[TV] Election Debate, Climate Change, Channel 4, TONIGHT 7pm

[Machiavelli]

No Im not wrong when that point is rooted in reality. The planet could actually take about 10 billion without the strain on natural resources or food production and things associated with consumerism. With the way we live in Europe, the actual amount is just under 2 billion. And europe consumes only 60% of what the US does.

So it goes back to the central theme of theory vs reality. Does Europe and other westernised nations close down all energy, transport, industry and food production and decide to live in mud huts and become subsitence farmers to sustain more people globally?

Or does the vast numbers of migrants flooding across the Mediterranean prove that those from poorer backgrounds and infrastructure would prefer to live the westernised way in the real world we actually live in? in which case how many is the sustainable level in the real world?

You haven't remotely engaged with what I've said, and then made certain claims about the future (clue: it hasn't arrived yet) and indicated that these projections are reality.

Enjoy the game.

 

[BenGarfield]

Reply to PW

PW wrote

"There are just to many reasons why I would and could never vote for Corbyn. His past associations, attitudes towards extremists groups, terrorists, the nuclear deterent and those nations who are a national security threat to ours, and that's before getting to what would be a calamitous economic mistake that will make this nation and its people poorer. He wants to use the economic advantages of the Capitalism system that would allow him to borrow unprecedented amounts of other peoples money, to fund socialists dreams without any plan to actually pay back that money, except by dumping the debts on the heads of others down the line, such is the reality of the world we live in and has happened every time before. What is the plan to pay it back, hope the revolution occurs first having used the nasty capitalists borrowed cash?"

Why I support Corbyn:to counter PWs rant-

1. Associations: Corbyn is opposed to the use of violence and tries to bring people together even the violent ones.
2. Nucelar deterrent - no deterrent at all - competely pointless, dangerous waste of money. The SNP are right to want get rid of Trident.
3. Government borrowing "other peoples money". In an economy such as the UK or USA, all the money is produced by the central bank. For governments who have their own currency, the idea of government debt is a myth. Now we are off the gold standard in the era of fiat money, the government doesnt need any money from anyone, doesn`t have to tax or borrow. Although some use of the latter, and other measures.,can be used to curtail infllation. It can follow whatever policy it likes, spend what it likes - left or right wing measures, whatever - provided it controls inflation. Inflation is not caused principally by the growth of the money supply as the Friedman school would have it. I know this isnt Labour Party policy yet - but should be - as McDonnell is afraid that following the current fiscal rules was necessary to placate any hostility that might arise in the large UK finance sector.
4. Dumping the debts down the line: Did this do any harm to the USA after their New Deal and their second world war spending. Weren`t the 50s and 60s regrded as the golden age USA capitalism? .

.

 

[Wrong-Direction]

The thing is, all these old ******** will be dead by the time it matters, hopefully the generations coming up pull together for change, well they have too really.

Sent from my SM-A600FN using Tapatalk

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

I have a little time to come back to this one

The world you paint is not the world I see or the world in which we live, its not some Dickensian wasteland, with rich overlords and miserable starving masses.

2 billion people on this planet live on less than $2 a day. Poverty and deprivation in Britain is worse now than at any time since the 1930s.

While the overall wealth in society is higher than at any time in human history - the wealth gap is also at its greatest. It is not the overall level of wealth that impacts on deprivation - it is the scale of the gap between rich and poor (and countless studies have shown this)

Injustices happen, they always have and always will. Whether or not youre a bible believer, the central figure in that book another "JC" said "the poor will always be among you", this 2000 years before 21st century captalism. I'm not happy about it either, but this Utopian Socialised economy revolution i'm sure is not the answer. North Korea minus the executions?

Injustices do not have to happen - they are a manifestation of class division and exploitation in society - and nobody has to be poor - the planet is oozing with wealth - the problem is that it is concentrated in a tiny number of hands.

A planned economy is not utopian - hell - the British government in WW2 planned the economy - but once the war was over Churchill was screaming 'we can't plan the economy - that's communism' - it was a major reason in his landslide defeat in 1945.

There are just to many reasons why I would and could never vote for Corbyn. His past associations, attitudes towards extremists groups, terrorists, the nuclear deterent and those nations who are a national security threat to ours, and that's before getting to what would be a calamitous economic mistake that will make this nation and its people poorer. He wants to use the economic advantages of the Capitalism system that would allow him to borrow unprecedented amounts of other peoples money, to fund socialists dreams without any plan to actually pay back that money, except by dumping the debts on the heads of others down the line, such is the reality of the world we live in and has happened every time before. What is the plan to pay it back, hope the revolution occurs first having used the nasty capitalists borrowed cash?

