as people age, is not occurring to anywhere near the same degree as it once used to. Which bodes well, as the oldies do tend to be the ones who go out to vote in the biggest numbers. I shouldn't LOL but their was one report that 2m brexit voters have died since 2016, far more than remainers as a proportion, and of course you have hundreds of thousands of younger votes now eligible to vote. We have to hope that some bad ideas just die out with time/age and of course progress.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 3:16pm Nevillman wrote:
Well you certainly went some way to dispel my accusation of stereotyping there green. I can quite understand why Tories go on about magic money trees and caviar for working classes when confronted by views like yours. You really can only spend it once green. Students are given the money for their education and then repay it when they are earning enough. Is there any evidence that good students are deterred from studying by this arrangement? Maybe some who, like you, misinterpret it but I doubt if it is many and I doubt their suitability for higher study if they are that stupid. The money that you would like to be giving to them should of course be spent on old people's homes and subsidies for carpet slippers.
I thought that the brexit vote went the way it did not because of many old people voting leave but young people who couldn't be bothered to vote. Too busy drinking skinny mochas and using MySpace on their phones I expect.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 10:28pm Tom Pain wrote:
The magic money tree really exists, in spite of Keynes' lying insults to the contrary. I know nev thinks this is ok but to me it seems peculiar. If I had the license I could lend him digital credit to buy a house and if he defaulted on paying back the virtual loan, trebled with interest, which cost me nothing, I could take his house. Banks do not lend money deposited with them, it's forbidden by law. The amount they can lend is governed by the amount of deposits they have. Their lending is in the separate department dealing the fairy dust from the magic money tree. This is a published, forensically proven fact which has not been widely publicised for obvious reasons. Wouldn't sorting this scam out be a benefit far greater than brexit reversal.
On 18 Nov 2023 at 10:46pm Green Sleeves wrote:
LOL "myspace", yeah that will be it, and listening to too much music/noise on the "hit parade" with their mpthrees!
I understand how student loans and repayments work. If you are going to keep them, then they should at least be means tested so that the poorest kids aren't paying the same as the wealthiest. The issue with that is that it adds layers of complications, so its easier to just make it free for all again like it is in progressive countries that think long term. Instead of it potentially being repaid over long periods of time for those students then earning enough later, which apparently gets written off after 30 years anyway.....its just a pointless entry fee that invariably deters people from poorer backgrounds still. This is on top of all the additional loans they have to borrow for just getting through the 3+ years of study beyond the 9k fees.
Brexit probably did win due to the older vote, and lack of young people going out to vote. This has long been a problem....and its a shame really, but i guess you could make it compulsory like they do in Australia? Then again, feels wrong to force people to vote, even if it ironically is more democratic on such massive decisions.
On 19 Nov 2023 at 10:27am Nevillman wrote:
The student loan is repaid based on prosperity after the education. You want to base it on prosperity before the education. Not sure I get the benefit of that. I can see both sides of the publicly funded higher education debate and I don't know how much of the student loan total is ever retrieved by the government. Not much I expect.
Having student loans should mean that students are more motivated to get more out of their education and that universities provide better value for money. It should also mean that young people are deterred from frivolously applying to university to get their free three year holiday by studying something as academically rigorous as applied yoghurt farming. These young people should be working in the care industry doing useful things like keeping me amused, helping me find my glasses and running errands for me.
I do wonder if proportional representation might solve some of the problems of apathy. People would be able to vote for parties that more accurately reflect what they believe rather than just the main two centrist parties. While I always vote, I don't think it should be made compulsory. Give people more reason to vote.
I think it is common knowledge that the banks lend money they don't actually have Tom so I've no idea what the 'obvious reasons' you refer to are talking about. I rather doubt if you have the knowledge required to allow you to make a remark like that about Keynes. I still don't know what your problem with it all is, why it is a scam or what your preferred method of borrowing money is. Please don't feel obliged to try to respond.
