Overthrowing capitalism for beginners: reply to Janet Daley
EXCITEMENT mounts in my City fringes-based workplace over tomorrow’s anti-G20 demonstrations, with police claims that crusty hoards have commandeered the pub over the road as an operational headquarters. Our HR department this morning emailed all staff, positively instructing us to ditch the normal dress code – suit and tie if you’ve got an external meeting, [...]
Expense account porno flicks: just not on
LIKE many men whose work sometimes necessitates stays in anonymous chain hotels in strange towns around the world with little or no discernible rainy weekday nightlife, sheer ennui has on occasion led me to drain the minibar prior to sampling the indeterminate erotic delights of pay-per-view adult television. Indeed, one particular film – featuring a [...]
Evan Harris should demand a British republic
AT THE apex of the highly developed and still largely unassailable British class system – the social networks that centre on the landed aristocracy, the county set, the upper layers of the Church of England, the Bar, and the City, and officers serving in ‘good regiments’ – stands the royal family. That must make Evan [...]
Trots in the Labour Party: reply to Luke Akehurst
I USED to practice deep entry, and let me tell you, it was nowhere near as much fun as it might sound. For the uninitiated, the phrase refers to the strategy of sections of the Trotskyist left, who have been active inside the Labour Party continuously since the 1930s. The idea, of course, was that [...]
Bricking Fred the Shred’s windows: not the right answer
ON £700,000 a year and without the encumbrance of a job to attend to, I suppose Sir Fred Goodwin will easily be able to sort out the smashed windows at his home and the collateral damage to his Merc, inflicted this morning by a group calling itself Bank Bosses are Criminals. This is what is [...]
David Cameron on City regulation: the Tories will never take on capital
BACK in 1952, Charles Erwin Wilson – president of what was then the largest motor manufacturer in the US, and widely known by the nickname Engine Charlie – famously quipped that ‘what’s good for General Motors is good for the country’. Substitute ‘the City’ for GM, and you have the watchword which has dictated British [...]
Jade Goody: the lessons for social policy
SO HOW would the government explain and justify quantitative easing to somebody certain that she had heard of Rio de Janeiro, but not quite sure exactly who the man was? And how could a woman under the impression that East Angular is a foreign country possibly develop an informed opinion on the merits of British [...]
Protestantism and Trotskyism: results and prospects
TROTSKYISM was not the first ideological trend to turn hair-splitting sectarianism into an art form; Protestantism got there the best part of 400 years ago. There may be little tangible dispute between Episcopalians, Presbyterians and Congregationalists over what they actually believe about God, but differences on church governance are another matter entirely, as students of [...]
Japan’s stagnant economy: the limits of Keynesianism
BEN Bernanke believes that the economic crisis will be over in just a few months, a claim that if nothing else displays remarkable confidence on the part a man who is a leading academic expert on the slump of the 1930s. But then again, ‘managing expectations’ – to slip into central banker-speak – is part [...]
Booze prices: Sir Liam Donaldson’s flawed logic
I GET a regular full health screening at a Harley Street clinic – there’s a bit of a confession for a leftie – which annually sees me subjected to every type of health check known to medical science. Perk of the job. Most of the results last year were fair enough for a man whose [...]
