A Christmas Carole from the Lefty Tossers at the Mirror
Discussion
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/12/2...
Once upon a time, on December 24th, young Ebenezer Osborne sat in his counting house. It was a cold winter’s night, the snow covering the roof and gardens of his £2million five-storey Victorian villa like a beautiful Christmas card.
In the bleak midwinter beyond, Britain was enduring its worst Christmas for a generation. Hundreds were stranded in airports, thousands were separated from their families by snow.
More than 2.5 million people were on the dole. Youth unemployment was at almost record levels, and female unemployment at its highest for 20 years. Matt Cardle’s Christmas single was at number one.
The future baronet Osborne, heir to a fine fortune, threw another log on the fire.
The counting house door was ajar so that he could keep his eye upon his butler, practising his lines in front of a tiny fire in a dismal little cell beyond (In this coalition, it was Osborne who had all the coal).
“These cuts are necessary,” the poor wretch repeated through chattering teeth. “There is no other choice.”
“That’s it, Cable!” Osborne called. “We’ll soon have you back on track!”
Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Osborne! A squeezing, wrenching, scraping, clutching, covetous wretch.
Now, at last, Britain’s future lay within his grasping hands. Every day another nail in the coffin of public services… A million low-paid NHS staff with their wages frozen for two years! 100,000 more public sector jobs to go by spring! Tuition fees for students tripled! Child benefits axed! The health service’s backbone ripped out! This governing lark was turning out better than he and his chum David had ever dared dream.
“A merry Christmas! God save you!” poor Cable called.
“Bah!” cried Osborne, “Humbug!”
With Cable locked into his cell for the night, Osborne returned to the counting house of his great mansion. He was settling in with his favourite board game Tax Evasion Monopoly, when he heard the cellar hatch fly open.
Suddenly, there in front of him appeared a terrifying sight, fully recognisable despite its ghostly pallor.
“Gideon Ebenezer Osborne!” boomed the Ghost.
“It’s George!” Osborne whined. “I changed my name by deed poll!” He paused. “But aren’t you the ghost of Claire Rayner? I thought you’d threatened to haunt David. What do you want with me?”
“His time will come,” the ashen-faced agony aunt declared. “But it is you I see slashing public services, stealing children’s benefit, penny-pinching from the pockets of students, meddling with my beloved NHS.
“What have you got against mothers and children? What have the sick and the poor ever done to you?”
“Oh I get it,” Osborne huffed. “We’re in a festive re-working of Dickens’ Christmas Carol, and I suppose I’m Scrooge.”
“I shouldn’t dignify you with the name,” Ghost Rayner declared. “Scrooge sat in his miserable home barely spending a farthing. You expect the country to starve while you sit comfortably in your Notting Hill mansion counting your £4million Trust Fund, flipping your houses and exploiting loopholes to avoid paying tax! At least Scrooge was as miserly to himself as to others!”
“Humbug!” said Osborne. “You aren’t real! I won’t believe it. If you are a ghost, how did you get here?”
“With wings!” Ghost Rayner replied.
Osborne sighed. “Oh go ahead,” he whined. “Bring out the Ghost of Christmas Future and get on with it.”
“There are no ghosts of Christmas Future,” Ghost Rayner boomed. “Haunting’s a five-year course. The only hope for young ghouls these days is to win I’m A Phantom Get Me Out of Here. Otherwise they’re stuck in the underworld watching Spooks.”
Spirit Rayner cast a withering glance at Osborne. “But it’s the ghosts of Christmas past I really feel sorry for… Who would be an Old Age Phantom in the society you’ve got planned?”
Osborne sniggered. “And the Ghosts of Christmas Present?”
“All stuck at the Amazon sorting office by your appalling provision for a scattering of seasonally predictable snow!”
“So now it’s my fault if it snows?”
“It’s your government’s fault that thousands of people are having their worst Christmas ever.” The Ghost rattled its chains bitterly.
“And don’t think I don’t know all about your plan to fully privatise the NHS and sell it to Simon Cowell…”
“X-Ray Factor – where the public decide who gets treated. How did you know about that?”
“It was on SpookiLeaks.”
“Anyway,” Osborne sneered, “Aren’t you going to take me on some journey of discovery to where decent working class people are living miserable lives? Where are we going, Albert Square for the EastEnders Christmas Special?”
“No need, young Osborne,” Ghost Rayner said, sadly. “We shall see from here how the Poor and Destitute are suffering.” As she spoke, the doorbell rang with a great clang, and Osborne peeped out between the curtains. Down below five little gruel-fed carol singers with coal-smudged faces stood forlornly in the snow.
“It’s One Direction!” Ghost Rayner declared. “Won’t you let them in to warm their little hands at your fire?”
“The Cleggbot will deal with them,” Osborne said, and pressed a black button next to the window.
Down below the front door opened, and a mechanical Clegg puppet could be clearly seen, framed by the hall light.
“Please sir,” said Harry. “We should like to go to university so as to make something of ourselves.” Behind him, a great mass of people in ragged clothes pressed up towards the house.
There was a mechanical whirr, and then the Cleggbot’s mouth opened: “The country simply cannot afford it. In these difficult times we must make difficult decisions.”
“But sir, you promised…”
“The country simply cannot afford it…”
At this, Ghost Rayner raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain with such a dismal and appalling noise, that Osborne began to tremble.
“Mercy!” he cried. “Dreadful apparition, do not harm me!”
Again the spectre raised a cry, pointing to the giant flatscreen television. Osborne saw flickering images of his childhood. His head flushed down the toilet at his exclusive private school, his Bullingdon chums refusing to let him join their japes at Oxford University. Oh misery!
“Were they so very beastly to you?” the ghostly agony aunt whispered in his ear.
