People or War? 124

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We could have built 120,000 new homes, desperately needed. Instead we spent the money on a bloody big ship. To what purpose? An aircraft carrier is of no use to defend the British Isles – land based planes can do that much better. It is to enable our armed forces to operate elsewhere, far from here. In other words, it is not for defence, it is for attack. It was ordered in the Blairite era of enthusiastic invasion of other countries.

Look what that left us. The Middle East in turmoil, half the world hates us, a wrecked economy. Oh and a bloody great ship. Thanks for that.

Not only could 6.2 billion pounds have built 120,000 social housing units around the country, but doing that would have created 200,000 more jobs, and helped cool the housing bubble, as well as giving families nice places to live.

Next time a disabled person has their benefits cut, we can say “Aah, but look, we’ve got a really good boat!”

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124 thoughts on “People or War?”

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  • ------------·´`·.¸¸¸A.Node

    @Peacewisher 4 Jul, 2014 – 11:49 pm

    Thanks for bringing us an uplifting story : that the Algerian World Cup team has donated their £9m prize money to Palestine. Awareness and empathy are not commonly associated with today’s spoilt footballing celebs.

     “Their donation is an act of pan-Arab and pan-Islamic solidarity that carries the echo of Algeria’s more heroic period as a beacon of decolonisation and Third Worldism in the 1960s.

    But it is also a simple gesture of humanity, in a world where such gestures are conspicuously absent. And for that reason we should celebrate it too, and be glad that even in these dark times, a team of footballers has done something that is unselfish, splendid, and really quite noble.”

  • Mary

    The mad. mad. mad, men.

    ‘By their works, ye shall know them’ or similar.

    F-35 Burns on Runway During Testing
    by William Boardman / July 4th, 2014

    One $100 million Air Force plane leaks oil, another bursts into flame

    Troubles never seem to end for the F-35 Strike Fighter. Not yet fully operational, the nuclear-capable fighter-bomber recently had different test versions either leak oil in flight or burst into flames on takeoff.

    The F-35 is the world’s most expensive weapons system – $400 billion and counting. The estimated lifetime cost of this military-industrial project is $1.5 trillion. The F-35 is already close to a decade behind schedule and its cost is already more than twice the original estimate. The Pentagon has lowered its performance specs and it’s still years from being operational.

    According to Motley Fool, the estimated additional cost to operate and maintain the F-35 for 55 years is another $1.1 trillion. At more than $2 trillion, the F-35 is projected to cost more than half the entire Iraq War, so far.

    /..
    http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/07/f-35-burns-on-runway-during-testing/

  • Foolish grin

    Had not seen the HMS Astute post – beautiful. Black humour and satire especially really funny satire is always the best argument; especially funny is the bit about they learnt the sandbank strategy from Lawrence of Arabia.

    More humour please. When you make someone laugh you have got them and the message gets through.

  • Peacewisher

    @A node:

    It just shows that people are capable of doing wonderful things either alone or in groups. Of course, the bigger the group the greater the effect… and I think that might have been some of the thinking behind putting an end to the Stonehenge gatherings in the mid-1980s… Maggies other “enemy within”?

    Of course, the mainstream media don’t seem to have touched such a “good news story”. Help for Gaza is verboten, and charities raising money for the desperate in Gaza are terrorist sympathisers. It seems to be moving that way with the Donbass people as well, as far as the MM media are concerned.

    One important exception:
    http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/worldcup/algeria-to-donate-9m-world-cup-prize-money-to-people-of-gaza-because-they-need-it-more-than-us-9581338.html

    In spiritual terms, it is said that people can bring forth up to half of the original positivity of a wonderful act by focusing on it, so lets all keep thinking of those Algerian footballers on a regular basis… 🙂

  • craig Post author

    Hope it’s true – that report is full of caveats.

    I thought Brazil were terrible in last night’s match. They set out just to kick Colombia off the park. It was a deserved irony that Neymar got injured. The Germans will stuff them.