On 19 Nov 2023 at 10:58am Green Sleeves wrote:
You didn't have those same pressures when you were a student, yet you want to heap on more pressure? Extra debt, as that "incentive" to get out and work harder, and use that degree they paid (sorry, repaying) 30 grand+ for. Yeah, you definitely don't sound like a tory, especially with the notion that students these days just do it for the jollies and pompously trivialising courses! 
It this some sort of petty revenge because your generation didn't have smashed avocado and soy lattes??
Proportional representation is about the single thing we can recently agree on. Or any form of democratic system that makes your vote actually count. Its deeply flawed, and it amuses me how the counter-arguments are that it prevents extremists from parliament. I think we've had plenty of extremists running/ruining our country for decades now. I hardly think having a few extra Green and Reform MPs are going to make it worse.
On 19 Nov 2023 at 1:48pm Nevillman wrote:
No. The incentive is to make sure you are studying the right subject and then to make sure you do well in it. I very much doubt if anyone is then motivated to earn as much as possible to repay their debt although I am sure you have your finger more closely on the pulse of young people today than I have.
I don't care how you want to classify or stereotype my position. You really do seem to think that a government can go on spending on anything. If there is any additional money available for education I would prefer to see it to go on improving schools rather than providing university education so that students can earn more money for themselves rather than pay back for some of the education that has helped them earn so much. I know you will say we only need to tax the top 5 percent of earners a bit more but I've already seen your shopping list.
In an ideal world it would all be free and the sun would shine everyday.
If my believing that makes me a Tory in your eyes then I respect your right to judge as you wish but I disagree and I don't care.
In my day smashed avacado was called mushy peas and we were grateful for it.
On 19 Nov 2023 at 6:09pm Green Sleeves wrote:
I don't think you really believe that students paying tuition when you didn't is fair. I'm sorry though if you do think that way. Thats quite sad to think you are happy for benefiting from preferential treatment, but consider yourself a centrist, or classic "liberal". It all sounds a bit "tory" to me, but I think that is something I had a blind-spot on. I find myself continually disappointed with liberals/centrists, where as I kind of know what to expect from right-wingers at least.
There is always money available, its just how and what its spent on (that letter that the Labour party left in 2010 was indeed a joke, but the tories latched on to it to push for a smaller government and massive cuts to public spending and that sadly worked). I would hate to guess the kinds of mouthwatering sums of money that both tories and "new" labour have wasted on stupid schemes in the past in total, or trying to cut back somewhere that ends up costing much more in the long run. But this all equates to tens of billions of pounds, potentially hundreds of billions - of both public money as well as just private citizens having their incomes squeezed as a result of economic incompetence, as well as reckless profiteering for a tiny minority at the cost of ethics and safety. All of this would be the kinds of sums of money which do indeed pay for everyones education, better public services and more vital industries owned by everyone and for the benefit of everyone and generate wealth as well for the country. You seem to expend more effort on berating policies that you would want but think we can't afford, and almost no attention or heat (perhaps Brexit, aside) on the similar sorts of money that ultimately goes down the plughole anyway. "You can only spend it once" - well we keep seeming to spend it on stupid policies and ignoring the mistakes of the past.
On 20 Nov 2023 at 8:48am Nevillman wrote:
Sorry to be the one to break it to you green but life isn't fair. Expecting people to pay for a qualification that will lead to them earning more out of their extra earnings while I got my education for free isn't the worst example. I also got free school milk.
From the pragmatic viewpoint that it is mostly to attract most votes maybe it would be a good idea but that would still make it reasonably low on the list of wrongs to be righted green in my opinion and I would prefer the money to go to primary education or nursery.
Couldn't agree more about the waste of public money. To return to the original thread you only have to look at the collosal waste caused by brexit including the loss of government revenue caused by the loss of GDP. To use that as a reason for abolishing tuition fees..... I don't get it.
I am amused that I have saddened you by my views. Maybe you should stop pigeon holing and assuming what people think quite so much. We already know you are destined to a life of political opposition. It would be a shame if you are also going to be continually disappointed by people as well.