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The Forum > Article Comments > The Conservatives and collaborating Lib Dems can't be allowed to gut Great Britain > Comments

The Conservatives and collaborating Lib Dems can't be allowed to gut Great Britain : Comments

By John Pilger, published 5/11/2010

Arise John Bull, read Shelley and join the Greeks and French in the streets.

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Pilger said "What is happening in Britain is the seizure of an opportunity to destroy the tenuous humanity of the modern state. It is a coup, a "shock doctrine" as applied to Pinochet's Chile and Yeltsin's Russia".

This guy is truly a joke. Sure the world is in some mess, but to imply that the present govt is uncaring nor interested in preserving the national and international interest is a disgrace.

These jokers would have us spend and spend until our nations are broke.

Rather than bagging the system, why doesn't Pilger and the other simpletons merely push their agenda for change by discussing why it is needed rather than bagging everyone now responsible in govt.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Friday, 5 November 2010 6:54:52 AM
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What a gem.

It reads almost exactly like one of those faux-Trotskyite polemics from the sixties, complete with all the old to-the-barricades words like "venal" "bourgeois" "the masses" "collaboration", "totalitarian" etc.

I'm only surprised that he couldn't find room for "irredentist", one of my favourites from those halcyon days.
Posted by Pericles, Friday, 5 November 2010 7:54:08 AM
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As an ocassional visitor, I wonder what Mr Pilger actually thinks of planet earth?
Posted by peter piper, Friday, 5 November 2010 8:17:04 AM
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Fantastic article, thanks John.
Posted by Ozymandias, Friday, 5 November 2010 8:35:32 AM
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I refer to Pilger's plea to the masses.

Did it ever occur to Pilger that a significant proportion of the masses actually voted for such change.

That is the thing with our leftwing do-gooders. They always blame those in power and plead to the good people who should supposedly be in full agreement with John Pilger's view of truth and justice.

Well many are not in agreement. Many do not want debt to rise and rise.

Get over it, and try to convince the public of any sound reason for change rather than rave on to the already converted.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Friday, 5 November 2010 8:50:08 AM
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I'm with Pericles although I remember this sort of tosh being rolled out at my Uni Campus back in the 80s. Obviously it never gets old (for some).
Posted by bitey, Friday, 5 November 2010 9:12:44 AM
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As he usually does, John Pilger is a bit over the top. Nevertheless there are two problems with the UK deficit reduction programme. The first relates to the conflict between economists over whether to spend and stimulate – or cut and reduce deficit: certainly increasing unemployment substantially, as they are going to do, must reduce the tax take considerably. The other comment that I would make is that I believe that we are, as a society, a commonality and it follows that the financial problems are problems for all of us. Therefore reductions in real income should be progressive not regressive: the pain should be distributed so that the hurt is felt across us all, with those with most giving most. This is where the British response is somewhat disturbingg to we observers.
Posted by Gorufus, Friday, 5 November 2010 4:16:14 PM
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Gorufus,

I agree with you. Western societies need to make reforms. Key s how they do so in a fair way to balance competitiveness and compassion.
Posted by Chris Lewis, Friday, 5 November 2010 4:37:26 PM
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John Pilger is right but communism is not the answer.The fractional reserve system of banking must end. http://secretofoz.com/
Posted by Arjay, Friday, 5 November 2010 8:45:49 PM
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Welllll it took a while for Pilger to show is 'revolutionary' true colors but time tends to bring out these things.

Young Idealistic Unionists....
"Addressing the masses from platforms".....

Older Realistic Unionists....

"They are then shown older, florid, self-satisfied and finally adorned in the ermine of the House of Lords."

So...Pilgers answer ?

INCITEMENT TO VIOLENCE and SEDITION!

The BA workers, the fire-fighters, the council workers, the post office workers, the NHS workers, the London Underground staff, the teachers, the lecturers, the students can more than match the French if they are resolute and imaginative, forging, with the wider social justice movement, potentially the greatest popular resistance ever. Look at the web; and listen to the public's support at fire stations. There is no other way now. Direct action. Civil disobedience.

Notice good reader that ALL of those mentioned above are 'STATE' employees.

