Continuing discussion arguments.
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Most historians agree that the Treaty of Versailles - and the reparations it included- drove the Weimar republic to pursue a deliberate policy of hyperinflation. That provided the foundation for making the Nazi Party look a real alternative to the existing Government. Add into that the removal of various bits of Germany full of Germans... and you have all the ingredients needed for a nutter to gain power.
(Rather like UKIP just now:-)
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Not as simple as that madf.After the hyperinflation where a kilo loaf of bread cost 201.000.000.000.Deutsche Mark in Nov.1923.
A new Government took over under leadership of Gustav Streseman the Deutsche Volkspartei.
They did everything to stop the hyperinflation and I miljard Mark became 1 Mark.This was called the Rentenmark.New international agreements where reached.
As is always the case poverty and high unemployement create the ideal breeding ground to start wars.And after WW2 we have had continuous misery caused by conflicts.Not wars they can only be achieved between two equals.
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As Dutchie points out, the chronology just doesn't fit with that explanation. The hyperinflation was already cured before the nazis got anywhere near power.
The "Germans" in Austria, the Sudetenland, and further east had never been in the "reich", unless you go back to the Holy Roman Empire at its peak. The idea that they all wanted to "return" to Germany was another nazi myth.
The nazi vote had already peaked and was falling again when they came to power.
All these factors played some part, doubtless, but I suspect the real reason was simply electoral weariness and endless orchestrated street violence. The nazis appeared to have answers to all real and imaginary problems, and lots of good people were happy to stand back and let them have a go.
They then proceeded to have a go at one unpopular group after another, until finally they were entrenched and it was too late.
Perhaps the allies' real fault was in humiliating and down-grading the armed forces, so that the only force actually capable of containing the nazis in fact was happy to connive with them.
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So is Farage:
(1) Heir to Margaret Thatcher; a conviction politician who will bring honesty back to politics, and will be the end of the wishy washy Tories?
(2) A loon whose day has come and will disappear again.
(3) Britain's Hitler, who will be eating Muslim babies etc. etc.
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4) Slightly out there, but serves to ensure that various views are given value.
We need people like Farage, and we need him scaring the government of the day, and entertaining the media.
We just don't need him running the country.
Also, for as long as people like Farage exist, you can be reasonably comfortable its still a free country. Some of the places I live, he'd have been shot by now.
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I'm inclined to agree, Mark, but a lot of people are rather more worried than that. So it makes me wonder whether I'm missing something.
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There are a LOT of enthusiastic followers of UKIP.
I suspect if we get another political corruption scandal - and odds on we will as MPs appear tooooooooo dumb to learn anything from the last one...then UKIP could win loads of seats.
Equally, however, UKIP could provide us with another scandal or twenty..
You don't need many supporters who oppose women wearing skirts.. trousers... tinyurl.com/am7q2df
Last edited by: madf on Thu 23 May 13 at 14:49
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If I were Cameron, I'd be very pleased to have UKIP stirring anti EU feeling when I was trying to renegotiate terms for remaining in the EU, and I suspect he is though I wouldn't expect him to say so. In any case he'll use it if he can.
The EU establishment has clearly had enough of opt outs and rebates for the rosbifs, and we need some leverage.
If we can get rid of the financial transaction tax it will be a good start.
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"The left loves failure. That way, the hordes of the slobocracy votes for them through both desperation and ignorance".
Comment filched from A.N. Other place.
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I see that the 'honourable' Patrick Mercer has resigned from the Conservative party. He won't resign as an MP, I guess, because he has his pension and his golden goodbye to consider.
A couple of days ago in the local press, I saw that one of the newly elected UKIP councillors has a rather questionable past as well. Is there any such thing as an HONOURABLE politician???
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Would you ever vote for someone that wants power?
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>> Would you ever vote for someone that wants power?
There's no one else to vote for Zero. Anyway what's the point of voting for a shrinking violet who won't try to play a part in making and maintaining law and the state?
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"Would you ever vote for someone that wants power?"
It's a real dilemma......
It's some years since I read 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' but, IIRC, the President of the Universe was a hermit living in a cave on a planet somewhere on the outer regions of a little-visited galaxy. It had been decided that anyone who actually wanted to be 'President of the Universe' would be too incompetent/self-serving/thieving etc to do the job properly and honestly ....... so the post was awarded to a bloke who didn't really want it.
