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The pound in your pocket
What we should do is get more involved in Local politics and eventually " good " locals will rise to the top of their party structure.
We should not accept the " parachuting " in of fast trackers from central office.
Of all the major parties the liberals are closest to this idea but they will never form a government.
We should not accept the " parachuting " in of fast trackers from central office.
Of all the major parties the liberals are closest to this idea but they will never form a government.
This is how the Americans view Gordon !
In advance of Gordon Brown's trip to America, profiles of the Prime Minister have been appearing in the U.S. One such preview on Eye-Witness News, Palm Beach, went:
"Good morning America, how are you? This is your favourite son, Chad Hanging, reporting. The President of Englandland, Norman Brown, is arriving in our nation's capital this afternoon to meet with President Bush. But just who is this guy? Let's cross to our special correspondent in London."
"Hey, Chad. As you can see, I'm standing in the world-famous Trafalgar Circus, with the House of Fayed directly behind me."
"So what can you tell us about Norman Brown?"
"Well, Chad, he has been President for some nine months now. He used to be Chancellor."
"What, you mean he's, like, German?"
"No, that's what they call their Treasury Secretary over here."
"And is he a Conservative, like President Tony Blair?"
"No, Chad. He's Labour. President Blair wasn't a Conservative, either. He only pretended to be."
"So how did Brown get the job?"
"He just kept shouting at President Blair until he stood down."
"But he won an election, right?"
"No, Chad, there wasn't an election. He did think about calling one, but decided against it because he was frightened he might lose."
"How can you change Presidents without having an election? I mean, it's not like President Blair was assassinated."
"That's just the way it works in Englandland. The leader of the party with the most seats in the House of Lords gets to be President."
"So Norman Brown was elected leader of the Labour Party?"
"Negative, again, Chad. He did raise money and have a leadership campaign, but no one stood against him."
"What, nobody? No primaries, no general election, nothing?"
"Affirmative, Chad."
"Let me get this straight. His party hasn't elected him, the country hasn't elected him, yet he still gets to be President. Sounds like a tinpot Commie dictatorship to me."
"You could say that, Chad. Norman Brown doesn't really like anyone being given the chance to vote on anything."
"Someone must have voted for him, some time."
"Oh, yes. He was elected to the House of Lords by his constituents in Scotlandland."
"He's Scoddish, then?"
"That's a big Ten-Four, Chad."
"So is he President of Scotlandland, too?"
"No, that's a guy called Alan Salmon."
"Hang on, if Brown's from Scotlandland, how can he be President of Englandland?"
"That's just the way it goes in this crazy country, Chad. Brown can make laws for Englandland, but not for his own people in Scotlandland. Not that it matters much because Brown has signed away most of Englandland's lawmaking powers to unelected European bureaucrats in Brussels, Belgiumland."
"That would be like stripping Congress of the power to make laws in America and handing it over to Mexico."
"I guess so."
"How in the Hell did the people of Englandland vote for that?"
"They didn't. Brown wouldn't let them, even though it was a solemn promise in his party's manifesto the last time people were allowed to vote."
"Couldn't the Supreme Court have stopped him?"
"Not really. The Supreme Court of Englandland is now in Strasbourg, where the geese come from."
"Isn't there any opposition?"
"There's a guy called Boris."
"Sounds Russian."
"I wouldn't be surprised, Chad. There are millions of Eastern Europeans living here now, mainly in Peterburl. Englandland has seen mass immigration over the past ten years, but no one voted for that, either."
"What in the name of Ulysses S. Grant is going on over there, Brit? We're talking about the country which gave us Magna Carta, saw off the Armada, stood alone against Hitler and invented parliamentary democracy. How does Norman Brown get away with it? He must be a popular guy."
"Far from it, Chad. According to the latest opinion polls, he's the most unpopular President ever. His approval ratings are even worse than George Dubya Bush. There's talk about him having to stand down soon. He's already promised the job to some guy who works for him - name of Balls."
"Say again, Brit, you're breaking up."
"BALLS!"
"You're damn right there, buddy."
"Good morning America, how are you? This is your favourite son, Chad Hanging, reporting. The President of Englandland, Norman Brown, is arriving in our nation's capital this afternoon to meet with President Bush. But just who is this guy? Let's cross to our special correspondent in London."
"Hey, Chad. As you can see, I'm standing in the world-famous Trafalgar Circus, with the House of Fayed directly behind me."
"So what can you tell us about Norman Brown?"
"Well, Chad, he has been President for some nine months now. He used to be Chancellor."
"What, you mean he's, like, German?"
"No, that's what they call their Treasury Secretary over here."
