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DISTRESS

I know fundamentals are not 'immediate', hence make poor news, but might Newsnight just chuck a crumb in the direction of global CULTURAL MELTDOWN*, and then go back to the symptomatic Money mess?

*Too many dogmas, too much war, over consumption, misconceived education, misperceived human nature, etc.
In short: a triumph of clever over wise.

Your move Jaded Jean.

'Peter Marshall is in Washington. Which guests should we have on?'

Well, we could have The Boss, Tim Robbins... etc, to help 'us' grasp the 'real' US situation more... in 90210.

What are the odds?

Speaking of sucking...

'Susan Watts reports on a radical new approach designed to stop climate change. Confused?'

As I look out of my window at a lovely autumn taking over from summer (well, what passed for one), I simply ask that whatever man-made effort is made to mitigate (if at all possible and affordable) the power of what man might not be helping much as nature does her thing, I'd still like the climate to change a bit, please.

It's complex, and so easy for us all to get confused, I guess. But while dealing with possibly addressing possibly/probably man-worsened negative climate change is a rallying cry I could get behind, the shorter version used here is about as much use as Global Warming is... was.

Guess we should ask all those chaps I saw on the news recently who are going up to the Antarctic to race about how it's all going. Maybe when they meet the eco-racers driving round the country to see how little fuel they can use?

At least the atmospheric Deep Throat (one mighty suck for mankind) hoover sounds a bit more like DOING than talking, but I do worry about relative %ages near the things. Harking back to my A level sciences, if you suck all the C02 out locally and hence cause an osmotic (or is that fluids?) gradient towards them, won't that monkey around with the natural balances of the various gasses that make up air?

And is that a good thing?

I know it looked nifty (if in reverse) in Total Recall, but it's just that 'we' have not proven over nifty in our meddling with nature before.

There's this, too, which I am ashamed to say I was not aware of until now:

China makes Nobel prize warning



China has said it hopes the Nobel Peace Prize will reward what it called "the right person"

Can't have the 'wrong people' getting awarded/voted for, etc...

Hope the artificial trees and algae would be strictly controlled. If they got out of control we have new problems. New algae? Newer problems ...

On the economy how much trouble is in the pipeline further down the road. Perhaps now is not the time to ask the question but then the more informed the public the less panic?

Hey, way to go & kudos... hyperlinks!

'Gordon Brown has said he is "angry" about irresponsible behaviour by bankers and has said "the days of big bonuses are over".'

Was it the bonuses or was it the total lack of oversight that caused the problem?

If you make huge amounts of money you want huge amounts of money in proportion.

The buck stops there! No there! Over there!
With Gordon? Nah.

AIG executives went on a $400.000 junket AFTER their bail-out!!! The cultural and lifestyle which bankers are familiar with is going to be a hard habit to break. My personal opinion is that some should swing in the wind.

As the blame game is starting early - hardly surprising and I am up for it - will we do it properly?

I mean will we allow Brown to pronounce on the bankers guilt and stress his pure and unsullied innocence?

Or will there be a full and independent (i.e. not Alistair Campbell chairing) public inquiry into how the hell we got into this mess? Who knew what and when and what did they do?

Even in the current climate where the public think politicians slither on their bellies in Parliament they will be appalled if Brown is allowed to airbrush the truth out and probably have a statue of himself built in Parliament Square to celebrate his heroic rescue of the UK from the wicked bankers whom he hardly knew.

Apart from the odd hundred advisers to his government etc etc.

NOT SUCH A BREEZE (#7)

I heard that the Big Brother people have world TV and movie rights on 'Swinging in the wind' and are arguing for a patent, in court. Oh - and your injunction is in the post.
'Celebrity Tar and Feather' is mooted, but Health and Safety law is proving a problem.

thegangophone, I see you are back on your pet topic of blaming Brown. As he has been blamed for everything else adding this to your list makes very little difference apart from forgetting those who started this mess. Tory Central Office would be proud of you.

Continuing to build on this castle in the air you ask for a public inquiry, a bit like closing the stable door etc. Most are a waste of money and a "money trough" for those who are on them. Perhaps you may want to dip into that trough for you appear to know more about what has gone on in the past than me. You would be an ideal candidate to expose the truth.
Judging by the Tory reactions to these in the past as being "whitewashes" you had better wait 18 months for your Tory Government who then indeed can set one up to determine the truth. Why not re-open the one on Iraq and that man's suicide? As a lawyer I can see lots of fat fees heading my way.

By then we will have all moved on (and probably out of our houses) and we will be all discussing Brown's next perceived faux pas. (it will be when the lights go out if it is a hard winter-another one you can "land" on Brown, that is if he is still PM).

Keep up the good work. Your postings show that you are "really up for it" and provide a little light fiction and entertainment in these difficult times.

"Peter Marshall is in Washington. Which guests should we have on?"

How about someone who can do an objective report into ACORN voter registration fraud? Having read Marshall's new blog I very much doubt he can be trusted, and Greg Palast certainly can't (Greg Palast? Who next, Michael Moore? No wonder Newsnight is fast becoming a laughingstock.) Come on Newsnight, at least try to make the effort.

given libor is the root block and is set by the british bankers assoc then asking them their views would make sense?

