Political naivety

[smokingboot]

I watched the inauguration yesterday and felt...a sweetness and a kind of envy in all that belief.
The waving and the Paternoster, faces full of hope, praying, really wishing. And I wondered about us.

I suppose one might argue that the cynicism, the weariness endemic to British politics stems from it being a much older political entity than the States. We've seen it, we know it doesn't work seems to be the attitude. Maybe we're right. What we have done though, is absolve ourselves from the effort of trying. Our great art is the Comic Whinge. And sport.

I remember attackers of socialist doctrines telling me that socialism just can't sustain itself. And now apologists of capitalism are saying, 'Well of course capitalism can't work on a stand alone basis...nothing does!' So it was bad when socialism couldn't work by itself, but it's not bad, it's only to be expected when capitalism fails in the same way. I spy the covering of bottoms, beeeeeg bottoms...

I see what happens when greed goes insane, the evils of laissez-faire, the truth that the market does not regulate itself, it becomes a feeding frenzy for sharks. In the end everyone suffers cos there's always a bigger fish.

I see the warnings of Orwell regarding socialism, the overlegislation, the erosion of civil liberties, nulabour = nucrimes for all. Try anything and see what happens. IDs and databases, someone somewhere's got to keep an eye on you, the government knows what's best, so eat what's good for you, be abstemious, be a good role model, don't say nasty things, be good. Fuck off Nanny, I'm down the pub with a swearword on my tee-shirt, a pint in one hand and a rollie in the other (possibly somewhat extreme, I don't even smoke) it's somehow hard to take the dangers seriously because our politicians are a bit funny looking. How can Crash Gordon be dangerous, looking so lumpy and absurd? But he is.

Are the alternatives any better? David Cameron seems full of ideas. But the grass root members are the same bunch who voted in the disgraceful legislation of care in the community and other ways of cutting money to the dispossessed, aka probable non-tory voters. My abiding memories of the Thatcher years are the beggars suddenly flooding the streets of London, 13 year old kids selling their arses around Piccadilly at midnight, and the cardboard box towns under railway bridges. Even if Cameron isn't the spawn of Baroness Davros, his party's track history worries me.

The Lib Dems seems so nothing right now. What are their dynamic policies? Where are they? I don't see them.


I suddenly envy America its new hope; we could wait, sour and knowing, for the messiah to show his feet of clay, and quote endlessly the corruption and callousness of American life perceived by us, in stark contrast to the American Dream.

But what's our dream?

Comments

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

My mother, brought up in Franco's Spain, was charmed and astonished by the ease with which opinions could be heard and publically acknowledged here. Speakers Corner was always a thing of wonder to her, and I know for a fact she has been one of those placard holders outside the houses of parliament. Of course, they move them along as swiftly as they can now...

After a few years here, she said that the right to protest was very cunning, because while people felt they could shout and affect, they wouldn't actually revolt. It is helplessness that makes people riot. But we are poor indeed if we look to violent protest as a specific tradition; any folk of any nation will do it if they feel they must and smashing shops helps no-one except looters. Great protest should be a warning to leaders (i.e the poll tax riots) but it often turned into pro government propaganda (i.e the miners' strikes) so it is very much a double edged sword.

Civilisation of the kind to which we aspire must meet the needs of the people long before such a state.

I totally agree that we don't seem to have any underlying senseo of principles or ideals. I certainly think state funding rather than private funding for political parties would change a great deal. But can we afford it?

Money is not evil - no business equals no money, equals no NHS or roads or schools - but it is not a moral principle. Gain is not God.

[hybridartifacts.livejournal.com]

The right to protest is only relevant if you have people in power who are willing to listen. In theory the strength of a democracy is that politicians are easily replaced, but in my view it only actually works if you are lucky enough to have politicians with integrity, humility and vision. How many are there like that? The problem becomes that you end up choosing between the lesser of evils - one useless or corrupt politician against another.
So far as I can see it the message of Obama's campaign was that so long as someone with those qualities is willing to stand, if people really want change and back it, it can and will happen. Without that the only I can see to at least limit political abuses is to sever the link between politicians and business - deliberately uncompetitive salaries for MPs (say based on the pay of nurses), making any and all perks illegal, and having a blanket injunction on all lobbying and mps being 'retired' after service into some sort of state pension and a permanent bar on taking any other form of paid work. State funded parties is a good idea as well- and also effectively levels the playing field in elections. They would hate it, so of course it will never happen because they would have to vote the approach in...

