tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171Sun, 31 Jul 2011 10:43:27 +0000Commentary | Stories | Investing | Psychology | Political Economy | Human Givenshttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)Blogger200125Subscribe with My Yahoo!Subscribe with NewsGatorSubscribe with My AOLSubscribe with BloglinesSubscribe with NetvibesSubscribe with GoogleSubscribe with PageflakesSubscribe with PlusmoSubscribe with The Free DictionarySubscribe with Bitty BrowserSubscribe with NewsAlloySubscribe with Live.comSubscribe with Excite MIXSubscribe with Attensa for OutlookSubscribe with WebwagSubscribe with Podcast ReadySubscribe with FlurrySubscribe with WikioSubscribe with Daily Rotationtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-6412351900900749937Sun, 20 Jun 2010 23:05:00 +00002010-06-21T00:08:08.072+01:00Alastair Darling was on The Politics Show today. He looked better than I've ever seen him down - well turned out, alert and lively and positively animated. Like the rest of us, getting out from underneath Gordon Brown is clearly doing him a lot of good. And of course he had his reputation to defend and he was almost persuasive in his defence off holding off deficit reduction for just a little http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/i-guess-this-is-important-week.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-1967969970838540119Sat, 19 Jun 2010 21:02:00 +00002010-06-19T22:02:02.583+01:00I knew so something was up - Huhne talked sense for the first time in my experience on QT.  Now we know why.http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/ok-carina-you-can-have-chris-huhnes.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-2321849870043745879Thu, 17 Jun 2010 23:43:00 +00002010-06-18T00:44:53.176+01:00I have waited a long time to hear a politician really lay into Labour - on their lying and mendacity on the budget and all that. And today at last I was rewarded. Chris Huhne did not spare himself on Question Time. He said there was no choice or there would be much pain tomorrow. He lashed into Hain and said that we were still to hear one word of detail on what Labour would have done. He washttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/i-want-to-have-chris-huhnes-babies.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-2972656323889531060Wed, 16 Jun 2010 23:21:00 +00002010-06-17T00:28:49.303+01:00The Independent Safeguarding Authority was set up towards the end of the Labour Interregnum and was charged with the administration of a system that required all adults that regularly had anything to do with children other than their own to be subject to formal checks. As I look back, I can recall that it was this measure more than many others that filled me with despair. Quite gratuitously andhttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/two-and-half-cheers-for-theresa.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-1042901003570364876Mon, 14 Jun 2010 22:44:00 +00002010-06-14T23:44:56.673+01:00The Office for Budgetary Responsibility is independent - so that's all right. Their forecasts must right - right - wrong. Sir Allen Budd has spent his life in the Treasury and ha lived and breathed GNP projections for a lifetime. And his projections will be better than anyone else. Indeed as he is making them before the budget measures, there're probably even less useful. And what I wonder http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/sir-allen-budd-does-what-he-knows-best.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-8510724901833446098Wed, 09 Jun 2010 23:43:00 +00002010-06-10T00:43:15.523+01:00For the Labour contenders, the elephant in the room remains the deficit. Very little is being said about it and certainly no apologies or acceptance of any responsibility or even the beginning of an acknowledgement that the party has disqualified themselves from winning again. All there is a reluctant girding of the loins - to oppose the cuts and trying to find a way of doing this which does http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/if-only-labour-had-been-labour-and-not.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-5399044608107410493Tue, 08 Jun 2010 23:00:00 +00002010-06-09T00:00:46.598+01:00Double binds and are a great favourite of hypnotherapists. The double-blind apparently offers a choice but in practice does not. We use them everyday – “would you like tea or coffee?” The apparent choice is between tea or coffee but what is presupposed is that you are having a drink. In therapeutic terms, say you are working with somebody wanting to stop smoking, then at one point in trance you http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/double-binding-back-to-prosperity.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-7278338900550604691Sun, 06 Jun 2010 23:05:00 +00002010-06-07T00:05:49.644+01:00Seeing Cameron in Cumbria and hearing him being interviewed, I was surprised at my reaction. At that moment it had much less to do with the tragedy of these terrible events and much more to do with the emotion and release following the realisation that, for the first time for a long, very long thirteen years, we have a leader of integrity that in some sense we can be proud of. I still remember http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/getting-on-with-real-life-again.