With this country’s massive needs in housing and renewable energy, it is typical that the only public spending announcement the Tories wish to make is on more potential for death and destruction at Faslane. The politics of the ludicrous claims on employment creation are risibly transparent. Don’t vote SNP! Don’t Vote Corbyn! This is not an industrial or a services economy, its the WMD economy.
I was frustrated during the referendum campaign by the mealy-mouthed response to the unionists constant carping on about job losses at Faslane. Chucking out Trident will cause job losses. Good. Doing evil should not be sustained as a job creation scheme.
It is like arguing to keep the Spanish Inquisition going because of the workers it employs. Woodcutters gather the material for the burning alive of heretics. Skilled workers lay the faggots and construct the bonfires. Blacksmiths forge fetters and implements of torture. Then the torturers themselves have good steady jobs, and what of the clerks who write down the confessions? Ending the Spanish Inquisition would cause economic disruption.
I think that pushes the parallel far enough, but it is a sad comment on our moral relativism that anyone is allowed to talk of employment at Faslane as a bonus without being roundly ridiculed and socially shamed. As usual Osborne’s numbers are a trick of mostly totaling existing plans over a lengthy period. But even if this was genuine investment, he should be told where to stuff it. Scotland must not be a WMD based economy.
Republicofscotland
You’ll remember that when you used to call Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second “old Droopy Chops” and so on, I used to reply by saying that you yourself, although much younger than Her Majesty, were probably no oil-painting yourself.
I am glad you have now confirmed my view:
“.. I’m no oil painting myself but IDS is indeed a ugly b*stard..”
(your post at 18h58)
🙂
RobG
” Edward Teller, the ‘father of the H-Bomb’, who was a truly evil bastard.”
_______________
Not an evil bastard, just someone from Central Europe with fewer illusions about the kind Soviets than Einstein and Oppenheimer.
Habbabkuk (La Vita E’ Bella)
31 Aug, 2015 – 7:12 pm
Habby, seconded, yet very difficult to implement!
We’re just going to let him rake in his millions, not that he’s short of the odd bob or two now. But, its interesting: its their next generation that will inherit al these greasy-gains and won’t have to do a jot of work if they don’t want to.
BBC1 have just transmitted a performance of the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo.
The Tattoo’s main sponsor is the Royal Bank of Scotland. LOL.
http://www.edintattoo.co.uk/beyond-the-ramparts/main-sponsor/
Any more bail outs in the offing? Where is Sir Fred Goodwin now?
‘Sir Fred, knighted by Tony Blair in 2004, spent £350 million of the bank’s money on a fittingly grandiose corporate headquarters on the outskirts of Edinburgh, complete with its own Tesco, Starbucks, swimming pool and 500-seat restaurant.
The bank also acquired a £17m private jet, based in Paris, to ferry Sir Fred and his colleagues around their new global empire, and hired the golfer Jack Nicklaus, a hero of golf fanatic Sir Fred, as a global “ambassador”.’
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/4291807/Banking-bailout-The-rise-and-fall-of-RBS.html
Is Gideon planning any further bonanzas for his City pals?
RBS sell-off: George Osborne defends £1bn loss
Hedge funds snap up 60% of first tranche of shares as critics brand UK government’s share sale as ‘short-changing the taxpayer’
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/aug/04/rbs-sell-off-george-osborne-defends-1bn-loss
Funny how the trolls come on duty at this time of day.
King:
“This would be the same Einstein who fled Europe when the Nazis seized power and went to live in the US. Meanwhile many men from that country— soldiers whom he disparages — travelled in the other direction and laid down their lives to rid the continent of the Nazis. Perhaps he should have been a bit more grateful for their sacrifice.”
King I am very much a post-War product and not at all a keen historian. I have a greater interest in real philosophy and some learning on how to live — right action etc.
So i can’t really comment on your suggestion which, at any rate, is very hypothetical while I prefer to discuss in the realm of the here and now reality. My take on Einstein who i have studied somewhat is that he was a pretty wise and practical man. I should’ve liked to have seen a dialogue between him and J Krishnamurti since they lived in similar enough times. I have gleaned that many of the contents of Einstein’s personal philosophy were also part of K’s rationale.
