To the Victor, the Howls

[Stavros]

Labour's landslide victory should have brought it to the Annual Conference riding on a wave of near hysterical ecstasy. In fact, barely has the new Labour Govt had time to formulate the policies it is going to present to Parliament than the media has become obsessed with 'freebies' as a symbolic reckoning with the alleged fact that this year's winner's are no better than the last lot.

I did not vote Labour, but I hope they do have a realistic programme that not only offers change, but actually works. On some issues, such as foreign policy crises in the Middle East, Asia and the Horn of Africa, Labour is a waste of time, more or less irrelevant depending on how 'vital' British weapons and money are.

The media storm is overplayed. Watching GB News is to be confronted with a rage that seems more to come from defeat than anything Labour has not yet done. The howls of rage from the super-rich makes one wonder what they do to secure their wealth if they are so terrified of paying their share they would rather abandon the country.

Time will tell, but as far as image management goes, Labour has not got off to a smooth start.

Against, here-
UK Labour Party faces rocky start to government, freebies scandal (1news.co.nz) (https://www.1news.co.nz/2024/09/23/uk-labour-party-faces-rocky-start-to-government-freebies-scandal/)

The freebie scandal could cost Keir Starmer | The Spectator (https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/keir-starmer-cant-forget-this-scandal/)

Defence, here (but a long winded offer from James O'Brien)

Labour freebie scandals are an 'absolute salad of rollocks', says James O'Brien | LBC (youtube.com) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjVpNQhPziE)

[Stavros]

If you want to raise an army of the outraged and the entitled (literally in the case of the Early of Derby) then advance anything to do with land reform and taxes. In this case, Labour has begun to overhaul what it views as a policy, in part inherited from a law the Thatcher Govt passed in 1984, that increases inheritance tax on land owners, mostly around 500, hence the whist drive. Issues around farming and land ownership are some of the most sensitive in this country, and least understood.

Cooking programmes often have a chef, with or without the Michelin stars, visiting suppliers of their meat, veg, dairy products and green things that grow in bushes -all conscious of the bounty of the land. We don't get to see the massive estates owned by hedge funds or corporations who make the most profit from farming, supplying supermarkets all over the UK, maybe even the EU though that market is obstructed by Brexit Regulations (the ones Boris said we would not have).

Will Hutton this offers a clearly stated argument in favour of a Labour policy. My only query is whether or not inheritance tax could affect those people who now rely on their parents for an income, being poorer than the generation that preceded them.

But this opening paragraph is succinct in its statement of a problem we see too in the US: the richer you are, the more powerful; the more powerful you are, the richer. Why do people who ain't got it, yearn so much to be part of a world in which they are not welcome? Are Americans now the most common masochists in this world?


"One of the baleful dimensions of our times is the way that the conversation about what constitutes the good society is framed by the rich and their interests. A conception of the common good withers; instead it is replaced by the existential importance of private wealth, private interests and private ownership to societal health. Nowhere is this more exposed than in the debate over taxation, and in particular the taxation of inherited wealth – as the debate over the past fortnight has dramatised.".

Farmers have hoarded land for too long. Inheritance tax will bring new life to rural Britain | Will Hutton | The Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/17/farmers-have-hoarded-land-for-too-long-inheritance-tax-will-bring-new-life-to-rural-britain)

[Stavros]

Elon Musk has also read the article by Will Hutton, only he says this

"Musk...reached straight for the Josef Stalin comparison Monday, name-checking the 20th century Soviet dictator who ran a brutal program of farm collectivization, which was followed by widespread famine.
“Britain is going full Stalin,” he posted, as he shared a Guardian article on the U.K. plan.".
Elon Musk says UK going ‘full Stalin’ – POLITICO (https://www.politico.eu/article/elon-musk-uk-goverment-donald-trump-stalin-politics-labour-tech/)

He doesn't know much about Stalin, and even less about the UK, but since his views are literally worthless, why should anyone in this country care? It is the Americans who have to deal with someone so detached from reality.

That said, if they do send me to the Gulag, be sure I will send you a postcard. Probably from Footdee, or the Isle of Man.