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-1232736244227627008Thu, 03 Jun 2010 23:58:00 +00002010-06-04T09:06:36.630+01:00 Here is a beautiful story I have discovered by Alan Cohen. One morning, Eve decided it was time to clean her fishbowl. Unable to find a container in which to put her two goldfish, Yin and Yang, while the bowl was being cleaned, Eve let about two inches of water into her bathtub and lovingly placed the little creatures there. when she finished scrubbing the bowl and putting the ceramic deep sea http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/yin-and-yang.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-5797893104076974021Wed, 02 Jun 2010 23:01:00 +00002010-06-03T00:01:52.317+01:00According to a ComRes poll, a large majority overwhelmingly support abandoning the first past the post voting system. Over 80% say they believe in electoral reform that will implement a system which reflect more accurately the portion of votes cast of each party. In another question 43% of those asked would have preferred to see an outright winner and former government following the election. http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/reminder.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-277870507930127422Mon, 31 May 2010 23:23:00 +00002010-06-01T00:23:03.446+01:00The main reason for believing this is that banks are not lending, credit and broad money supply is falling and with the exception of the UK, consumer price inflation is not far above zero. The big increase in equity prices since March of last year can be explained easily in terms of near zero interest rates, the reaction to the realisation that the world economy was not falling off a cliff (at http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/06/ive-decided-im-deflationist-at-least.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-1815699856821661795Sun, 30 May 2010 23:03:00 +00002010-05-31T00:03:00.330+01:00Janet Daley, writing in today's Sunday Telegraph, hit the nail on the head. Labour is a party of opposition and despite winning three elections on the trot, could never escape from the mindset that their main purpose in power was to keep power rather than use it. And the novelty of winning three elections, including that glorious first in 1997, became the obsession - namely to win and win againhttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/its-going-to-take-some-getting-used-to_31.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-5942535873199128425Fri, 28 May 2010 00:09:00 +00002010-05-28T08:50:01.279+01:00Below are the blog comments of Michael Meacher on Iain Duncan Smith's proposals, set out so far in outline, to begin to reduce welfare dependency in this country. That this needs to be done is self-evident and agreed by all parties (though Labour will always be ambivalent as welfare dependents are Labour voters and of course it has always been  legitimate and in the interests of the nation that http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/resistance-begins.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-18461830932962957Wed, 26 May 2010 23:29:00 +00002010-05-27T00:29:22.133+01:00 Good to know that the European Community is ignoring its imminant demise and instead is setting us all the most ambitious reductions in greenhouse gasses of anywhere on the planet.http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/fiddling-while-rome-burns.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-7483327118085905406Tue, 25 May 2010 23:20:00 +00002010-05-26T00:20:02.482+01:00The idea that the next budget could see a significant increase in capital gains tax - with rates rising and allowances falling - is almost beyond belief. Having given the Lib Dem's higher tax-free allowances and decided to postpone Inheritance tax cuts, you would have thought that that would have been enough. To even pretend that the higher income tax allowances could conceivably be paid for by http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/capital-gains-is-first-big-test.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-1112013884908142218Mon, 24 May 2010 23:57:00 +00002010-05-25T08:06:33.459+01:00I reproduce below the full comment from Antisthenes - who very kindly is trying to convey something of what Europe is about to a very ignorant Brit. And below is the quote from the comment which seems to me to encapsulate the bullying threat that lies at the heart of what keeps Europe together. Or, it is all based on fear - just like Gordon. If the EU does become a viable entity then to be a http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/i-just-dont-get-it.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-3046845122314725578Sun, 23 May 2010 22:06:00 +00002010-05-23T23:19:29.650+01:00 I was never that concerned when Cameron junked the ‘promise’ to have a referendum on Europe. It hardly seemed the priority given the state of the public finances and I had a sneaking suspicion that before too long an opportunity would present itself is. And so it has. The Greek crisis with the PIGS in the wings is indeed the Euro crisis that was bound to arise one day. The simple reason is http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/events-dear-boy.