I have met Damian Green a few times, mostly in his capacity [when the Tories were in opposition] as a director of his regional water company. I would be very surprised indeed if he wasted his time, or risked his reputation, using an office computer to spend 'many hours' watching soft porn. If his computer was used in that way, by one of the staff in Portcullis House or possibly by an intern, then it is no part of the role of the police to make accusations against Mr Green on national television. The fact that the credibility of the First Secretary is being challenged suggests that there are indeed dark forces at work, with the intention of bringing about the end to the agony of failure of this government.
The precarious state of our national politics is again emphasised by the letter to the Prime Minister [which has, of course, been released to the press] from Nigel Lawson, John Redwood, Jacob Rees-Mogg and others who seem to want the nation to be quite sure of their guilt if the economy hits the disaster to which their demands would drive it.
I find it difficult to concentrate on other issues - of which there are many - when the key elements of national sustenance and security are being knocked away. The people, whether the they voted to stay in or to leave the European Union, deserve a better politics than they are offered at present. The entire political class, including McDonnell and Corbyn no less than Mrs May and the Thatcherite dinosaurs who have just sent her a 'nudge' towards ruin, have forfeited the trust of the electorate; but we are left with no better choice, no alternative that could achieve any degree of visibility to the electorate before March, 2019.
If, in the coming days, there is real news about the economy or our society - or about Economics - I will not be able to restrain myself from blogging about it; otherwise, I shall go off-line for a period and try [yet again] to set out my current understanding in a longer piece of continuous text.
Showing posts with label Rees-Mogg. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rees-Mogg. Show all posts
Sunday, 3 December 2017
Wednesday, 1 November 2017
Bitcoin Marches On
Nobody really knows what 'Bitcoin' is, or what damage it can do to the global economy. Some people know [but do not tell] who invented this 'virtual' pseudo-currency; several dozen people and firms have made money from trading in it, and it is rumoured that some people and firms have played in the market and lost.
No government has responsibility for bitcoin; but several governments could find themselves dealing with a crisis which arose from reckless or careless trading in this medium to the extent that it impinged badly on their national economy. It would be unconscionable if any government required its taxpayers to assist any firms or persons who found themselves in a bitcoin crisis; and it would be politically disastrous if any government thereby plunged its citizens into a decade of reduced living standards as the British government did with the bale-out of the banks in 2008.
There have been plenty of warnings from well-known market players, to the effect that this totally unregulated free-enterprise market has no substance and can thus cause major disruption in any economy that allows assets designated in this nonexistent medium to take a prominent place in anybody's asset register.
Despite this, and despite asserting even a few days ago that they would never allow their platform to be used for bitcoin-denominated trades, the CME [formerly known as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange] has announced that bitcoin will be allowed in trades passing through their books. It is immaterial that this is experimental, and is envisaged only ever to be a small sideline in the market. The big point is that one of the world's largest and most important exchanges has legitimated this bastard child of greed.
Gordon Brown's memoirs are being marketed, for a big launch next week. He would not have wished it, but the commentariat will concentrate primarily on his failure to develop a mature prime ministerial personality [with the resultant tantrums and failures] and on his success - with Alistair Darling, the Chancellor of the day - in 'saving' the world banking system; at the long-term cost of the British people. In extracts that have been released already, Brown makes it clear that he deplores how completely his successors [the Tory-Lib coalition, the Cameron government and now the May regime] have totally failed to reform and rebuild the banking system so that it has the clarity of structure, the strength of reserves, and the separation of banking from wholesale gambling that were shown by the crisis to be absolutely necessary.
The Bank of England has warned that some 75,000 City jobs will migrate to Europe unless Britain gets a Brexit deal that keeps the country within the European Economic Area: but that is just the start of the catastrophe that could be played out if the bonkers Brexiteers ally with the 'free markets' lobby of wholesale gamblers in making the claim that any losses from legitimate banking and financial trading within the EU context can be replaced by growth in 'virtual' finance and betting.
Media muckrakers have found that Jacob Rees-Mogg was a notably unsuccessful fund manager in the period when Gordon Brown was at the apogee of his power, before the 2008 market failure. He is not a believable prophet of supposed good times that can follow from a 'hard Brexit'; nor is any other of the vociferous minority who are agitating for Britain to be plunged at the deep end of the shark-infested global market: if any of those buffoons comes out as an advocate of bitcoin, that will be proof positive of their intellectual limitations and perversity.
No government has responsibility for bitcoin; but several governments could find themselves dealing with a crisis which arose from reckless or careless trading in this medium to the extent that it impinged badly on their national economy. It would be unconscionable if any government required its taxpayers to assist any firms or persons who found themselves in a bitcoin crisis; and it would be politically disastrous if any government thereby plunged its citizens into a decade of reduced living standards as the British government did with the bale-out of the banks in 2008.
There have been plenty of warnings from well-known market players, to the effect that this totally unregulated free-enterprise market has no substance and can thus cause major disruption in any economy that allows assets designated in this nonexistent medium to take a prominent place in anybody's asset register.
Despite this, and despite asserting even a few days ago that they would never allow their platform to be used for bitcoin-denominated trades, the CME [formerly known as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange] has announced that bitcoin will be allowed in trades passing through their books. It is immaterial that this is experimental, and is envisaged only ever to be a small sideline in the market. The big point is that one of the world's largest and most important exchanges has legitimated this bastard child of greed.
Gordon Brown's memoirs are being marketed, for a big launch next week. He would not have wished it, but the commentariat will concentrate primarily on his failure to develop a mature prime ministerial personality [with the resultant tantrums and failures] and on his success - with Alistair Darling, the Chancellor of the day - in 'saving' the world banking system; at the long-term cost of the British people. In extracts that have been released already, Brown makes it clear that he deplores how completely his successors [the Tory-Lib coalition, the Cameron government and now the May regime] have totally failed to reform and rebuild the banking system so that it has the clarity of structure, the strength of reserves, and the separation of banking from wholesale gambling that were shown by the crisis to be absolutely necessary.
The Bank of England has warned that some 75,000 City jobs will migrate to Europe unless Britain gets a Brexit deal that keeps the country within the European Economic Area: but that is just the start of the catastrophe that could be played out if the bonkers Brexiteers ally with the 'free markets' lobby of wholesale gamblers in making the claim that any losses from legitimate banking and financial trading within the EU context can be replaced by growth in 'virtual' finance and betting.
Media muckrakers have found that Jacob Rees-Mogg was a notably unsuccessful fund manager in the period when Gordon Brown was at the apogee of his power, before the 2008 market failure. He is not a believable prophet of supposed good times that can follow from a 'hard Brexit'; nor is any other of the vociferous minority who are agitating for Britain to be plunged at the deep end of the shark-infested global market: if any of those buffoons comes out as an advocate of bitcoin, that will be proof positive of their intellectual limitations and perversity.
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