Kind regards,
😉
RoS Good info on IDS. I did know about the Betsy swindle and way back posted the documents from the inquiry on here. I also posted a Street View of his country residence which he acquired on marriage from her family. Nice pad.
The ingredients of this thread are ideal: anti-nuclear, anti-England, naval bases, ships, armaments……
surely our Transatlantic friend will not remain silent?
A worrying piece again on the SNP selection process in which Craig gets a small mention:
https://anindependentscotsman.wordpress.com/2015/08/
So, Mr Spencer-Davis, are you going to apologise to our host for requesting him, in all his personal and career difficulties to “Imagine being one of the people put out of work.”
You work very hard, almost too hard, to portray exemplary manners. So, I hope you are not, as a very pro-active member of this esteemed blog going to let us down?
Btw, I am surprised that you haven’t renewed your plea for my being banned–have you given up being a sneak? Btw, I was fortunate to go to boarding school and that was one trait that was absolutely unforgivable. But since you didn’t learn this in your childhood, I’ll forgive you, the wannabe whistleblower, now.
Now man-up to your faux pas, will you?
Fred,
Yes, I am aware of those events. People who had nominated me in that constituency also got a letter from the party threatening to expel them for splitting the party.
Doris
“Funny how the trolls come on duty at this time of day.”
________________
Can’t speak for other dissidents, but I have been on the beach for most of the day.
Super-calm water, slight north breeze, hot and oh, the women, the women!
So that’s why I haven’t posted earlier. I apologise, Doris.
Falloch,
Thanks from me also for you’re heartfelt post, we had a ceremony in Greenock for Hiroshima a few weeks ago, when we threw flowers into the Clyde.
Peace to you.
There is This –
” There was a serious dispute between the President and the Prime Minister about where the Polaris submarines should be sited – and also about who should control the weapons of mass destruction within them. The UK Government proposed a site at Loch Linnhe, near Fort William, because it was a reasonable distance from Glasgow. The Americans rejected this, claiming Mr Macmillan had earlier agreed on the site they wanted on the Clyde, perilously near Glasgow, Scotland’s most populous city, which was less than 20 miles away, as the crow flies. There was then a further dispute about who should actually control any launch of the deadly missiles from the submarines.
The Americans made it brutally clear they found the British positions on both issues unacceptable. Mr Eisenhower eventually told Mr Macmillan bluntly he had to think again. The Prime Minister duly did as he was told. The British Cabinet met, and it rolled over. Everything was given to the Americans as they wished. Westminster was utterly, and pitifully, in thrall to Washington.”
http://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/13156680.Macmillan_s_sell_out_a_vital_lesson_for_Scotland/
And Remember When the MoD said this –
” Responding to a Freedom of Information request from the Scottish CND, the MoD said: “Neither the Devonport naval base nor the dockyard safety case permit the berthing of an armed submarine.” At least 11,000 Plymouth citizens could be killed in a worst-accident scenario envisaged by the MoD, and that is deemed an unacceptable risk ”
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-314187442.html
TWO CITIES…In Size of Population
i did a wee Gathering of nearby Towns missing out many Villages in between, But we shall start with Glasgow 20 miles up the river
Glasgow (Pop, 596,000 )
Clydebank ( Pop, 41,000 )
Dumbarton ( Pop, 21,000 )
Port Glasgow ( pop 16,000)
Greenock ( Pop 44,000 )
Gourock ( Pop, 11.000 )
Helesburgh ( Pop, 14,000 )
Dunnon ( Pop,13,000 )
The Large Towns From Port Glasgow Down, are all in the Immediate vicinity of Falslane, and Coulport…being just a few Miles away…
Two Cities.
Mary
On you’re Map you can see the Coulport Complex..opposite Faslane, on the hill…Ta.
Fred
31 Aug, 2015 – 8:04 pm
” A worrying piece again on the SNP selection process in which Craig gets a small mention: ”
________
Thanks for that Fred. I read the letter in the link and the copious detail. Worrying to the point of sickening.
Craig, you better get out of there double-quick!
