Prepare for Fiscalnacht

Over at The Devil's Knife, DK has posted a very good series of posts recently about the scale of the problem, referring to others who are doing the same, and a solution that has long been available to us.

Many of us have been banging on about the need for 20-25% cuts in spending to balance the books, and this is Libertarian Party policy. The recent quibbling about the £6bln NI tax has taken the biscuit. The so-called "leadership debate" just showed me that they are not leaders. If they were true leaders, they would be able to deliver bad news and they failed us and the nation.

The big three have been fiddling while our money burns. And why? Probably because no government does well in an election promising austerity. Ah, yes, getting into power is more important than being straight with the population.

This, however, is not about austerity, it is about SURVIVAL.

To survive we need those 20-25% cuts on average. We need to eliminate £170bln of spending even to have a chance of treading water.

Our debt is reaching £900bln in comparison to £600bln (if we are LUCKY) in revenue and £750bln or so in spending.

Interest on those debts is or will be around 4.5% for sections of that debt.

Growth? 0.2% so far.

Can anyone else see the other problem here?

Our debt interest will be higher than the rate in which revenues will grow. Growth will fail to cover the costs of servicing our debt even if we achieve zero deficit.

So we need to more than balance the budget, we need to shrink the DEBT and to do that we need to cut spending well below revenues to both service the debt and reduce it. After we cut £170bln out of spending to end the deficit we need to cut still further to attack the debt.

It is wishful thinking to presume that growth will grow fast enough to enable even a balanced budget to keep pace with the debt servicing costs on £900bln for some considerable time. To trust to that kind of luck with the Eurozone ills, international situations and the potential for all manner of external factors is a gamble too far, or should I say yet another gamble too far, for Gordon has already gambled too far and lost - where we are now is the result.

Forget "the bankers". We were bust. Period. Regardless of the Banking crisis.

Unless Cameron comes clean before May 6th he cannot say he has the mandate to face down the vast vested interests that will line up to prevent their gilt edged rice bowls being taken away from them. People may say he betrayed them. He needs as many people behind him as possible, or at least not attacking him and siding with those in the public sector who will want to remain in never-never land.

And no, the excuse of "not being able to see the books" does not count. We know this already. he knows this already - or damn well should do. It is no surprise.

I doubt he will.

The Libertarian Party has always been clear about our need for drastic cuts in State spending from both a practical, philosophical and common sense perspective.

Living within our means.

We are about to find out that the Social Democratic, Welfarist, Statist experiment was not, is not, will not, cannot, could not and, dare I say it, should not be afforded.

Prepare for Fiscalnacht.

Norwich North: No such thing as a "bad" result for the LPUK

The LPUK's candidate, Thomas Burridge, gained 36 votes.

This was the LPUK"s first outing in a National election. To say we had a "bad" result is really not getting the point. Yes, retaining our deposit is a very good result, but the only truly "bad" result would be if the LPUK does not learn lessons from this campaign and this will only be known over time. I have confidence that the lessons will be leant.

I do hope Thomas sticks with it and in 5 years when the Tories are exposed as the mendacious, Authoritarian Centrist Statists that they have become under Cameron, Thomas will gain more votes.

Thomas had wisdom beyond his years before this election. It is safe to say that many more years of wisdom have been added to those shoulders since the by-election was called.

Last Chance for Liberty: Norwich North

Today, the good folk of Norwich North go to the polls in their by-election.

Standing is one Thomas Burridge for the Libertarian Party UK. He is young, but has a wise head on his shoulders, as can be heard here.

From nothing the LPUK is now standing in National Elections and is a great achievement for all those concerned.

I wish Thomas every success and hope that the result will make people sit up and take notice.

Pragmatically I hope we just retain our deposit. If we gain the same percentage as in our last outing (in Council elections) of just under 8% it will be a triumph for a party with almost no media exposure and prevented from participating in the hustings (due to the cuckoos, natch).

All the best.

Cameron in danger of opening the gates (and wedging them open).

Cameron's proposals will enlarge government, not shrink it, I suspect.

It is one thing being lorded over by 646* professional morons , but even worse is being lorded over by 64,600 amateur morons...on your doorstep.

I do suspect that Cameron will be an unwitting stooge (if he is benign) or an out and out traitor (if willing) in handing over more authority to the Regions. Wait for it, for his army of dim-bulb no-nothing "useful idiots" will be persuaded by some Federast to move power to the Regions and let them sort it out.

He will NOT, I repeat NOT be able to relocate ANY powers WHATSOEVER from the EU machine back to the UK UNLESS he leaves the EU. He will not, so any talk is pointless.

