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Banks Blast Hostile Sarkozy - Times
Even Zimbabwe Comes Out of Recession Before UK – KRO
David Davis Joins Climate Sceptic Backlash - ConservativeHome
Government Cancels Christmas ‘Comics for Troops’ – Bleeding Cool
Brown’s Love of Big Numbers – FT
Morgan Stanley: UK Sovereign Debt Crisis 2010 – Telegraph
Patrick Cormack Stepping Down – Iain Dale
Brown Breaks Convention Reveal SAS Deployment – Telegraph
Paul Krugman said in 2003… “My prediction is that politicians will eventually be tempted to resolve the [fiscal] crisis the way irresponsible governments usually do: by printing money, both to pay current bills and to inflate away debt. And as that temptation becomes obvious, interest rates will soar.”
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 2, 2009
UPDATE : Will Straw still won’t let this go; yesterday Will tried to implythat Spain was somehow the 21st member of the G20 and therefore Britain was not the only member country in recession. Brown obviously works from the same script*, because he also spun that line today. Will is now nuancing his position, arguing that because the Spanish PM has attended a meeting, Spain is an informal member. The Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi attended the G20 annual summit in April, on this evidential basis isn’t Ethiopia an informal member too? The Tories have unearthed a quote that should settle the matter, ‘Spain is not a member of the G20’, or so said the Prime Mentalist himself at a press conference in October last year. This year he wants to pretend it is. Si?
*Remember how the last “independent” left-wing blog turned out to be part-scripted by Damian McBride? Hmmm…
MPs Refusing to Pay Back Expenses to Have Funds Sequestered
Guido is trying to get hold of the letter regarding this that Sir Thomas Legg is sending refusenik troughers.
If any co-conspirator wants to fax it across…
UPDATE : Headline changed to delete pensions because, according to Gary Gibbons, if MPs are leaving they will plunder their severance (up to £60,000) or their winding up allowance (up to £45,000), and if MPs are staying they can plunder their salary.
New Aussie Opposition Leader Defeats Climate Tax
Tony Abbott ousted Malcolm Turnball as leader of the opposition Liberals after he tried to foist an emissions trading scheme on the party which would have cost billions in new taxes. Straight away Abbott has defeated Rudd’s Labour government on a crucial pre-Copenhagen vote. Abbott rightly claims he has “delivered a big win for the people of Australia who have been saved from a massive new tax that would have been foisted upon them without proper scrutiny”.
The Cameroons are very out of touch with the Tory grassroots on this issue. There is widespread contempt for Zac Goldsmith and there is an abiding suspicion that the whole Vote Blue, Go Green agenda is a cover for tax hikes. Whereas most Conservatives support measures for a cleaner environment, recycling, even organic farming and such like, the whole Copenhagen carbon taxing and subsidising policy agenda is seen as absolute hogwash.
The Tories have dropped back at the polls following the Lisbon Treaty shambles which dismayed eurosceptic supporters. The majority of activists and supporters do not want to see their cars being used as cash cows for taxation and they don’t want their annual summer holidays to be ever-more regressively taxed. New green taxes are extremely unpopular with the grassroots and supporters. Dave needs to remember that not all Tories are as rich as Zac Goldsmith…
CRU Boss Stands Aside, Queens University Blocking Data FOI
CRU boss Phil Jones is standing down while the university investigation reviews the Climategate emails. He should be a scientific pariah for this one email alone “I can’t see either … being in the next [IPCC] report. Kevin [Trenberth] and I will keep them out somehow – even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!” Science is all about conjectures and refutations, if climate scientists try to close down debate* it undermines public confidence. The public might not understand the calculus of thermodynamics, but it understands snake oil salesmanship when it sees it…
The CRU is a taxpayer funded body which is now exposed as not fit for purpose, compromised by global warming advocates rather than staffed by truth pursuing scientists. It has funding largely from the British taxpayer and the EU. Until there is a clear out of the compromised personnel, not just CRU boss Phil Jones, funding should be halted. Taxpayers should be confident that their money is being used for scientific research, not to fund a cabal of global cooling deniers intent on creating a scientifically unfounded basis for a political project.
There is similar issue developing at Queens University Belfast (QUB), where once again global warming alarmist scientists are blocking Freedom of Information requests. QUB is one of the world’s leading centers for tree-ring work, the tree-ring data that QUB has gathered is valuable for studying the global climate during the past 7000 years. For 2 years mathematician Douglas J. Keenan has been battling to get them to release the data unsuccessfully. QUB is throwing up chaff to prevent him having access to the data. Why do they feel so threatened by external review of their data?