It is important that any new regulation should address the real factors which now drive the financial markets; not those of half a century ago which still drive the IMF.

Of these new factors it seems to me that the most important may be:

1) In the first instance banks should once more be strictly limited to (traditional) banking – safe lending rather than speculation - and, indeed should be barred from, separated from, speculation. Speculation should be the business of the many entrepreneurs who find casinos irresistible.
2) Even so, risk - in all its forms - should be reported; and reports of the banks true viability should take this into account.
3) Beyond that limitation, banks should be positively, and rigorously, supervised – as indeed should all financial institutions.
4) This supervision should be global, with international bodies involved in rigorously supervising global transfers the global transfers which currently bedevil regulators.
5) Where there is a separate role for credit rating this should be independent, only using the results of its own unbiased investigations.
6) Where governments are involved in supporting banks, directly or indirectly, their exact roles should also be subject to independent investigation.

In view of current proposed solutions, where nations are underwriting banks, the last item has now become significant. In view of what has happened to Iceland, this element needs just as much supervision. A year ago if its PM said the nation would stand behind all the debts we would have believed him; and presumably many then did. Of course we now know his word was worthless. But much the same might be true of other smaller nations whose economy was boosted by similarly dubious machinations. One wonders what exactly is the position of those tax havens whose trillion dollar financial activities are so carefully hidden.

One that has, in any case, worried me for some time is Dubai. Its building boom, now running into billions of dollars, has been funded on the basis that the Sheikh in effect runs his own sovereign wealth fund – much like that of other oil producers – which easily covers his ‘hobbies’. The reality seemingly is that the trillions of investment are covered by something like just $100 billion of GDP, mainly in the same finance industries which have just brought Iceland to its knees. However, of this GDP only 1% or so comes from oil – which is due to run out in a decade or so. Dubai is, therefore, literally built on sand. It is all smoke and mirrors; as befits the entertainment industry of which it really is a part.

Can we have some balance for once?

#10 Billbradbury

I could be mixing you up but aren't you a Labour councillor? If so your comments are shocking about Brown!

I despise the Tories also and vote Lib Dem.

Can't see where the fiction is and it seems to me that you are simultaneously being Labour and anti-Labour. A neat trick if you could pull it off.

No public inquiry and we will have all of the usual bum steers about what really went wrong. If its a public inquiry and independent maybe they would find it WAS the bankers and not Brown. Like I say Brown is blaming the bankers that means he doesn't feel he could have done anything this could not be prevented in the future - if it could it have been prevented this time?

But not in my world where you don't say "whoops" after you dole out half a trillion and don't know whether its gpoing to work.

Who knew what and when and what did or didn't they do to correct the situation.

If the lights do go out I would blame him because he hasn't been anywhere nearly aggressive enough on investing in alternative fuels.

Instead he cosied up to big business and nuclear and it won't deliver and will leave us with a legacy of waste we still don't know how to deal with.

For the record I don't think the Tories would have done anything much different.

Unfortunately, we have forgotten sharing and co-operation. These things happen in families that work. Now that the iron curtain is gone there are more nations than ever making things faster and faster with fewer and fewer people and all in competition. To justify that, people are encouraged to buy faster and faster. It's a wonder we didn't make a bigger mess of things a long time ago. Competition leads to conflict and the various wars must make a fair sized footprint while the waste from our mad consumerism is greater than ever. No wonder people are not happy. Is our best vision for humanity a dream house, a dream kitchen, a dream holiday, a dream car?
We used not to think like this. In any case we eventually wake from dreams - like now.

the gangophone, good you see sense at last. The Tories won't do anything different, probably worse. As for my opinion about Brown, his time has come with this crisis, as his anihilation of Cameron was seen at this week's PM question time.

However as I have blogged many times before the country wants the Obama "Change" or "buggins Turn"

As for my party there will be some inter-nicene fighting over whether we go left or right. Watch out for Cuddass. Have you noticed our "suicide note" is back in the frame, Clause 4 and the Nationalisation of the Banks. Were we right or were we right?

Stick with us, 25 years later we were proven right. As a Labour Cllr. I stay and fight from within the party and if you doubt my loyalty, my area with Yes THREE of us doing the canvassing we bucked the national trend and had a LABOUR GAIN. -in fact 2.
Perhaps as the election looms and electors get over the "kicking arse" at by-election time, when they hover with their cross when electing a GOVERNMENT they might think twice about Cameron and the Tories.

He has told you that the next 10 years will be increased taxes etc. "Undoing the Labour mess". So that is alright then???

Oh I forgot. The LibDems and alternative fuels. Is this the party that opposes barriers across the Severn in case it upsets some rare frog or other? Is this the party that opposes Nuclear? Is this the party that opposes coal? Is this the party likes to see the countryside covered in Wind farms? Is this the party that has no energy policy apart from some unsustainable. Is this the party in my home town that opposes putting freight on to trains?

The Lib/Dems, there only chance is proportional representation when we will get a permanent Lib/Dem Government. I will leave that for you to work out.