Habba, nuclear war is the very definition of ‘total war’. You don’t just fire a small number of missiles, because you know that a retaliatory strike is inevitable. If you’re going to launch nukes you can only do the full works, in the vague hope that you can completely knock out the enemy before that counter-strike comes (and it’s quite terrifying that the swivel-eyed loons in the USA are once again talking about nuclear war as being ‘winnable’).
So, if the Soviets had launched their missiles (I use the past tense because I don’t see modern-day Russia as any kind of threat) and wiped out most of the UK, would you really want UK leaders to launch a ‘revenge strike’ and kill upwards of a 100 million Russians?
Not that it would make much difference, because the USA would have incinerated most of the Russians, anyway, and humanity would have ceased to exist for all intents and purposes. It’s a moral question.
Would you be happy taking part in a mass murder unprecedented in human history? Would you be happy taking part in the extinction of the human race?
What about the rest of you lot here. Would you be happy with a revenge strike?
When aliens one day in the distant future uncover the smoking, radioactive ruins of planet Earth it might perhaps be nice for them to discover that the UK was one of the countries who refused to take part in collective suicide.
“Can’t speak for other dissidents, but I have been on the beach for most of the day.
Super-calm water, slight north breeze, hot and oh, the women, the women!
So that’s why I haven’t posted earlier.” Habbabkuk
************
Ah, so relaxing… I hear the strains of Barry Manilow wafting in upon the salty breeze. That hair style, those white suits…
************
I am not on the beach. I am in a permanent, howling Stooges song.
🙂
Brian. I had no idea. 16 reinforced bunkers.
It’s an enormous area as shown, especially on magnification.
https://goo.gl/maps/rla40
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RNAD_Coulport
‘Planning work at Coulport began in 1982, and the estimated final cost for the entire programme, at 1994 prices, was approximately £1.9 billion. This made it the second most expensive procurement project in the UK after the Channel Tunnel project.’
Dr Strangelove is indeed alive.
Perhaps the acronym MAD does not feature in a troll’s vocabulary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction
No sane or balanced human being could wish mass destruction of any other group of human beings. Those bent on such an intent, they are sick and psychotic individuals in need of of medical stabilisation.
Aliens hopefully will not be discovering this rock yet, we have no means of defending ourselves against any malicious entities that we have no knowledge of. Trouble with the myopic bastards posing as our dear leaders with their cohorts is; they don’t see much past their nose!
As it stands all life could be annihilated and cease to exist with a gamma ray burst (we do not know when or where these are happening) there is no need for us to plan and design weapons systems to do that. Alas the few mad bastards masquerading as the most clever boys in the room have no ideas about the world outside the two hundred miles bubble in the skies direction.
We are sitting docks on a little rock amidst the huge universe with all manner of resources, and we have set up resource scarcity as the basis of our economies, and all of the policies are to reinforce and maintain this claptrap. Resulting in a constant drum beat of over population, as though the whole of universe is inhabited by our species and we are not limited to inhabiting this little rock streaking at 68000 miles per hour in the direction unknown!
Gideon had a busy day all arranged by his handlers for maximum publicity.
‘The investors in the project, Maersk Oil and its co-venturers, JX Nippon and BP, are committing 50 percentage of the £multi-billion capital investment to the UK industry and supply chain and they anticipate that over the projected life of the field, a further £2 billion will be spent in the UK domestic market.
Speaking in Aberdeen, the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne said the Scottish government would have struggled to deliver such support alone – its own numbers showed that due to the current oil price an independent Scotland would have faced a £20 billion black hole in its public finances over the first three years.’
UK Approves Production At New Culzean Gas Field In North Sea
6hrs ago
http://www.lse.co.uk/AllNews.asp?code=p23b194e&headline=UK_Approves_Production_At_New_Culzean_Gas_Field_In_North_Sea
A piece in the Financial Times today on the SNP’s record in government.
In 18th century London, the public viewing of the impaled heads of traitors at Temple Bar was a city attraction. It was here that people made a brisk trade in renting out spy-glasses at halfpenny a look. They were also visible from a telescope set up in Leicester Fields. From the twelfth century the favoured site for a hanging was Tyburn- slightly to the north of what is now Marble Arch – the first being noted in 1196 and the last in 1783. “Execution Day” was a Monday.
