I wrote about the 'Tory revolution' this morning. That's the process I described in The Courageous State where this government (and to some extent the New Labour one that preceded it, but with this one being much worse) has sought to create what I call a cowardly state:
This is.... a state that sees responsibility and runs away from it. This is a state that now exists solely to facilitate the looting of its power to tax for the benefit of an elite who want to own its assets through the PFI scheme, and be guaranteed a high and risk-free income for doing so. It is a state that wants to privatise its education system through ‘free schools' — free only because yet more tax goes to the private sector in the process. And it is a state that wants to hand control of one of the UK's greatest achievements — the National Health Service — to the market so that we can copy the US healthcare model and double the cost of provision in exchange for worse healthcare outcomes — all so that a few can cream off from the tax revenues a wholly undeserved and excessive risk-free return for being in the right place at the right time, somewhere near their old school friends who might now be in power in Westminster.
I am not alone in thinking so. Ivan Horrocks put it another way in a comment this morning:
I'm not surprised at all by this news. It's the inevitable conclusion of a strategy and process that was undoubtedly conceived while the Tories were in opposition and in concert with many of those who stand to benefit.
As I and others who read this blog have commented before, it's all part of the UK equivalent of the ‘shock doctrine': in this case the use of the banking crisis and subsequent deficit as cover to dismantle the state — while arguing that it's about paying off our debt and rebalancing our economy. That economic goal has always been a secondary concern — the primary objective was political and social — to finish the work that Thatcher began in the 1980s. This is a crucial distinction far too many economic commentators miss, thus providing further cover for the primary objective.
Now the Tories are aware they'll only be in power for one term completing the demolition of the state, the fire sale of public assests and services, and the engineering of the corporate control of as many regulatory and governmental institutions as is possible will gain pace drastically. As will the tempo and harshness of the attack on the poor and less fortunate in our society. This is absolutely inevitable because one of the deep seated beliefs of modern day Tories is that Thatcher wasted her first term in office (as did Blair as they see it) and thus they are not about to make the same mistake. Expect the Lib Dems — as weak and lacking in strategic vision as they have shown themselves to be so far — to simply be swept aside.
Make absolutely no mistake as to what the desired result of this Tory ‘revolution' is: a managed, corporately controlled, and deeply unequal ‘democracy' of the type that would make Putin envious.
I agree.
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I wonder if the above could have any bearing on this nonsense at the JC+? Don’t forget, there’s no more legal aid for benefits problems after the end of March… still, those who consider Thatcher wasted her time should consider why it is we don’t have a poll tax. How would the Coalition cope with riots on that scale and more? I don’t imagine we’ll have to wait to long to find out!
You think ?
More about expanding the range of corporate welfare payments I would have thought !
Although I noted on BBC news earlier:
“The BMJ says 426, or 36%, of the 1,179 GPs it looked at – who are in executive positions on boards – have a financial interest in a for-profit health provider beyond their own practice”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-21772143
Ivan and I have been in agreement on this before – this will be a Neo-feudal state, in which we subjects in the oligarcho-democratic state we now enjoy are transformed into serfs,without rights, in a feudal state where the land-basis of mediaeval fedualism will be replaced by a “territorial” carve-up on the basis of income streams from taxation = Prince HMRC and Duke NHS and Marquess Tertiary Education, and Earl Secondary Education – somewhat reminiscent of Prohibition Chicago!
These new “garagiste/card-sharping/rent-seeking” baronage know the price of everything and the value of nothing, and their only skills are those of rip-off and plunder, and are a universe away from the real economy and real wealth creation, which will be the task of the serfs – as it always was.
And oligarcho-democratic state? Well, we’ve never been a real, full democracy. First of all we are still currently “subjects” under the Crown, rather than being free citizens of a truly sovereign state. Secondly, on top of this, the old landed aristocratic set-up, deriving from this monarchic/class principle and structure also constrained our free exercise of power as citizens, but that set-up was modified, to produce a semi-democracy, in response to popular pressure (we owe SO much of our current “freedom” to Chartism, Trade Union pressure, and the sacrifice of thousands of ordinary people in two World Wars – without those, the old feudal set-up would never have changed). So we have a oligracho-democracy.
This lot, however, want us truly to be subjects, lacking all rights, but bound to a money-making machine and elite, in which which we have a duty to pay, and they have the right to be paid. Frankly, I’m beginning to feel like one of those small businesses in Chicago that had to pay Al Capone protection money! That’s the set-up they’re after – obtaining money with menaces is the charge! Maximum penalty 14 years!
Labour should be putting down a marker – a future Labour Government will bring all these illicitly disposed of mutually created assets back under democratic control, without compensation where possible, which, given that it is highly likely that their new “owners” will already have made more than they have paid for the assets, will be easy to justify.
The Tories are the vehicle but the real architects are those behind the WTO and the Washington Consensus .. a last gasp determined to squash the ‘dangerous’ rejection of ongoing liberalisation. The US-EU FTA will create a trading bloc which will account for about half the world’s economic output and nearly a third of world trade .. operating under a corporate tribunal which will have the power to change domestic legislation. Put this together with all the other, secret bi-lateral FTAs and the Trans-pacific (TPP) one being negotiated by Obama, and the world is carved up between China and satellites and the US and satellites.
‘It is significant that the libertarian US think-tank, Cato asks the question whether some of the concepts contained in the draft EU-US FTA are appropriate for a binding international agreement on free trade ‘or do they turn trade agreements into a kind of global constitution?’’
http://think-left.org/2013/02/20/are-we-already-in-the-post-democratic-era/
As you said in the #bbcqt spot.. the cabinet aren’t really Conservatives. They are neoliberals or more appropriately neofeudalists!
the last hits the nail on the head
Neo-feudalists indeed! Welcome to the New World Order!! 🙁
I think Ivan Horrocks has the political dynamic wrong. I can’t see how the tempo of anything will go up in this coalition government. I agree that what he predicts is what may have happened had the Tories had a majority, but they don’t. And I can’t see how the LibDems will be “just swept aside” – they’ve been pretty daft so far, but aren’t complete idiots.
What is interesting now is the battle within & for the LibDems, with the “orange bookers” like Laws etc going head to head against the majority of the party.
Rather than a broad front, I’d keep an eye out for Cam/Osborne/Clegg/Laws trying to do just one more big thing before they lose office – some outrageous gift to the lobbyists that will see them right once they’re out of a job.
I think you underestimate by fr the power of the Orange Book
And the neoliberal consensus
I’d very much like to believe you’re right, Strategist, and I’ll be more than happy to be proved wrong on this. But I don’t think I will be.
The real problem is that There Is No Alternative – party to vote for, that, is. When will Labour throw out its New Labour leadership and swing sharply back to the left?
Don’t tell me – I know the answer, hence TINA.