There is a mountain of bollix spouted about Corbyn's 'associations' (it is another arm of the ant-semitism stuff) - Corbyn met Gerry Adams and Irish republicans in public - the Tories held secret talks with the IRA for years. I have no truck with republicans - yet I have held talks with Adams in a past life trying to persuade him of the futility of individual terror (just like Corbyn did) - if I was running for the job of prime minister there are plenty of photos they could drag out of me with Adams as well. I have also sat around a table with the likes of Kinnock (who in my opinion is a far bigger slimeball than Gerry Adams).

I know many people who lived in the former soviet Union, maybe not your pure vision for the world but certainly a system more in line with your utopian one than the capitalist one. You cite Amazon using a legal loop hole and offshoring to avoid tax (something that needs to be addressed for sure - albeit a non revolutionary tweak), where in the soviet union - with as I stated, the inherently corruptability of human beings, the people with business avoided things like high taxes with bribes to those in the tax office, something that is rampant in all socialist economies, where everyone is forced to be poor/breadline and without hope of better. You go to the soviet train station, no tickets available today, until you find some extra roubles and then they magically appear. The whole system is built on bribes because people were poor and desperate for more. People still using whatever initiative they can to try and bring extra money to their family, corrupt or otherwise.

1. Stalinist Russia has nothing in common with a democratically planned socialised economy - the only characteristic feature of note is the state ownership of the economy but even that was in a centralised, bureaucratic and distorted form.
2. there is no difference between Amazon using 'legal loopholes' and outright tax avoidance - Amazon pays millions to influence the tax regime in the US throughout lobbying and funding right-wing politicians. Prominent individuals in Amazon are among Trump's leading fundraisers.
3. I will repeat this again - human beings are NOT inherently corrupt - there is no corrupt gene. If humans were inherently corrupt we would live in a society that would be unrecognisable from what currently exists. Indeed the wealthy elites aren't even inherently corrupt - they are forced into that situation in order to maintain their power and wealth (although some, like Trump, are sociopaths).
4. Corruption was just as rampant under Stalinism as under capitalism but that does not mean that socialism is inherently corrupt - it means that when you organise society from the top down rather than the bottom up you will get corruption.
5. The difference between Stalinism and capitalism in Russia is as follows - under Stalinism people had money but there were few goods to spend it on - under capitalism there are plenty of goods but people don't have the money to buy them.

I'm not in the 1% or Corbyns 5% and I don't see this world you paint. Making the so called evil rich people poorer is not going to give poorer people today a better or happier life under a socialist utopia, it will make everyone poorer and take away all hope and aspiration, key human traits.

The guy on Question Time last week claimed that he was not part of the top 5% - but he actually was. A lot of things have fallen my way over the years - I have been very luck - I am not in the 5% but I am not too far off of it. I came from a very poor working class background as a kid (as did my wife) - I became a committed Marxist at a young age and I continue to be despite being relatively financially comfortable. I recognise that there are billions of people on the planet who have not been as lucky as I have been and the reason why they cannot live a relatively comfortable life is because capitalism has to screw them in order to create a hegemony for its continued existence. I am committed to fighting this in order to improve the lives of every one on the planet.

This is not about making the rich poor - it is about using the resources currently controlled by the rich to improve the life of everyone (including the wealthy). Contrary to your claim - capitalism does not create hope and aspiration -it destroys it. Hope and aspiration are not and should not be commodified so that they can only be represented by financial gain - hope could and should be about hope for the future for your family, for your community, for the planet without poverty, deprivation and environmental destruction - aspiration should be about acting together to improve the lot of everyone - not acting alone to make financial gain at the expense of others.

A guy sitting alone in his apartment for 2 years risking it all to get his fledgling IT company called Amazon off the ground, should be applauded, he should also pay fair tax without question, and that is his major failing. 2 fellas in a garage writing a search engine program called google, will it work, wont it work who knows but lets invest our time to risk and see if it can. These companies have a duty to pay more taxes, the fact they avoid them legally shows international taxation laws need changing not that the system that allowed such innovation and employment needs torching.

