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181 [lbo-talk] Britain's failed experiment -- rank: 1000

No, after inflation it is still an increase, though only just. Of course you are right to say that investors anticipate some substantial cuts and that has a consequence on their future investment decisions, but investors expectations are more based on the poor state of the private economy in Britain (and Europe), with the government only reflecting that. On the whole, it strikes me as a Keynesian bugbear that government expenditure is the driving force, and investment levels reflecting that, rat ...

Document Size:	5902
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Dec 9 06:21:23 PST 2011

182 [lbo-talk] Britainīs failed experiment? -- rank: 1000

Since UK government expenditure *increased* in the 2010/2011 year (from sterling 669 to 691 billion), a decrease in government expenditure is not a very good explanation for the poor performance of the UK economy.

Document Size:	4830
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Dec 9 05:55:18 PST 2011

183 [lbo-talk] Britain's failed experiment? -- rank: 1000

Public spending as a share of GDP under M Thatcher was cut back from 44.5 per cent of GDP in 1980 to 34.25 per cent in 1989. Between 2000 and 2011 it grew from 34.6 to 44.7. The Tory-Lib-Dem alliance has threatened widespread cuts, but there is a difference between what government s say and what they do. http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/downchart_ukgs.php?chart=F0-total&year=1900_2011&units=p&state=UK#copypaste It s a mistake, by the way, to equate government spending with socialism ...

Document Size:	5428
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Dec 9 04:55:53 PST 2011

184 [lbo-talk] Britainīs failed experiment? -- rank: 1000

The Spectator says that the NYT s account of UK austerity (cited here last week) is not true, that Britain s spending cuts are lower than America s and that the country has a lot of debt. http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/7453963/the-new-york-times-austerity-myth.thtml It is a right-wing perspective, but I think it is probably true on the detail. There are cuts and local authorities are in a lot of difficulty, but as yet this is no Thatcherite assault on the public sector.

Document Size:	5228
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Dec 9 00:52:59 PST 2011

185 [lbo-talk] Speaking of University Bashing... -- rank: 1000

> she used to be an english professor and > thinks english courses are only about fiction? It did look like a course by someone who was fed up with teaching English, and probably should be teaching on a political science degree. Still, what business is it of Beng s how the college organise their curriculum?

Document Size:	4893
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Dec 9 00:35:51 PST 2011

186 [lbo-talk] Posh as Fuck -- rank: 1000

"The right hates academia because it's their political enemy" Really? Nothing makes me more certain of the victory of our ideas than our success in the universities Adolf Hitler, in Victor Farias, Heidegger and Nazism, p 79 Teachers tend to be just a little to the right of society, and so do intellectuals. I analysed the voting intentions of British teachers, going back over polls reported over the last thirty years of elections, a while ago. In 1974 more teachers voted for the Conse ...

Document Size:	6078
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Dec 6 12:42:52 PST 2011

187 [lbo-talk] posh as fuck -- rank: 1000

Like most institutions and workplaces under capitalism, universities combine a reactionary and a progressive potential. On the reactionary side, they are engines of social inequality. They don t create social inequality, but boy do they entrench it. Schools too. Looked at in those terms, it is right to speak of credentialling , the distribution of a restricted supply of certificates that give you access to social success, based on ability to pay. On the progressive side, the understanding that ...

Document Size:	6807
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Dec 5 15:02:10 PST 2011

188 [lbo-talk] France and Germany call for tougher treaty -- rank: 1000

As predicted by me back in May: Why the EU will thrive on Greece s troubles Merkel says the Union is in trouble, but this is pure fearmongering designed to make people toe the line http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8915/

Document Size:	5006
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Dec 5 09:13:51 PST 2011

189 [lbo-talk] Public sector strikes in Britain -- rank: 1000

Me, on Britain s public sector strikes: http://www.newgeography.com/content/002554-its-not-1980s-britain-anymore

Document Size:	4805
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Dec 5 02:45:19 PST 2011

190 [lbo-talk] Posh as Fuck -- rank: 1000

Doug writes: So better now to make it really expensive? Do you think so? It wasn t what sprung to my mind.

Document Size:	4597
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Mon Dec 5 00:28:20 PST 2011

191 [lbo-talk] Posh as Fuck -- rank: 1000

Joanna writes Teachers could form co-ops and charge very reasonable fees for instruction. Students would opt for the lower cost and avoid the high fees of the universities My free market solution to the excessive cost of university fees was that universities should be obliged to examine any candidate, at cost price, and award them a degree accordingly, so that anyone who wanted to teach students to a college s curriculum could enter those students for examination, on an equal footing to those w ...

Document Size:	5232
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 4 11:51:47 PST 2011

192 [lbo-talk] posh as fuck -- rank: 1000

The British university system was indeed generously supported for home students in the period up to the mid-1980s. Fees and a maintenance award were paid (I was a lucky recipient of this system). However, it was in no sense socialistic, or even egalitarian. Rather, the allocation of places in Higher education were limited so that the subsidies were mostly paid to those who did well at school (and who could afford to live without bringing a full wage in for three years). About one per cent of tho ...

Document Size:	7266
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 4 10:50:43 PST 2011

193 [lbo-talk] Egypt Islamists widen poll lead -- rank: 1000

Doesn t the question of why the secular left is or is not organising in Egypt come down to the relationship between the protestors and the wider Egyptian public. The military s partial concession over elections put the protestors under pressure, because though theirs is a large and vocal movement, it falls a long way short of a majority. The military for many years kept the Muslim Brotherhood at arm s length, but the elections are a concession that the Brotherhood is best placed to win, since th ...

Document Size:	5818
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 4 05:42:43 PST 2011

194 [lbo-talk] Climate Justice Requires a New Paradigmby Vandana Shiva -- rank: 1000

The Independent today editorialises that tackling climate change is off the political agenda Despite apocalyptic warnings about temperatures reaching record levels and carbon emissions rising faster than ever, the delegates at the vast UN climate conference in South Africa this weekend could not be further from reaching a deal or further from the thoughts of a global population gripped by economic fears. ...Environmentalists fear there is now a lack of political momentum behind the green agend ...

Document Size:	5429
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Dec 4 05:27:42 PST 2011

195 [lbo-talk] London riots anew -- rank: 1000

It is easy to tell when Richard Seymour is feeling defensive, just look at his prose, littered with 'attendant phenomena , facile narrative , apodictic insights . This, is in writing, what raising your voice, lifting up your chin and sticking your chest out are in gesture. When I point out that the Socialist Workers' Party line is that the riots are the stirring revolution, See-less complains that there is no such line. But there is. It is here, on record, in the 13 August edition of Socialis ...

Document Size:	6306
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Aug 16 00:10:48 PDT 2011