Really, I have heard of some daft Government policies, Cones hotlines, Dangerous dogs, 5-a-day, etc.
But today takes the biscuit big time. At the G20 Alistair Darling and Gordon Brown started advocating the tobin tax. This is an old left idea for taking a tax on all international finance transfers.
Not only do very few countries agree with this idea, it is simply impractical to implement; and wrong. more tax is never the answer as all good capitalist know.
What really staggers me though is that Badger and Brownstuff could promote this idea in the very week in which they confirm the UK taxpayer is to own the largest international bank in the world by assets and 43% of another top 20 bank.
So the UK government now owns banks and is advocating a policy which will cripple there recovery. This is beyond stupidity, it really is.
In years to come the political world will have a new lexicon for all this Government;
'as stupid as a Brown plan' - for a truly appalling policy announcement
'even Brown would not have done that' - for a really turkey of an idea
ad infinitum.
14 comments:
From one extreme (light regulation so financial services thrive in London) to another (well, there is not much other money they can nick, er sorry, tax). Even Brown's arguments weren't sound; some banks did not need rescuing and those they did rescue are repaying the money. No wonder there is no love lost between the PM and the Governor; Brown was not going to make conversation with Meryn on the television newsclip this evening. Could this be because Gordon and Alistair have disregarded the advice that while there are many ways to skin a cat, some of these ways are unacceptable? I think banks, like cats, have claws. Great post.
Gordon, the moron, will my aide memoire. More have rejected the idea this morning. What a plonker.
measured: " .. light regulation .."
There was no regime of 'light regulation'. For a start we had the anti money laundering regulations. One of the most intrusive instruments (and I would add useless ) implemented by government.
The government simply chose to monitor and regulate the WRONG things.
CU: "This is beyond stupidity, it really is."
Honestly, the surprise is you are surprised. For this pair of idiots, the answer is 'more tax', now what is the question?
And what they appear to want to tax this time, and the manner of its taxing, will encourage the tinfoil hat brigade to start talking about a One World Government, in the same way that 20 years ago their fear was a Single European State/Government.
Nothing to see here, pass quickly along please.
We already have the "brown bottom" so why not have "that plan is so brown" or "don't be a gordon".
He will have the immortality he craves just not in a positive way, more like Canute.
Old, old keynesian economics that has been invalidated by communications technology - Brown isn't very good at modern economics, nor the history of economics either, for that matter. As a matter of interest who DID teach Gordon economics and who advises him now? And who taught them? It may seem a remote question now he's so old, but there is such a steady smack of stupidity and low level grasp of old fashioned stuff that makes me wonder.
Actually, support for this tax is the first time this year I've cheered one of their proposals.
Impact on transactions: tiny, but mitigating against speculation-led fluctuations.
Impact on tackling poverty: potentially enormous.
The sad thing for me, and the reassurance for you, is that these two clowns have come to it so late in the day, and are so beyond being effective, that it'll never happen.
I have referred to Gordon Brown as "The Red Shadow", on Friday 6th. Too long explain here, but use your imagination.
It's just posturing. Brown and Darling know that it would need complete international agreement and therefore that it will never happen. But it might shore up his core vote a little and play well with the "bash the bankers" crowd.
Gordon is a Moran.
That's the T/shirt for the Luton MP election.
Agreed.
But I don't think that a silly tax on banks is as terrible as their energy policy, to wit shutting down reliable coal and gas plants in favour of hugely expensive windmills and nuclear and so on.
Their policy is to hand over to the Tories the biggest pile of elephant dung imaginable.
If the Euro-sceptic Tories had any sense they'd split the party and throw the next election. Cameron is a fake and will do nothing for Britain.
Leave the whole festering mess with Brown and his cohorts.
Therein lies Gordo's grasp of finance.
MW - Agreed. Prehaps this is just the daftest week they have managed!
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