News and Opinion in Black and White

Talk about stupidity, taking someonee livelyhood away for the rest of their life because they cheated. Idiots. Lets give an example of what its like. A burglar, completely socialy unacetpable, it goes against everything we believe in about a fair society. But we dont lock burglars up forever but the BOA wants to ban Dwain from competing in the Olympics. What sort of example does that set about a free and forgiving society. It makes me wonder how this sort of person gets into postions of such resonisibilty when they dont really to subscribe to the beliefs of the country’s people they claim to respresent. Looks like another case of the old boy network, what else can it be?

I suppose the biggest companies in the World will have the best PR departments as well. What a cunning spin they put on it, perhaps the ultimate argument. Well it would be the ultimate argument if it were true.

Their argument is that putting aside crops to grow fuel instead of fuel hurts the World’s most vunerable people because food prices increase and they cant afford to feed themsleves. The biggest load of nonsense Ive heard in my life and I cant believe that even so called environmental groups have fallen for it.

Im going to deal with the faults with this argument one by one.

First of all the only reason that it pays to grow fuel crops instead of food crops is because oil is so expensive. Now fuel is the most crucial part of developing economies so if you want to keep or push a country back into poverty high oil prices is the thing that is going to do it. Poor countries spend by far a greater percentage of their wealth on fuel. For example there are case of poeple in Vietnam who are being forced to revert to farming with animals because the price of the fuel is too high to run their tractors. Talk about a backward step, talk about a reduction in productivity. Now Im not saying that this is the fault of the oil companies but lets support these countries in growing their own fuel instead of saying bio fuels is bad which is what is being said at the moment, its not going to happen overnight but lets give them time to develop their systems. Think about it with machines one man can work 1 acre a day for example by hand, but with a tractor he can work 100 acres, now I here you say what going to happen to the people who used to work the land, 1 man is doing the work of a hundred. They will do what every other country does and they move to the cities. Now tell me something else, which food do you think is going to be cheaper, the food produced by a 100 people of the food produced by 1 person with a tractor. Its not rocket science. Fuel prices are the primary problem not food prices

Now people are also saying people cant afford to eat. Who cant afford to eat? It must be the people in the cities because farmers are self sufficient. Why havent the people in the cities got the cash to buy food? because their economy doesnt produce enough cash. If high oil prices and growing bio fuels isnt a ticket to a giving a country a BOOMING export industry, I dont know what is.

Bio fuels are going to increase the price of food. This is only true if we dont develop new farmland. Now as Ive mentioned before, there are millions of acres of uncultivated land in Africa. So all we have to do is to expand argricultural land. But then the argument is what about the carbon emissions from transporting all this food thousands of miles. Simple, the fuel used will be from bio fuels.

Food is like any other comoditity, oil, corn, gold whatever. As demand and prices go up, its becomes profitable to develop new agricultural land, just like it is to develop oil fields in hard to reach places. America looks like its going to pass laws to develop off shore oil drilling around the coast of America. They could do that or they could grow the fuel. The fact of the matter with the USA is that they have a finitie amount of land and its all used for something. They really are in a bit of a pickle becuase you know the farmers want to make as much money as possible and not just America but all developed countries. Germany, UK, France, USA, Japan all the countries are close to being maxed out with regards to the growing capacity fo their land. Food, OK there is enough land to be close to self sufficent, but can you imagine the problem when the farmers have the oppurtuinity to produce fuel as well. Food competing with fuel. Bio fuels are really not an option, at least for the West. Really, its the last thing that governments want. The US govenrment really is panicking, they have opened a Pandoras box and they know it. As if the high price of oil wasnt a big enough problem there are also the environmental pressures.

The only obvious solution at the momentis bio fuels, it kills two birds with 1 stone. Carbon Neutral and it WILL be cheap to produce if sufficient money is invested. The problem? The West arent in a position to solve the problem themselves. Its comes back to what I was saying, the West doesnt have enough land, nowhere near enough. The West needs access to millions of acres of uncultivated land.

Gordon Brown’s government are really up against it at the moment. The latest 48 hour stirke buy the lowest paid public sector workers is completely correct though. These people are the hardest hit by current inflation. The price of wide screen tvs maybe coming down but the price of essentials are sky rocketing. Given that lower paid workers spend a larger portion of their income on essentails they get hit the hardest which is why they should not be effected by the current “tough attitiude” against inflation. There is no reson why the least well off should pay the biggest price, given the minor effect they have on the economy as a whole. Gordon Brown’s government should should some moral principle. Time after time they are making stupid decsions which punish the least well off. Whether they do it soley to raise money or if it’s simply a matter of not realising the actual effects of their policies, either way it’s imcompetence.

There is talk about employers being forced to make peoples slaries openly available in an attempt to eliminate pay disparity between the men and women. Bring it on I say, it can only be a good thing for employees, not only for a motivational point of view but also from a fairness point of view. Sure it might lead to people chopping and changing their jobs more often to get better pay but that can only be a good thing. It’s puts the power back into the hands of the workers and not in the hands of the shareholders. Middle management may complain but they will gain as much as everyone else.