*Guido is looking forward to tomorrow’s George Monbiot v James Delingpole debate* being organised by Index on Censorship : “Saying the unsayable: is climate scepticism the new Holocaust denial?” Thursday, 3 December, 6.30 – 8pm, Free Word Centre, 60 Farringdon Road. RSVP to:bookings@freewordonline.com, more details here.
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 1, 2009
It didn’t take long for Will “we don’t do attack dog” Straw of Left Foot Forward to, errm, go on the attack. The editor of the well funded “evidence based” blog dismissed Guido’s story (“Economics for 7 Year Olds“) about the UK being the only G20 country left in recession by quoting the figures from the back pages of an out of date copy of the Economist.
He even made a little dunces hat and wittily headlined his piece“Economics for Gui-d’oh Fawkes”.
Will might have checked a back-copy of the Economist, but it seems he missed the news yesterday that Canada grew 0.1% in Q3, Mexico grew 2.93% in Q3, South Africa grew 0.9% annualised in Q3, and so did Russia. The story was driven by the new data released. Guido isn’t sure what Will is smoking, but the icing on the cake was the citing of Spain as an example of a G20 country still in recession. Spain isn’t even in the G20 Will.
Will’s blog is usually pretty good, provocative and produces original content, he really should stick to evidence based positive stuff, the last mysteriously funded high profile left-wing blogger who tried to take Guido on head-to-head made a huge fool of himself. Will should also know (from his years of spinning for HM Treasury) that you need evidence that is up-to-date. Guido’s story was based on news, not old data or wishful thinking…
Economics for 7 Year Olds
Above is an easy to understand venn-diagram for readers who are not into the dismal science. The big circle shows all 20 members of the G20, the left-hand set comprises those members who are out of recession, the small right hand set contains those countries still in recession. This is one chart you won’t see on Will Straw’s Left Foot Forward…
Embarrassingly for Gordon Brown, who sees himself as financial saviour and leader of the world, the only member country of the G20 still in recession is the UK. Gordon is currently chairing the G20, which adds to the embarrassment. The Times of India blames the UK’s debt burden for the divergent performance. Who do we blame for the the debt burden?
Powerless Couple
Guido imagines it was an awkward breakfast in the Bowe household this morning. Last night former Labour MEP David Bowe was beaten in to an embarrassing third place in the selection process to become the PPC for Pudsey – by his wife. They don’t seem to be a particularly successful power couple, Helen Bowe got eleven votes to her spouses 10. The successful candidate got one hundred and twenty-seven.
At least it will make for an interesting Christmas letter this year. Better than news of the Homer and Bart the guinea pigs…
Fabians in Fine Fettle, Kilfoyle Very Tired and Emotional
Guido wandered into the Fabian’s Christmas party on the terrace of the Houses of Parliament. The booze, Guido noticed with some amusement, was sponsored by Serco, the private-sector outsourcing outfit. That irony would see the Fabian’s founders, the Clause Four authoringWebbs, spinning in their graves. Sunda Katawala told the assembled drinkers that Fabian Society membership was at an historic high, which is quite an achievement by him given Labour Party membership is at an historic low.
Yvette Cooper was the star turn, Guido was mesmerised by her green leather boots so didn’t follow the thread of her argument closely, think it involved Etonians eating babies and David Cameron personally slaughtering first borns at Sure Start centres. She did a lot of that head-nodding thing she does for emphasis.
The former Defence Minister Eric Joyce seemed demob happy and confirmed just how miffed Cathy Newman was when Guido beat her to getting his resignation story out.
When the booze ran out Guido slipped into the Stranger’s Bar for some subsidised Guinness (think of it as a tax-rebate) and chatted with blogging Labour MPs Greg Pope (also demob happy) and Tom Harris. Late in the evening a tired and emotional Peter Kilfoyle exploded at the bar “You’re Guido Fawkes, you’re Guido Fawkes” ranting bitterly about a story exposing him for paying his daughter’s firm out of expenses. He tried to have Guido thrown out of the bar, shouting to the patient barman about the injustices of this blog’s editorial policies. Guido was a little worried that the red-in-the-face Kilfoyle was going to have a coronary…
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