Also in trouble with the Unions now is the Labour opposition leadership (if that is the right word for them!)

Captain ‘Block-Ed’ Milliband aided by the First m(R)ate Ed ‘Balls-Up’has dramatically changed course away from the rocks showing all the brave skills of a certain cruise ship captain and so has really angered his Union financiers.

This episode has echoes of when he stabbed his brother in the back to take command of the good ship Labour. Now its the turn of the Unions to enjoy his loyalty after they sponsored his leadership election campaign.

Having failed to convince the public of the Labour opposition policy to reduce the enormous national debt by borrowing even more, Ed ‘Balls-Up’ seems to have finally accepted the really serious economic crisis we are in and done a political U-swerve as he couldn’t even organize a proper U-turn. Or it just could be a cunning plan to have the Unions get rid of ‘Block-Ed’ so that his Mrs can take over as party Leader.

5,4,3,2,1..............

OR him not his wife,but I think youve got it in 2 .The treachury of these career polititions has no bounds

A politician lying in order to get into power? What an unheard of idea that is

What does that even mean?

First Mate - as in ship. With intended alternative sarcastic comment First Rate Balls-Up. Sorry craig

It's the way you tell em.

Good thread this.

Your mistake is thinking that a choice in government means a choice in policy. What is happening now, policy wise, would have happened with either of the parties, and as is the done thing in politics, the opposition party would have "a better way of doing it" albeit irrelevant as they aren't in power, before backtracking when public support for politics starts lingering.

Or put another way: Whoever you vote for, the Government always gets in....

[url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFZrzg62Zj0My considered response to this thread.[/url

Mine was a comment on current events and not a "mistake in thinking". I have little faith in any of the younger career politicians who in recent times all seem to be in it for personal gain and offer little knowledge of how to run a sweetie shop let alone a country. That is with a very few exceptions. However the Labour opposition having been in power during the world boom and bust left us in a big mess and only now appear to realise just how big a mess.

This dearth of political talent is not confined to these shores. The ongoing Euro crisis with the EU leaders useless and rudderless as they cruise on Titantic like to a well predicted disaster. While a glance across the pond is enough to see a bunch of candidates who you would say are just unbelievable if you read it in a fictional book. The disappointing President should gain an easy 2nd term.

Obama has been dissapointing ,but the curcus over here that is the GOP primaries it gets worse every day.The gop know they are going to lose this they are hoping they will have a decent candidate next time

Your allegiances to the Conservative party aside, none of the mainstream political parties would have changed the outcome that was always going to be a bust. The fact that the opposition party is the Labour party is irrelevant. As opposition parties usually do, they pretended to have a simple, favourable policy whether it would work or not to try and win votes. The Labour party has decided to change its stance on this as the polls obviously weren't looking as they expected.

I think the Obama administration has been slightly more than disappointing. As for the "Euro crisis", Germany seem to be doing pretty well out of it all!

I do not have any allegiance to the Conservatives - its just that IMO they are currently the best of a poor lot. Your Labour allegiance overlooks the fact that before the last election the Conservatives while in opposition stated their policy was to make big cuts to reduce the deficit, a promise they have carried out while in Government.

Labour's policy and economic record was rejected at the election and their opposition policy has also failed to win over the public since the election. Their leaders late conversion to economic reality may fool the dyed-in-the wool Labour supporters but not the marginal voters. You would appear to be one of those quite happy with their flip-flopping. This change of course may be short lived as the Unions, who control the purse strings, flex their muscles and push for a new leader.

With regard to Germany they have done very well out of an under valued Euro which has helped their exports for most of the last decade. But to try and staunch the Euro crisis, at best, they will have to become the safe haven of last resort in the Euro zone to prevent the collapse of the Euro as they are the only one with a AAA credit status and they are the richest. If indeed the Euro were to collapse then a new Deutschmark would become strong and greatly harm the German exports. Either way they are heading, along with the rest of Europe, for recession and at best slow growth.

It may well be that the best days of the EU are now past us as it has been ruined by incompetent and self seeking politicians who have created a monster bureaucracy out of what was originally a good idea. The Euro was created for political not economic reasons and was not thought through. It has been great for a few of the richer countries but has made the majority uncompetitive. The Eurozone will not continue in its present form and the strains of trying to solve it may threaten the very future of the EU itself.