Those about to be hanged were taken in an open cart from Newgate, generally attended by a huge enthusiastic crowd. “The English are a people that laughs at the delicacy of other nations,” one foreign traveller reported, “who make it such a mighty matter to be hanged. He that is to be takes great care to get himself shaved and handsomely dressed either in mourning or in the dress of a bridegroom….Sometimes the girls dress in white with great silk scarves and carry baskets full of flowers and oranges, scattering these favours all the way they go.”
So the ceremonial way to Tyburn was also the site of celebration. The procession made its way down Snow Hill and across Holborn Bridge and into Holborn itself, with those about to be hanged greeted with cheers; they were always surrounded by a group of officers on horseback who restrained the crowds. At the church of St Giles-in-the-Field the malefactors were ritually handed jugs of ale.
After the prisoners had quenched their thirst, the procession moved forward down Broad St Giles, into Oxford Street, and on to Tyburn itself. When the corpses were cut down and there was a general rush for them because they were seen as a cure for disease, women, in the presence of thousands of spectators, would insist on having the hands of the dead placed upon them. There was a disturbing paganism latent beneath the surface of this piece of dramatic theatre which was repeated throughout London, typically at crossroads which were regarded as a natural location for the gallows.
At Newgate, rooms in gin shops and coffee houses as well as roofs and windows in the vicinity, were hired out so that people could watch the proceedings in comfort and with good views. Crowds at street level would begin to assemble at four or five in the morning and the whole area was packed by seven. By the time of the ceremonies themselves, some of the spectators, pressed up against the barriers for several hours, had nearly fainted with exhaustion. Dealing in death was a great money earner in which thousands of jobs were created.
Over two centuries later, the current conservative government claimed that their investment in weapons of mass destruction at Faslane will create thousands of jobs and boost the UK economy. Perhaps these jobs will go to Britain’s disabled and sick, who the government decided are fit for work to the extent that thousands subsequently committed suicide within weeks of the decision being made.
It’s surely a sad indictment on our country that the U.N regard the situation to be so serious that they have launched an investigation into whether Iain Duncan Smith’s disability benefit changes have led to “grave or systemic violations” of disabled people’s human rights. Meanwhile, a vast swathe of the young unemployed are being effectively coerced into dead end jobs for poverty wages with no prospect of living independently in a home of their own until their parents die.
With public investment in renewable energy, infrastructure, housing and job creation widely seen as providing a much needed boost to a stagnant economy, as evidenced by the popularity of Jeremy Corbyn, the decision by Osborne to instead invest in weapons of mass destruction at Faslane, is beyond the wildest imaginings of even the most fervent of satirists.
http://cultureandpolitics.org/2015/08/31/lets-bring-back-public-hangings-to-boost-the-economy/
Craig, I was introduced to Left politics in the anti-war movement, so I sympathise with the strong anti-war position. However I agree with JSD and above that people working in armaments factories are not necessarily evil. Some people admittedly are sociopaths – perhaps people working high up in the arms industry – but we need to see that ordinary workers usually just want to put food on the table.
It would probably surprise some commentators here that the Morning Star (socialist/communist UK daily) reflects both views. I recall reading a strong opinion in the paper – from a union rep I think – about the dangers of the anti-war Left wanting ordinary unionised workers to be made unemployed.
I think that, in the short term at least, closing down arms factories of various kinds is not workable, given the state of the world, and that means someone has to work in them. I think we can unilaterally dismantle our nuclear weapons immediately, though. Ideally I’d like to see all UK-based arms development happen in only state-owned factories, on the basis that it is immoral to profit from war – but I don’t see this as possible in the short or medium term.
“Super-calm water, slight north breeze, hot and oh, the women, the women!”
Noddy, Noddy – apart from Miss Prim and Miss Rap – Blyton does not really do women. As a school it’s Public, as a business it’s Private. You know this! Keep juggling with the conkers in your pocket. You’ll do well boy, when you grow up! May even make PM. 🙂
By the way, I’ve been playing golf in the pouring rain of Birmingham. And that’s the truth!
Now serious.
