threegee

Yeah, I fell for the Tobin Tax idea too. But since listening to a few people in-the-know (and one of them is Unswervin' Mervin) it's sadly not going to work. A classic case of too good to be true; somewhere the books have to balance, and someone has to pay the bill. I still remain to be persuaded that a straight levy on liquidity the banks create is not a bad idea. It seems crazy to me that licencing them to print money - and thus make huge profits with it - is not something the public purse shouldn't derive some large benefit from. Apparently revenue producing licences for semi-monopolistic activities are only for things like struggling community radio stations. Steven still seems to think that this problem is one of a few bad banks. It's not, it's systemic! Lehman sailed only very slightly closer to the wind than many, and the banks were only doing what banks do. If you are going to regulate them at all then you have at least to understand what you are regulating. It was a failure to understand what was going on, and a delusion that the economy could walk on water. Both in the failure and in the delusion our own Mr B had a rather big hand. Remember "an end to boom and bust"? Remember Mr Toast of the City, and how we were all in this together at the Lord Mayor's bean-feast? Our future was in financial services and the new globalnomics meant we could leave the getting-hands-dirty stuff to the minions in the Far East. Global problem? Certainly not from where the guardians of China's countless billions stand! But hopefully, to them, we're too big (customers) to let fail! I dunno about the fat-cat stuff. I think good old socialist envy comes into this argument at some point. On the other hand where is real capitalism and healthy competition in all this when failure is so generously rewarded? Brown/Darling must go, the quicker the better; the FSA is a joke and needs scrapping, put the light-touch regulation back in the hands of the B of E - the only one of the three institutions that seems to have the slightest grasp of what is really going on. Greece is a basket case; they (both major parties) are apparently demanding that the Germans get them out of the mess by paying war reparations. Now that's a way of persuading your only friend that has a thick enough wallet, that you've come to your senses, and will not over indulge in future! Especially when it seems that Germany did pay them quite substantial reparations way back when. Turkey in the EU? Didn't WE invade them at one point?

New Labour promises us "A future fair for all" if they win the election. Where should this "fair" be held? Nominations here: .....

I challenge anyone local to get a perfect score in this "Level: Easy" BBC quiz to teach foreigners correct English pronunciation. http://www.bbc.co.uk...ron/quiz/quiz1/ Toffee-nosed gits!!

I'm not sure I know what you mean by " the market always acts in ways to enhance its own validity, be that up or down." The fact is there were countless billions in "toxic debt" swilling around. That means that it had been through so many hands and so many transformations (all on margin) that no one knew where it actually came from, and at what point a default would ensue. When people finally woke up to the fact that a lot of the stuff was tied to people who had been mis-sold houses they couldn't afford, and worse fraudulent mortgage applications, the whole pack of cards started to collapse. This was a massive failure of regulation, both by our FSA and the Fed in the US. The banks were only doing what they'd always done - making money by moving bits of paper around. It is not and never has been a global problem. Not even a European problem; theirs is tied to other factors touched on in the SocGen bit above; though we have undoubtedly contaminated them. If you are arguing that no bank should ever be allowed to fail, then by all means nationalise them, because there's no point in them being limited companies. You've removed the moral hazard that makes capitalism work - and work well - for the benefit of everyone. But that's no guarantee that the same thing won't happen under state ownership, and it practically guarantees inefficiency and waste. If a problem of this scale were to happen under state ownership it would take the country down with it. And, through Brown/Darling's mismanagement it may yet do so to the UK. Certainly one thing is clear - you can't increase the money supply on the scale that has already been done without roaring inflation breaking out. That's a very strange thing to say at a time of record low interest rates; it sounds counter intuitive. But this *is* going to happen before too long. Pity is that it looks like it's going to happen on another watch to that of the people who caused it!

Lehman didn't implode the market Malc - the market did it for Lehman. As I explained earlier something had to go. All the merchant banks were under the same strain of circulating dodgy debt. A decision was taken to support other banks but not support Lehman Bros. But we had pre-warning over here and it was ignored. Letting NR go would have provided the requisite bloodletting and moral hazard; it would also have done it earlier, and today's taxpayer debt mountain would not be quite so high. As the crack slowly progressed and much bigger RBS failed, Darling did not act in the public interest as claimed. In publishing the then exchange of memos (why do these things always have to be leaked) between him and the BoE this week, the FT has done a public service. In these it is made very clear that the mandarins at the BoE foresaw major problems and risk in stepping in, and were effectively warning him not to. His reply illustrates that he didn't really understand what was going on. To me it also says that he put politics before prudence, and isn't a fit person to be in charge of our finances. Gordon Brown's single still-standing claim to anything pretending to be economic competence is that he gave control of interest rates to the BoE to stop them being used as the former political lever. Yet here - when it really counted - the BoE's prudence has been undermined for political gain in a much more fundamental way.

You're nicked for airspace violation! - C.A.A. "Merseyside Police said they had been unaware they needed a licence to fly..." http://news.bbc.co.u...ide/8517726.stm

Confused - what's facebook? Anyone seen my Filofax?

This whole Olympics thing is a lousy piece of marketing. In Winter I want to see sun and sand, in Summer I want to see cool. Therefore the Olympics should always be held in the Southern Hemisphere. Permanent Olympic villages somewhere in South America; look at the money saved! You know it makes sense!

Why don't you write to local business and offer them free advertising in the first year to the value of any contribution? In hard times that has to be an easier proposition than an outright gift. Plus of course an entry on the eternal roll of honour of those that got our community radio off the ground. It would be as interesting to see who didn't appear on that as who did! In fact stick the proposition up here too. Andy will doubtless run your display ads on the banner engine.

The Monsta Mail: "most the trees have gone because man chopped them down" The Times: http://www.timesonli...ticle637004.ece Discover how many trees there are in the World here: http://wiki.answers....re_in_the_world

Euro Area Headed for Break-Up, SocGen's Edwards Says "according to Societe Generale SA's top-ranked strategist Albert Edwards.... Even if governments' could slash their fiscal deficits, the lack of competitiveness within the euro zone needs years of relative (and probably given the outlook elsewhere, absolute) deflation. Any help given to Greece merely delays the inevitable break-up of the euro zone.” Not going to go down too well with the euro-at-any-price politicians that one then. Lehman failed Stephen because the particularly nasty CEO rubbed too many people up the wrong way. Someone HAD to be thrown to the wolves, and the old boy network didn't need much prompting as to who. If NR had been allowed to go the UK situation wouldn't have got quite as bad, and the taxpayer wouldn't be in for quite such a staggering bill. No one would have missed a piddling little regional BS that had got above itself, was being run by idiots, and had near disconnected with its customer base. The small guys would have been fully protected at a tiny fraction of the cost - if any at all - to the taxpayer. And the big boys would have got their comeuppance. Instead the big boys were rewarded for their folly, and the small guys get to pick up the massive bill - though this will be well hidden, and spread over years if not decades. In any form of capitalism companies have got to be allowed to fail. If there's a structural problem you don't paper over the cracks, you pull down and build afresh. The market is pretty good at this if left well alone, but politicians are allowed to meddle, so they do. Meanwhile the final tab just keeps on growing. Essentially what SocGen is saying there.

No, it would be the plant life that would grow in arid regions when we spend just a tiny fraction of what is being proposed on carbon capture on irrigation to grow plant crops to feed starving people. Read the whole thing! There's a job for you with the IPCC, picking what suits you, quoting it out of context, and completely ignoring the rest! "most the trees have gone because man chopped them down" - now there's a scientific fact! Who's allotment would this be on? Been to Kielder recently? The problem with bees is a mystery, there's nothing to connect it with pesticides, and some beekeepers report no problem. Not that trees or bees have anything to do with the subject of this thread. But ask yourself how, if we can't discover what is going on right now with bees flying under our noses, we can predict the climate decades in advance with enough confidence to spend countless billions of pounds on carbon capture in an attempt to change it. The fact is that last night's weather forecast for today has been drastically revised, and they are still pretending that they can predict it five days in advance! But hey, that is weather, and we are talking climate. With climate 15 years is just a statistical blip - except when it's a 15 years the IPCC says is climate and not weather. If this year is particularly warm, this will absolutely prove m.m. global warming. One in sixteen should be good enough for anyone. If it's cool then it will be a small part of an ongoing statistical blip. If the statistical blip extends another 15 years we'll declare a draw - insufficient data - further research needed - you didn't properly fund the research, and retire on our inflated pensions. Win win for the IPCC and it's ever increasing budget. But, no more megabucks for researching the ozone layer; no more "hole in the ozone layer" - get the connection? No, you're too young.

