Does the US need to be fundamentally transformed?

[mongers]

I think you mispoke in the bolded part.  If one does away with both the legislative and executive branches you are not really left with much of a government.  Typically the criticism of the Westminster system is that the executive (the PM and cabinet) has taken on too much power and the legislative has become a rubber stamp so long as the governing party holds a majority.  Is that what you meant?

Bagehot's 'efficient secret' of the British constitution.

My transformation's rather less dramatic.  I suspect we're at a period like the early seventies when the previous governing ideology is failing, and visibly so, in both the UK and the US.  I think there'll be a transformation as profound as Thatcherism/Reaganism. I don't know what it'll be or who or when.

Europe is on the edge of an even more profound transformation almost regardless of what happens in the Eurozone crisis.

QFT, wise words.

I get the same impression as yours from all sorts of people in different sections of society; there's a great unease, but apathy and no one seems to be articulating a viable way forward, by that I mean a coherent response to Thatcherism and what will replace it.

[crazy canuck]

I suspect we're at a period like the early seventies when the previous governing ideology is failing, and visibly so, in both the UK and the US.  I think there'll be a transformation as profound as Thatcherism/Reaganism.  I don't know what it'll be or who or when.

Europe is on the edge of an even more profound transformation almost regardless of what happens in the Eurozone crisis.

It will be interesting to see what comes out of all this - A Federal Europe perhaps.

 

[crazy canuck]

I get the same impression as yours from all sorts of people in different sections of society; there's a great unease, but apathy and no one seems to be articulating a viable way forward, by that I mean a coherent response to Thatcherism and what will replace it.

Britain already had its response to Thatcherism - The Third Way. 

[grumbler]

I get the same impression as yours from all sorts of people in different sections of society; there's a great unease, but apathy and no one seems to be articulating a viable way forward, by that I mean a coherent response to Thatcherism and what will replace it.

Britain already had its response to Thatcherism - The Third Way.

No one has a coherent response to the question of how to recover from Blairism, and what will replace it.

[crazy canuck]

I get the same impression as yours from all sorts of people in different sections of society; there's a great unease, but apathy and no one seems to be articulating a viable way forward, by that I mean a coherent response to Thatcherism and what will replace it.

Britain already had its response to Thatcherism - The Third Way.

No one has a coherent response to the question of how to recover from Blairism, and what will replace it.

Yeah, that is the point.  Thatcher certainly cannot be blamed for what is going on now as Mongers post seemed to suggest.

[Viking]

Nobody here seems to understand that Blairism is Thatcherism with a kinder gentler less matronly face. Blair made no moves to remove Thatchers changes and reforms and improved on a few of them (in part getting rid of the rotten reek of Foot).

[Sheilbh]

Yeah, as Lord Mandelson put it 'we're all Thatcherites now'. It's like saying Clinton was a rebuke to Reagan.

[crazy canuck]

Yeah, as Lord Mandelson put it 'we're all Thatcherites now'. It's like saying Clinton was a rebuke to Reagan.

I see.  The Third Way didnt work and that is Maggy's fault?

[grumbler]

Yeah, as Lord Mandelson put it 'we're all Thatcherites now'. It's like saying Clinton was a rebuke to Reagan.

Or that Churchill was a rebuke to Chamberlain.   Britain under Churchill was still involved in the same war, on the same side, as it had been under Chamberlain.

[mongers]

Nobody here seems to understand that Blairism is Thatcherism with a kinder gentler less matronly face. Blair made no moves to remove Thatchers changes and reforms and improved on a few of them (in part getting rid of the rotten reek of Foot).

I do, that in part was my point; Blairism is Thatcherism-lite as you've also pointed out. And Cameronism is the same policies, ie privatisation, but now by stealth, 'fronted' by that compassionate conservative bloke.

[Neil]

Nobody here seems to understand that Blairism is Thatcherism with a kinder gentler less matronly face. Blair made no moves to remove Thatchers changes and reforms and improved on a few of them (in part getting rid of the rotten reek of Foot).

I do, that in part was my point; Blairism is Thatcherism-lite as you've also pointed out. And Cameronism is the same policies, ie privatisation, but now by stealth, 'fronted' by that compassionate conservative bloke.

It's good that Thatcherism has softened though.  Organized labour needed to be taken down for the good of society.  Now finance is going to get it.

[grumbler]

It's good that Thatcherism has softened though.  Organized labour needed to be taken down for the good of society.  Now finance is going to get it.

Thatcherism was just good, middle-of-the-road governance with a touch of "tough love."  Blair didn't need the tough love, as Thatcher had done that part of the work. I think he put the NHS on a much sounder footing than Thatcher, though, and generally appointed better ministers.  Maintaining Thatcherism is just maintaining the kind of government Britain has traditionally had, though.  It was the post-WW2 nanny state that was the aberration.

[Viking]

Nobody here seems to understand that Blairism is Thatcherism with a kinder gentler less matronly face. Blair made no moves to remove Thatchers changes and reforms and improved on a few of them (in part getting rid of the rotten reek of Foot).

I do, that in part was my point; Blairism is Thatcherism-lite as you've also pointed out. And Cameronism is the same policies, ie privatisation, but now by stealth, 'fronted' by that compassionate conservative bloke.

It's good that Thatcherism has softened though.  Organized labour needed to be taken down for the good of society.  Now finance is going to get it.

The problem with pre-Thatcher unions is that they had a veto on economic activity. The problem with finance is that their incentives incentivized them to fuck the system and punters over. You can't solve the finance problem by creating a new veto on economic activity.

I'm actually starting to incline to the Austrian solution here. Regulation itself might not be capable of regulating given the gross imperfection of human planning and the extreme motivation politicians have to meddle. Many small busts and many small personal tragedies are quite possibly much more preferable to the big bust and the moral implications on fairness.

[The Minsky Moment]

I'm actually starting to incline to the Austrian solution here. Regulation itself might not be capable of regulating given the gross imperfection of human planning and the extreme motivation politicians have to meddle. Many small busts and many small personal tragedies are quite possibly much more preferable to the big bust and the moral implications on fairness.

Resist the temptation.
Gilded age economic history teaches that the busts of hard money laissez faire, while "many," are not "small".

[Sheilbh]

Yeah, as Lord Mandelson put it 'we're all Thatcherites now'. It's like saying Clinton was a rebuke to Reagan.

I see.  The Third Way didnt work and that is Maggy's fault?

Not at all.  Thatcherism was a necessary corrective to the 1970s.  I don't think you can blame Maggie any more than you can blame Attlee for the 1970s.  But in the same way as the 70s showed the fraying of the welfare state/post-war consensus/New Dealer era of politics, so I think our current era is showing the weaknesses of the Thatcherite/Reaganite settlement.  As I say I don't know what the response will be, I don't know what our next political transformation will be.

Blairism wasn't a major repudiation, or reform of Thatcherism.  It was the left coming to terms with that, accepting that it was a necessary response to the social and economic situation at the time.  To the extent it changed anything it was in its celebration of diversity and some increase in investment in the public sector.

Or that Churchill was a rebuke to Chamberlain.   Britain under Churchill was still involved in the same war, on the same side, as it had been under Chamberlain.

I must have missed Clinton's 'go, in the name of God go' speech.