Big Business rules the World

“We are not hostile to Corporations; we are merely determined that they shall be so handled as to subserve the public good.” – Theodore Roosevelt

I’m 1902, President Teddy Roosevelt and his Attorney General at the time, shocked both the Republican Party and the Country on the whole by announcing it’s intention to sue J.P.Morgan’s Northern Securities Company for breaching the Sherman Anti-Trust act. President Roosevelt did not particularly care about the actual breaching of a largely pointless act, he wanted instead to show the Country that the office of President was more powerful than the Office of a banker. He wanted to show that power of the public could not be bought or sold. It was a symbol against the power of private companies, even more so because Morgan ha contributed to campaigns Roosevelt had run in the past. It was an ingenious way of letting big business know “You can contribute all you want, but you do not own power over the public.”

Lately, whenever I turn the TV on, I see an advert, warning people that “we’re coming to get to you”. This is aimed at benefit cheats, it features a neighbour of a lady cheating benefits, calling the office. My instant reaction was “wow, much like when the Nazis asked people to inform them if they lived next door to a Jew.” I simply do not get upset and annoyed by benefit cheats. It doesn’t affect me. In fact, whenever I hear of a single mum struggling on the income she has, to feed her family, I would advise her to cheat the system a bit. Perhaps it’s a little controversial. My stance on this will also annoy people. But I refuse to let any take the moral high ground on the issue of scrounging a little extra cash to feed a poor family, when the tax payer has paid for a mass of Corporate bonuses over the past year, through Governments that metaphorically masturbate the big business men.

John Thain, the last Chairman of Merrill Lynch, who after destroying the company, begged for a $10million bonus, managed to secure $15million from the Bank of America bail out fund; taxpayers money. Within a month, he had offered employees of Merrill Lynch bonuses as much as $4million. He then spent $1.2million of tax payers money on redecorating his office. Thain is working at The Bank of America. Why aren’t the Governments of the World “coming to get” Thain? Surely using $1.2million of public money is a hell of lot worse than a single mum needing the extra £20 she’s “stolen” to feed her kids? Businessmen are exempt from the law.

Fox News, in particular Bill O’Reilly in 2005 began a campaign for America to boycott France, for no other reason than the fact that France are not America’s bitches. O’Reilly claimed that France had damaged America a considerable amount. And so all Americans should boycott French products. In comparison, O’Reilly doesn’t seem to have a problem with America’s destructive relationship with those great proponents of Democracy, the Saudi Royal Family. Could this be anything to do with business deals? If France had a decent supply of Oil reserves, O’Reilly would be inviting us all to his French themed birthday party in celebration of how wonderful France is.

The UK Government has strong ties to the aviation industry. They are, in essence, in the pockets of BAA and Virgin. Misleading figures and the decrediting of leading scientists who disagree and have the evidence to back it up, in order to advance their own agenda, aviation gets billions of pounds of taxpayers money, to keep prices low. BA has claimed to be taking steps to be pro-green in the future, and yet it keeps demanding extra terminals and runways. The BA website claims “Introducing a third runway at Heathrow won’t increase the overall level of carbon emissions in the atmosphere.” Clearly, that’s a lie, and impossible. There is no way that they are helping the environment rather than maximising profits. And the Government gave into them on Heathrow’s third runway.

Recently, the house of Lords has been the subject of much publicity. Four Labour Lords are accused of agreeing to accept £120,000 in exchange for changing to law to suit the person paying the money. Public policy influenced by the money of outside “donors”? No shit! The only difference between the four Lords at the centre of this scandal, and most other politicians, is that these four happened to get caught.

David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party claimed that Lords who misbehaved should be punished. Cameron himself refused to criticise the bosses of Bradford and Bingley after they systematically destroyed the company and can be partly held accountable for the mess our finance system is in today. Cameron told the BBC… “What you won’t hear from me this week is the sort of easy cheap lines beating up on the market system, bashing financiers.” So he’s quite happy to cycle to work, to prove he’s dedicated to climate change whilst his work suit is chauffeur driven in the Mercedes behind him for cheap publicity, but he wont criticise people who have destroyed the banking system? There must be a reason….. ah yes…. The bosses over at Bradford and Bingley are among the chief contributors to the Conservative Party since Cameron took over as leader. What a beautiful coincidence.