Now which organisation would that be? The whole mass hysteria seems to be predicated on the "hockey stick" thing. Would that it is warming up a bit on a permanent basis. Lives will be saved; more food will be grown; less fossil fuels used for heating; etc. etc. Where is the downside to a bit of warming? You can only create a doom and disaster scenario if there's a sudden non-linear take off. So of course you have to invent a computer model which predicts just this. All the records show that no such rapid change has ever taken place in the entire 4 billion year history of the Earth, and that there's a natural mechanism built in to limit the Earth's temperature to just under 25c. And that's despite all the cataclysms the Universe has thrown at it. Granted, 25c is a fair bit warmer than today, but what a gloriously fertile and productive Earth that would be. Lots of extra CO2 would be consumed by the plant life too (self-regulation again). Exactly the conditions that led to mammals and the human race in the first place! In other words if it hadn't been for a warmer Earth we wouldn't be here today. But the tree-huggers need another lever. We are told that the people in the Sahara are going to be fried in order to fuel our greed. But hang on, the Sahara has only been there for a couple of thousand years! Was the encroachment of the desert into formerly very fertile land due to the internal combustion engine and industrialisation? The point is that if such a thing were ever to happen as the "hockey stick effect" the ludicrous (and totally unfordable) sums proposed for carbon capture would feed, clothe, house, and air-condition just about any afflicted area of the earth many times over. And, we'd then be spending money at a point of real need, not throwing it at something which will in all common sense never happen. When people on our Earth are still starving it's totally immoral to be proposing such hair brained schemes as carbon capture, and to promote the silliness of carbon trading. Where's the money for irrigation which would really help these starving peoples? That irrigation BTW would be massively carbon negative, and there's a case that it would be more than economically neutral. What are we going to do with the carbon we capture? Oh yes, bury it underground! Could it be that there's no reason to fund such an obvious, compassionate and moral thing as ensuring the starving people of the world can grow their own food on a decent scale, because it doesn't suit anyone's hidden agenda? What's at the root of all this is an alliance of convenience between the green lobby, a small group of bent "scientists" out for their jollies, and sound-bite politicians. Journalists and teachers do have more than their fair share of the agin-any-sort-of-progress mob, so the hoodwinking and indoctrination can continue. You and I both know that none of this crap would have got past our forefathers. They may not have had the level of education of people today, but they did have good old horse-sense.

Climategate U-turn as scientist at centre of row admits: There has been no global warming since 1995 Someone needs to point this out to the Great Thought Lords at the Beeb. Their excuse for stifling all debate is that it has been settled! Maybe there's another IPCC we haven't been told about? Thought: If there was an IPSC (International Panel for Santa Claus), would it have proving Santa Claus was a fiction on its agenda?

It can't be North Terrace because if you look at the shadows they are coming from the South toward the back-doors. And it isn't Shiney Row either (which I initially thought it was) for exactly the same reason. The only one of the long rows with the backs facing that way would be Doctor Terrace. Also if you look right down at the end you can see a large building on the other side of the Glebe Road. That would be the stores (Moores Stores?). An old map would confirm that alignment. I know for a fact that the numbers on Shiney ran from low nearest the Dr Pit, to high at the Glebe Road end. Assuming this was true for all three of the major rows, then this has to be the lower numbers. Lets guess at the teens for now, though it could conceivably be single figures. 1951 says Cympil. Time of day looks about noon. It would be possible to pin that down to about 15 minutes, and have a pretty good stab at the month too.

