People of Merthyr give Ian Duncan Smith a reality check

[Plumdaff]

Funny how several organisations such at the Campaign Against Climate Change and the Greens put forward fully costed manifestos to create one million jobs, and do exactly what many people are saying here is the start of solution - but according to some people on here we're entirely doomed and shouldn't try to think of any way forward whatsoever.

Let's be aware of our chains but not rattle them because they're heavy.

 

[phildwyer]

The spokesman of the defeated

Amazingly enough, I think this moron is referring to Lletsa. And not, as everyone else can clearly see, HIMSELF.

There's nothing wrong with being a spokesman for the defeated. But don't pretend (or worse, imagine) that you are anything other than that.

 

[Proper Tidy]

Tourist

 

[phildwyer]

It probably the politics of envy

It's not politics at all.

 

[YouSir]

Funny how the people who are so big on suggesting that people from employment dead zones should move to greener pastures are so often to be heard spitting fire about people from, say, Poland doing exactly the same thing.

I'm still trying to figure out where these greener pastures actually are - I know everyone always points to London and the South East but it's not like we're drowning in jobs, 'specially not good ones. Plus you need a hefty amount to even move here given rent and living prices, I already know people who're looking for greener pastures beyond London, although with no luck.

And to Dwyer and the Defeatists, your basic answer is that nothing'll change so why bother even considering it I take it?

 

[LLETSA]

No, it isn't going to happen. And people aren't going to -- aren't able to -- leave. Which means that the outcome will be a downward spiral that leaves the people in these town ever more bereft of most things that should be their birthright. OK? Things are hopeless, we get that.

Doesn't mean we can't talk about what should be done. Because if there is one way to absolutely guarantee nothing ever improves, it's to not even bother trying to work out what the best options should be.

I am trying to get people to talk about what should be dione-but in a way that stands a chance of convincing people. I mean, if I, as one who wants to be convinced am to be denounced as defeatist, what about the millions who don't even know there are still tiny, fading organisations that stand for such solutions still (or ever did) even exist?

 

[UnderOpenSky]

The key is to not take your eye off the ball. Capitalism is a very cunning game of chase-the-lady. Somewhere along the line, you are duped into thinking you should be looking for the profit rather than the value. But profit is just one way of measuring value -- and a damned crude way at that.

In short, companies aren't able to pay people because they make a profit. No, it's the exact opposite way round -- they make a profit because they pay people... but don't pay them as much as they take from them.

Money derives from value, not profit. Added value, to be precise -- you take something, you expend some effort on it and the result has more value than it had before. That can equally apply to health and education as to the manufacture of widgets.

Ok...I think I get you.

What industries would you nationalise in economically deprived areas of the country like merthry which would add value?

 

[DotCommunist]

kabbes has it here. Potted marx. Although I would add that the reason public sector is shown to fail next to private is because it is hamstrung by 'competition' and the political will to sell off any part that does produce surplus. You cream off the rich bits and then declare the rest a failure

 

[Proper Tidy]

I am trying to get people to talk about what should be dione-but in a way that stands a chance of convincing people. I mean, if I, as one who wants to be convinced am to be denounced as defeatist, what about the millions who don't even know there are still tiny, fading organisations that stand for such solutions still (or ever did) even exist?

How has change happened historically? What has been the driver of the historical process?

 

[UnderOpenSky]

kabbes has it here. Potted marx. Although I would add that the reason public sector is shown to fail next to private is because it is hamstrung by 'competition' and the political will to sell off any part that does produce surplus. You cream off the rich bits and then declare the rest a failure

Are there ways other then revolution and lining the middle class up outside M&S that could achieve this?

 

[LLETSA]

Funny how several organisations such at the Campaign Against Climate Change and the Greens put forward fully costed manifestos to create one million jobs, and do exactly what many people are saying here is the start of solution - but according to some people on here we're entirely doomed and shouldn't try to think of any way forward whatsoever.

Let's be aware of our chains but not rattle them because they're heavy.

