The Great Depression MkII

In 2008 when the full extent of the banking crisis began to sink in, I was convinced that there would be some kind of depression for about 10 years.

We are now in the 5th year of the Great Depression MkII and things are looking just as bad as they were when it started. Despite the spin, PR, lies and delusional statements offered by economists, journalists and politicians. Despite the economy allegedly picking up twice then falling like a brick. Despite this alleged third 'upturn' and promises that eventually the economy will pick up. All the pointers are that the Great Depression MK11 will continue for a few more years yet, in fact my decade prediction is looking good.

It will be interesting to see what journalists and econmists will say when it is all over. Maybe something like:
"Well, no one could have predicted it would take Britain over 7 years to pull out of an economic decline, even the most experienced economists could not have predicted that..."

The fact is no ecomomist or politician can create the conditions to replace the massive vacuum caused by the banking crisis. The Labour party decided to borrow money to bail out the banks, this effectively made the fall of the economy a long slow one to the bottom instead of a fast one.

What makes things far worse is the current government ideology of ignoring the prosperity of future generations in favour of a fast buck today in an attempt to win approval of the electorate. Bit by bit, those that network with the current government are imposing a Big Brother style regime on the nation, whilst pretending to reduce red tape.

This week we have seen Big Brother attempts to re-write the Geography curriculum for Key Stages 1 to 3, removing any mention of climate change and hence deleting important science and knowledge from the curriculum. This is one of many intrusions and manipulations of peoples lives.

Yesterday Osborne arrogantly announced in the budget statement that it was for people that wanted to work own a home and had aspirations, as if the majority that were unemployed didn't want a job or had no aspirations! Previously Iain Duncan Smith had suggested that Geology students should 'aspire' to become supermarket shelf stackers. Clearly government ministers are in conflict with each others goals.

Osborne announced this on the day that unemployment rose and the young in particular suffering the most in this respect. He also announced subsidies for the last dregs of fossil fuel gas to be exploited via fracking, prolonging the emissions of carbon dioxide and handing future generations expensive climate change problems.

The governments 'green' record so far:

1. Removed carbon/climate public information films (despite approving others)
2. Reduced support for renewable energy
3. Investment in high carbon projects massively out weighs any investment in green low carbon projects
4. Removed/removing climate change from the school geography sylabus
5. General opposition to onshore wind farms
6. Increased subsidies for high carbon energy such as gas fracking and other fossil fuels

Locally, councils have:

1. Banned wind turbines from council land
2. Opposed solar farms
3. Approved biodiversity wrecking housing schemes on farm land
4. Failed to make good use of brownfield sites for building homes
5. Failed to support electric vehicle charging points
6. Generally paid lip service to green issues

That is just a few issues that I can think of. When added up, the government has been chipping away at it's promises to green issues. The failure to take green issues seriously not only hinders the economy, it also passes on serious problems to future generations.

Some links about the 2008 banking/financial crash:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932008
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200809/cmselect/cmtreasy/416/416.pdf
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/oct/08/creditcrunch.marketturmoil
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/BUSINESS/09/30/us.bailout.timeline/index.html