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Cabinet ministers, shadow ministers and former cabinet ministers are entitled to the courtesy handle Right Honourable. I'm not absolutely sure but I think the younger untitled children of hereditary lords are entitled to call themselves 'The Honourable ... (name and surname).
Seldom used these days I think except by people trying to pass dodgy cheques or borrrow a fiver.
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>> Cabinet ministers, shadow ministers and former cabinet ministers are entitled to the courtesy handle Right
>> Honourable. I'm not absolutely sure but I think the younger untitled children of hereditary lords
>> are entitled to call themselves 'The Honourable ... (name and surname).
>>
The term Rt Hon relates to membership of the Privy Council. If I'm writing to a current or former Parliamentarian it's the work of seconds to check their name against the list of Privy Council members. Not limited to current or Shadow Ministers. The Liberal MP Sir Alan Beith is a Rt Hon for example.
On the wider question of fundamentally decent MP's I'd nominate Frank Field, Mo Mowlam, the above Frank Field, two local current/former MPs Brian Binley and Sally Keeble. Of those who achieved Cabinet rank I'd nominate Tony Newton, later Lord Newton of Braintree (who I met occasionally as a NHS trust Chair and Quango member), Sir George Young, Roy Hattersley and good old Wedgie Benn.
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>> On the wider question of fundamentally decent MP's I'd nominate Frank Field, Mo Mowlam, the
>> above Frank Field, two local current/former MPs Brian Binley and Sally Keeble. Of those who
Missed edit - for bolded Frank Field read Alan Beith.
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>> The term Rt Hon relates to membership of the Privy Council.
Guh... shows what a sieve my brain has become.
Did anyone mention fundamentally decent MPs? There must be more than that anyway.
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>> Did anyone mention fundamentally decent MPs? There must be more than that anyway.
Haywain mentioned the concept of an HONOURABLE MP. 'Fundamentally decent' was my interpretation of honourable.
There are of course many more but the way our media works means they never come to attention. so I'm limited to those I've met or who are glaring exceptions from the 'in it for themselves' meme.
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I was using 'honourable' as a term of sarcasm in this instance, but I'm sure I've heard the speaker/others refer to "the honourable member for xxxxxxxxxx".
I went off Frank Field when he was dithering about over Gordon Brown's ill-fated 10% tax fiasco. Brown managed to buy him off in the end.
As far as I'm concerned, that leaves Mo Mowlam - and she, sadly, is longer with us. It's getting a bit desperate , isn't it, when we can just about count the number of decent individuals on the fingers of one hand - and some of them are dead!
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>> On the wider question of fundamentally decent MP's I'd nominate Frank Field, Mo Mowlam, the
>> above Frank Field, two local current/former MPs Brian Binley and Sally Keeble. Of those who
>> achieved Cabinet rank I'd nominate Tony Newton, later Lord Newton of Braintree (who I met
>> occasionally as a NHS trust Chair and Quango member), Sir George Young, Roy Hattersley and
>> good old Wedgie Benn.
>>
....and Margaret Thatcher?
Depends on your definition of 'decent' of course, but if straightforward, true to the country, conviction, etc is in the definition....then she needs to be on that list.
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"....and Margaret Thatcher?"
I think you're right there, WP; Margaret Thatcher wasn't everybody's cup of tea (I'm from a coal-mining background) but I believe that she was honest. She's dead as well though, so we still haven't identified half a dozen honest live ones!
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Interesting, not perhaps a word I would use to describe it. Everytime I've heard it's author speak, it's been cringe worthy stuff.
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Dunno. Could be true I suppose.
Could it also be true that UKIP, the party and their politicians, are not quite as "different" from the traditional parties as they and their supporters make out?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23001529
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>> Its enough to make you weep....
I listened to the interview. It made me snigger. I am 75% convinced that 'Paul' is winding the interviewer up, but only by expressing quite common attitudes: the delusion that people have unspecified 'rights' and that these include the right not to show courteous deference to others, and the right to wave his curly, carefully-coiffed, lousy barnet over other people's food...
The fellow is 38 and has two 'grown-up' children. Their mother or mothers must have seen the twerp as a glamorous radical. Surely in those 38 years he must sometimes have experienced a powerful kick up the backside? If not he has had the luck of the devil.
