File spoon-archives/anarchy-list.archive/anarchy-list_2003/anarchy-list.0303, message 326


From: "roger" <diogenes.jones-AT-attbi.com>
Subject: Re: "You will lose, Mr. President..."
Date: Tue, 11 Mar 2003 16:20:37 -0800


>
> I just got the link to wirk (WIRK?).  It's an article quoting US
Secretary
> o State Colin Powell warning Bush that he is going to lose the
Security
> Council vote.    Bush doesn't care.   Maybe he is beginning to feel
the
> heat on Blair.   Over the weekend the Original George gave a speech
> advising his son not to discount the necessity of the UN's approval.
Bush
> isn't paying attention to that speech either.
>
<snip>
> carp
>


yeah, tony's got his balls in a vice.  he bet the farm that the
french, et. al. would come along in the end.  while public support for
the war is solidifying over here, his base is running away from blair
like he had cooties.

if Dave, and Iain, and Andy would get off their asses and engage in a
little direct action instead of their constant, defeatist whinning . .
. no, wait, that's us ain't it.  sometimes i get confused a bit.

seriously, though, if there is any chance of stopping this thing, it
rides on getting blair to get bush to give it a few more weeks.  who
knows, maybe something will happen in korea that will convince bush
that this thing is ill concieved (THAT's really something to hope for,
eh).

maybe some intense, direct action in britain WILL work over the next
days/weeks.  i understand the points about the anti-Poll Tax movement
by Dave, Iain, etc.  i was a teacher in gawga then and spent two
summers in lancashire and birmingham during the period and the
anti-poll tax fun WAS fun.  and it did do a lot of the good things
that these actions do (i sent a post a while back about all the
coolness involved in direct action).  you can see how the lads across
the pond are still pretty stoked about those days.  and rightfully so.

BUT, i also see your point, carpo.  the poll tax was a radical attempt
to shift a significant portion of the tax burden to those of modest
means.  by tying local spending (heavily welfare related) to a flat
head tax instead of a graduated, steeply progressive income tax, it
was a frontal assault on the Welfare State.  you know this and you
know that while it failed, much of the actual substance of the logic
behind the Poll Tax has been enacted by blair and his bunch of
wankers.  they've done more slowly what thather/major tried to do
quickly.  taxation in britain is LESS progressive, and falls more on
the working poor, than at any time since before WWII.  Labour has done
the dirty work in britain just like Clinton brought us "Welfare
Reform" over here.

that doesn't invalidate the anti-Poll Tax movement, but it also is a
hard lesson.

roger


   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005