Iceland Gives Home Owners £24,000 Boost.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is up in arms over Iceland's decision to give every person with a mortgage in their country £24,000 in debt relief. Standard & Poor, however, have actually upgraded Iceland's credit-rating. Of course the IMF, despite their claim of promoting "global economic growth and stability, and raise living standards and employment", are only interested in keeping the world safe for bankers, whereas Standard & Poor simply report on what they see. The American CIA would seem to agree with Standard & Poor, pointing out in their report on Iceland that the country had completely reversed by 2012 the shrinkage of its economy after the banking crisis of 2008, while cutting unemployment by half during the same period. As an aside the CIA also mentions the fact that Iceland, formally negotiating entry into the EU, has now decided not to join because of that organisation's "economic instability". Iceland's policy compares favourably with Britain which has been down-graded by Standard & Poor and where the only real growth industry is in food banks for the increasing number of poor people who can no longer afford even the most basic needs. The report of the CIA with regard to Britain in 2012 makes for sober reading; "weak consumer spending and subdued business investment weighed on the economy. GDP fell 0.1%, and the budget deficit remained stubbornly high at 7.7% of GDP. Public debt continued to increase." The message is clear - strip out all the Tory ideological claptrap and the pro-banking propaganda and the comparison between Britain and Iceland couldn't be more stark. Iceland, after prosecuting it's bankers and politicians, is recovering strongly whereas Britain, still in thrall to the bankers and their corrupt political allies, is still bumping along the bottom.

Iceland Still Being Ignored By World's Press.

For those amongst us who can't imagine what the alternative to rewarding the banks for crashing the world economy might be look at the picture above. It was taken in Iceland as the people there said an emphatic "NO" to picking up the bank's bad debts and "NO" to their politicians who wanted to put them in debt for the rest of their lives. Essentially the people of Iceland quite rightly pointed out that the banks are private companies and do not have an automatic right to public funds in order to avoid the consequencies of their own mistakes. Nor do politicans have the right to impoverish their own citizens simply to protect their wealthy mates. There hasn't been much time devoted to this story over the last five years as the media have concentrated instead on the so-called "Arab Spring." They wouldn't like you to know too much about it because, unlike the "Arab Spring," the Icelandic revolution has been a resounding success. Not only have the Icelandic people told the banks and their political sidekicks to take a hike, it has been recognised that, under international law, they had a perfect right to do so. This is what the soveriegnty of the people means. In Britain and elsewhere across the world politicians have demonstrated quite clearly that they have no interest in the soveriegnty of the people, they care only about their rich cronies in the banks and in protecting their own priviliged positions. The media have been compicit in this confidence trick that they like to call "government" and it is hight time that this story was given the publicity it demands. It is time to wipe the scum off the top of the political brew once and for all.

Where Is The Resistance? Where Is The Leadership?

While David Cameron picks his fight with Europe to please his backbenchers, George Osborne puts his feet up and ignores the economy and Nick Clegg hides and ignores everything, the question arises as to where the resistence to the worst government in living memory is? Councils are having to face 30% cuts as the Tories force poor people, who didn't benefit from the "good times" to pay for the crisis in capitalism now that the bad times are here. Hospitals are being closed and forced into bankruptcy to soften them up for privatisation. Bankers are still paying themselves huge amounts of money for criminal activities and then refusing to pay tax. Wages are being slashed even as politicians seek to increase their own and still treat their expenses claims as a licence to print money. The newspapers are still harassing ordinary people for their "stories" and chasing the famous until they drop from exhaustion. The BBC still completely ignores protests in London while reporting those in Cairo in loving detail. After four years of austerity for us and business as usual for the wealthy what has changed? Nothing. Why? Because there is no effective opposition to all this. The Labour party has the perfect reason for rediscovering its radical roots in this crisis - just as the Tories have rediscovered their elitist, nasty and vicious origins. That Labour chooses to ignore this and offers only a slightly watered-down version of Tory austerity demonstrates that they too are wedded to the status quo. Only one nation has grasped the nettle and done what needs to be done - Iceland - and that has been studiously ignored by politicians and journalists alike. If Icelanders were dying in the streets or murdering each other in a vicious civil war the story would be everywhere, while their success in breaking the grip of corrupt politicians and criminal bankers is hardly worth a mention.

