Man I feel sorry for Julia Gillard. How would I explain to the country that, even though it looks like I have caved in to special interest, I actually haven't, but even though I haven't, the special interest wielding the power has decided to back me anyway, based on an agreement that only looks like I have bought him off. Still, guts for trying... I would have gone straight to the "well, Tony would have cost us more on this one" argument.
Better still, a principled politician would have said something like "taking resources from people and channeling them to special interests, to buy myself a letterhead that says Prime Minister, is a game I'm not willing to play.
Even better would be a system that does not allow people to take money from people across the country and channel it to special, very local interests, to buy things that the original owners of the money had no reason or duty to pay for. Such activity is usually called theft. It has the same economic impact as theft. Yet in this case we call it politics!
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
First post - me unloading on the French
There was just a French lady on SBS news complaining about the French government raising the retirement age. She said that the government is hell bent on destroying what makes France special, what makes it a social country.
How is it that Europeans, particularly the Greeks and the French, don’t understand that someone has to pay for their ‘social policies’?
How is it that they don’t understand that the debt collector has finally come to collect, because they have been spending more than they can afford for far too long?
How is it that they don’t understand that they have already pushed their taxation to the limit where they simply cannot afford to push taxes higher?
The way all these protesters are behaving represents nothing more than extreme greed, selfishness and irresponsibility. The desire to make someone else give them something for nothing, and hang the consequences.
However, these things are never free, they always cost someone. But for the most part they are just taxing themselves to pay themselves. The catch is, whenever you do this you change people’s and business’s behaviour in a way that has effects like increasing unemployment, decreasing wages and decreasing investment, so, as a country, it actually costs you more than you get in return anyway.
For too long, France, Greece, and most other European countries have been pretending that the basic laws of economics don’t exist. But they do exist and are as inescapable as gravity; you can ignore economics, but economics won’t ignore you forever.
France can’t keep giving itself freebies, just like I can’t buy borrow money for an Aston Martin without ever saving a cent to pay for it. If I try, the debt collector will come, take my Aston, and take a whole lot more besides.
I have a simple message that applies to all of France just as well as it applies to their soccer team. GROW UP!
How is it that Europeans, particularly the Greeks and the French, don’t understand that someone has to pay for their ‘social policies’?
How is it that they don’t understand that the debt collector has finally come to collect, because they have been spending more than they can afford for far too long?
How is it that they don’t understand that they have already pushed their taxation to the limit where they simply cannot afford to push taxes higher?
The way all these protesters are behaving represents nothing more than extreme greed, selfishness and irresponsibility. The desire to make someone else give them something for nothing, and hang the consequences.
However, these things are never free, they always cost someone. But for the most part they are just taxing themselves to pay themselves. The catch is, whenever you do this you change people’s and business’s behaviour in a way that has effects like increasing unemployment, decreasing wages and decreasing investment, so, as a country, it actually costs you more than you get in return anyway.
For too long, France, Greece, and most other European countries have been pretending that the basic laws of economics don’t exist. But they do exist and are as inescapable as gravity; you can ignore economics, but economics won’t ignore you forever.
France can’t keep giving itself freebies, just like I can’t buy borrow money for an Aston Martin without ever saving a cent to pay for it. If I try, the debt collector will come, take my Aston, and take a whole lot more besides.
I have a simple message that applies to all of France just as well as it applies to their soccer team. GROW UP!
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