Thing is this isn't a recession of the type any of us has been through. Those are a bit painful, but things inevitably bounce back in a year or two or three. It's actually a 21st century style depression. We got in this mess through constantly failing to face up to the consequences of overspending. This doesn't need explaining to anyone who has run a real business or even balanced a household budget. But when you attempt to write your own rules, as GB has (even though we've never been favoured with a set-in-stone explanation as to what those five rules actually are) and know no real restraints, then the result is inevitable. More inevitable than the final result of the MPs determining their own allowable expenses. Blunder one was spend-spend-spend through boom; blunder two was simply refusing to recognise it was a boom and extending "the economic cycle" to whatever fitted the convenience of the day. Blunder three was interventionism - remember that of-no-account building society with incompetent management that should have been allowed to fail. Rescuing NR sent all the wrong messages to the big boys. A huge mistake to throw tax payers money at it. And worse: Darling still pats himself on the back that it was the right thing to do! You're right about "neo liberal style economics". The solution to the failure of regulation is apparently more regulation. No mention that the regulation which failed was at heart the self-regulation of the politicians themselves. And the solution to being massively over-borrowed is more borrowing: http://news.bbc.co.u...ess/8513650.stm Today the solution to unemployment is less employment - I though I must have misheard that on the BBC, but no a 21 hour week is being seriously advocated by one quango or another! As Ferguson has pointed out roaring inflation is now locked in to the system. When it does break out you'd better not be on a fixed income, or indeed live in a community that is near dependant on fixed government handouts. There's a cruel symmetry built into this, in that many of those who put this bunch of self-serving incompetents into power are going to be the hardest hit. Who will they blame? Well, certainly not themselves!

Heavyweight economist Prof. Niall Ferguson has just published an article in the FT titled A Greek crisis is coming to America - the title of which might say it all, except that the article goes on to conclude: I'm convinced that his lecture last year in Westminster Hall has a something to do with the unprecedented numbers of MP's who are standing down at the election. In his Westminster lecture he called the present state of affairs "a repressed depression". An end to the recession, says Mr Darling! To borrow the famous words of W.C.: "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."

Of course we are all completely wrong on this - someone who was born there in 1955 has just mentioned the place on another thread in this section. http://www.bedlingto...654-barrington/ For my part the annoying thing is that I've probably been called out to Double Row on a repair job in the dim and distant past, and on more than one occasion! Certainly the name rang a bell; unfortunately no one was in at the time. BTW this one I've just spotted in Cympil's gallery really captures the spirit of almost 60 years ago in the rows. If it were a painting it would likely be a masterpiece! Where's the one of the free coal deliveries spilling over half the road though? http://www.bedlington.co.uk/community/gallery/image/351-ice-cream-man-jack-antoniho-dr-pit-1951/

Sounds like two must-be-there events for anyone with a decent camera, and who fancies themselves as a photographer Owen! Look forward to seeing the resulting pictures. Did anyone put these on the town calendar?

http://news.bbc.co.u...ogy/8512263.stm This sort of thing has to be the way forward, rather than pay the Rupert Murdochs huge sums that they don't need, and that aren't at all justified by the content. http://vimeo.com/9352664 I will be at the front of the queue to tip in a few quid a month. And if bedlington.co.uk were to have a flattr button I'd be clicking on it once a month to ensure Andy keeps up the good work. What's more, if or when Bedlington has a radio station and they ask for support they'd get a regular click too! Bring it on payitbay.com! 10% off the top is a bit much - almost as bad as the 11% odd that Amazon steal from small sellers. So I'd hope that when flattr gets over the initial hurdles it would reduce to something below 5%. But they've got the barrier of the banks creaming off their cut too, so one has to be realistic. BTW Andy is very busy at the moment coding a new project that we are going to see here for sure. This is looking so good that he's already attracted a few voluntary donations from other parts of the globe. It wouldn't surprise me if code originally planned just for this website is deployed on thousands of other websites worldwide. There are some brilliant and enterprising people in our small town, as indeed there have been throughout history.

There's a law against that sort of thing - even if you own it. Local "builders" please note! I'd buy the old infants school from the developer and put up a large monument to the people who don't want to see any change for the better in the town. The inscription might read: "Dedicated to those Bedlingtonians who would rather remain in the 20th century than make a few small compromises and move into the 21st."