Everywhere all the time, the greedy are out to put the squeeze on
At some point in the next 48 hours, The Slog will hit the ten million mark. During its four years of existence, the consolidation of capital power in the hands of the self-elected few has gathered pace to the extent that one sometimes feels the need for ten million eyes to monitor it successfully.
Truth is, there’s so much on the radar now, a sort of detective snow-blindness sets in. The only way to survive without simply regurgitating what other people are saying is to focus on one issue for a day at a time. In and of itself, this is woefully superficial. But just look at the sheer weight of skullduggery involved….
People might, for instance, think I’ve forgotten all about Fukushima (because most folks have) but I’m still on it. Australia’s ABC News ran some excellent whistle-blower stuff last week, with the usual script: obfuscation and cover-up from the Abenauts and Tepco, scientists saying it gets worse every week, more rods out of control and so forth. However, the scene is set there: readers can either get worried and do something, or not. The Nots have it on this one. From here on, only a BIG scoop that’s well-documented is going to cut it.
Ukraine continues to get more complicated by the day, but all I can do is listen to what’s said, check out the ‘facts’ behind it, realise they’re just more bollocks, and stick with my main conclusion: it’s 30% pissing contest, 50% Russian access to a Black Sea port, and 20% EU ego/energy mania. Polls having now confirmed that the vast majority of Russian speakers don’t want to be either Russian or EUnatic, it behoves all the Powers to f**k off out of it, but grant Russia permanent access to Sebastopol in the context of a Ukrainian Swiss-style confederation. It’s not going to happen (there is talk of Ukraine’s gold having been shipped off to Fort Knox already) but then that’s not my problem. I watched as a hatchet-faced US diplomat spouted hypocritical crap on BBCNews yesterday afternoon, then picked up some stories about the often less than pleasant supporters of the new pro-EU regime. But overall, the bent propaganda flying from both sides in this chaos only served to help me decide that the dick-size comparison-cum-energy-drinking contest will continue.
There is also the youthful and intriguing Centre-Left PM of Italy Matteo Renzi, and the possibility that he might engender closer contact with Alexis Tsipras in Greece. They share the same enemy – dead men’s shoes and nepotist corruption standing in the way of progress – and Tsipras is fluent in Italian. But first of all, Tsipras has to win the next General Election. If he wins, the EU won’t like it. The response of ClubMed as a whole to neoliberal rape could easily be the subject of a blog all to itself.
Then there’s the CoOp criminality, and the resignation of Euan Sutherland. In his leaving billet doux, Mr Sutherland wrote, “It is with great sadness that I have resigned as Chief Executive. I have given my all to the business and had hoped to be able to lead its revival. However, I now feel that until the Group adopts professional and commercial governance it will be impossible to implement what my team and I believe are the necessary changes and reforms to renew the Group and give it a relevant and sustainable future.” A thousand secrets and internecine plots lie behind that statement. And Ed Balls is up to his neck in them. But then, everyone with a functioning brain knows that already.
There’s Britain’s knackered economy that could barely turn over a leaf let alone a corner, and the QE-debt-put-off-til-after-I’m dead stuff that keeps what is laughingly called our banking system upright (good piece on this by Shaun Richards at Mindful Money). More celeb fitup-paedo trials to come, and the continuing we-are-about-to at the Elm House Enquiry. The predictable campaign to smear Nigel Farage, the leader of Ukip – accused by the Torygraph of employing his wife and “mistress” out of his European Parliament allowances, a story spoilt by the fact that she is not his mistress. The amazing disappearing trick of the Prime Minister’s peadophile head of anti-paedo monitoring. The Newscorp trial at the Old Bailey. Boris Johnson’s close interest in taxis, the Earls Court Development, Arab arms deals and events at the Bailey. The creeping surveillance ability of the security services/ISP axis both here and in the US. The looneys we backed in Syria now switching tack to cause trouble in Iraq (watch this YouTube of the Iraqi PM talking about the connection – clearly he’s a good bloke). Britain’s Federation of Small Businesses making more allegations of bank mis-selling. Opec and the oilcos manufacturing a ‘recovery’ demand surge to whack up prices again. Onandonandonandonandon.
The Sun headline remains unchanged, however: the world is being taken over in a piecemeal but increasingly effective manner by the corporatocracy, the politicians now work for it, the propaganda hiding all of it is beyond belief, our right to free speech and activist opposition is being dismantled, and the gargoyles will not rest until they own everything, including our money.
As I’ve written what feels like ten million times, debt will come back to bite them, broke citizens can’t consume – and so the model can’t work – and sooner or later, somebody will rebel. My two favourites for this are Italy or France (perhaps both) with the latter, before too long, being the most likely to turn the tide. But I don’t know that any more than anyone else does.
With so much subterfuge being reported, spun and denied in a 24/7 wailing wall of news, it is oddly enough in the Establishment’s interest to commit as many crimes against us as they can as quickly as possible: because after a while, the whole thing becomes a blur.
So I will continue to try and focus on more depth – with hopefully the odd reliable source not interested in talking to the Old Media Proprietors’ Union continuing to add value. Thanks for being with me thus far.
The Slog 