Keeping employees pay secret from their colleagues is a classic divide and conquer stratergy to keep workers pay down and I mean blue collar and white collar workers.

Let’s make this infomation public knowledge (for employees of the same company) sure it might cause a bit of offense at first but people will soon learn to live with it or even better, find a better paid job.

Power to the people

So say some members of the police, along with call to banning pubs from encouraging bing drinking. I’m sorry but I thought Britiain was a free country where we could do as we wanted as long as it didn’t infringe on other peoples safety and liberties. OK so some people are idiots when drunk causing fights and generally being unsociable but why should the behaviour of a small minority effect the liberties of the many. The type of people calling for these changes have got to accept we don’t live in a perfect society and never will.

As for the youth drinking on the streets and causing being a menace, what else is there to do. I don’t recall the last time I saw any facilities provided by the council for these people. How about some hard surface basket ball courts and football pitches. It’s not going to sort out all the problems but it would defintely be a step in the right direction. Its not like the old days. The youth of today, like the rest of us are more demanding when it comes to their entertainment what with the development of the internet, games consoles and the spread of satelite TV bringing us pictures and possibilities from all over the world. Let’s meet the younger generation half way. They aren’t old enough to buy their own satelite TV or go to the pub so we have to give them something else and what’s wrong with encouraging sport? Maybe start opening up school sports facilities in the evenings?

What the hell is the UK coming to. Gordon Brown & Alistair Darling back dating the cars that will be eligible for the increased road tax band is completely out of order. Its is wiping hundreds if not thousands of pounds of the values of peoples cars. Again, Labour supposedly the party to represent the working man is hitting the working man the hardest with this new law. This law will effect the poorest people, not those people that can afford to buy a new car evey year or every 3 years.

There is no 2 ways about it. They are taking thousands of pounds out of peoples personal wealth with this new law. Applying the law on new vehicles would not be a problem.

But changing the rules after people have already invested their cash, is, in our opinion, completely and utterly unfair. If the rises in road tax were gradual it would be a bit easier to swallow, but in some cases the road tax is doubling or more on some vehicles.

To put it in a metaphorical perspective. What would you do if your monthly line rental on your mobile phone doubled. You would go to another provider. But with road tax, the government has got us over a barrel. What happened to democracy, with the government running the country for the people.

..they are anti-car. Just when they are saying sensible things I agree with they come up with a statement like “we agree with the current price of fuel”. Lets see what the high price of fuel has on the economy and on peoples pockets.

Not enough land, what a load of bull. There are millions of acres of uncultivated land in Africa. With the proper support and with political stability there is no reason why Africa cannot be a world leader in the production of food, but of course political stability is essential for this to happen and that mean the price of valuable raw materials will increase. I know what my conscience can live with.

“The lack of liquidity in the money markets” Why? Because of the “US Sub Prime Mortagage Market” What does that mean? Banks have sold these mortgages as part of a security and if people can’t pay their mortagage then the security is effectively worthless, or, even worse, the bankers dont know what the securities are worth because they don’t know what it’s made of.

The problem now? The banks don’t want to buy any securities, and if the banks don’t want to buy then they can’t sell, hence the shortage of cash.

Why the problem with mortgages? Interest rates. People have arguably over borrowed and worse still at low interest rates. When the interest rates have risen the effect is multiplied. If more people that can’t repay their mortgages, the more securities that become worthless. And if the securities become worthless, then their value is taken off the banks balance sheet.

So what is the Bank of England trying to achieve by buying these securities? Well to give the banks more money so they can lend to other banks. I’m sorry, but why would the banks want to borrow money at the moment. The trend at the time of writing is for the banks to cut back their current lending. Why? Is it because they dont have the money to lend? Or is it because they need as much cash on their books as possible to cover any potential losses they might incur from the securities they are holding losing their value. Going by what the HBOS are doing at the moment ie raising cash, then banks obviously want as much cash on their books as possible.

So what effect is the 50billion pounds provided to the banks by the Bank of England going to have. Very little. This is the metaphorical rubber ring for a drowing man. They will keep this cash to protect them against the uncertainty of the future. Its NOT going to encourage them to lend. This money will get swallowed into the black hole that is securities. Not forgetting this 50billion is our money.

Whats the answer? The government has got to be tough and the banks have got to accept the good times with the bad. What does this mean? Well, for a start the financing by the Bank of England has got to stop. Is is artificially prolonging the life of vauless securities. People have got to be allowed to lose their homes. And if the situation gets too bad the government has got to step in. Step in??? How?? They have to FORCE the banks to renegotiate the mortgages they have with the customer and NOT reposses the house.

Not enough land, what a load of bull. There are millions of acres of uncultivated land in Africa. With the proper support and with political stability there is no reason why Africa cannot be a world leader in the production of food, but of course political stability is essential for this to happen and that mean the price of valuable raw materials will increase. I know what my conscience can live with.