IMF Discovers That Parasites Are Bad For Us.

When Iceland discovered that its bankers and politicians had defrauded the entire nation the people of that country decided to do something about it. They listened to the banks threatening to destroy the entire country and their politicians demanding that they pauperise themselves to protect the guilty and then arrested the lot. Having done so they then set about creating a whole new constitution that prevents corporate and political criminals from holding the country to ransom and told the IMF to go take a hike. Four years later, as the rest of Europe sinks under the weight of austerity, Iceland has made what the IMF describes as "surprising" recovery. Surprising, that is, to everyone except the Icelanders who, rightly in turns out, recognised that allowing the criminals who caused the problems in the first place to dictate the terms of the "recovery" was madness. Instead they put the interests of the people first and the interests of the bankers and the politicians nowhere. We in Britain, on the other hand, swallowed the lie and then stood by as our so-called government blamed the sick and disabled in our society and forced them to pay for the greed and mistakes of a criminal banking system. The Icelanders were right and had the courage of their convictions. We were wrong and are now suffering for our craven cowardice in the face of the enemy. But it is not too late. Even now we too could arrest our bankers and politicians, tell the IMF to shove it and start thinking for ourselves.

The Turkeys Vote For Christmas

It is not often that you get to see an entire nation committ collective suicide but that is the effective result of the Greek elections. After a sustained attack by the banks who want the money they recklessly gambled away back and by European leaders more interested in their own careers than the welfare of their people, the Greeks cannot bring themselves to be rid of the Euro. They have clung to it like a child clings to its mother's skirts. They have been blackmailed, lied to and bullied unmercifully and, as Antonus Samaras said, "have decided to stay anchored to the Euro." Why anyone drowning would refuse to let go of an anchor is beyond understanding, but any real alternative was carefully hidden from sight. And there is an alternative as Iceland has amply demonstrated. It is possible to say "no" to the banks, arrest their directors and even impeach the politicians who have conspired with them to line their own pockets at everyone else's expense. After two years of dire predictions as to what would happen to Iceland if they didn't do as they were told, they have cast off the dead hand of the banks who are now queuing up to knock on that country's door and begging to be allowed to do business there once again. The world has been through 30 years of sheer economic insanity and, when the wheels came off, all our politicians could do was insist on more of the same. And, like sheep, most people have gone along with it. Entire countries have voted for austerity, inequality and poverty, frightened by two-faced politicians intent on protecting their own wealth and privileges. Some like France, however, have not. The stage is now set for a titanic struggle between the stupid and selfish on one hand and those with a better vision on the other. What happens next is up to us.

Politicians Continue Destruction Of World Economy.

Manufacturing output in Britain fell in May by the greatest amount in three years. Meanwhile the economic forecast for next year has been downgraded, yet again, to 0.1% which, in statistical terms, is indistinguishable from no growth at all. It is reported that Spain's manufacturing output is now below that of Greece while unemployment across Europe is at 11% and climbing. It is a picture of unremitting gloom from Crete to Scotland, from Portugal to Poland and its getting worse while politicians chant "austerity" like a mantra and the banks plunder entire countries to make good the loses they made through their incompetent and reckless gambling. All this is a direct consequence of a literally bankrupt ideology and politicians more concerned about their personal fortunes than the good of their countries. As reported a couple of days ago in the "News in Shorts" a twelve-year old Canadian girl is the only voice of reason that has been heard so far and only one country, Iceland, has shown enough courage to abandon an economic system that destroys overall wealth and is designed to transfer what is left from the from the poor to the already rich. The world economy is bleeding to death while our leaders are still wielding the knife like demented serial killers. It is time to stop these madmen (and women) and to find a new economic order that delivers fairness if it cannot guarantee prosperity.