Thursday 28 January 2016

Our Friend George Osborne Looking Shaky

Shock of Heir
Even before this week's run on the Osborne (RBS, google-tax etc), the currency was looking a bit shaky.  You know how sometimes you find there's been a rash of MSM articles on the same subject and you know something's afoot?

Well over the past week or so there has been an otherwise inexplicable number of pieces musing over whether Osborne's blown it already / has whipped in enough craven careerist Tory MPs to get the Big Prize / will be brought down by his unattractive personal flaws / resembles Gordon Brown circa 2005 too much for his own good etc etc.

These 'coincidences' usually mean someone's been dining the journos intensively.  Is May on manoeuvres?  Boris been briefing?  A sneaky strategem from Camp Corbyn?   Has it been George himself calling in the layabouts of the Lobby for a cosy tea + crumpets, but it's all gone a bit wrong (which wouldn't be unknown)?  Things can turn, then turn about again very quickly in politics, and Osborne holds a lot of very powerful levers in his ambitious paws.  Then again, the pack loves a chase; and when the smell of blood's in the air ...  

Here at C@W we have an ambivalent outlook on the Boy Genius, admiring his tactical nous (in a student-politics kind of way) and willingness to think the game through: but pretty sceptical of his judgement on matters of substance (Hinkley - need I say more?).  There is just so much scope for 'events' between now and Dave's departure ... a short Osborne position looks to be a good bet just now.

ND

20 comments:

CityUnslicker said...

We can;t comment on everything but just look today:

Lloyds share sale postponed
EDF delyaing Hinkley indeifinitely
EU likely to declare Google tax as state aid...ffs.

I really hope Osbo is toast, his latest pension raid is deep Brownian motion. Cameron should be stronger than Blair, Hammond would be a better Chancellor or even Javid.

You know, taxes can go down as well as up is my view.

Roderick said...

There's something about Osborne that reminds me of Mandelson... ace player of politics but seems to have no hinterland. No sense of a common touch, despite his numerous hi-vis-jacketed photo ops staring delightedly at a row of bricks.

Blue Eyes said...

He is nothing like Brown! Not a week past in the NuLab years when the papers did not report some machination or other.

This pension tax which the Wailograph has become obsessed by has been on the cards for years. It is basically inevitable, as it has become politically impossible to cut spending any further, and we still have a huge public sector deficit. The tax perks for the top 5% are easy fish to shoot. Heh, if he goes for a flat-rate rebate of above 20% but below 40%, then he can even paint it as a boost for middle-income-earners.

Macroeconomically it even makes sense, because high earners are going to save no matter what, it is those closer to being able to make ends meet who are more likely to respond to such incentives. By Jove, it might even begin to erode the necessity of a ever-higher state pension.

Sounds like a win.

The media are full of George stories, though. The BBC is currently running an article entitled "What happened to the march of the makers". Ouch.

Not sure who is better placed, though. Let's wait until the referendum result, shall we?

Blue Eyes said...

Passed, obvs.

Raedwald said...

I still reckon he looks like an Onanist, albeit less furtive.

All my career I made no secret of the fact that I was a first class 2IC without pareil, and would always be a 2IC, the only variant being that the rank of my CO would rise steadily until my retirement. Know your limitations was my credo. I think Osborne is also a top notch 2IC but not clever enough to know he's not cut out to be the CO.

Nick Drew said...

Roderick - reminds me of Mandelson

oh yes - no doubt studied at the feet of the master; was on board Deripaska's yacht with him; gets fan-mail from him; and warmly reciprocates it

Anonymous said...

The whole Google farrago leaves a bad taste, and has a fair old whiff of NuLabour corporatism cosying whenever someone waved something shiny and technological in front of Blair. It's far worse than Vodafone getting a let off, in that they keep bringing Google in for policy advice, most of which seems to involve Google being able to make money from other peoples' works.

I expect businesses to reduce their tax as much as they can, but there comes a point where much piss is being taken, and you don't chuck 130 million at the Treasury, that both sides have agreed on without showing any sums, unless you've got a good deal for yourself, either in reducing what you could have paid (see Vodafone) or getting your back scratched in some way.

It's pretty rotten. Google do lots of good stuff, but they're pushing it, and weak-willed cretins like Osborne and Cameron are letting them so long as they get to bask and play with new toys.

The latest message appears to be "fuck the SME's for the big boys." Someone should sit them down and draw a big pyramid and point who sits where, pays what and employs how many in the larger scheme of UK ltd.

Blue Eyes said...

Hilarious. You should spend more time over at Tim Worstall's.

Anonymous said...

Machiavelli? A theatre of the Muppets - more like.

Some bod', a something or other History grad - got in with the dickhead crowd and found himself cuddling up to Dave.

DAVE! FFS!

Whereupon, TPTB-EUropean elite who these days choose the UK's political party leaders (believe it) ever since they debagged Maggie.

Yes, it's hard to fault their logic in choosing DAVE. Thus, Dave would be the puppet making the moves but guided by wiser hands.

What did they get?

Hmm, a gormless, green goon patsy in Cameron primed to continue on..... with, er not to get in the way of; Le grand projet.

THE Brussels Empire, on the road to federalism and the Internationalists - not least Soros and his Marxist bent, of societal engineering must have been thrilled to bits over Dave, a man who uses fewer brain cells than does the Amoeba and has about as much spine, when did this lad ever have an original idea in his pretty little head and watched over by the towers of Sheffield - manipulated by the nuts, is DAVE.
Dave, and thanks to MacMental had little to no opposition because DAVE MK I - Blair had retired and so DAVE somehow he was made PM BUT...... next, God forbid - he dubbed George as.............. his chancellor.

Go figure - or not, in George's case.

MyLookAndSeeName said...

People, I have pointed out recently that Corbyn will be more successful in gtting what he wants as a strawman, than any real threat to power.

Both parties realise this now and are acting accordingly.

I did warn, for example, that he will allow the Tories to do "the most un-Tory things™". If the alternative is Corbyn, the electorate (read: pensioners, Daily Mail readers) will allow the government to do pretty much anything.

Things being what they are, we need to raise far, far more revenue than any cuts would allow. Thus, the election of Corbyn facilitates the (necessary) increase in taxes in areas previously un-thought of in Tory circles.

George might be an idiot, but he might just be a genius too.

Electro-Kevin said...

I've been saying for a long while. The country is not being cured of its economic problems.

Anonymous said...

Brussels Empire/Referendum etc.

Have seen the early versions of the "in" publicity and it's all over bar the voting. Focus groups are all in favour of the status quo and have identified angry white middle-class men as the most likely to want "out" but are unlikely to actually vote.

It was put simply as - angry white middle-class men want out of their marriage, their job, their house and rid of their children. Essentially they are noisy but impotent - or everything they were angry about would have been changed.

These Focus groups are amazingly accurate - ask Linton.

Set your clocks for late June. Business as usual.

CityUnslicker said...

EK - it is a bit, the banks are not about to collapse anymore. Our long-term ills remain however.

James Higham said...

Banks won't collapse - not till after the referendum.

Blue Eyes said...

EK I doubt anyone would say "yay everything is fixed #goodtimes".

However, things have been getting better. That is not to say the current turmoil won't turn into a crash - it might, it might not. Let's hope not.

As CU and Lord Cable could point out, not all predicted recessions actually turn into recessions ;-)

Electro-Kevin said...

We could have been putting things right for the past 6 years instead of making them worse.

Blue Eyes said...

Wot, by voting UKIP?

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