David Cameron really can’t stick this one on Labour

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Some people might have noticed I'm not a great fan of Labour's economic management right now. I'm not alone, I know. But I admit David Cameron's comments yesterday really seemed to me to push credibility beyond any known limit.

Yesterday morning he was saying on television that nationalisation had to be the wrong answer for Bradford & Bingley. He was looking for a market solution. Only days ago George Osborne was in favour of short selling. Yesterday at the Tory conference Cameron was seeking to blame the whole crisis on Brown.

Brown can carry a lot of blame. His own belief in neo-liberal markets was horribly misplaced. But it's nothing like the Tories, who still believe there is no crisis that cannot be solved by a subsidy for business, usually by a tax cut, and an injection of the market model into any state system. And, of course you must, they say, deregulate always.

This was the recipe that created the mess we're in. It cannot, ever, be the solution.

And then we have Boris Johnson still referring to the 'Masters of the Universe' and the need to keep them in London. The man is insane. They and their model are bringing us to their knees. The only thing they can master is greed. And yet Johnson, a sure servant of that greed, still claims we must pander their every whim. I cannot believe the depth of the intellectual void required within this brain to think this.

And he seems to share that void with Cameron and Osborne.

How did we get here? If ever there was time for a new political party based on sanity, putting people first, and ensuring we have a fair, balanced economy based on meeting the real needs of all people and at least some of their wants then this time is it.

Thorstein Veblen was right: the real economic issue is neither unlimited wants, nor even finding the mechanism to fulfil them. The real problem in our economy is the waste caused by conspicuous consumption. That is the deep-down cause of this crisis. It is the cause of our more general environmental crisis. And the issue for us now is not how to meet need. We can do that. It is how to change our perception of wants so that we can live within our means.

The Tories have no idea what this might mean, despite their talk of debt management. The reason is simple: they believe in the greed that has driven the current system. That means they can never reform it.


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