—————————————————————-
As to the blog topic in general there has been much criticism that workers at Faslane could be out of work due to closing it down, which must be an objective of all but the trolls (who to my mind are almost all of them involved in some military occupation or other. It is much more complicated than that. People who work in defence, which I have done, are ordinary people – often, but not always – with families to feed, but the abolition of this industry would be a good thing.
Anybody critical of those who do work in defence should consider this. Some of the engineering jobs I have done, to very tight tolerances, have been for the defence industry – as it is known – and as it purports to be. When I got a job from British Aerospace in my mind I questioned what the purpose of the job might be because I was already moving towards pacifism – which is the teaching of my religion. I also questioned earlier work I had done, but everybody needs a source of income.
Believe me none of the workers at Faslane is any more guilty for trying to keep hold of his or her job as anyone else in engineering, because much of defence work is contracted out to other companies. I learnt much before I left the trade about things not being black and white. Today there is little industrial base in England since much has been sent abroad where cheap labour, and here Craig might think of the cotton-fields of Uzbekistan, has given us a better standard of living at the expense of exploited nationals.
When the dollar pops its clogs, and the world economies collapse and negotiate a proper financial system with a single currency (there is so much gain made from exchange) it will be a better place. Today I do not criticise the workers and understand that they have needs. The finaciers have needs too. These two needs are in conflict. The financiers needs relate to profit. Profit equals exploitation.
Psalm 14 sums it up for me:
Well, the rest of us are subject to changes in the economy, and restructures – not to mention off-shoring – so the people working at Faslane should be no different. I actually once had a gentle disagreement with a friend regarding the Royal Family. He argued that they created jobs, and this justified their existence. Firstly, I wasn’t convinced they really do create that many jobs, but it doesn’t matter – if job losses are the price, a temporary price of course, of a Republic, so be it. It’s a shame on the people who lose their jobs, but as I say, none of us are exempt from the capriciousness of capitalism. I fail to see why servicing something useless, costly and dangerous should be a protected job. Same goes with those who work at Faslane! I’m here all week.
I kinda tire of the stupid arguments put forth by these politicians. Speaking of which, I note that Osborne calls JC a national security threat. I was reminded of the referendum, where Craig pointed out that, as a designated national security threat, the SNP were fair game for the spooks. I rather think Osborne has just told the spooks, with Cameron’s implicit agreement, that JC is in play, go to it.
Apols: Psalm 15.
How interesting that the tories were not nearly so keen on preserving jobs when they wanted to close the mines and break the unions.
Bert.
Fedup, I’m not surprised that you’re fed-up.
Maybe others might answer my question: if the UK is attacked and wiped out by nuclear weapons, which would be in the scenario of an all-out nuclear war, would a UK revenge attack be morally acceptable?
Fedup, your ‘gamma ray’ link doesn’t work for me. The ‘gamma ray’ is perhaps reminiscent of the ‘neutron bomb’ back in the 1980s. This device (which was real and is still in the arsenals of the nuclear powers) was the cuddly version of nuclear weapons. Instead of blast and heat it instead put out a massive wave of radiation, killing all life yet leaving buildings, etc, undamaged, but of course totally irradiated.
I only wish I were making this stuff up, and I could detail much more when it comes to the Strangeloves.
But don’t worry, suicide is painless (written by a fourteen-year-old!)…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlZdFmEdffg
Einstein, although he was a Zionist to the extent of supporting a Jewish Homeland in Palestine and of being one of the founders of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem (to which he donated his papers), was also moral enough to oppose the establishment of a separate Jewish state and to protest against the atrocity of Deir Yassin. He was indeed a moral man. (I was once in his house in Princeton for a memorial service for his secretary.)
Teller, on the other hand, shared in the paranoia that was so widespread in America during the Cold War.
Fedup
Same here Re that Link..Fails.. Just say Though a GRB 200 LY away is So bad news…a super nova at that distance is Bad news.. It’s 2,000 LY for GRB’s.. Not sure if you are Familiar with the Fermi Pardox, But GRB’s Are certainly one of the Possible solution’s …. As is also NOT gaining Wisdom in step with Technology, Particle Physics, Nukes n such.