Not the same as the last Great Depression

How it won't be

A very interesting and credible New Great Depression scenario from Drake Bennett at the Boston Globe, explaining how the grainy images of the 1930s will not be remade and colorized for the 2000s. The same, and not the same.

htp: Michael Panzner - another nugget brought in by the news miner!

What goes up

The US dollar is in a kind of bear market rally, according to Jim Rogers. Then it's down.

htp: Anticitizen One

Presumed Consent, Part Two

The government "has not ruled out" a scheme to treat those who die intestate as donors to Party funds, a spokesman said today. A White Paper shortly to be issued by HMSO for limited distribution assumes the writing of a will to be an opt-out by the deceased from offering their estates to the Labour Party, and deems those who fail to make such an elementary arrangement to have assented thereby to the seizure of their goods after death. At Prime Minister's Questions, the Premier declined to discuss the proposal, saying that it was a matter for the Treasury Committee, to which he has just made several new appointments to supplement the existing membership. Further details of the Paper and the composition of the Committee are withheld, as subject to a Confidentiality Order under European legislation. However, we are permitted to reveal that a Will Contestation Board will shortly be set up and given terms of reference, under the aegis of the Privy Council.

Presumed consent

The government has embarked on a campaign to convince the nation that an opt-out or presumed consent system for General Elections will improve government majorities and save on administrative costs. Under the proposed system, the voter will be presumed to have voted for New Labour unless he/she has registered their dissent. Only if an outright majority of those eligible to vote have registered such a protest, will the public be put to the inconvenience of an election. Dissenters will be interviewed at Neighbourhood Offices to determine that they understand the issues properly and that their reasons for objecting are valid.

Infiltration

Is it me, or has this formerly-funny radio programme become a tendentious political broadcast aiming to reinforce the prejudices of a snickering, sycophantic coterie of not-as-smart-as-they-think-they-are socialists? Alan Coren, thou shouldst be living at this hour.

Carte Blanche

"... Congress doesn't know how much money he (Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson) has given away to anyone."

- an estimated $290 billion so far.

We are star dust

Spot the difference: