GEORGE LEE: WHAT A MUPPET
May 22nd, 2009 by Conor McCabe
Geoge Lee has absolutely no economic ideas to offer this country. Absolutely none.
The man has a list of bloomers to his name, but my favourite at the moment is his statement that we need to get the social partners talking together.
What, something like social partnership, George?
Something that was first introduced to this country in 1987? And is itself a variation of the national pay agreements of the 1970s?
Or how about his call to give dole payments to long-term unemployed while working?
Something like the recently-scrapped Back to Work allowance, maybe? Or the still in place schemes like the Very-Long Term Unemployed Programme? Or the Revenue Job Assist? Or the part-time Job Incentive Scheme?
George also wants to cut stamp duty in order to stimulate house sales, something Fine Gael ran with in 2006, before the last general election.
These ideas have been around for so long now that Sarah Carey could probably pick them up in the bargain bin in TESCOS with her €16.50 voucher.
Original and dynamic they ain’t. and you would think what with George being an investigative reporter and all, that he would have at least known that these policies are as retro as Enda Kenny’s Y-fronts.
I dunno. You reckon George has Now That’s What I Call Music 1987 on his Sony Walkman, and with each new track he goes “Wow! What an original song! I must tell the world about this right now.”
This is for you, George.
Enjoy.
Soooo, are you saying you are pro-FF? I’m not judging, just curious.
Soooo, are you telling me that you believe there’s a difference between Fianna Fail and fine Gael? That’s there’s any choice between right-wing FF and right-wing FG? It’s just that if you’re suggesting anti-fine gael means pro-fianna fail, it would suggest that you believe that there’s some kind of “choice” between fianna fail and fine gael.
I’m not judging, by the way. just curious.
Nice
Nope, totally agree with you there, but fancied a stir.
No, I’d like to see political parties that have arisen from a paradigm other than “lets fuck each other over seeing as we just stopped getting fucked over by another country”.
I’m also unsure about the shelf life of the whole left/right model. There are many ways to slice things, that’s just one.
That’s true, there’s Tony Blair’s “third Way”, or Bill Clinton’s “Third Way”, or George Lee’s recent statement that there is no left or right, just “common sense”…. that’s another way I suppose.
errrrrrrr, no, not them. That’d be just spin. Sure Tony blair only believes in right anyway, right?
Ok. so, a way of addressing the severe economic imbalances which grow out of the extraction of surplus value in modern capitalist economies that won’t involve tackling the economic power base of the right which is dependent on the extraction of surplus value in those modern capitalist economies through the rotation of finance, nor one that involves tackling the inherent contradictions of that right-wing economic system - namely constant expansion while at the same time limiting the purchasing power of those who need to consume in oder to keep the machine moving - while in terms of the left a new way of tackling same that doesn’t involve trade union organisation coupled with a political movement which will act as a bulwark against the right with regard to the kidnapping of the full resources of the state by the right in order to protect private capital against its own contradictions.
That’s one of the funny things about right-wing political parties in modern capitalist economies. Their job is to gain political power in order to protect business against itself, against the damage caused by the inherent contradictions of capitalist dynamics. At the moment that’s exactly what it is doing.
so yeah, go for a third way, but unless you’re looking at the exploitations and contradictions which arise at the point of production (typically, a left-wing stance), or at the problems raised when we assume that exploitations and contradictions arise at the point of consumption (typically, a right-wing stance), then whatever you come up with is completely ignoring the structural problems of modern capitalist economies.
Left and right aren’t models, they’re stances within the system itself. They are as structural as M-C-M.
I’m not suggesting the ‘third way’. I’m not proposing any concrete solution. I am suggesting that the semantics of the current dichotomy are possibly now limiting the systems capability to move beyond a tug of war and consider other solutions. Third way is just spin to sell the same old concepts to people otherwise ideologically incapable of accepting them. Now, I seem to have got up your nose more than I meant to so I shall leave it at that.
Sorry trift. I didn’t mean to piss you off. I know you were only ribbing me.
GEORGE LEE from Dave Donnellan on Vimeo.
Conor, I love “Whitesnake”; thanks.