"And is he a Conservative, like President Tony Blair?"
"No, Chad. He's Labour. President Blair wasn't a Conservative, either. He only pretended to be."
"So how did Brown get the job?"
"He just kept shouting at President Blair until he stood down."
"But he won an election, right?"
"No, Chad, there wasn't an election. He did think about calling one, but decided against it because he was frightened he might lose."
"How can you change Presidents without having an election? I mean, it's not like President Blair was assassinated."
"That's just the way it works in Englandland. The leader of the party with the most seats in the House of Lords gets to be President."
"So Norman Brown was elected leader of the Labour Party?"
"Negative, again, Chad. He did raise money and have a leadership campaign, but no one stood against him."
"What, nobody? No primaries, no general election, nothing?"
"Affirmative, Chad."
"Let me get this straight. His party hasn't elected him, the country hasn't elected him, yet he still gets to be President. Sounds like a tinpot Commie dictatorship to me."
"You could say that, Chad. Norman Brown doesn't really like anyone being given the chance to vote on anything."
"Someone must have voted for him, some time."
"Oh, yes. He was elected to the House of Lords by his constituents in Scotlandland."
"He's Scoddish, then?"
"That's a big Ten-Four, Chad."
"So is he President of Scotlandland, too?"
"No, that's a guy called Alan Salmon."
"Hang on, if Brown's from Scotlandland, how can he be President of Englandland?"
"That's just the way it goes in this crazy country, Chad. Brown can make laws for Englandland, but not for his own people in Scotlandland. Not that it matters much because Brown has signed away most of Englandland's lawmaking powers to unelected European bureaucrats in Brussels, Belgiumland."
"That would be like stripping Congress of the power to make laws in America and handing it over to Mexico."
"I guess so."
"How in the Hell did the people of Englandland vote for that?"
"They didn't. Brown wouldn't let them, even though it was a solemn promise in his party's manifesto the last time people were allowed to vote."
"Couldn't the Supreme Court have stopped him?"
"Not really. The Supreme Court of Englandland is now in Strasbourg, where the geese come from."
"Isn't there any opposition?"
"There's a guy called Boris."
"Sounds Russian."
"I wouldn't be surprised, Chad. There are millions of Eastern Europeans living here now, mainly in Peterburl. Englandland has seen mass immigration over the past ten years, but no one voted for that, either."
"What in the name of Ulysses S. Grant is going on over there, Brit? We're talking about the country which gave us Magna Carta, saw off the Armada, stood alone against Hitler and invented parliamentary democracy. How does Norman Brown get away with it? He must be a popular guy."
"Far from it, Chad. According to the latest opinion polls, he's the most unpopular President ever. His approval ratings are even worse than George Dubya Bush. There's talk about him having to stand down soon. He's already promised the job to some guy who works for him - name of Balls."
"Say again, Brit, you're breaking up."
"BALLS!"
"You're damn right there, buddy."
Emm quote "So we elect Cameron because he is not Brown.... and any thoughts of this recession coming to an end in 2-3 years go up in smoke."
unquote
Emm - He couldn't be any worse !! We know Brown has messed up so we need change however we don't elect anyone until there is an election when we hear all the different cases. Thats the problem with Brown - as Widges very funny report tells us - he has never been voted into the power he now holds!!!
This recession will end because , despite what Brown told us , boom and bust is still part of the economic cycle. The UKs problem is how much longer will it take us to recover than other countries because of Browns mishandling of our economy.
You are right in that we need massive changes in our style of government
but that takes a long time - right now we need a quick answer to the current problems and the first thing neccessary is to have an election where all parties will offer their proposals and at least the new government , whichever it may be , will have a mandate from the public.
unquote
Emm - He couldn't be any worse !! We know Brown has messed up so we need change however we don't elect anyone until there is an election when we hear all the different cases. Thats the problem with Brown - as Widges very funny report tells us - he has never been voted into the power he now holds!!!
This recession will end because , despite what Brown told us , boom and bust is still part of the economic cycle. The UKs problem is how much longer will it take us to recover than other countries because of Browns mishandling of our economy.
You are right in that we need massive changes in our style of government
but that takes a long time - right now we need a quick answer to the current problems and the first thing neccessary is to have an election where all parties will offer their proposals and at least the new government , whichever it may be , will have a mandate from the public.
Yet again I ask , what are the alternative policies, I don,t want to find out after the election.
You are right if we had vote today a one legged blind dog would beat Brown.
Cameron does not have to say or do anything.
What does that say about the UK voting population.
Moving on, for business reason I have the Reuters financial news/exchange rates on all the time and have seen the £ lose over 2 cents again this week.
