SHORTPOD (29): THE END OF AUSTERITY (UNTIL AFTER THE NEXT ELECTION)

UK government debt £1,889,540,434,996 +

Affirmative Right Chief Editor Colin Liddell discusses the US midterms, before turning his attention to UK Chancellor Philip Hammond's latest Budget. Hyped as the "End of Austerity" Budget, Liddell argues that the package of tax cuts and increased government spending is economically moronic but politically astute, and is influenced by the tragic fate of John Major's government in the 1990s which unwittingly fattened the calf for its Labour opponents.

Buy Colin Liddell's first book Interviews & Obituaries

SYRIZA'S GREEK TRAGICOMEDY

Alexis Tsipras welcoming those who have no wish to stay.

by Daniel Barge

Greece, as is well known, was the birthplace of comedy and tragedy. Recently, with the GREXIT crisis, the “Greferendum” (the vote on whether Alexis Tsipras should prostrate himself to Angela Merkel or simply kow-tow), and all the other absurdities of recent months, we have seen both of these thespian aspects in constant interplay. One simply doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Greece has effectively become a tragicomedy

The main problem all Western countries have is that we now have highly-evolved economic, administrative, and policing systems – coping systems – that can manage most of the problems now deeply embedded in our societies. This sounds great but it isn’t. What it really means is that we seldom have to directly face any of our problems and thus we seldom have to solve them. Our system is essentially maladaptive. Having a gang of idiots like SYRIZA in power, however, changes this dynamic. This is the main value of the Left today.

PODCAST 28: HANGING THE PARLIAMENT

Unfortunately, a "hung parliament" doesn't mean quite what you would want it to mean, merely being a British expression for a parliament in which no political party has a majority. With the UK general election just round the corner, Andy and Colin discuss what is sure to be one of the most interesting elections in British political history, with the only certainty being uncertainty.

COMMUNESIA

by Colin Liddell

There is a new disease sweeping Europe. While the North continues to be afflicted by “Swebola,” the South is now being ravaged by a new illness, which I have taken the liberty of terming “Communesia,” a portmanteau term that combines “Communism” with “amnesia,” and denotes a collective forgetfulness about the ill effects of trusting one’s economy to Communist political control.