No socialist has ever said that Bezos should not have a decent income and a comfortable life - but does he really need an extra half a billion a week in income? My daughter is a doctor (she moved to the UK because she wanted to work in the NHS rather than the two tier private system in Ireland, despite the fact that she would make more money here). As part of her training two years ago she spent some time working in a GPs surgery located close to an Amazon warehouse. Every week she would see up to 30 Amazon workers (it was a big warehouse) suffering from repetitive strain injury - she would recommend that they take 3-4 weeks off work on sick leave to recover - the workers refused because if they did they would be sacked. There are countless examples of warehouse supervisors refusing to stop the production line when a worker is injured, workers are often prevented from going to the toilet because of the way the line works. Amazon recently touted that they were increasing wages for their staff in the US to $15 an hour - what they didn't say was that they cut production bonuses and eliminated stock options for workers. More and more Amazon are hiring agency workers who are earning far lower than the minimum wage and have zero rights. There is a reason why Amazon workers around the world staged strikes on Black Friday.

Fortunately the die hard socialist ideologues peddling such revolutionary Citizen Smith guff make up a lot less than 1%. The grown ups in the room need to fix and tweak many things but not burn the house down. adding 1 pence per pound onto income tax would be fairer and better way to start, and that would shoulder the responsibility of better public services proportionally on all citizens, the rich would pay a lot more, but all would be invested in it. But my guess is that's not far enough for revolutionaries, making enemies of those they hate and envy is deeply ingrained. Even if that means the objects of their hate move with their money and the government get a higher % of nothing.

1. the 'grown-ups' in the room (specifically the rich elite grown-ups) have caused the problem - the kids are the ones demanding it stop. The climate change protests have been about pointing out the problem - those involved have yet to draw the conclusions about what is necessary to solve the problem.
2. Tweaking around the edges will solve nothing - go back and look at the Monbiot video I embedded above - scientists have been warning about this problem since the 1970s - 1p onto income tax means that working class people pay while the rich elites continue to destroy the planet for profit.
3. Socialists do not hate people - socialists do not envy people - it is a pointless exercise that serves no purpose other than alienating yourself from society. Like corruption - there is no hate and envy gene - hate and envy are productions of capitalism and are manifest in society by the hate-speech of the far-right. Far-right populism has surfaced because capitalism is in its death agony - it represents the dying kick of a corrupt capitalist system - it has to be opposed because if it isn't then the climate denial approach of far-right demagogues will ultimately destroy the planet.

 

[mr sheen]

I have a little time to come back to this one


2 billion people on this planet live on less than $2 a day. Poverty and deprivation in Britain is worse now than at any time since the 1930s.

While the overall wealth in society is higher than at any time in human history - the wealth gap is also at its greatest. It is not the overall level of wealth that impacts on deprivation - it is the scale of the gap between rich and poor (and countless studies have shown this)


Injustices do not have to happen - they are a manifestation of class division and exploitation in society - and nobody has to be poor - the planet is oozing with wealth - the problem is that it is concentrated in a tiny number of hands.

A planned economy is not utopian - hell - the British government in WW2 planned the economy - but once the war was over Churchill was screaming 'we can't plan the economy - that's communism' - it was a major reason in his landslide defeat in 1945.


There is a mountain of bollix spouted about Corbyn's 'associations' (it is another arm of the ant-semitism stuff) - Corbyn met Gerry Adams and Irish republicans in public - the Tories held secret talks with the IRA for years. I have no truck with republicans - yet I have held talks with Adams in a past life trying to persuade him of the futility of individual terror (just like Corbyn did) - if I was running for the job of prime minister there are plenty of photos they could drag out of me with Adams as well. I have also sat around a table with the likes of Kinnock (who in my opinion is a far bigger slimeball than Gerry Adams).


1. Stalinist Russia has nothing in common with a democratically planned socialised economy - the only characteristic feature of note is the state ownership of the economy but even that was in a centralised, bureaucratic and distorted form.
2. there is no difference between Amazon using 'legal loopholes' and outright tax avoidance - Amazon pays millions to influence the tax regime in the US throughout lobbying and funding right-wing politicians. Prominent individuals in Amazon are among Trump's leading fundraisers.
3. I will repeat this again - human beings are NOT inherently corrupt - there is no corrupt gene. If humans were inherently corrupt we would live in a society that would be unrecognisable from what currently exists. Indeed the wealthy elites aren't even inherently corrupt - they are forced into that situation in order to maintain their power and wealth (although some, like Trump, are sociopaths).
4. Corruption was just as rampant under Stalinism as under capitalism but that does not mean that socialism is inherently corrupt - it means that when you organise society from the top down rather than the bottom up you will get corruption.
5. The difference between Stalinism and capitalism in Russia is as follows - under Stalinism people had money but there were few goods to spend it on - under capitalism there are plenty of goods but people don't have the money to buy them.


