To think that being Tory doesn't make you thick?

[RainbowSheep]

Ok, my family are all very liberal (I mean my parents, aunts & uncles, who incidently have all had lots of money & opportunities throughout their lives). Their parents (who were poor working class) were more conservative as are me and my brother, who are both pretty poor. We recently had a family get together where I was told by my uncle (university lecturer) that Tories were unitelligent and I was beginning to sound like an idiot for having conservative views... I don't think I am particularly right wing.

Ihatebabyhake/HugeManatee - I very much agree about the inevitable decline of Western wage levels to bring us in line with those in Emerging economies combined with our aging populations and and the huge burden of social welfare payments is the Gorilla in the room that Western politicians of all sides dare not mention. Telling the voter that they cannot expect a life as good as their poarents had is hardly a winning proposition.

However, what is also an increasingly obvious is that not everyone in Western society is getting poorer. Let us not forget that the deepening of the divide in UK society between that 'haves' and the 'have nots' over the last 20 years happened mostly under a Labour Govt.

It occured because billions of people in Eastern Europe and China have entered the global labour market. The divide between the wealth and income of those at the very top and very bottom of society is a typical charactersitic of Emerging Market countries and is increasingly mirrored in the West. In fact, the USA looks economically like an Emerging Market country with millions living in debt slavery on minimum wage with no access to healthcare and the top 1% enjoying stupendous wealth.

I do not think the UK will ever get to the stage the US has reached but I don't see any UK politicians of any party really coming up with a solution. The David Cameron idea of a 'Big Society' was a throw back to Victorian benevolence but Victorian Britain was the most divided society the World has ever seen. Meanwhile Labour continues to talk about an ever expanding welfare state. Neither is a feasible solution.

cantspel - very interesting reading that Germany is not tackling this issue either.

I realised belatedly that the poster I quoted was IHateBabyJake, not IHateBabyHake

Damn autocorrect

Beta - you speak a lot of sense. The distorted economy we have in the UK, where financial services constitute a disproportionate amount of the tax take while vast swathes of the country are left to moulder is deeply unhealthy and would take a massive jolt to change.

I was mulling over last night the argument that financial services should just be left to fail. It would cause horrific disruption and a lot of suffering for some, but there is a school of thought that uses the example of Iceland to argue that following the initial shock the economy would eventually rebalance away from the over-reliance on financial services, towards a more diverse economy.

I was also wondering how well it'd go down if some kind of levy were introduced on financial services, not to prop up the benefits bill but to fund a new industrial policy that aimed for a rebirth of manufacturing and industry in the North. Of course some would argue that this would just be another way of handing money to fatcats, but on the other hand there just aren't enough jobs to go round, especially in former mining and manufacturing communities.

If more industrial-type jobs could be created then maybe, just maybe we wouldn't need to rely so much on the tax take from the City, maybe we wouldn't need to pay out so much JSA, and maybe there would be less of a sense that the finance sector is being propped up for the benefit of a small minority while the rest of the country stagnates in hopeless, penniless misery.

Before discussing politics with anyone, I always find it helpful to ask them if they know the difference between the deficit and the national debt.

If they do, I'll entertain their opinions and we can have a reasoned debate.

If they don't, their ignorance of the most fundamental political issue in the western world today renders their opinions worthless.

Wow Rolo, what's it like up there in your ivory tower?

In answer to the op:

THICK AS THICK CAN BE AND THEN SOME

AND/OR GREEDY

AND LIKELY ON THE NASTY SIDE.

Hope that clears things up.

No, Hully, it clears nothing up but does reflect on your understanding of political theory.

D'you know Hully - I was looking for something to cheer me up, and bless you, you've done it! Cheers

Marvellous comment

Like everyone working for a better world who happens to be to the right-
of-centre

That is an oxymoron.

Hth too Lemon

No, it's not an oxymoron. Unless you're in the blinded-by-stereotypes-and-sloganeering understanding of politics that most people leave behind in their student digs.

Rolo, harsh but fair.

The scary part is that a while back I watched a program called "Britain's Trillion Pound Horror Story" on BBC2 and they interviewed a few politician's and listened to each tow to party line as to the fault of the deficit. Then they asked each what the national debt was. Only one could give a ballpark (fair enough), the rest didn't even know what the deficit was and several confused the debt for the deficit.

If these are our MP's, god help the rest of us.

"Then they asked each what the national debt was. Only one could give a ballpark (fair enough), the rest didn't even know what the deficit was and several confused the debt for the deficit."

Yep, it's horrifying! These people are supposed to be running the country!
If you put all this into a video game, within a week every 12 year old boy in the country would be better informed than our MP's :)

The thing is, unless the difference is understood it's rather pointless to try to argue which pensions or benefits the country can afford, and what does or doesn't need to be cut.

Generally though, I've found the left/right wing belief seems to boil down to two different positive focuses. The left wants to make sure the pie we have is evenly spread between the population but doesn't worry about how big it is, and the right wants to make the pie as big as possible but let the people divide/earn it amongst themselves.

Neither side is 'wrong', but different circumstances call for different approaches.

the right wants to make the pie as big as possible but let the people divide/earn it amongst themselves.

The difficulty with this approach being that three people have 98% of the pie while the rest fight over the crumbs.

Rolo i disagree - i have learnt from posters who may or may not know the difference between deficit and debt, but have still explained why the benefits system is unfair.

It seems like a bit of a school boy error to only want to debate with those having the same starting point as you.

Hully, that pie imagery has no basis in anything other than left-wing cliche. It shows a complete lack of understanding of political theory or complexity on either side of the argument.

Lemon, I think we all understand that you are deeply concerned and troubled by my total failure to grasp political theory and complexity.

Shall we just take it as a given?

"It seems like a bit of a school boy error to only want to debate with those having the same starting point as you."

Yes, I'm referring to more generalised left/right discussions. If you're discussing only one specific issue, it can be perfectly fine not to know or care about the bigger picture.

It's not your understanding that troubles me, Hully, it's a more general lack of knowledge and perception about politics amongst so many people that's more of a concern. Never mind the deficit, there are still plenty of people who think don't understand half the discussion.

Hmm. Do you need to have an PPE degree from a top Uni to understand that taking from the poor and disabled while letting big business off tax bills is wrong?

Basic ethics that. Taught at one's mother's knee: Sharing is good. Nobody likes the kid that wont share their toys and eats all the cake. Eating all the cake will eventually make you sick.

'Eating all the cake will eventually make you sick.' (What? No you don't need a PPE degree. But I think if you want your ideas to be taken seriously then the lame food analogies have to go.)

Honestly, the Right doesn't want to 'eat all the cake'! That is puerile. Tories believe they have solutions for whole society benefit. Why is that so difficult to accept? Once you've accepted it, there's still plenty of room to disagree, it's just you'll be on an intellectual footing rather than a... unenlightened pie/cake image slogan one.

ooooh it's all getting very political on MN at the mo..........and I think the lefties are winning...........all very back foot there on the right

But what do the Tories want to do to help make sure everyone can have some cake?

Lemon, what are you on about? You are reading stuff into my posts that isn't there. I didn't attribute my post to either side of the political divide.

I didn't even mention Tories, or the right or the left.

I was talking about decent, human compassion and morals.

Interestingly, it was Rolo, who has intellectual requirements to be met before being prepared to enter debate, who introduced the pie analogy.

I used it both from politesse, and as perhaps it was an analogy with which she was comfortable.