The BBC reported a story in 2003 regarding Coca Cola, poisoning a water supply in India. Coca Cola have not been prosecuted for human rights violations, which they should be. Nor has anything been made out of the story that Coke have been draining a water supply from a village in India to fuel their prosperity, whilst living hundreds of local villagers without water. Coke tried to make up for it by sending a truck to the village with the bare minimum amount of water. To me, that’s a disgrace. Local farming had to be abandoned, even though it was thriving up until Coca Cola decided it would impose it’s will and steal the water. Coca Cola is accused of even more…. dumping it’s waste in riverbed, containing lead and cadmium, which can cause cancer, and attacks the nervous system of children. When will someone stand up and say that the disgusting chase for profit, is not worth this? When will a Politician stand up to these disgusting people? They wont…. because big business like Coca Cola are much more powerful than the Governments of our Countries.

I have a deep problem with the Party funding system itself. No body donates a huge amount of money to a political party, out of the good will of their heart. More often than not, they want something in return. The government should not be privately run. It inevitably leads to scandals like the Cash for honours debaucle that plagued the end of the Blair administration.

Where have the Roosevelts of the World disappeared? Why have our governments been hijacked by weak men dedicated to the promotion of Big Business. Big Business runs the World.
Nobody seems to care that business is allowed to profit from war. Shouldn’t that be regulated? No one should be allowed to make money out of death and misery in the perverse way that Halliburton and KBR have. Dick Cheney received $36million in compensation when he left Halliburton in 2000. An extra $1million in deferred compensation followed. In 2004, he’d been awarded an extra $398,000 from Halliburton. KBR, affiliated with Halliburton, has made over $33million from the war on terror, and built Guantanamo Bay detention centre. It all stinks horribly corrupt. Both companies, have strong ties to Dick Cheney, the Vice President in the Bush Administration. Conflict of interest, between an Oil company, and the American public, during a war with a nation rife with Oil rich lands? It isn’t a conspiracy, it’s Modern Politics. It’s just how it is.

It will be of no shock to you, that I believe those like Dick Cheney and John Thain among others, should have a very long prison sentence ahead of them, not a lovely big pay packet to see them through the rest of their lives. They are criminals. Nothing more.

If Capitalists truly want the Government to keep out of Private affairs, then big business should take it’s own advice and stay out of public affairs. Big business, as we’ve seen with the War for Oil in Iraq, seeks only to maximise profit at the expense of animals, the environment, the future of the planet, and humanity. It should be Governments job to stop the trial of destruction big business leaves, before it gets out of hand. This cannot happen whilst those who need to destroy the planet in order to be able to afford a new yaht at the end of the quarter, pay for candidates to be elected officials on their behalf. The government is private.

“Wherever in any business the prosperity of the businessman is obtained by lowering the wages of his workmen and charging an excessive price to the consumers we wish to interfere and stop such practices. We will not submit to that kind of prosperity.” – Theodore Roosevelt

We already know!

So it would seem, that last week in British Politics became decidedly boring. This in turn, meant the BBC had very little to report. Which meant, it’s editors were forced to submit articles to the Politics section of the BBC News website, that appear to have been posted by Captain Obvious.

Take this article, referring to the leader of the Liberal Democrat’s Nick Clegg’s claims on the Andrew Marr show, that The Tories offer nothing different to pull Britain through tough economic change.
Clegg is quoted as saying … “I don’t believe for a moment that a Conservative government will take radical action to make the tax system fairer.” … As if we didn’t already know this. Firstly, they aren’t called Conservatives for no reason. Radical isn’t really in their vocabulary. Secondly, when the word “Radical” does breach Conservative Security, the Country ends up with a Thatcher. I cannot imagine anyone in the Country other than the greedy bankers she spawned, would want to see radical Conservatives again.
Clegg wasn’t finished with the obvious statements. He went on to suggest that a Tory Government would not help those on middle or lower incomes. Again, did he really need to make that point? Does anyone seriously believe a Conservative Government who have pledged to simply do nothing productive for the less advantaged in Society during this long horrible recession, are the best choice for those struggling the most?
The Conservative Party Website says… “Our welfare programme will be delivered by private and voluntary providers, who will only be paid when someone gets and keeps a job.
Combined with our commitment to end the couple penalty in the tax credits system, our radical welfare plans will help lift almost half a million children out of poverty.”…. Private Welfare? Delivered by those out for profit? Not only can I see that pushing more people into poverty given that they pledge to not raise minimum wage, but I foresee that parents will feel forced to work longer hours, meaning that work becomes more important than family. The Tories will never help poor families. We do not need Mr Clegg to point that out.