The guy on Question Time last week claimed that he was not part of the top 5% - but he actually was. A lot of things have fallen my way over the years - I have been very luck - I am not in the 5% but I am not too far off of it. I came from a very poor working class background as a kid (as did my wife) - I became a committed Marxist at a young age and I continue to be despite being relatively financially comfortable. I recognise that there are billions of people on the planet who have not been as lucky as I have been and the reason why they cannot live a relatively comfortable life is because capitalism has to screw them in order to create a hegemony for its continued existence. I am committed to fighting this in order to improve the lives of every one on the planet.

This is not about making the rich poor - it is about using the resources currently controlled by the rich to improve the life of everyone (including the wealthy). Contrary to your claim - capitalism does not create hope and aspiration -it destroys it. Hope and aspiration are not and should not be commodified so that they can only be represented by financial gain - hope could and should be about hope for the future for your family, for your community, for the planet without poverty, deprivation and environmental destruction - aspiration should be about acting together to improve the lot of everyone - not acting alone to make financial gain at the expense of others.


No socialist has ever said that Bezos should not have a decent income and a comfortable life - but does he really need an extra half a billion a week in income? My daughter is a doctor (she moved to the UK because she wanted to work in the NHS rather than the two tier private system in Ireland, despite the fact that she would make more money here). As part of her training two years ago she spent some time working in a GPs surgery located close to an Amazon warehouse. Every week she would see up to 30 Amazon workers (it was a big warehouse) suffering from repetitive strain injury - she would recommend that they take 3-4 weeks off work on sick leave to recover - the workers refused because if they did they would be sacked. There are countless examples of warehouse supervisors refusing to stop the production line when a worker is injured, workers are often prevented from going to the toilet because of the way the line works. Amazon recently touted that they were increasing wages for their staff in the US to $15 an hour - what they didn't say was that they cut production bonuses and eliminated stock options for workers. More and more Amazon are hiring agency workers who are earning far lower than the minimum wage and have zero rights. There is a reason why Amazon workers around the world staged strikes on Black Friday.


1. the 'grown-ups' in the room (specifically the rich elite grown-ups) have caused the problem - the kids are the ones demanding it stop. The climate change protests have been about pointing out the problem - those involved have yet to draw the conclusions about what is necessary to solve the problem.
2. Tweaking around the edges will solve nothing - go back and look at the Monbiot video I embedded above - scientists have been warning about this problem since the 1970s - 1p onto income tax means that working class people pay while the rich elites continue to destroy the planet for profit.
3. Socialists do not hate people - socialists do not envy people - it is a pointless exercise that serves no purpose other than alienating yourself from society. Like corruption - there is no hate and envy gene - hate and envy are productions of capitalism and are manifest in society by the hate-speech of the far-right. Far-right populism has surfaced because capitalism is in its death agony - it represents the dying kick of a corrupt capitalist system - it has to be opposed because if it isn't then the climate denial approach of far-right demagogues will ultimately destroy the planet.

Excellent post

 

[beorhthelm]

Poverty and deprivation in Britain is worse now than at any time since the 1930s.

really? despite national healthcare, education, welfare state. universal water and electricity, central heating and in door toilets. and you'd rather have war time style planned economy. i think you're a parody.

 

[Jolly Red Giant]

really? despite national healthcare, education, welfare state. universal water and electricity, central heating and in door toilets. and you'd rather have war time style planned economy. i think you're a parody.

Yes - with the emergence of the welfare state after the war the lot of working class people improved in Britain up to the 1970s - then Thatcher came to power and since then it has been on a downward trajectory assisted by the Blarites, the ConDems and now Boris. 1 in 5 families live below the poverty line - 1 in 3 children live in poverty. The basket case that is Ireland is better by comparison. I visit England regularly since my daughter moved there 3 years ago and I have been shocked by the level of poverty I have seen in many places. On the surface things appear normal - but you don't have to dig down far to see what is really happening. I am a school teacher and as a teacher you learn to read the signs of deprivation - and I can see them every time I visit Britain. By the way - one of the worst examples of this is the way benefit applicants are treated in the UK and the universal credit system is b*llocks.