So, Cameron is going to move power from Westminster to the Regions (I suspect), who are EU lickspittles and beholden to the Brussels coin while not moving ANY powers back to Westminster.

It will be hollowed out.

Once the process begins, the call for each region to match the Scottish, NI and Welsh Regoinal Assemblies will become incessant - all funded, look you, with OUR money! OUR money used to fund the theft of OUR sovereignty and more of OUR money.

School For Scoundrels, in fact.

What should happen first and foremost is a mass repeal of needless and/or illiberal legislation. This would include the European Communities Act, so bringing back full sovereignty to the UK. Cameron does not promise this.

In parallel, the Regional Development Agencies - Regional Government In Waiting - must be dismantled. Nobody asked for them, nobody voted them in, but local politicians love them because they provide great "career" prospects, sinecures, comfy buggins-turn posts and more committees, biscuits, junkets and unaccountable power - a metaphorical ball-pit the size of Wembley Stadium for them to play in. They will not be able to throw their toys out of the pram because we would have taken all their toys and sent the pram back to the shop. Cameron does not promise this.

Any "devolving of power" should, in the first instance, be delivered to the Individual, NOT to local councils. Cameron does not promise this.

Remember we will be removing Education and much of healthcare from their remit. Their role is mostly parks, pavements and the lighting thereof. Libraries, that sort of caper. Oh, and something very very important - care of those who are not in a position to fully exercise informed consent - the Elderly and Mentally Ill. Kids, in general, have their guardians to do that for them, btw, and that will be restored too.

Cameron has not really promised power to the people, he has just made it more likely that more people - local politicians - will have more power and so people will experience this power and at closer quarters. I am in no doubt that the vast majority of people will not like it one bit.

For all his talk of reforming Parliament, until he gets us out of the EU, that is like talking about reforming a Steam Train factory during a nationwide electrification programme outside his control.

Put the kettle on, Dave, there is a good chap.

If you want to see the restoration of Sovereignty, the re-assertion of the Rule of Law with the reduction in coercion and the increase in consent that this brings, there is only one choice - The Libertarian Party, UK.

* give or take one or two genuine sharp tools.

Ron Paul unwittingly with the UK Libertarian Monetary Policy

Ron Paul talking about restoring the value of the currency (in his case the US Dollar). He suggests introducing a gold-backed currency in parallel, as otherwise the transition would be nigh on impossible. He also speaks about repealing the legal tender laws to enable this gold backed currency to fully compete. Private money would also factor, if I am not mistaken and this is basically the UK Libertarian Party position.

Hear Ron Paul speak below, just a few days ago - 30th Jan 2009.

More More: More Nonesense by Anatole

Anatole Kalensky at the Times calls for savers to be "punished" so they spend their money (on buying the Times, I suppose).

Has this guy lost his abacus beads or something?

Savers' cash is invested, Anatole. It is not stuffed into some great mattress in Threadneedle Street. Now, if people WANT to do that, that is fine, but they get no interest and would be charged for the service, and rghtly so. All this is part of Libertarian Party Monetary Policy, so is this actually what Anatole is asking for? True deposits charged for keeping money out of circulation?

Maybe he is, but given the fact that he does not seem to understand what happens to savings, it might be a case of "do us a favour...and stay off our side".

The last thing we need is for VAT to be cut and all the spare cash we have spent on imports, causing the £ to fall even further as importers sell those £ to buy other currencies.

Of course, up cranks the worlds most subsidised violin to the tune of adopt the Euro.

I want to keep Sterling so we still have a Treasury worthy of the name (or should I say so we can rebuild one...). If Brown wants my Sterling he must Μολὼν λάβε - come and take them.

To use a phrase of Chuck Heston - "FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS!"

The Mask slips still futher

At times the Government puts up a little effort to pretend to be our elected representatives.

I now hear that the UK Police will be asked/allowed/enabled/directed to enter your property, vis your computer hard drive without your permission, without notification, nor with a warrant. They will do so if the active agent is a "foreign" Police force, i.e. another EU force.

Therefore, "our"* Government is happy to see our Police be a proxy for an EU Member State force, bypassing our Courts and English Common Law.

The EU is not one for Rule of Law and the EU is the source of this outrage. I doubt the EU will see it as an outrage, for it probably makes it "easier" for them to perform their activities -NEVER a sufficient justification for reducing the rights of the individual.

This Labour Administration has shown it is now no more than an EU Gaulieter. The UK Police is clearly considered no more superior with regards to our liberties than any other EU force. We have seen how foreign courts can demand the UK Police jump and arrest someone, but again, I do believe that the UK Government no longer considers them "foreign", just as they do not appear to consider other EU forces as "foreign".

