So, Why Did Labour Lose The Election?

Ed Miliband is a decent human being who put forward a simple message - we deserve better than eternal austerity and should be entitled to a fair shake of the stick. David Cameron's message could not be more different - we deserve nothing better than eternal austerity because it was the British welfare state that crashed the world economy and anyone who can't afford a £1 million mansion cannot be anything other than a scrounger on benefits. One was the politics of hope, the other the politics of despair. The problem for Ed Miliband was that he struggled to get his message across. This is hardly surprising given the rabidly right-wing press in Britain, but there is a deeper underlying problem that Labour just could not overcome - an ill-educated and largely unintelligent electorate that is simply unable to grasp even simple facts. They have little understanding of economic history and cannot fathom the deep mystery of how a hugely destructive world war with its massive government spending could drag the world out of recession. By 1945 it was obvious to even the dimmest voter that Keynesian economics with its deficit spending actually works. By 1979, when Margaret Thatcher managed to wipe the collective memory, this had been forgotten and was replaced with simplistic economic theories that were apparently easy to understand even though they were utter mumbo-jumbo. Throughout the long dark years of the 1980's and 90's Labour spent a great deal of fruitless energy trying to re-educate the British electorate to no avail. They learned the truth contained in the old maxim; "Never try and teach a pig how to sing. You waste your time and you annoy the pig." Ed Miliband's mistake was the most basic of all - he tried to teach the pig how to sing. He had to try I suppose but, to be honest, the British electorate (or at least 37% of them) now have the government they deserve. The rest of us too now have the government we deserve. We had to chance to change the voting system for one that was fairer but allowed Rupert Murdoch and other right-wing snake-oil salesmen to talk us out of it. The News in Shorts has a message for all those who voted Tory - "Oink, oink." - its about the only thing you understand.

The NHS - Again.

In a move completely unexpected by those who have no idea what the Tory party stands for, the Cameron junta has begun negotiations to sell of something that doesn't belong to them (in this case the NHS) for money they have no right to pocket. "We understand public concern," a Tory spokesman told our reporter,"especially when it appears that we are prepared to sell the NHS to Johnnie Foreigner. But this story is based entirely on rumour and a few e-mails that no one else was supposed to see. The most important thing here is finding out who it was that leaked these e-mails." When asked if it wasn't the future of the NHS that was the most important thing, the spokesman replied; "The future of the NHS? It hasn't got one - its already a goner." Nick Clegg, recovering in hospital after a severe beating from his own party said; "The NHS is safe in our hands and any suggestion that we are about to sell parts of it off to the Krauts is almost entirely untrue." When pressed as to which part was untrue the Deputy Prime Minister and head of propaganda in the coalition replied; "The bit about selling it - we're actually proposing to give it away for next to nothing in an attempt to get Britain's finances on track for the bankruptcy we all hope for." George Osbourne, rumoured to have something to do with managing the economy later expanded on his colleague's comments. "People in this country have to realise that we simply don't have the money to support undeserving bankers, bone idle Prime Ministers and corrupt MP's as well as luxuries like the NHS. Something has to go and its much better for us if it's something that's not needed by rich people. I too understand public concern but one of the advantages of being rich is that I can also completely ignore it. We've just been through an exhaustive listening exercise in which a whole bunch of people we didn't know told us things we didn't want to hear. What more could we have done?" Meanwhile the leader of the Opposition, recovering from an unfortunate attack of conscience, told a packed House of Cards; "We cannot let the Tories get away with this. If anyone should benefit from flogging off the NHS it should be us. During our last turn at robbing the country blind we had Cameron on our backs morning, noon and night going on about the bleading NHS. Now this - two faced git!" Vince Cable, apparently completely bewildered by this latest revelation that the Tories have been telling him porkies, threatened his coalition partners with complete surrender. "If this sort of underhand back-stabbing continues we'll have no choice but to move a motion of no confidence in the last Labour government and demand an immediate increase in our expenses."