Wealthy property tycoon, Will Hutton, is having himself a right old grumble today.
He is angry because other people are not paying enough tax and it is all the fault of those wretched Americans:
Equally, would our readiness to stand by progressive taxation have been so weakened without the view from the US that high rates of income tax on the rich are morally and economically wrong?
We had Mrs Thatcher, but arguably her dominance in British politics would have been less secure had it not been for the succour she took from American policies and conservative ideas. Britain is not a slave to American influences, but it cannot ignore the international common sense which the US more than any other nation shapes.
But, and lest anyone think that Mr Hutton is mindlessly anti-American, salvation is at hand. If US Conservatives have crippled the British left then American socialists can help them to cast away their crutches and enable them to walk tall again:
But opinion is moving. My bet remains that it will carry John Kerry to the White House – just. Of equal importance is the fact that neo-conservatism is on the defensive and that American liberalism has its best chance to regain ground for the first time in a generation.
It is not just American politics that could be transformed by Iraq, but our own. To believe in universal rights and fair societies might become respectable again.
Ergo, Mr Hutton believes these things are not respectable now.
For the most part, this is standard, nay boilerplate, Sunday fare for Guardianistas. Something to be to scanned in approvingly over a nut roast washed down with a steaming pot of fair-trade, dolphin-friendly, non-judgmental eco-coffee.
But if his regulars are unable to appreciate the sumptuous irony here then I can because Mr. Hutton is a member of that peculiar class of British metropolitan scribblers who are forever bewailing what they see as American dominance of our economy and culture and demanding that we look to Europe for inspiration. Yet Mr. Hutton feels himself unable to make the case for socialism without the bulwark of a Democrat President in the Whitehouse and notwithstanding the fact that Europe is a social democrat lock-in.
I think the truth is that Mr Hutton has lost the capacity to make the case for ‘universal rights and fair societies’ under any circumstances. But if he insists on blaming Ronald Reagan and George Bush for this descent into rhetorical impotence, then that is just fine by me.
This is such typical socialist demogoguery. What we think is “economically and morally wrong” are the high unemployment rates, low growth rates, lack of respect for individual libery, and lower standard of living that characterize the socialist economies.
Timbro Report Comparing EU & US Growth Rates, Living Standards
In a better world, it would be remarkable that someone so thoroughly shamed as Hutton dared to get up on his hind legs to preach at us until a decent interval had passed.
Twenty years would seem about right.
Hmmm, Thatcher took office in May 1979 and Reagan took office in January 1981.
Yeah, it was definitely the United States that caused Thatcher’s success and electoral wins.
Of course, I’m an ugly American so this is just agitprop.
“American liberalism has its best chance to regain ground for the first time in a generation.”
You must have shorter lifespans in Britain. Clinton only left office a little over three years ago.
And lest it be thought that Clinton wasn’t “Left” enough for these twerps, it should be remembered that he (and his liberal cohorts in Congress) passed the largest tax increase in U.S. history (whereupon Congress abruptly changed hands).
Ahhh yes, the Carter years: 70% tax rates, and all that economic prosperity to show for it…
I remember reading his book, ‘the State we’re in’, when it was ultra fashionable in 95, or 96. Anyway, the gist pretty much boiled down to the fact that continential industrial and governance structures were outclassing our own, which were driven by short-termist profit maximisation without sufficient regard to the longer term. If only we could adopt the continental model, with aspects of the Japanese, then we’d be on track for milk and honey. I haven’t read any of his more recent work, but has he adjusted his stance now on this, shifting to emphasise competition, R&D investment and demand management or is he still clinging to his continental idealism?
Susan,
Thanks for the report. The American left definitely doesn’t want you to see that.
The intellectual side of me knows that everybody performing at a high economic level is the best situation for everybody to get righer. However, there a small, petty part of me that wants Europe to keep taxing, regulating and interferring their way into economic oblivion, as sort of lesson to the rest of the world.
While America is certainly way ahead of Europe, and most of the rest of the world as far as the amount of money diverted into the public sector, I fear that if the rest of the world gets it’s act together and gets the free-market religion that all of a sudden our 30% of GDP going to government (and growing) will put us at a disadvantage. There are now officially more people employed in government than in manufacturing in America. Few voters in America really understand that economic prosperity doesn’t come from government. Not a day goes by when I don’t hear somebody on the news or in the paper wish for a nationalized healthcare system and more cradle to grave poverty programs, especially for the richest demographic in the US: Senior citizens.
Am I paranoid to see our economic advantages slowly slipping away? Can we really depend on our competitors to harm themselves worse than we harm ourselves for the foreseeable future?
European-style socialist policies are definitely a threat to our economic well-being. That is why New Class functionaries like Will Hutton so desperately hope that we adopt these failed policies — to hobble us to the point that we are brought down to Europe’s level.
Remember, to a socialist, equality of outcome is the end-all and be-all of life. A socialist would not mind at all if the living standards of American poor people declined as a result of their policies — as long as they bring everyone else (excepting themselves, of course) down to that level too.
I haven’t even read that entire article yet but all I need to know is that headline: “No wonder Bush is running scared – 25 years of neo-conservative ascendancy in the US is under grave threat.”
25 years of neocon ascendency?!? Those neocons are truly devious. They’ve been running things for decades and we’re just getting wind of it! !!!
In today’s DT Blair is declared to be a neo-con, no wonder Hutton is so damn grumpy.
Until Hutton is no longer “wealthy” or “propertied”
he’s a hypocrite.
How much does he need to live on, anyway?
And nothing has ever stopped Mr. Hutton from paying what he considers to be his “fair share.”