Sponsored by
Bill Carmichael: Black Marx for capitalism
PRIVATE Fraser, the dour Scottish coffin-maker from Dad's Army, would be in his element in today's spiralling economic crisis.
"We're all doomed!" just about sums up the reaction of the commentariat as once-solid banks collapse on a weekly basis.
Certainly, there is no shortage of material for the gravediggers of modern capitalism, and there is little sign that the crisis is over – or even at its peak – and there's a feeling abroad that things are likely to get worse before they get better.
This has all been greeted with an obscene degree of lip-smacking relish by Marxist economists and their fellow travellers in the British press.
No matter that hundreds of thousands may lose their jobs and we'll all be hit by higher mortgage payments and depleted pensions (unless you're lucky enough to work in the public sector, of course) – the doom-mongers jubilantly claim that the latest events have at last proved them right.
"This is the end of capitalism," they cry with glee. "The free market model has failed!"
And out of the ashes of the collapsed system will rise a glorious proletarian revolution – or at least increased regulation and control by the state of what socialists call "the commanding heights of the economy".
Well perhaps, but I can't help thinking I've heard it all before. In fact, the theory that cyclical crises in capitalism will eventually lead to its inevitable collapse has been around a long time – ever since Karl Marx first propounded it in Das Kapital in 1867.
As with many fine theories, brute reality often finds a way of proving them wrong – and capitalism has shown itself to be remarkably resilient, bouncing back from each crisis to become ever stronger.
But if this really is the end of capitalism, we should bid it a fond farewell – because it has benefited ordinary people enormously, creating wealth on a previously unimaginable scale and lifting millions out of destitution.
In contrast, wherever a Marxist system has been imposed on the people, the invariable results have been repression, murder, famine and economic collapse.
Ask yourself this, where would you rather live – in the US, UK or Germany, or in the socialist paradises that are Zimbabwe or North Korea?
Would you rather be weeping into your Verve Clicquot in New York, or boiling up a soup of grass clippings in a vain effort to feed your family in Harare?
I suspect the present obsequies for capitalism are premature. No doubt we're in for a hard few years with a good deal of economic pain. But eventually, people will once again want to develop businesses, build houses and create jobs.
It is this irrepressible creativity of ordinary people that may just ensure capitalism's survival.
Loyalty bonus
You would think that putting your life at risk to fight for the UK's Armed Forces would be proof enough of a person's devotion to Queen and country, particularly if the person in question was born overseas.
Not according to the Home Office, which argued in the High Court this week that five Gurkha veterans do not have "strong ties" to the UK and, therefore, have no right to settle here.
Loyalty and courage don't count, argued the Home Office lawyer. Even if a Gurkha had won the Victoria Cross, he wouldn't be allowed into Britain.
Yet if the Gurkhas converted to Islam, entered Britain illegally, claimed benefits, preached that women are inferior and that homosexuals and unbelievers should be murdered, and persuaded impressionable young people to blow themselves up on the Tube – they'd probably breeze in.
Isn't it just possible that the government has got its priorities wrong?
Email to a friend
Print this page- Leeds lose Ward to Palace: Is there anyone they can afford now?
- Sheffield Wednesday leaving it late to hijack Leeds United over Ward
- As Snodgrass dithers over Leeds, Warnock throws a lifeline
- Ball is in Leeds United’s court over contract - Snodgrass
- Police turning blind eye to Asian voter fraud, says MP
Looking for...
Featured advertisers
Jobs
Search for a job
Motors
Search for a car
Property
Search for a house
Weather for Yorkshire
Friday 25 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 10 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 20 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 8 C to 20 C
Wind Speed: 16 mph
Wind direction: East
