1984 & All That...

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Under cover of funerals regal and the general nationwide wringing of hands and handkerchieves, Kwarteng-Under-Truss have signalled quietly that they intend to remove the cap from bankers' pay, along with the other tax cuts proposed recently, neatly heralding a free-for-all feeding frenzy for the New Aristocracy. Whilst the nation would appear to be swearing fealty to our Ancien Régime, the real power-grab is taking place under wraps, only to be reported on by the few remaining real news outlets: the likes of The Guardian, FT, The New Statesman, Private Eye, et al. The rest of the media is all wall-to-wall Royalty.

A good day to bury  - whether it's good or bad depends exactly where on the wealth spectrum you sit - news, the smokescreen the current events afford the government, is tragically convenient. We're facing a climate/energy/financial crisis axis, the like of which is simply unprecedented: a potentially world economy destabilizing event, that our government seems more than happy to catalyse in the interests of those who are the major culprits in it all. It really does beggar belief.

It seems apposite, timely and maybe a tad deliberate that Radio 4 this morning broadcast an episode of Melvyn Bragg's 'In Our Time', discussing George Orwell's '1984'. The parallels with today's smoke & mirrors society are more prescient and telling than one would at first divine from his anti-totalitarian critique of postwar Stalinism, wrapped in a dystopian future. Unpick the threads that run through it all, and you will find a breadcrumb trail to where we stand at present, and it don't look good...

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