ALB
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That’s reassuring. I was beginning to imagine you dressing up as a cavalier at your Civil War re-enactment society events. Incidentally, the Party will have a stall at the Levellers Day event in Burford on Saturday 20 May. Come dressed as a pikeman if you can make it.
Fair enough. You reject the materialist conception of history and interpret history in terms of some abstract, eternal principles of morality. It’s not a crime. A lot of people do.
That wasn’t your original position, TS. You commended Charles I for not being a “prop of the bourgeoisie”. Which of course is what Charles III is, though “puppet” might be a better term.
That would have saved you from being hanged, drawn and quartered when Charles II came to power.
Odd for a socialist to criticise the bourgeoisie for being too revolutionary.
Even Winstanley and the Diggers supported the overthrow of the king and the defeat of the royalists. They knew that this was a precondition for making the Earth a common treasury for all.
The first Charles wouldn’t play ball. That’s why they chopped his head off. At least he wouldn’t be a prop for the bourgeoisie.
What !!! Next you’ll be telling us that James II was a good bloke too. I think you are forgetting, comrade, that at the time the bourgeois revolution was historically progressive.
Holy Russia again:
Are there any efforts to try to measure how the election campaign brings extra enquiries to HO etc?
Yes, all our local election leaflets now have a QR code taking people to a dedicated page on our website. The numbers using this should be available soon.
We don’t know whether Royal Mail will allow this on free-delivery general election leaflets.
Kent & Sussex branch communicate:
Just a quick summary of the results today, where we stood in two wards in Folkestone (in two council elections), both wards are the same electors but councillor numbers vary.
We have seen some decreases and some advances in votes cast, but there are several factors which will have influenced the absolute vote numbers.
Folkestone Central
This is only the second time we have stood in this seat individually (rather than as part of County and Parliamentary seats).
District Council ward: 81 votes (first time contested)
Town Council ward: 121 votes (last contested 2021, 61 votes in by-election)Folkestone Harbour
This seat has been contested many times, individually and as part of County and Parliamentary seats.
District Council ward: 45 votes (last contested 2019, 59 votes)
Town Council ward: 61 votes (last contested 2019,131 votes)Maybe interesting to note that the Tories have been ousted as largest Party from Folkestone and Hythe District Council, reduced to a rump of five out of 30 councillors (UKIP and a Tory split group no longer have seats).
Gains made by Greens and Labour, leaving no overall control.
New Council:
Green 11
Labour 10
Cons. 5
Lib Dem 2
Ind 2Looks as if the Labour Party thinks it is already the government the way is seeking to save money and not frighten the rich.
Here’s a couple of headlines from the Times so far this week:
STARMER READY TO ABANDON PLEDGE ON FREE UNIVERSITY TUITION (Tuesday 2 May)
STARMER ABANDONS TAX RISE PLAN FOR THE TOP 5% (Wednesday 3 May).
Starmer made these promises to win the Labour Party leadership election. Having won that, he now casts them aside.
It’s plain to see the man’s a complete opportunist, just after the fruits of office. And of course he already got one reward, a knighthood, for serving the repressive side of capitalist state as chief prosecutor.
Those around him, who are expecting cabinet posts, are just as bad. They, too, are unashamed place-hunters.
You are not saying, are you, that the limited political democracy that exists in the UK and other constitutional monarchies is more limited than in the USA and France? A case could be made out for saying that it is less limited as the presidents of these two states are in effect elected kings with decision-making powers that constitutional monarchs don’t have.
Also, in some republics, the head of state is not directly elected, not in Germany or Italy for instance. I know the president of Austria is, but does that make Austria more democratic than Germany?
In any event, that is not the point. The point is that, whatever the constitutional situation, the economic situation is that capitalism exists in both republics and constitutional monarchies and that a changeover from the latter to the former would make no difference (whatsoever) to the problems generated by capitalism. It would be a completely irrelevant change and so not worth campaigning to bring about.
The case against changing to a republic making any difference can be stated in two words: one is “America”, the other is “France”.
Yes, further confirmation that banks don’t create out of thin air the money they lend, but are financial intermediaries borrowing money at one rate of interest and lending money at a higher rate. Generally, borrowing short-term to lend longer term.
Which means that if interest rates go up they could be in trouble. Today’s Times of London describes what happened to First Republic. The US central bank, the Federal Reserve, has been “lifting interest rates rapidly over the past 14 months” with this effect on First Republic:
“Their rise prompted customers to explore alternative options and, as higher rates also knocked the value of its mortgage portfolio, the lender had to stump up to keep depositors. It paid $428 million in interest on deposits during the last three months of 2022, up from $20 million during the same period of 2021. It paid $555 million during the first quarter of this year.”
Who says banks don’t need deposits.