  • Huw

    No one has pointed out the almost-surrealism of calling a bloody big warship “Queen Elizabeth”. I know that the Navy has had battleships named after members of the Royal Family before, but it was an “imperial” family then and people still deferred to them and anyway none of them was a sweet little old lady. No need to arm HMS QE with aircraft we can’t afford anyway – just give her a bloody big handbag (and, for “mercy missions”, a packet of lozenges).

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    craig 5 Jul, 2014 – 10:28 am

    “I thought Brazil were terrible in last night’s match. They set out just to kick Colombia off the park. It was a deserved irony that Neymar got injured. The Germans will stuff them.”

    I agree about the game, and also about Germany stuffing them, but I hope we’re wrong. Germany play ‘better’ football, and definitely ought to win, but I’ve yawned through every one of their games. I don’t believe this is some sort of sub-conscious conditioning on my part about German efficiency and organisation – they just are boring to watch. Whereas Brazil are seat-of-the-pants viewing. The emotional burden they carry for all their compatriots doesn’t lead to clinical football, it leads to reckless mistakes and glorious triumphs and tears of pain and joy.

    I wouldn’t bet on Brazil, but I’ll be supporting them.

  • Mary

    Anne Diamond (late TVAM presenter/media hack/hacked by NotW when her son was buried/Leveson witness) was quite pleased about the existence of the new aircraft carrier when reviewing the papers on Sky this morning. She said that when the Ark Royal turned up at ‘a trouble spot’, we all felt safer and reassured. Her thinking did not extend to exploring reasons for the ‘trouble spots’ occurring in the first place.

  • Ba'al Zevul (Chimp Assassin )

    Absolutely OT –
    http://londonnews24.com/2014/07/google-street-view-removes-tony-blair-paul-mccartney-and-katherine-jenkins-homes-8/

    I don’t believe it. Why are slebs even considered to be special cases? They’ve spent their entire careers getting people to look at them, and suddenly their houses are sacrosanct? You know, the houses they bought to rub their wealth and famousness in the faces of passers-by? Get net curtains like poor people have to, you arrogant, paranoid gets.

  • Ba'al Zevul (Chimp Assassin )

    Did you link to the image, ANode? All I’m getting is a page full of cars. Not the (ho, ho) Knesset at all…

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    The link works for me, Ba’al.
    Hey it’s half time. Want to talk footie? Are you sure you don’t? Huh.
    OK, only a little.
    Argentina are up for it. Belgium ain’t.

  • Rose

    Oh Baal at 4.12 – you’re so rude. Keep it up.

    PS – gets? Is that the same as gits but a bit more avaricious like?

  • mark golding

    Leaked document by the RAND corporation may be blueprint for mass public disorder in the United Kingdom.

    The document provides three stages for the conduct of a military operation in eastern Ukraine.

    The first stage implies total isolation of the region considering that all local citizens are terrorists or sympathizers.

    The Region should be encircled with troops and sealed off entirely from any flow of goods and persons. Broadcasting services, Internet connection, telephone and mobile communications in the region shall be shut down.

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/president-poroshenko-uses-rand-corporation-action-plan-for-eastern-ukraine-including-ground-assaults-and-air-strikes/5389795

  • Peacewisher

    The sad thing, Mark, is that the plan seems to be working…

    Is Ukraine the new Isreal?
    (Isreal better watch out…)

  • Peacewisher

    I was joking when I started to write it, but people know I like to speculate outrageously, and one day I might be right (!) More criticism of Israel from EU countries than hitherto, but Ukraine still seem beyond reproach. Maybe Isreal was the original plan to beat USSR, but now they’ve come up with a better one???

  • Derick Tulloch

    Very impressed by the quality of troll you attract, Craig.

    Less impressed by having my taxes pay their wages. Not getting value for money, as it were!

  • Dave

    I think you’ll find that much more than half the world hates Britain. Not just for its warmongering, but for the way that also translates into the state’s treatment of its own people. It’s easily the worst and most unethical country to live in.

  • Ba'al Zevul (Chimp Assassin)

    Rose –
    Think ‘get/s’ is archaic Irish for offspring, but derogatory, usually of animals, and with the suspicion of bastardy. As in ‘bitch’s get’. Less friendly than ‘git’, which may be its London derivative.

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