Daily Archives: October 14, 2015

Opinion – PETER VINCENT PRY: Does Obama hail the end of the American Century? – Washington Times – John Gelmini

October 14, 2015 By in Business Administration, Defense Policy, Foreign Policy, People, Politics, US Election Tags: , , , , Leave a comment
English: In January 2009, President of the Uni...

English: In January 2009, President of the United States of America, George W. Bush invited then President-Elect Barack Obama and former Presidents George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter for a Meeting and Lunch at The White House. Photo taken in the Oval Office at The White House. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Dr Alf should rest easily, the American century will not end with Obama, although America and the rest of us would be better off without him.

What is needed is a sensible balance of power, with Iran and North Korea held in check, and countries with regimes interested in creating trouble and “Global Caliphates” and reincarnated “Ottoman Empires”, brought appropriately to heel. The people placed in charge of these countries must not be possessed of megalomania, nor any characteristics that would be likely to inflame their people into insurrection, rebellion or unrest.

Russia and China are large and powerful, so with them we need rapprochement, trade and a focus on the young who represent their future. The present policy of trying to destabilise them with colour revolutions, umbrella revolutions and stirring up Uighurs, Tibetans and troublesome Muslims in Southern Russia is counter productive in that it creates more opportunities for jihadism and the potential for more refugees and economic migrants that we can frankly all do without.

John Gelmini

Opinion – The real ticking time bomb for the Tories is home ownership – Telegraph – John Gelmini

October 14, 2015 By in Austerity, Business Administration, David Cameron, Fiscal Policy, George Osborne, Growth, Immigration, People, Politics, Public Services Reform Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Conservative Party (UK)

Conservative Party (UK) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This post from the Telegraph, courtesy of Dr Alf, is manifest nonsense. We have had a housing crisis in the UK for at least 100 years, and nobody has seen fit to take the necessary measures to put it right. Indeed, things are getting worse with the so-called “Mortgage Market Review”, proposed restrictions on buy-to-let landlords over and above the Chancellors measures on buy-to-let tax relief restriction.

There is, and always has been, an unwillingness to use Hof Haus systems building methods, or build upwards, or tackle the scandal of too many local authorities and their excessive greed and mendacity surrounding many but not all planning applications.

Furthermore, we lack the construction workers to build the houses, even if they could be financed, and plans for carbon reduction make many of them too expensive to build, even if they could be financed.

The problem that the Conservatives will face is immigration and the belief in the minds of the public that the world owes them a living. Immigration has been allowed to proliferate unchecked because too many members of the indigenous population are unwilling to do certain jobs and are lazy and unproductive. For those who take umbrage at this criticism, I say look at the figures for productivity which place the UK at 20th position in the world with 32% public sector productivity, plus excessive overmanning, and 48% private sector productivity, with just 400 world-class companies and a balance of trade deficit growing at £3 billion gbp a month since 1981.

John Gelmini