This is how it now appears - that the Labour Administration does not consider EU Member States as "foreign", nor the EU Parliament, nor the EU Commission, but views the UK as just a collection of Regions with no more or less sovereignty over us as any other EU Region.

Come on, you bunch of Fabian Fifth Columnist lickspittles. Admit it. Have the stones. Then we can begin your trial for Treason.

BTW, forget the Tory Administration, they are Centrists who are part of the problem. The LibDems are a nest of Fabians for sure. Any Libertarians therein have got to realise this now, especially after the horsetrading that is going on over some so-called "National Unity" Government. Anyone who thinks this will do anything other than swallow up and spit out the Lib Dems is naive. Not forgetting that UKIP has an historic membership of albatrosses who are united by one thing only - a hatred of all things EU, so the true Libertarians therein are also up the swanee.

Nope, the one party that stands for Rule of Law, yet sees the EU and a bloated State as a threat to it, is the Libertarian Party. The Libertarian Party is the one party that will not stand in the way** of you to live your own private life as Tory or as Socialist as you want to be, as long as you do not try and coerce others to be also, or make them pay for it against their will. Set up your voluntary workers collective or go it alone and set yourself moral standards...for yourself, we will not stop you. Try and impose your dogma on others and you have another thing coming, mind.

* "our" as in a cockroach found in one's kitchen could be considered "one's cockroach".

** note the term "not stand in the way", as opposed to the language of the others, which talks of "allowing". Allow - who do they think they are!

"Share the Proceeds of Growth"

Who does the growing? The Government? No. Employers and workers do the growing. The best way of enabling them to automatically get their rightful proceeds is to stop taxing them and not, as is suggested by the poisonous phrase, have a "beneficent" Government decide how much and when such proceeds are to be "shared" after they have taken their slice. It is collectivism, and being the Government with its enforcement, of the involuntary kind.

I doubt the Tories will listen hard enough. Regardless, an alternative in the wings.

"A Stronger Fairer Britain", Mr Brown?

I posted the following here over that The Telegraph at 10:35, 24th September. The T had the decency to post it up:

A stronger and fairer Britain? No, A safer, efficient and free Britain, please.

We need less government and more personal freedom. Personal freedom comes hand in hand with personal responsibility and accountability, the reverse of the infantilisation, "rights" and compensation culture of Socialists (e.g. Labour, Lib Dems, recently the Conservative Party and the daddy of them all, the EU). Disband State or State-sanctioned monopolies, strengthen Rule of Law and dramatically reform Welfare.

We need a Libertarian Party of Great Britain!

Ways forward

1) Health. Evolve NHS into a first rate insurance-based scheme provided by a plurality of companies as they have in Switzerland, Germany, France. People can swap providers, but providers are legally bound to accept policies.

2) Education. Remove the State monopoly on Education as presided over by the LEAs. Vouchers are one way forward. Any competent organisation should be able to set up a school where they wish. Result is likely to be a surplus of good or better places = parents' heaven, as happens in Sweden.

3) Disband the raft of QANGOs which execute government policy in private and without parliamentary scrutiny and cost us £160bln+ pa. Throw out Regionalisation, which is a stalking horse for the EU to disband England.

4) Flat tax plus significant personal allowance (e.g. £12k pa) so the poor do not pay income tax, nor are they forced to beg for tax credits. The rich cannot and need not bother with tax accountants. Each person is taxed fairly. No need for a vast administration.

5) Law and Order. Repeal vast amounts of useless, fascist and nannying legislation that has occurred in the last 30 years. No wonder our legal aid bill is astronomical! Build significantly more prisons and lock up persistent offenders for longer.

6) Reform Welfare. No benefit or housing increases if a person expands their family. The Welfare State can then help those who fall into poverty, as opposed to those who decide it is a lifestyle. Cut down the Welfare Hammock and replace it with a net. Evict disruptive families and cut off their benefits. Word will spread and most people will reform themselves.

7) Decriminalise the consumption of drugs. Distribute drugs for free from registered outlets for consumption on the premises. Result: Gang and drug barons have no money. No money source, no power, no motive for crime.

8) Asylum claims need to be made at port of entry. All others and those who are "discovered" should be rejected out of hand as illegal immigrants. Introduce points system to welcome skills and talent. Illegal immigrants and asylum seekers who cannot prove a solid case (e.g. they could just as well have moved city in their original country) repatriated. If they refuse to disclose country of origin, use language experts to determine country of origin and deport anyway - they refuse to cooperate, so it will be their responsibility of they are repatriated to the wrong country.

9) Do to all the above, it is necessary to step back from political union in the EU and become a member of the EFTA.

More power to the Libertarian Party!

UPDATE: Roger gets two (or is it 1 and 1/2?) nods in the comments.