The reason why is ALL the bad news that we persist in publishing, today it was the trade gap ( the low £ is not helping the economy ) and Tesco results.
The ECB and major European economies seem to attach must less importance to individual events whcuh must be just as bad.
We may see on thursday when the ECB sets its new interest rates.
You are right if we had vote today a one legged blind dog would beat Brown.
Cameron does not have to say or do anything.
What does that say about the UK voting population.
Moving on, for business reason I have the Reuters financial news/exchange rates on all the time and have seen the £ lose over 2 cents again this week.
The reason why is ALL the bad news that we persist in publishing, today it was the trade gap ( the low £ is not helping the economy ) and Tesco results.
The ECB and major European economies seem to attach must less importance to individual events whcuh must be just as bad.
We may see on thursday when the ECB sets its new interest rates.
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Bruce Wallis
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Gary/Gaynor
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EMM I take it your answer is not to publish bad news and hey presto it might all just vanish in a haze. The European papers are just like there English counterparts and print what they feel the peolple should know be it right or wrong. It is not the fault of the press if the trade figures are bad or the pound has devalued.... Mind you Im sure Gordon Brown would not mind censoring the press it may will be his next call he has already taken away countless privileges and rights we used to have. The man is outright bloody dangerous to the well being of the country.
Gary
Former editor of The Sun..
Gary
Former editor of The Sun..
Yes we really do live in a dictatorship don,t we.Gary/Gaynor wrote:EMM I take it your answer is not to publish bad news and hey presto it might all just vanish in a haze. The European papers are just like there English counterparts and print what they feel the peolple should know be it right or wrong. It is not the fault of the press if the trade figures are bad or the pound has devalued.... Mind you Im sure Gordon Brown would not mind censoring the press it may will be his next call he has already taken away countless privileges and rights we used to have. The man is outright bloody dangerous to the well being of the country.
Gary
Former editor of The Sun..
The people in Zimbabwe,Iraq, Iran etc don,t know when they are well off.
why are they so stupid as to want to come here.
I am not sure that the competitive environment in which the press finds itself in this day and age is beneficial to the factual content and relevance of the released stories. If the main goal is good figures and revenue rather than providing information, this has led, more often than not, to the publication of the sensational rather than the factual.Gary/Gaynor wrote:The European papers are just like there English counterparts and print what they feel the peolple should know be it right or wrong.
The consumer is clearly at fault here, as statistics show that blood, sex and violence will sell exponentially better than boring straight-up facts.
Taking into consideration, that a large portion of the wealth and well being was created under the umbrella of "feel good" and "get rich quick" that was propagated by advertising and the press, how safe is it to assume that good press will eventually restore consumer confidence to the point that we all again start spending money we don't have?
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mindthepond
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I see the Maggie haters are all crawling out of the woodwork blaming her for all this countries ills, So lets forget the 20 years of unparralleled wealth we have just gone through which is down to her, lets forget that that wealth was in the hands of the workers who earned it not in the government's who seek to waste it, lets forget that what was done with that wealth was down to the people who held it so what has happened was all down to personal choice.. We will blame her for decimating mining communities and making everybody greedy!! Like the millions of out of people on benefits that we are carrying was she to blame for them?? But lets forget all that But remember where we were before her, Strikes, 3 day weeks, power cuts, devaluing the £, British Leyland, sick Man of Europe,nationalised industries, maybe you have forgotten what I was like but I havnt, but dont let that worry you because you are going to be reminded of it soon because thats just where we are headed..
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Gary/Gaynor
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EMM
To be quite frank I find that to be a pathetic answer Im sure most of us could find countries much worse off than we are. Does that mean we can lower the bar because of this. I still think that Brown is not all there and is a danger to the country. This mad desire he seems to have to drive us to bankruptcy is quite scary and this must be seen to be doing something policy is all wrong as far as Im concerned. The sooner he goes will not be soon enough.
Gary
To be quite frank I find that to be a pathetic answer Im sure most of us could find countries much worse off than we are. Does that mean we can lower the bar because of this. I still think that Brown is not all there and is a danger to the country. This mad desire he seems to have to drive us to bankruptcy is quite scary and this must be seen to be doing something policy is all wrong as far as Im concerned. The sooner he goes will not be soon enough.
Gary
Lembit Opek as PM ? now that conjures up some thoughts - cheeky girls on the front bench and weather reports at PMQs - God forbid !!!!!
As for bad news in the Press - remember the old adage - "Don't shoot the messenger".
Mindthe pond is quite right in his points and right now we do need a very strong person like Maggie to get us out of yet another mess created by another Labour government. Even Brown has admitted his admiration for her by first inviting her to number 10 and now by having her portrait there. She still evokes emotion from all sides unlike Blair whose only contribution now remembered is the disastrous Iraq war.
As for bad news in the Press - remember the old adage - "Don't shoot the messenger".
Mindthe pond is quite right in his points and right now we do need a very strong person like Maggie to get us out of yet another mess created by another Labour government. Even Brown has admitted his admiration for her by first inviting her to number 10 and now by having her portrait there. She still evokes emotion from all sides unlike Blair whose only contribution now remembered is the disastrous Iraq war.
If we believed the initialpress headlines and channels like SKY news then companies like Tesco, Sainsburys, M&S, J Lewis etc would all be holding closing down sales.
All admit that their results were not a high as they wanted but ALL were better than the pundits forcast.
Todays markets react so quickly to bad news ( even ) when wrong and with the world in such a parless state there is a responsibilty for the media to at least get it right.
But when did they ever!!
All admit that their results were not a high as they wanted but ALL were better than the pundits forcast.
Todays markets react so quickly to bad news ( even ) when wrong and with the world in such a parless state there is a responsibilty for the media to at least get it right.
But when did they ever!!
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Bruce Wallis
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Was that an unsubtle pop at me darling??EMM wrote:If we believed the initialpress headlines and channels like SKY news then companies like Tesco, Sainsburys, M&S, J Lewis etc would all be holding closing down sales.
All admit that their results were not a high as they wanted but ALL were better than the pundits forcast.
Todays markets react so quickly to bad news ( even ) when wrong and with the world in such a parless state there is a responsibilty for the media to at least get it right.
But when did they ever!!
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Gary/Gaynor
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EMM
This can of course work both ways I agree the media can give even fairly good results from these companies a negative response. On saying that however what about last week when the most gloomy of predictions for American unemployment was in the 700,000s. When it was announced only 624,000 were made unemployed it was made out to be good news so you pays your money and you get your choice. At the end of the day I do not believe for one you can talk yourself into a recession and neither can the press bad news will always seep out. The trade figures do not bode well the devaluation of the currency (approx -30%) was meant to make things better so what next !! I think a lot of what Mr Brown says lately about helping the unemployed etc is all hot air at the end of the day intentions cost nothing but may look good in the papers. So we now have Gordons Graduates (Bevins Boys) and some crackpot idea of giving employers £2500 to take on long term unemployed when nearly all employers will take on the most suitable candidates no matter what. They seem to be announcing a new idea every day now and very few seem to pass mustard. Ben Benanke has just announced that the stimulus package has not worked and may now have to use plan E,F, G but that matters not we will go down the same path safety in numbers. Lemmings over a cliff comes to mind
This can of course work both ways I agree the media can give even fairly good results from these companies a negative response. On saying that however what about last week when the most gloomy of predictions for American unemployment was in the 700,000s. When it was announced only 624,000 were made unemployed it was made out to be good news so you pays your money and you get your choice. At the end of the day I do not believe for one you can talk yourself into a recession and neither can the press bad news will always seep out. The trade figures do not bode well the devaluation of the currency (approx -30%) was meant to make things better so what next !! I think a lot of what Mr Brown says lately about helping the unemployed etc is all hot air at the end of the day intentions cost nothing but may look good in the papers. So we now have Gordons Graduates (Bevins Boys) and some crackpot idea of giving employers £2500 to take on long term unemployed when nearly all employers will take on the most suitable candidates no matter what. They seem to be announcing a new idea every day now and very few seem to pass mustard. Ben Benanke has just announced that the stimulus package has not worked and may now have to use plan E,F, G but that matters not we will go down the same path safety in numbers. Lemmings over a cliff comes to mind
There are many news channels now available and they all have a bias of one sort of another - none more so than the left wing dominated BBC - but they cannot tell lies - they don't make up the unemployment figures nor the borrowing numbers. The perception of individual companies trading statments is the basis of the stock market - everyone has different views and this is what makes a market.
I do agree that the press are obsessed with their viewing and circulation figures which causes some parts to sensationalize the news but as long as people keep on subscribing then it won't stop.
Look at the ridiculous amount of space given to the so-called celebrities and their antics - I just dont bother with it but a lot of people do and it sells papers. Its the crazy world which we now live in!
I do agree that the press are obsessed with their viewing and circulation figures which causes some parts to sensationalize the news but as long as people keep on subscribing then it won't stop.
Look at the ridiculous amount of space given to the so-called celebrities and their antics - I just dont bother with it but a lot of people do and it sells papers. Its the crazy world which we now live in!