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>> I am 75% convinced that 'Paul' is winding the interviewer up, but only by expressing quite common attitudes:
I suspect that you're correct. But it is the fact that the attitudes involved are "quite common" which makes me despair.
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Kind of following on from Alanovic's post, I don't really understand the outcry about tax avoidance.
If the law says these are the rules and you must pay tax according to them, and then someone/some company pays according to those rules, where's the problem?
If you want them to pay more tax, then change the rules.
But it would appear that people are getting upset because they feel people/companies should voluntarily pay more tax than the rules say they have to?
I reckon those protesters should lead by example....
Although I would change the rules and ensure they paid more appropriately, you can't revile them for following rules you've laid down yourself.
Evasion being, of course, a whole 'nother thing.
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>> Although I would change the rules and ensure they paid more appropriately, you can't revile
>> them for following rules you've laid down yourself.
Yes agreed, companies that avoid paying tax are merely following the tax rules.
>> Evasion being, of course, a whole 'nother thing.
>
Now there is a whole new ball game, and some companies may be blurring the boundary.
Starbucks for example, deliberately inflating the cost of royalties (paid out of country to a subsidiary in low tax state) to ensure the UK arm makes no profit.
Evasion or Avoidance?
Google, claiming all UK sales are made from Ireland, but in fact sales are made by salesman in the UK, but "booked" via the system in Ireland.
Evasion or Avoidance?
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Digital Equipment, and others for all I know, sold and shipped all software for any European country from Galway in Ireland to "avoid" tax. And that was in the 80s.
Starbucks should get audited, and I would expect auditor to request proof that the royalties were reasonable and consistent with other country payments or I'd nail them. Pretty much what they'd do to you if you were trying to claim for the cost of something.
Google should be audited and asked to show reasonably why that transaction should not be subject to UK Tax. As they would do to you or me.
I think we should change and toughen the rules, and I think tax audits should become a thing to be feared, not delegated to PWC because they're difficult to do.
Either that or pay the auditor on commission of tax collections. That'd liven things up.
But the wringing of hands needs to stop.
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Obama not on this Irish MP's Christmas card list...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIMucHfUMyg
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For those of you unfortunate to be working - chew on this and despair!
tinyurl.com/qzctn9r
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Why did that article not choose the wage that the majority are earning, ie under 41k a year?
Last edited by: Zero on Sat 29 Jun 13 at 15:56
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Ask the authors - The Centre for Policy studies.
Last edited by: Roger on Sat 29 Jun 13 at 15:57
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I'll ask you, why did you post a link to a misleading and unrepresentative article.
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Not sure what the gripe with Roger is, the chart is interesting, but Guido clearly doesn't understand what a marginal rate is - or he wouldn't say
"A middle-class single income family with 2 children and the father earning £50,001 will have a marginal tax rate of 59.5%. That means he works to provide for the state Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and only begins to provide for his wife and children on Thursday and Friday."
That implies a total tax rate of c. 60%, which isn't the case, Shirley?
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My grips is why provide the link at all, when its clearly chosen a very narrow parameter that looks bad, to try and make a wider point. The chart is not in the least bit interesting for that reason.
We could all scour the web and dump a shed load of "essentially made up facts"
Its perfectly reasonable to ask him why he chose that "essentially made up fact"
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As Manatee says the chart displays a fundamental misunderstanding of 'marginal tax rate'.
Either that or there's deliberate distortion.
The subject tax payer may. via the combined effect of higher rate tax and loss of Child Benefit gain less than 40p net from each pound he earns over £50k.
Income below the threshold and over his tax allowance is still taxed at 20p. Overall he works part of Monday for the taxman, the rest is his own.
He might of course reduce his taxable incmoe via salary sacrifice, say for a bike or childcare.
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I don't know much about the ins and out of the tax system.I still pay tax on my works pension which I find odd.
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>>He might of course reduce his taxable income via salary sacrifice, say for a bike or childcare.
Or by paying more into pension.
One of the problems Iain Dunkin' Donuts has with his welfare reforms is a bit similar. A single bod living in rented, with savings below the threshold, has no incentive to build up a £100 a week pension of their own - they'll lose 90% of in in reduced benefits.
That is a bigger problem IMO.