I do not fall in to either of your categories. How can you say that I have a "Labour allegiance", and then in the next paragraph tell me I'm "one of those quite happy with their flip-flopping". I think my previous posts demonstrate against this and identify the point I was trying to make, which was easy to understand and picked up by others, is that you voted for the government. Neither party would act differently in the others shoes, contrary to what they say which is just to save face. I think the phrase is [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divide_and_rule"divide and conquer"[/url. Until people realise this - you being a prime example, we will be divided as a nation and nothing will ever change.

With regard the to Euro, Germany will prop it up until it is no longer profitable for them to do so. The Eurocrats and other people whose jobs were born out of the single currency will also prop it up until they can no longer pretend that it will work.

The main problem, and something that is slowly dawning on a lot of people, is that it doesn't matter which flavour of party is in power at any given time, world affairs are going to stuff us up anyway, nay, Euro affairs are always going to stuff us up anyway and if the Eurozone doesn't then something in America will.

The really sensible thing to do would be to reorganize democracy in this country and run it like a public business with all monetary policy being decided by the Bank of England who in effect would be the board of directors of GB PLC, given proper control over cashflow and budgets for both short and long terms they could actually do that job properly with a very long term goal rather than being hamstrung by politicians and their short term beliefs and experiments.

The board of directors of GB PLC would of course be liable to be re-elected to the board in the same way that every PLC director is, the politicians in the House of Commons would then have their budgets already set, any incoming new government would already know what the balance sheet of GB PLC looks like and so couldn't hide their "make it up as you go along" fiscal policies behind the smokescreen of "we didn't know how bad it was until we got into power" and they'd be left to simply allocate the already decided budget according to their political whims - they wouldn't have their hand on the tiller any more, they wouldn't even be working in the engine room, they'd be serving the cake at the Captains buffet supper.

Of course, we could still be stuffed by some fookwit buying duff mortgages in the USA or the Greek olive harvest failing but we might have someone actually watching the horizon this time.

Ditto.

Politicians serving cake to everyone would be a winner!

Well it was you who incorrectly said I had a Conservative allegiance and now incorrectly say that I voted for the Government. Like I previously told you I have no allegiance to any party. That I am more critical of Labour is because they were in power for 13 years during the decade long world boom and the recent economic crash and therefore it is fair that their deficiences are pointed out.

It does not need Sherlock Holmes to guess that you have Labour leanings as you have taken issue with my comments critical of the Labour flip flopping. Even now it is not clear what their economic policy is. To brush this off by saying ...well the other parties would have done the same is to ignore the fact that HM Opposition policies are in tatters and this is not good for democracy.



It is not true that both main parties would have acted the same. All three parties had different solutions and the Coalition so far is delivering the medicine it promised. Do you think Labour would have had the courage to try and reduce the state sector that it was responsible for bloating up? The Unions would simply not allow it.

The nation has always been politically divided and nothing wrong with that. I have lived long enough to witness many Govenments with real Opposition and many true conviction politicians on both sides. It is the apathy of people, perhaps like you, that have let in the current brigade of even more corrupt politicians. Fancy voting for Blair a 3rd time... I mean...!



Ehem.... So far Germany has shown no appetite for nor any action to prop up the Euro yet. They do not like the idea of a new Euro bond to replace all the tainted ones and they have blocked the plan for the ECB to be the lender of last resort. This is understandable if you are a German as they are the only country economically sound enough to guarantee such things. Hence the ongoing problem.

No you should not need Sherlock to tell you where his leanings lay,you only have to cotton on to "WEST LEEDS"to tell you that.I remember in the late 50s us little Sandford lads got the idea to go carol singing in posh Headingley,but it didnt last long got a much better reception in our our good natured working class area.

Is there any reason this thread isn't on the Sin Bin, or does the OP just want to bore Leeds fans?

I suspect it's on this board (or bored) because a certain person Juan likes to argue with doesn't frequent the Bin.

Thats why I included cake in my post - now it has credentials it can stay.

Its just filling in time till the season starts. You don't need to contribute particularly as your so bored (boring) with everthing!