The Slow-Motion Crash Has Begun

The news that the budget deficit for June 2008 was the worst on record reached our little allotment in South Gloucestershire at lunchtime as Nosher and I sat in our deckchairs on the little patch of grass outside his shed.
'Well, I guess the slow motion crash has begun' he announced as he switched off his little trannie 'Gordon the Moron's ten years as Chancellor and one year as PM have left us without any reserves and an economy highly vulnerable to the vagaries of international trade.'
'Do you really think things will get that bad?' I asked, curious to know exactly how far Nosher's predictions of economic meltdown would go.
He gave me one of his 'you're so stupid' looks.
'It's going to get bad' he said 'very bad. We are going to see widespread poverty in this country - not just relative poverty, but real poverty. The wealth redistribution in the Dis-United Kingdom has worked to the advantage of the wealthy since NuLabour came into power, and they will not want to give any of that up. Whereas the millions of people who are only just above the poverty line now will be pushed under once the recession bites harder. That's the economic legacy of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.'
'Surely you can't blame Blair and Brown for the vagaries of the oil market?'
Nosher's 'you're so stupid' look intensified.
'What we are going through just now has very little to do with vagaries - that will come later' he replied 'but this current situation an entirely predictable result of the massive increase in demand for oil from the burgeoning economies of China and India. Granted the situation has been made worse by speculators in the futures markets, but that was predictable too. It has been clear for at least ten years that eventually China and India would experience a rapid rise in consumption of oil within the foreseeable future. Blair and Brown did nothing to insulate our economy from the effects of that rise in demand, so they must shoulder some of the burden of responsibility for what is now happening to our country. They could have taken steps to protect the poor and vulnerable, at the very least. Now it's probably too late without bankrupting the country. It's as simple as that.'
I can't help feeling that Nosher may have a point.
More from http://www.overthegardenfence.blogspot.com/ soon.
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