Such organisations have no chance of being elected into government and if they did (or if other parties adopted large parts of their programmes), they would be prevented from carrying them out by both the immensely powerful vested interests who would have their operations impeded by such measures, and the public, who would be manipulated into backing the vested interests.

 

[phildwyer]

I am trying to get people to talk about what should be dione-but in a way that stands a chance of convincing people. I mean, if I, as one who wants to be convinced am to be denounced as defeatist, what about the millions who don't even know there are still tiny, fading organisations that stand for such solutions still (or ever did) even exist?

I think they're fucked. What do you think?

 

[DotCommunist]

Are there ways other then revolution and lining the middle class up outside M&S that could achieve this?

we wait till they destroy themselves and pick up whatever they leave us that is rescuable.

 

[dennisr]

Let's be aware of our chains but not rattle them because they're heavy.

Good quote that one.

We should still be living in caves if the chain non-rattlers had their way. Personally I believe in evolution - change happens - that sort of thing.

 

[kabbes]

Ok...I think I get you.

What industries would you nationalise in economically deprived areas of the country like merthry which would add value?

Well this is where we start running into problems. Because I'd invoke the classic response to being asked for directions, "Well, I wouldn't start from here."

In short, you can't use a sticking plaster over a festering wound. The whole damn system is rotten to its core and merely nationalising one industry, though a good start, isn't going to fix it. I don't really think this is the place for the kabbes manifesto, but it would start by eliminating the concept of the public limited company, continue by renationalising every utility (and everything I would define as a utility) and certainly include some way of properly accounting for externalities, including those created by siting every damn job within the same 30 miles by 30 miles. Then we'll move onto phase 2.

 

[weltweit]

Creating jobs quickly would mean, IMO, creating jobs that won't last. Like we see with Bosch mentioned above, any company fickle enough to be lured in with bribes (bribes which may come at the expense of the pay and conditions of the workforce) will be lured away again just as easily.

But we need jobs in the short term as well as the long term.

Bosch provided jobs in South Wales for a long time, the WDA could have attracted other makers in the meantime rather than sitting on their laurels. But I agree that if firms are attracted here by incentives they can be attracted away also.

However we do make things in the UK, we make cars, we have a thriving car industry, Honda, BMW, Land Rover, Nissan etc all make cars in the UK. British workers can build top quality cars, British managers can build quality cars, the problem is that British financiers cannot run top quality British car plants. All the plants I mentioned are foreign owned, the failure in British industry is at the financiers level that is why we have a thriving British car industry but none of it is British owned!

It's going to take a long time to create an economy which is not dependant on multinationals, not dependant on the retail and service sectors but which is based on the (horribly old-fashioned) concept of creating things which have value. With most of the country living hand-to-mouth or terrified of losing their job or both there's no scope for the innovation and enterprise which governments always bang on about. We are told to aspire to greatness one moment and then told we can work 60 hours a week at ASDA or die in the gutter the next.

It is going to be difficult to put the genie of globalisation back in its box if you really want to go back to making things again. (which I want) But with the advent of automation it should be possible to build things in the UK at a profit, perhaps not mass market things totally but certainly slightly more niche things. But automation means fewer low skilled jobs, but more engineers and the like.

Work is good for you, but only if it has a purpose. Working in a dead end job for a company that does nothing but sell imported shite at a 90% mark up and doesn't give a fuck whether you live or die is not good for you. Maybe there are people in this country who genuinely don't want to work, and can you blame them? Anyone would think from the rhetoric surrounding unemployment that once you're in a job you'll be treated with dignity and respect. Fat fucking chance, as soon as the balance sheet says so you're back on the scrapheap.

Been there, done that

 

[LLETSA]

How has change happened historically? What has been the driver of the historical process?

I'm asking you to tell me. But seeing as you insist, it's been working class struggle in the main. It will always exist as long as there's a working class. But the outcome will not always be the same. A 1917 type outcome is (in its broadest sense), for instance, no longer possible for a massive host of reasons, and wasn't even possible in most places even before 1917.