It's a useful chart actually, though that particular version is specific to single income 2 sprog families which is probably what Zero is objecting to.
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A lengthy but interesting modern parable:
The Squirrel and the Grasshopper
THE REST OF THE WORLD:
The squirrel works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building and improving his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.
Come winter, the squirrel is warm and well fed.
The shivering grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.
THE END
----------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------
THE BRITISH VERSION:
The squirrel works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.
Come winter, the squirrel is warm and well fed.
A social worker finds the shivering grasshopper, calls a press conference and demands to know why the squirrel should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others less fortunate, like the grasshopper, are cold and starving.
The BBC shows up to provide live coverage of the shivering grasshopper; with cuts to a video of the squirrel in his comfortable warm home with a table laden with food. The British press inform people that they should be ashamed that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so, while others have plenty.
The Labour Party, Greenpeace, Animal Rights and The Grasshopper Council of Great Britain demonstrate in front of the squirrel's house. The BBC, interrupting a cultural festival special from Notting Hill with breaking news, broadcasts a multi cultural choir singing "We Shall Overcome"; Ken Livingstone rants in an interview with Trevor McDonald that the squirrel has gotten rich off the backs of grasshoppers, and calls for an immediate tax hike on the squirrel to make him pay his "fair share" and increases the charge for squirrels to enter inner London.
In response to pressure from the media, the Government drafts the Economic Equity and Grasshopper Anti Discrimination Act, retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The squirrel's taxes are reassessed. He is taken to court and fined for failing to hire grasshoppers as builders for the work he was doing on his home and an additional fine for contempt when he told the court the grasshopper did not want to work.
The grasshopper is provided with a council house, financial aid to furnish it and an account with a local taxi firm to ensure he can be socially mobile.
The squirrel's food is seized and re distributed to the more needy members of society, in this case the grasshopper.
Without enough money to buy more food, to pay the fine and his newly imposed retroactive taxes, the squirrel has to downsize and start building a new home. The local authority takes over his old home and utilises it as a temporary home for asylum seeking cats who had hijacked a plane to get to Britain as they had to share their country of origin with mice.
On arrival they tried to blow up the airport because of Britain's apparent love of dogs.
The cats had been arrested for the international offence of hijacking and attempt bombing but were immediately released because the police fed them pilchards instead of salmon whilst in custody.
Initial moves to then return them to their own country were abandoned because it was feared they would face death by the mice.
The cats devise and start a scam to obtain money from peoples credit cards.
A Panorama special shows the grasshopper finishing up the last of the squirrel's food, though Spring is still months away, while the council house he is in, crumbles around him because he hasn't bothered to maintain it.
He is shown to be taking drugs.
Inadequate government funding is blamed for the grasshopper's drug 'illness'.
The cats seek recompense in the British courts for their treatment since arrival in the UK.
The grasshopper gets arrested for stabbing an old dog during a burglary to get money for his drug habit.
He is imprisoned but released immediately because he has been in custody for a few weeks and is placed in the care of the probation service to monitor and supervise him.
Within a few weeks he has killed a guinea pig in a botched robbery.
A commission of enquiry, that will eventually cost £10,000,000 and state the obvious, is set up.
Additional money is put into funding a drug rehabilitation scheme for grasshoppers and legal aid for lawyers representing asylum seekers is increased.
The asylum seeking cats are praised by the government for enriching Britain's multicultural diversity and dogs are criticised by the government for failing to befriend the cats.
The grasshopper dies of a drug overdose.
The usual sections of the press blame it on the obvious failure of government to address the root
causes of despair arising from social inequity and his traumatic experience of prison.
They call for the resignation of a minister.
The cats are paid a million pounds each because their rights were infringed when the government failed to inform them there were mice in the United Kingdom.
The squirrel, the dogs and the victims of the hijacking, the bombing, the burglaries and robberies have to pay an additional percentage on their credit cards to cover losses, their taxes are increased to pay for law and order and they are told that they will have to work beyond 65 because of a shortfall in government funds.
THE END
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You forgot to say that it's an illegal immigrant grasshopper! ;-)
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An interesting interview with UKIP leader Nigel Farage on Radio 5 Live:
Starts 6 mins in www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0368qjy/Victoria_Derbyshire_05_07_2013/
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Politics/putting the world to rights thread. Vol 6 - madf