SO....now you know it....people of Australia... you know where the communist revolution will come from. Which segment of society will be the 'disrupters/agitators'...the foot soldiers will be the construction Unionists.
Posted by ALGOREisRICH, Saturday, 6 November 2010 5:31:45 PM
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Dear Gorufus

You raise the question of 'Spend and Stimulate' or 'cut spending'

The problem of 'spend/stimulate' is that you are using money you don't have on the 'off chance' that somehow it will create more money.

Sorry..Private enteprise creates wealth and new money..from export and trade.
Governments do not create jobs.

"Spend" to stimulate just increases your interest payments on loans of money you don't have and can't afford.
Posted by ALGOREisRICH, Saturday, 6 November 2010 5:35:44 PM
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John Pilger

We need a New Dictionary.

Conservatives, Liberals, Socialists, Communists, Anarchists and Percy Shelley make no more sense.

The Power Pyramid that represents the way in which we relates to each other is ‘the Structure’ and the names who occupy the positions in this structure (Brown, Blair, Thatcher, Cameron, Osborne, Clegg, Murdoch, Woodley, Howard, Robb, Pinochet, Yeltsin, Sarkozy etc) are irrelevant in the sense that it is one but could be any other and not them and whoever he/she is, his/her actions are determined by the positions occupied within the structure.

Let’s than forget the position-occupants and direct our attention to a possible way of undermining the Castle (Franz Kafka) which looks solid but it is really only a form of construct whose columns are made by prejudices.

As such prejudices have marred man since he appeared on Earth, the history of Man’s vicissitudes does not teach us anything and, in accordance with Kurt Gödel’s incompleteness principle, we have to wait for someone from outer space to tell us where we go wrong.

In the mean time we can pulp all books and Encyclopedias while waiting for a New Dictionary.
Posted by skeptic, Saturday, 6 November 2010 7:51:15 PM
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They really only have two choices in the UK, after years of Labor’s make believe public sector “job” creation.

They can either gut the public sector, & save the country, or continue as they are, save the public servants, & kill the country.

I think the typical union system of last on etc should suit.

They should do what we need to do in Oz. Sack every bureaucrat hired in the last 10 years, then rehire any that are noticed to be missing. I’m sure no one would notice if 60% never turned up again.
Posted by Hasbeen, Saturday, 6 November 2010 8:01:42 PM
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Hasbeen,it is not just the bloated public service.It is the banking system that is robbing us blind.They own our additional GDP and counterfeit our money via infaltion.They own us by virtue of creating $91 billion of new money from nothing pa.This money should be created as a tax credit by our Govts and not as debt. http://secretofoz.com/
Posted by Arjay, Sunday, 7 November 2010 6:49:58 PM
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Pilger knows the reality unlike some secure,ignorant people whose major concern is the parasitic finance community which produces nothing of tangible worth and feeds of the creativity and sweat of the real economy.

The revolution has begun and the parasitic banking industry needs serious reform.
Posted by Arjay, Sunday, 7 November 2010 7:00:39 PM
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Some more Pilger reverse spin, it was the left who have gutted the lot in the west via stupid causes and unviable regulation, read waste, price inflation and global warming, not the banks, and pill, now has the hide to blame those who want to revive to survive. It wasn't the left who brought communism out from the cold it was the competitive private sector and responsible governments made only rich by the right who know what hard work and value really means, which represent the free world. What a hypocrite Johnny is, spinning sour milk. I bet he doesn’t drink his own. It’s a crying shame that those who do supply goods and service outside government, you know the wealth producers, whose who supply the tradeable goods, and the left only want to redistribute what they could not even consider getting their hands dirty, with work outside the spin and public funding, via taxes. Take this pill, and shove it.
Posted by Dallas, Sunday, 7 November 2010 11:30:55 PM
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Pilger's call to arms is directed at "The BA workers, the fire-fighters, the council workers, the post office workers, the NHS workers, the London Underground staff, the teachers, the lecturers, the students". All public servants and/or unionists; probably few of them understand what it's live in the real world of an open market economy. I think Pilger's understanding of the world is about 30 years old - pre-Thatcher and Regan. About time he matured.
Posted by Bernie Masters, Monday, 8 November 2010 10:21:07 AM
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