Skip to main content

Why I Pay the Tories

I can't believe I decided to sponsor a political party - and particularly one that seems hell-bent on self-destruction. But I'm filled with terror that the Labour shower will get in again, no doubt assisted by their hard-left Liberal chums. Blair/Brown didn't scare me as much. They got the unions to put up and shut up by getting the enterprise/worker balance about right. Miliband/Balls/Clegg probably also understand enterprise has to come before labour (small l), but they need votes from people with short memories. And those people, who need little reminder their wealth is declining day by day, are being goaded by journalists who are relentlessly forcing us to believe that making money ('cos they don't and can't perhaps) is bad. Fat Cats, bonuses, evil millionaires sunning themselves in the Caribbean while wage-slaves work themselves to the bone to line their pockets.... And what about our growing fear of immigrants 'taking our jobs' while costly dole queues lengthen. It's very easy to whip up loathing and anger about the wealthy.

Now as a matter of principle, I generally assume that whoever gets in will either cock things up, or do nothing and let things cock themselves up. So whoever the Great British public decide has the best hairdo, we're buggered. But we're extra buggered if spend spend spend Labour/Liberals get in, and incentives for amassing wealth are driven out of the UK into the arms of our competitors.

So I'm contributing to the Tory's war-chest to help them put up a fight. Probably pointless as we descend inexorably towards another recession, albeit a less severe one than if Balls had been allowed to 'balls' it up (what a shame it's too obvious to say 'Balls by name, balls by nature'), but the basic message I want them to put out there is this:

Who is more likely to be able to create sustainable jobs? People who have a track record in job creation, or politicians and civil servants? And if you really believe jobs should be created by governments, whose taxes are going to pay for them? If your answer to the second question is Public Sector Workers taxes, then you're an idiot and will probably vote Labour.

In my view the difference between the parties is simple.

Capitalism = Do everything you can legally and sensibly to encourage money-making first, then decide how to use the taxes resulting from a growing economy to support the welfare state (which will be cheaper anyway, because fewer people will be relying on handouts). Painful start (as every self-made businessman will recognise), but you reap what you sow.

Socialism = The economy will be what the economy will be. Spend as much as you can today to maximise votes because the next election is 5 years way and if we're lucky, we'll end on a high. If not, we'll blame the world economy and the fat cats. Popular softer start, and luck will prevent us heading into deeper waters. Luck like finding oil under the North Sea and fat cats deciding on London to sell financial services - but which incredibly the Labour government tried to prevent with a Selective Employment Tax (SET). Watch socialism in action, and be very afraid....



So I'm paying the Conservatives to remind us what happens when socialist principals interfere with markets. (And get well soon Andrew Marr! Not all journalists are rabid haters of job-creators).

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Phillips screws - yes I'm angry about them too

Don't get me wrong. They're a brilliant invention to assist automation and prevent screwdrivers from slipping off screw heads - damaging furniture, paintwork and fingers in the process. Interestingly they weren't invented by Mr Phillips at all, but by a John P Thompson who sold Mr P the idea after failing to commercialise it. Mr P, on the otherhand, quickly succeeded where Mr T had failed. Incredible isn't it. You don't just need a good idea, you need a great salesman and, more importantly, perfect timing to make a success out of something new. Actually, it would seem, he did two clever things (apart from buying the rights). He gave the invention to GM to trial. No-brainer #1. After it was adopted by the great GM, instead of trying to become their sole supplier of Phillips screws, he sold licenses to every other screw manufacturer in the world. A little of a lot is worth a great deal more than a lot of a little + vulnerability (watch out Apple!). My gromble is abo

Addictions. Porn, Drugs, Alcohol and Sex. Don't prevent it, make it safer.

In 1926 New York, during Prohibition, 1,200 people were poisoned by whiskey containing small quantities of wood alcohol (methanol). Around 400 died, the rest were blinded. The methanol they drank was in the moonshine they had bought illegally. In fact it had been added by law to industrial ethanol in order to make it undrinkable. Prohibition existed to protect everyone from the 'evils of the demon drink'. However, people still wanted to enjoy alcohol. So bootleggers bought cheap industrial alcohol and attempted to distill it to remove the impurities the state had added, but the process wasn't regulated. The state was inadvertently responsible for the suffering - although it was easy for them to blame the bootleggers and to justify escalating the war. This didn't stop the bootleggers. In fact it forced them to become more violent to protect their operations, and even less cautious about their production standards. Volumes of illicit alcohol, and therefore proportionat

The Secrets of Hacker Golf

Social media is awash with professional golfers selling video training courses to help you perfect your swing, gain 50 yards on your drive and cut your handicap. They might help a few desperate souls, but the rest of us hackers already know everything we need to complete a round of golf without worrying the handicap committee or appearing on a competition winner's list. What those pros don't realise is that for us hacking golfers who very occasionally hit shots that if you hadn't seen how they were hit, end up where the pros might have put them, we already know everything we need to know - and more. Unlike pros who know how to time the perfect swing in order to caress a ball 350 yards down the centre of a fairway, we hackers need to assemble a far wider set of skills and know-how to complete 18 holes, about which pros have no comprehension, need, or desire to learn. Here are some of them: Never select your shot until after you've hit it. A variation on this is to alway