Comments on: Clegg’s Liberal Moment?

By: Jack Hughes

Jack Hughes — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 05:09:27 +0000

Re: “Something must be done”

This is so horribly vague and it’s also passive voice. Who ? What When ? Why ? How ?

Albert Einstein once said: “If I had an hour to save the world
I would spend 59 minutes defining the problem and one minute finding solutions”

Over to you guys to define the “problem” with the environment.

By: James

James — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 07:23:13 +0000

Meeting binding climate change targets won’t require some kind of democratic centralism or five year plans. There are plenty of ways to skin this cat (apologies to the laser kitties).

And, re the Flandersism query above, what would you actually do?

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 06:52:02 +0000

Which is precisely why I said it depends how you’re defining productive. Of course one of the things reiterated in this pamphlet is the desire to stop the poorest paying income tax altogether…

By: Roger Thornhill

Roger Thornhill — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 22:54:53 +0000

Andrew, who is talking anout the rich? Pepple on minimum wage are taxed.

Even if I were, your stance Shows your blinkered prejudices and ignorance of how an economy functions.

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 15:26:32 +0000

How are you defining ‘productive’, Roger? Because as far as I can tell many of the richest people are some of the *least* productive members of society…

By: Roger Thornhill

Roger Thornhill — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 15:24:00 +0000

Internationalism is fine as long as it is non-binding. Once that happens (q.v. EU, UN) then sovereignty leaks away into unaccountable cesspools.

But back to Clegg – the problem is the vague word “fair”. Fair to me is equal treatment under Rule of Law. Clegg says fine words, but the Authoritarian, nay, Totalitarian devil is in the detail. Is it fair to take from the productive to give to the unproductive without consent? How about if those who produce decide where it goes?

As for “social radicalism in schools” – how about “get your bad haircut out of my school”? A liberal who wants to interfere so much is basically an Authoritarian-Totalitarian who wants to be loved.

By: Julian H

Julian H — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 14:04:45 +0000

“Clearly it’s more helpful to, for example, tackle illegal arms dealing on an international basis as opposed to a local basis”

I’d have thought that’s because national governments are the biggest buyers and sellers of arms by a country mile.

Overall I agree with your point, though – I’m happy with large, international institutions – or at least would be if they were constitutionally limited to stop remote politicians and bureaucrats imposing vested-interest-suiting rules over all of us.

By: Thomas Byrne

Thomas Byrne — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 13:21:48 +0000

I don’t know about you James, but our Schooling Policy, and International Aid Policy, sitting alongside the Lib Dems ‘fairness’ (Making cuts for the rich as well as the poor) and social liberalism sits pretty well with me.

By: James Graham

James Graham — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 11:54:15 +0000

Clegg doesn’t talk about who he would or would not make pacts with in this pamphlet and the emphasis is on replacing Labour not working with them. But the subtext of placing the Conservatives as The Enemy and Labour mere rivals is inescapable. You can’t claim the mantle of “progressivism” while sitting pretty in Cabinet with David Cameron.

You only really need the introduction and the conclusion by the way. Most of the chapters merely restate policy.

By: Charlotte Gore

Charlotte Gore — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 11:29:34 +0000

Alix,

Yes, I agree with you that certain international action is always essential – mutual free trade agreements being the obvious one.

It’s the Green thing – the solutions offered so far are economic planning. The idea of that being organised centrally on an international level is chilling, not least of which because if the result of such economic planning is economic disaster then the greater the number of countries under the control of the governing body, the worse things will be for everyone.