Late 2008, Goldman Sachs asked for a $7,000,000,000 bail out. They put $6,000,000,000 aside for bonuses, according to The Guardian. It defended it’s bonuses by suggesting bonuses are needed to attract the best people. The best people, who seemingly lost £1.4bn for the fourth-quarter of 2008. I’m quite happy to lose that much money for a company, if it means a hefty bonus at the end. Bring it on.
Similarly, according to The Daily Mail, between 2003 and 2007, Sir Fred Goodwin, boss of Rbos received £15.5million in pay and bonuses, and Eric Daniels of Lloyds TSB received £10.2million.
The housing market boom, seeing prices pushed for modest properties, way beyond the £1million mark, is estimated to have been worth an incredible £5.5bn according to Savills, in London, by City Bonus buyers alone. Greed. Nothing more than pure Greed. So why has it taken so long for an MP to stand up and critise this greed culture. Lord Myners told The Times, that “The golden days of huge bonuses are over” and that “grossly over-rewarded” executives must shoulder some of the blame for the global recession. In short, right winged economic policy, the concept that deregulated… “the markets will save the World!!” is so horribly overestimating the power of the greedy minority who rule the World. Lord Myners went on to uncover himself as Captain Obvious, with this “Let us be quite clear: there has been mismanagement of our banks.” No shit.

Whenever I watch Parliament, in particular Prime Minister’s Questions, it strikes me as inconceivable how little Parliament is actually allowed to scrutinise Whitehall. It does not matter how many time the Prime Minister is asked a question, he will never answer it truthfully, and he will try his very hardest to sneak around the question. And yet, The BBC seems to think it’s a story worth telling that the Prime Minister wont answer MPs questions adequately. As if it’s shocking. As if we didn’t already know they do this. According to the BBC citing The Ministerial Code, Members of the Government should be…….” as open as possible with Parliament and the public, refusing to provide information only when disclosure would not be in the public interest“…. and yet quite evidently, they aren’t, in fact, they couldn’t be further from that rule if they tried.
We know that Labour is incredibly out of touch, we know that they have very little support, we know they do themselves very little favours when they try to block calls for more transparency and scrutiny, like the full disclosure of MPs allowances under the Freedom of Information act, which Harriet Harman has been using the most ridiculous legal jargon to postpone quite tragically for Democracy, as long as possible. But it goes even deeper into the realms of the hypocritical and ridiculous when Labour’s Deputy commons leader Chris Bryant tells the BBC that openness is vital in Parliament.
Norman Baker goes on to, according to the BBC “accuse Mr Brown of using stock excuses to avoid answering questions“. Is this really a story? The entire country knows just how slimey Politicians are when it comes to the truth. You just have to sit watching Prime Ministers questions to know this.

Captain Obvious has been busy, neatly suggesting that the title of this blog “futile Democracy” isn’t as radical a claim as first may seem.

President Barack Obama

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“To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.” – President Obama

My grandparents claim to have felt the hope that echoed around the World when John F Kennedy became the President of the USA way back in 1960, from as far away as we are in the United Kingdom. The glimour of hope that change had come, that the World super power was not in the firm control of the Business elite, and the anguish and sorrow they felt when they heard of Kennedy’s assasination. They both say that the feeling of hope rekindled was evident in their minds yesterday at the inauguration of President Barack Obama.

Sky News played a video this morning of an interview with a Black American child. The interviewer asked what the election of President Obama meant to him, the child said…
“It means that when people see a black man on TV, they won’t see only a criminal or an athlete. They’ll see a president, a lawyer or a doctor.” – How beautiful and powerful can one child’s voice be? This voice, this single sentence, encapsulates a new America spectacularly.

