Mark Carney Calls Time On Osborne's "Recovery".

Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England, has issued a warning to George Osborne over his so-called recovery. The booming house market poses the "biggest risk" to Britain's economy, he told Sky News, while the fundamental problem remains that not enough houses are being built. This undermines the central, indeed the only, plank in Osborne's fake economic recovery. Essentially there is no recovery with GDP stagnant apart from the increase in the notional value of housing which feeds into the figures. The wealthy might be smug as they borrow against the "value" of their houses and create a slight boom in luxury goods, but the vast majority have found that their income, based upon real work and not a largely fictional increase in the value of their assets, has shrunk. This, in turn, is denting demand in the real economy and putting the brakes on production, threatening the long-term interests of the nation and undermining any prospect for a real recovery. The Tories claim that unemployment is falling as their "recovery" takes hold but the truth is that they have massaged the figures, failing to count those they have forced off benefits or forced to take up low-paid, zero-hour contract work. They remain unconcerned about such things, concentrating instead on the privatisation of national assets so they can line the pockets of their rich mates and take the backhanders that they call "donations" but are, in reality, bribes. All this corruption is taking place against the background of a sustained and deliberate assault on the poor, sick and unemployed unprecedented in British history and yet the Tories retain the support of nearly one third of the electorate. Why? As John Stuart Mill, the great 19th century liberal philosopher, once observed; "Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative."

Vince Cable Latest To Throw Toys Out Of The Pram.

Vince Cable waded into the spat between the Tories and LibDems today telling his coalition partners that their proposed boundary changes would be defeated in the Commons with the aid of the Labour party. Another LibDem who's discovered where he left his spine? Unfortunately for the rest of us the answer has to be a resounding "no." If Vince really did think in terms of the national interest instead of the narrow interests of the LibDem party then perhaps the economic figures would be a little healthier. After all he is the Business Secretary. Instead we have the Bank of England having to point out the blindingly obvious - that the British economy is flat on its back and, like a turtle, lacks the means to get back onto its feet. To drive the message home the deficit figures out today show the greatest gap between imports and exports since 1997 which, by the merest coincidence, happens to have been the last time the Tories were in charge of wrecking the economy. So, as far as Vince is concerned, its 10 out of 10 for scratching the Tories eyes out and 0 out 10 for actually doing his job.

What Is Quantative Easing?

Mervyn King has promised another £50 billion in "quantitative easing" this month, putting the total quantity so far eased at £325 billion. But what is it? Essentially the Bank of England purchases government bonds from the banks, the intention being that this "money" will then find its way into the wider economy and boost demand. There are, however, a few problems with it. First, no extra money is actually printed - the "cash" is actually "fiat" money, an electronic transaction that simply transfers credit from one place to another. Secondly, the banks have absolutely no intention of passing this "money" on to the wider economy through loans because they would rather use it to pay their bonuses and as stake money for their gambling addiction. In other words nothing is transferred from nowhere to nowhere else and achieves absolutely nothing in the process. Why then do they do it? The Bank of England likes it because it looks as if they're doing something without risking an increase in inflation. Politicians like it because it looks as if they're doing something without actually spending any real money at all. It's as if the government has a steam engine, the boiler of which is filled with water and all that is needed is to light the furnace. Unwilling to invest in the coal necessary to make a fire, however, the government simply keeps adding more cold water to the boiler. The result of all this is stagnation. Except for one group of people that is. The bankers charge management fees for all this non-movement of non-existant money - a deserving cause I'm sure you'll all agree.

Bank Of England To Choose Between Equally Useless Measures.

The Bank of England is contemplating which utterly useless thing it will do next. The choice lies between pumping more money into the banks as "qunatative easing" where it will never see the light day again in the wider economy, or punishing savers by reducing the base rate from 0.5% to some equally irrelevant level. We asked a Bank spokesperson for a comment; "You are quite wrong in claiming that we only have a choice between two things - we also have the alternative of doing absolutely nothing at all. The fact that all three choices amount to the same thing is neither here nor there. Since we haven't got a clue what we're doing anyway we are seriously thinking about choosing by chanting "eeny, meeny, miney, mo" or, more excitingly, by playing a knockout game of "paper, scissors, rock." We are confident that, whatever choice we make or don't make, we will retain our jobs which is the main thing. In the meantime austerity remains the only viable alternative and our future projections suggest that we will have saved the British economy when we're reduced the entire population to bartering for basic foodstuffs." Our reporter next turned to George Osbourne for his view; "Personally I think they should stick to the tried and tested method of putting all three alternatives in a bag and then choosing one at random. That's what I did when I wrote the budget. Except for tax cuts for the rich, that was my idea. In fact it was and remains my only idea."

Economic Forecast Cut Again.

The Bank of England has cut its forecast for economic growth in Britain this year from 1.2% to 0,8% and has warned that inflation will remain stubbornly high for the foreseeable future. Worse yet Mervyn King has said that the Eurozone is "tearing itself apart" and that Britain cannot remained unscathed as our chief trading partners descend into chaos. With Baroness Warsi warning against "radical thoughts" it seems that the British government is content to remain in its complacent lethargy safe beneath layers of thought-proof concrete. David Cameron remains distracted by his potentially disastrous appearance before the Leveson Enquiry. George Osborne is too busy protecting the rights of tax havens. Andrew Lansley is too intent on asset stripping the last thing of value in the country, the NHS, for the benefit of his rich mates. Ian Duncan Smith, believing himself to be Jesus Christ, is too preoccupied with inflicting revenge on the disabled for refusing his command to "get up and walk." Theresa May is too busy removing police officers from the streets and border guards from the airports. And what can we say about Nick Clegg except that he's the walking dead? Forget radical thought for the moment, any kind of thought from this sorry collection of misanthropes would make a refreshing change.