Where our tradition of protest is concerned-sometimes it has been peaceful, other times not. The Peasant Revolt, English Civil War (which would have been wonderful had someone promptly killed Cromwell) and the Chartists spring readily to mind, but of course there are others. A democracy should encourage peaceful protest by responding to the voices of the people, because if it fails to do so it does tend to open itself up to riot and disorder eventually.

The classic example of a bunch of English getting fed up with not being represented or listened to is, of course, the American War of Independence. We forget all to easily it was a very English revolution... perhaps the validity of giving a forceful push lies with the founding fathers of America. I hope it does not though.

Where money is concerned I agree-its not evil in itself, and capitalism isn't all bad either. I do think that a totally free market is a terrible idea though. The function of government is to seek the best for its people and to safeguard them, but generally business interests look purely to profit these days and are not the best of lobbies for politicians with a duty of care to the public to listen to. Perhaps a different attitude in government would ultimately also encourage business to use alternate models such as co-operatives and profit sharing schemes more often?

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

We are seeing now what the Free Market achieves without some sort of watchfulness:-( One massive illusion has been dispelled at least. We have learned that left to its own devices capitalism does not 'naturally' incorporate self regulation now for the sake of improved profit later, that mercantile commonsense is not a given, even among the oligarchs who specialise in it and rely upon it.

Re non competitive salaries for MPs, I don't believe in non-competitive salaries for anybody - the best want to be paid, and paid well, for what they do.

When nurses in Britain were being paid abysmally, many stayed out of sentiment...and many went to other countries where their pay reflected respect for their work. Their places here were often then taken, not by people who wanted to nurse but by those who just wanted a secure job. Some of those people grew into their work magnificently. Some really didn't. A crisis in that industry's standards became very evident.

I honestly think that in any field of work, second rate pay does not attract the truly dedicated, because even these have obligations that cost money. Very generally speaking, second rate pay attracts only those who can't get more elsewhere.

[hybridartifacts.livejournal.com]

The problem with the philosophy of 'competitive' salaries as it stands is 'competitive to what'? Whose salary?
In the end it comes to the problem that actually we have a totally crap sense of value in our society where money is concerned. People who do essential work-medical professionals, janitors, labourers and the like without whom we have would have a terrible time are effectively considered of little worth-when someone who moves others peoples money around has massive financial 'value'. I just think that if politics is treated with the same 'value' as those essential services things would be better. Instead politicians want to compare themselves in 'value' to company directors. Its based on the premise that people like company directors are massively talented people deserving of huge pay, but as this crisis is showing, half the time they quite simply are not.

I think people like nurses should be paid more, and people like company directors should be paid less, but there you go. My point was really that if politicians had lower salaries and less other financial incentives to go into politics, we would be more likely to get people with a sense of self-sacrifice entering politics, and that ultimately it is a spirit of humble service to the nation that we need more than almost anything else in our politicians.
Plenty of people do actually go into lower paid work because they believe in what they doing, and many people go so far as to give up all their possessions and wealth completely to do so. Im not asking for that level of dedication, just an end to the 'gravy train'.

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

I can see what you are saying. A little bit of altruism wouldn't do any harm. And I agree about our values. What is essential and what isn't? Should footballers really be paid as much as they are for what they do, compared to what a teacher is paid?

[hybridartifacts.livejournal.com]

Of course the big problem is however idealistic my desire to see a revision of our sense of 'value' may be, it's one of those things that probably will never happen. 'Dirty' jobs are generally seen as low skilled and only for the desperate (who really wants to clean toilets?), jobs that tend to involve a lot of real dedication like nursing get people despite the lower pay because often they are really committed to what they are doing, and high paid jobs tend to involve creaming off from massive profits because they involve activities that are commercially popular even if they are largely wasteful of resources or not very practical.