Main Street Blog

My big concern is that we currently appear to be talking about two different piles of £20bn. The £20bn that we will shift from low and middle income earners and onto the wealthy and polluting, and another £20bn that we are looking to cut from existing government spending. Most of the latter will be allocated to Lib Dem spending priorities with just a slither going towards tax cuts.

…its first priority will be diverting identified savings away from “Labour priorities” to “Liberal Democrat priorities”, Mr Davey explained. Only after that process is complete will the tax burden proposed by the party be quantifiable in overall terms.

“The savings package will involve reallocating money within the same spending area,” he added.

“I wouldn’t see it as a short-term move, nor as a philosophical shift… it’s a response to long-term trends in government expenditure.”

“We are now in a process of identifying what I believe will be the most radical package of tax- cutting measures for people on middle incomes.

“We will bear down on the ballooning government budgets. Vince Cable and I have been working over the summer identifying about £20 billion that should be reallocated and the vast bulk of it given back through tax cuts.

“We have taken some difficult decisions already to provide tax relief and we are doing some ongoing work… to help the vast majority of taxpayers. There are a number of options we are looking at. We have our pledge to cut the basic rate of income tax by 4p but as we do the sums, as we identify where we are going to get the money from we can become very much more creative between now and the next general election.”

What we have is monumental confusion. We’ve had it for a couple of months now. I’ve never seen a major political party do such a poor job at explaining its economic policy before and the blame lies squarely on the leader.

The decision by the party to have an elected leader means it has crossed a rubicon which in the past it has been unwilling to cross. Back in 1989, when it scored a record but also Islington’s Finance Head Honcho Andrew Cornwell.

The decision to have an elected leader then marks a sea-change in ambition. The fact is, like any organisation, while it may have lacked an individual with the job title of ‘leader’ it always had leaders. They just weren’t elected. The result is the party has been a franchise for pretty much anyone capable of self-publicity to adopt. Regardless of their relative merits, a party cannot be both a Caroline Lucas party and a Derek Wall party and expect to be taken seriously.

The GLA result this year also revealed a seriousness of purpose. The Greens were entirely realistic about their chances and how to make the best of them in a way that the Lib Dems frankly were not. Their plan wasn’t dependent on them sharing media space with the Boris and Ken Show, nor was it saddled with a target seat strategy. The result - retaining both their share of the vote and their AMs - may not sound tremendous but given the circumstances it was a minor coup. By comparison, the plunge in Lib Dem support showed we had left ourselves entirely vulnerable to a squeeze on both sides.

… und CHIP ist - nach jetzt 30 Jahren - noch immer da! Herzliche Glückwunsch und alles Gute für die kommenden Jahre!

Der Button und Schlachruf der ersten Jahre von CHIP

Ja, am 7. September 1978 war es soweit - CHIP ist da!
CHIP – die Zeitschrift für Mikrocomputer-Technik in Hobby und Beruf
Ausgabe Nr. 1 September / Oktober 1978
Erstverkaufstag Donnerstag, 7. September 1978

und liegt (seit heute) an mehr als 15.000 Kiosken und Bahnhofsbuchhandlungen, sowie rund 100 Elektronik/Computershops in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz zum Verkauf aus. Der Einzelverkaufpreis 4,50 DEM [2,30 EUR] (Abo-Preis 24, 00 DEM [12,27 EUR]- für 6 Hefte).

Übrigens:
Zu dieser Zeit gab es nach Angaben von IDC erst rund 6.800 Computer- und Small Business System in Deutschland und verkauft haben wir von den beiden Ausgaben in 1978 durchschnittlich 30.967 Hefte (inkl. 9.800 Abos) und mitfinanziert von 19,5 Seiten Anzeigen.

Die heutige CHIP Mannschaft hatte das Jubiläum sicherheitshalber schon einmal im Frühjahr dieses Jahres mit einem Relaunch zur Ausgabe April 2008 gefeiert.