It isn't even possible to have a mildly reformist social democratic Labour government (as opposed to one that carries out pro-market New Labour-type reforms) anymore and won't ever be again.

 

[SpookyFrank]

we wait till they destroy themselves and pick up whatever they leave us that is rescuable.

They'll destroy us first if we let them. Capitalism is founded on exploitation, why would the capitalists renounce their favourite thing in times of trouble?

 

[dennisr]

It's not politics at all.

at least it ain't snide smug shite

 

[treelover]

']Well, that is probably what Americans would do, in my limited experience they move distances for work at the drop of a hat. For some reason British people are not the same.'

yes, look at the levels of anomie and atomisation in the US, not a good example, as many here have pointed out...

 

[phildwyer]

How has change happened historically? What has been the driver of the historical process?

Don't tell me, let me guess.

Loonies tapping away on their keyboards and fantasizing about being Che Guevara?

 

[UnderOpenSky]

we wait till they destroy themselves and pick up whatever they leave us that is rescuable.

The problem as I see it is that they are destroying the people of Methyr and like well before they destroy themselves.

 

[Plumdaff]

Such organisations have no chance of being elected into government and if they did (or if other parties adopted large parts of their programmes), they would be prevented from carrying them out by both the immensely powerful vested interests who would have their operations impeded by such measures, and the public, who would be manipulated into backing the vested interests.

If people had always thought your way, women wouldn't have the vote and we'd have never had an NHS. In fact, there'd never have been any form of collective action by the working class. You don't think everybody else knows the enormous vested interests we're up against, it's just, unlike yourself, they are aware that history always involves change, and to the one certainty is that nothing will change if we all thought like you.

 

[kabbes]

Are there ways other then revolution and lining the middle class up outside M&S that could achieve this?

There are three things that are needed for effective change:

a) People have to want things to change
b) People have to have a clear view of the result of change
c) People have to have a clear roadmap of how the change will happen.

These are conceptually multiplicative: if one is at some notional 0% then the total is at 0%. If they are all at a notional 50% then the total odds of a successful outcome are just 1-in-8.

At the moment, I wouldn't say that there is any kind of broad consensus for any of the three drivers of change. But I think it's building. And things change very quickly in a generation so who knows what the situation will be in 20 years?

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Well this is where we start running into problems. Because I'd invoke the classic response to being asked for directions, "Well, I wouldn't start from here."

In short, you can't use a sticking plaster over a festering wound. The whole damn system is rotten to its core and merely nationalising one industry, though a good start, isn't going to fix it. I don't really think this is the place for the kabbes manifesto, but it would start by eliminating the concept of the public limited company, continue by renationalising every utility (and everything I would define as a utility) and certainly include some way of properly accounting for externalities, including those created by siting every damn job within the same 30 miles by 30 miles. Then we'll move onto phase 2.

That sounds good.

 

[LLETSA]

I think they're fucked. What do you think?

I fear you may well be right, at least in the sense of the predictions I've been making in this thread.

 

[Fedayn]

I must say i'm liking the Lletsa/Dwyer, Stadtler/Waldorf or Godfrey/Jones double act here. Therre is a difference however, as much as he is not the most optimistic of chaps lletsa is entirely in favour of pro-working class politics and similar change. Whereas dwyer is simply the dilletante who feels himself above us in that he can really see what's happening as opposed to his inferirors who are-unlike him of course-fucked.

 

[Proper Tidy]

Don't tell me, let me guess.

Loonies tapping away on their keyboards and fantasizing about being Che Guevara?

Lol. What you doing now Phil?

 

[Fedayn]

Don't tell me, let me guess.

Loonies tapping away on their keyboards and fantasizing about being Che Guevara?

Nope, by people running off to become air miles intellectuals then lecturing those who they 'left behind;' on the 'real world'.....

 

[LLETSA]

And to Dwyer and the Defeatists, your basic answer is that nothing'll change so why bother even considering it I take it?

The problem is that most people confuse realism with defeatism.

Darlington FC will never reach the dizzy heights of the Premier League. Is that defeatism or realism?