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-2333450522909146280Fri, 21 May 2010 00:11:00 +00002010-05-21T01:11:19.707+01:00“ We share a conviction that the days of big government up over; that centralisation and top-down control how proved a failure to we believe that the time has come to disperse power more widely in Britain today;........ our government will be a much smarter one, shunning the bureaucratic levers of the past and finding intelligent ways to encourage, support and enable people to make better choiceshttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/joined-up-government.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-8020742238772642061Wed, 19 May 2010 23:31:00 +00002010-05-20T00:31:46.490+01:00So there is a liberal heart beating. It is not just the collectivist, distributionist, social Democrat root that is alive and kicking but a genuine believer and lover of freedom. I had hoped to hear what Nick Clegg said today from a conservative politician, but maybe it had to come from someone else and he was the man. Truly to hear what he had to say today was nectar. And the way he said it –http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/hallelujah.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-8445101232319098401Tue, 18 May 2010 23:42:00 +00002010-05-19T00:56:46.126+01:00There are at least three areas of government where quite soon, we will begin to see the colour of this coalition. Will it be conservative with a sprinkling of liberal or liberal with a sprinkling of conservative? The first area is clearly the principles that will guide deficit reduction. How much will it be primarily devoted to reducing spending or to increasing taxation - the former is http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/liberal-conservative-or-conservative.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-7893313357508033819Mon, 17 May 2010 23:17:00 +00002010-05-18T08:34:48.024+01:00The media is getting very exercised by the election of the new Labour leader. Newsnight tonight focused on a focus group, who very much preferred David Milliband out of the candidates who may or may not put themselves forward. And then David himself had a very friendly little chat with Jeremy Paxman. I think we're getting the gist of it. The candidates are saying that they have to listen to http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/saying-sorry.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-1401019610417132942Sun, 16 May 2010 23:30:00 +00002010-05-17T00:30:07.321+01:00I am calming down and indeed beginning to feel rather flat. After all the election is over, real life is intruding again.  So in no particular order: 1) How the hell are we going to get our deficit down to manageable proportions, even before we begin to think about paring down debt levels? 2) How the hell are we going to begin to generate a healthy private sector and so begin to recover from thehttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/resisting-temptation.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-8014645600729111111Fri, 14 May 2010 00:24:00 +00002010-05-14T08:46:55.817+01:00As readers of my blog will know, I have a real problem with the word fairness. Politicians love it because we all have had experiences when we believe we were treated unfairly and so to be promised redress has to be attractive. Consider this though: If you earn £20k, you will pay approximately £3k in tax right now or 14% If you earn £100k, you will pay approximately £30k in tax, or 30% So thathttp://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/in-defence-of-fair-taxation.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-8318277876903087837Thu, 13 May 2010 18:02:00 +00002010-05-13T19:03:21.271+01:00A young man married a beautiful woman who had previously divorced 10 husbands. On their wedding night, she told her new husband to "Please be gentle; I'm still a Virgin". "What?" said the puzzled groom. "How can that be if you've been married ten times?" "Well, husband #1 was a Sales Representative; he kept telling me how great it was going to be. "Husband # 2 was in Software Services; he http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/11th-husband.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8150098673446234171.post-7235174012302719157Wed, 12 May 2010 23:35:00 +00002010-05-13T16:23:42.669+01:00Human beings have a very deep and instinctive attraction to joining groups. We know that this is how humans survived in the wild at the beginning of their evolution - by forming groups and so finding themselves able to protect themselves against predators. Indeed one of the most terrifying ordeals that it is possible to imagine is to be excluded, to be on the outside and unprotected. I was http://andrewrichardson-grumpyoptimist.blogspot.com/2010/05/psychology-of-groups.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Andrew Richardson)4