Die heutige CHIP Mannschaft hatte das Jubiläum - sicherheitshalber - schon einmal im Frühjahr dieses Jahres mit einem Relaunch zur Ausgabe April 2008 gefeiert. Dazu gibt es auch ein Video mit dem jetzigen Chefredakteur (und Geschäftsführer) und

Teil 1:
Teil 2:
Teil 3: CHIP, CHIP Hurra! (Schluss)

Aller

P.S.
Vielleicht versteht der geneigte Leser, wenn ich heute manchmal schmunzeln muss, wenn ich von der brilliante Idee einer Augmentation, Markenspreizung und/oder Marktdurchdringung und -erweiterung lese oder jemanden von dem ‘neuen’ Gebot der Stunde sprechen höre …

Taking the Monkey’s intervention first, it would certainly be a shame. I know that in the past in a work capacity I’ve contributed to the site - not to troll but to bring issues to Labour supporters’ attention (just as we’ve also done on Conservative Home). This policy would mean that Labour supporters would have less opportunity to hear new ideas, thus increasing the likelihood that they will be walking around with bad ones bouncing around in their heads.

What Recess and Matters are both advocating is a virtual pulling up of the drawbridge. Psychologically, this is interesting in terms of what it tells you about the Labour psyche at the moment, and links directly to . Fundamentally, Labour activists no longer want to reach out - they want to talk (or, more often than not, fight) amongst themselves. A political party that does that is no longer a political party, but a cult. Think along those lines is tantamount to admitting you are not fit to govern.

But fundamentally, this is a question of economics - rarely a Labour strong point. You either believe in free trade or protectionism and this is classic protectionism. By putting up barriers, all Labour activists will achieve is to make it harder for themselves to get their message across on the internet.

Upon reflection, the big fantasy football draft this year produced some results that were a little bit odd. I’ve got a lot of players on teams I don’t usually follow all that closely.

For quarterbacks, we got Trent Edwards (Buffalo), Tavaris Jackson (Minnesota), Phillip Rivers (San Diego), and Tony Romo (Dallas).
At running back, there is Earnest Graham (Tampa Bay), Andre Hall (Denver), Tim Hightower (Arizona), Felix Jones (Dallas), Marshawn Lynch (Buffalo), Jonathan Stewart (Carolina), and LenDale White (Tennessee).
Catching the ball will be Anquan Boldin (Arizona), Marques Colston (New Orleans), Vernon Davis (San Francisco), Braylon Edwards (Cleveland), Jabar Gaffney (New England), and Vincent Jackson (San Diego).
Kicking will be Phil Dawson (Cleveland) and Steven Gostkowski (New England). And there is the usual Green Bay Packers defense — the only Green Bay “player” at all.
Fortunately, nearly all of our fantasy football opponents got the joke in our team name, “McCain’s Folly.” My partner and I were afraid it would be too subtle and historically obscure, but enough people caught it and thought it was amusing.

A little bit more than half of all NAPP readers are very, very down on the choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate. Certainly, for liberals and other critics of the McCain campaign, she is the gift that keeps on giving in terms of scandal and hot-button issues. The latest is a rumor about her own marital fidelity; is there any substantiation to it? I don’t know, of course, but apparently the story is about to be broken by the National Enquirer and it will be based in part on the records of divorce proceedings involving Todd Palin’s former business partner.

For the record, I see no reason why we should be surprised or concerned that a female politician had cheated on her husband — at least, we shouldn’t be any more surprised at that then we would be at news that a male politician had cheated on his wife. It’s embarassing and salacious, but by itself it has nothing to do with the person’s ability to hold public office. And it suggests hypocrisy in those individuals who hold themselves out as models of good moral behavior (as all politicians impliedly do).

But we had 37 votes. If you count my opinion — I think she was really intended to appeal to not-particularly-liberal former Hillary Clinton supporters and to the religious and socially-conservative right — that’s 20 out of 38, or not quite 53%, who disapprove of Palin.* National and statewide polls draw from thousands of respondents. And the real poll is the one that will be held in November.

Still, people are still talking about Sarah Palin and nothing else when it comes to politics. That is, I think, a net gain for the Republicans. Obama has got to start making some news himself soon or eventually people are going to hear about Sarah Palin for so long they’ll get confused and think she already is Vice-President. That’s a net loss for Obama. And let’s also not forget that it’s still eight weeks until the election, and world and national events are going to continue occurring in that time. A lot depends on the kinds of things that happen between now and then like, say, Russia annexing South Ossetia, or a nuclear power plant meltdown, or who knows what else.

* One of these days, I’ll have to discipline myself about parenthetical statements embedded within sentences. Not today, though.