In the hearts of those of us who have become disillusioned with America, (which includes Democrats, and the entire World, apart from the Republicans) hateful of the Bush Administration, sick of out dated intolerant Republican policies, it was a monumentous occasion to witness the end of such intolerance, not just with a new administration, but with an African American President who less than a century ago, would have been banned from sitting on the same bus as the white man.

Often i’ll be searching online blogs and come across those of cynical Republicans who have already condemned Obama to political hell, judging his legacy before it’s even begun, purely because he’s a democrat. Ridiculous comments like “He’s socialist“, when Socialism is about as far from Obama as a word could be, “He wont hand over his birth certificate“… as if they don’t adequately vet a potential senator and President before they take the job. “His middle name….. Hussain….. like Sadam….. AARRRGH!!!“…this one speaks for itself. “He refuses to swear on the bible, proving he’s a muslim“…. as if it matters what faith a man is.
All of this before the inauguration, even though he did in fact swear on the Bible. Republican smear tactics, tactics of an extremist party with extremist views, and who put forward an extremist candidate for Vice President. It was hope versus continued fear, and hope presided, thankfully. Why wont those same Republican Bloggers admit that their President over the past eight years has achieved nothing short of criminal, and should be taking the place of those at Guantanamo.

Aside from the policies Obama has which are right, good, and above all, hopeful for a country that has relied too long on the reckless behaviour of the wealthy, it’s the symbol that is enduring and so attractive. The symbol of a new World based not on the colour of somebodies skin. The symbol that you do not have to be somehow affiliated with Oil production to be welcomed into Washington. The symbol that the last eight years is dead, and a new era based not on fear or on hidden corruption and lies is replaced by intergrity, human decency, and kindness. It’s a symbol that becomes increasingly difficult to avoid buying in to. I certainly buy into it fully. I do not expect Obama to be a sort of Jesus-like figure, like some do. I merely welcome the departure of the destructive nature of Republican Conservativism. It has to be fair to say that the Republicans, who have spent eight years killing, silencing, looting Nations for nothing more than individual wealth whilst all the time letting Americans know that if you feel guilty that America is causing so much pain and suffering across the planet, then you’re not a true American, is over. Already, my faith in the most powerful nation on Earth is slowly renewing.

For the past eight years, or four years at least, it’s been difficult to envisage a time when “President Bush” was no more. The moment Obama was sworn in, his speech; his passion for what he was saying, inspired a smile from me, knowing it marked the end of the Bush regime so beautifully and eloquently, it rolled back the policies of the past eight years. The speech needed to renew hope and faith in America, it did just that.

BBC News interviewed a Republican voting couple in their home in Kansas. Their home, was a 200 acre land, sixteen room house, who claimed to be “struggling“. The lady they interviewed, was speaking to them from her library. I thought to myself, this is the legacy that has died today, the stupidity of people like this, the absolute nerve of these kinds of people to claim to be “struggling“. The BBC did it beautifully with the voice over man saying “We interviewed the family from their 200 acre property, that they really don’t need.” That alone, embodies the passions of the Left.

As I sat watching the inauguration, I could not emit the image from my mind, of the Black Panthers, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali dumping his Olympic medals because they wanted to send him to war yet wouldn’t let him sit on the same bus as a white man, Rosa Parks, and all those who suffered the wrath of the Ku Klux Klan, the slaves who built the White House, the thousands of black Americans who have struggled for equality across America over the generations. Yesterday, was the greatest day in the history of black America, and a day that will be remembered forever.

The election of President Obama is not about one man. History alone will judge the substance of his Presidency. The election of President Obama is a symbol. A symbol of how far America has come. How America does not need to be all about slamming an iron fist across the World, that love and hope is not dead, that the Republican Party has not indoctrinated the American public in intolerance, disunity and callous individualism.

When it was all over, Obama was stood with his wife and children, the new occupants of the White house, smiling gleefully at the future, after a speech that should be carved into stone, it pained me to see them walk off without turning to George Bush and say “You do not have to say anything unless you wish to do so, whatever you do say will be used as evidence in court”….. maybe one day.

Still, Did the BBC really need to tell me what roads in Washington were closed today? My car barely gets me to Tesco in Wigston.