Osborne fought back a sob. “It was David and Boris! They were so terribly mean. I thought if I became meaner…”
“Hear me!” cried the Ghost. “My time is nearly gone.”
“I will,” said Osborne.
“I am here tonight to warn you, that you yet have hope of escaping a terrible fate.” And the ghost whispered to Osborne how he might redeem his vile self.
On Christmas morning, Britain awoke to the news that the most savage of the cuts were ended, and that the bankers who had caused the crisis would now be paying their fair share. A public holiday, Rayner Day was announced for Christmas Eve every year.
Osborne threw open the doors to his mansion and shared his giant Christmas goose with the poor and homeless. The Cleggbot was dismantled and Butler Cable was released. Students returned to the universities, nurses to the hospitals, and joyful children sang carols in the streets.
Osborne pledged to pay his taxes like any other citizen and announced that he, David and Boris were leaving politics for ever to form a boyband. And bells of joy rang out across the land.
“A Merry Christmas to everybody,” Osborne called out from his window. “A Happy New Year to one and all!”
Read more: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/12/2...
Once upon a time, on December 24th, young Ebenezer Osborne sat in his counting house. It was a cold winter’s night, the snow covering the roof and gardens of his £2million five-storey Victorian villa like a beautiful Christmas card.
In the bleak midwinter beyond, Britain was enduring its worst Christmas for a generation. Hundreds were stranded in airports, thousands were separated from their families by snow.
More than 2.5 million people were on the dole. Youth unemployment was at almost record levels, and female unemployment at its highest for 20 years. Matt Cardle’s Christmas single was at number one.
The future baronet Osborne, heir to a fine fortune, threw another log on the fire.
The counting house door was ajar so that he could keep his eye upon his butler, practising his lines in front of a tiny fire in a dismal little cell beyond (In this coalition, it was Osborne who had all the coal).
“These cuts are necessary,” the poor wretch repeated through chattering teeth. “There is no other choice.”
“That’s it, Cable!” Osborne called. “We’ll soon have you back on track!”
Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Osborne! A squeezing, wrenching, scraping, clutching, covetous wretch.
Now, at last, Britain’s future lay within his grasping hands. Every day another nail in the coffin of public services… A million low-paid NHS staff with their wages frozen for two years! 100,000 more public sector jobs to go by spring! Tuition fees for students tripled! Child benefits axed! The health service’s backbone ripped out! This governing lark was turning out better than he and his chum David had ever dared dream.
“A merry Christmas! God save you!” poor Cable called.
“Bah!” cried Osborne, “Humbug!”
With Cable locked into his cell for the night, Osborne returned to the counting house of his great mansion. He was settling in with his favourite board game Tax Evasion Monopoly, when he heard the cellar hatch fly open.
Suddenly, there in front of him appeared a terrifying sight, fully recognisable despite its ghostly pallor.
“Gideon Ebenezer Osborne!” boomed the Ghost.
“It’s George!” Osborne whined. “I changed my name by deed poll!” He paused. “But aren’t you the ghost of Claire Rayner? I thought you’d threatened to haunt David. What do you want with me?”
“His time will come,” the ashen-faced agony aunt declared. “But it is you I see slashing public services, stealing children’s benefit, penny-pinching from the pockets of students, meddling with my beloved NHS.
“What have you got against mothers and children? What have the sick and the poor ever done to you?”
“Oh I get it,” Osborne huffed. “We’re in a festive re-working of Dickens’ Christmas Carol, and I suppose I’m Scrooge.”
“I shouldn’t dignify you with the name,” Ghost Rayner declared. “Scrooge sat in his miserable home barely spending a farthing. You expect the country to starve while you sit comfortably in your Notting Hill mansion counting your £4million Trust Fund, flipping your houses and exploiting loopholes to avoid paying tax! At least Scrooge was as miserly to himself as to others!”
“Humbug!” said Osborne. “You aren’t real! I won’t believe it. If you are a ghost, how did you get here?”
“With wings!” Ghost Rayner replied.
Osborne sighed. “Oh go ahead,” he whined. “Bring out the Ghost of Christmas Future and get on with it.”
“There are no ghosts of Christmas Future,” Ghost Rayner boomed. “Haunting’s a five-year course. The only hope for young ghouls these days is to win I’m A Phantom Get Me Out of Here. Otherwise they’re stuck in the underworld watching Spooks.”
Spirit Rayner cast a withering glance at Osborne. “But it’s the ghosts of Christmas past I really feel sorry for… Who would be an Old Age Phantom in the society you’ve got planned?”
Osborne sniggered. “And the Ghosts of Christmas Present?”
“All stuck at the Amazon sorting office by your appalling provision for a scattering of seasonally predictable snow!”
“So now it’s my fault if it snows?”
“It’s your government’s fault that thousands of people are having their worst Christmas ever.” The Ghost rattled its chains bitterly.
“And don’t think I don’t know all about your plan to fully privatise the NHS and sell it to Simon Cowell…”
“X-Ray Factor – where the public decide who gets treated. How did you know about that?”
“It was on SpookiLeaks.”
“Anyway,” Osborne sneered, “Aren’t you going to take me on some journey of discovery to where decent working class people are living miserable lives? Where are we going, Albert Square for the EastEnders Christmas Special?”
“No need, young Osborne,” Ghost Rayner said, sadly. “We shall see from here how the Poor and Destitute are suffering.” As she spoke, the doorbell rang with a great clang, and Osborne peeped out between the curtains. Down below five little gruel-fed carol singers with coal-smudged faces stood forlornly in the snow.
“It’s One Direction!” Ghost Rayner declared. “Won’t you let them in to warm their little hands at your fire?”
“The Cleggbot will deal with them,” Osborne said, and pressed a black button next to the window.
Down below the front door opened, and a mechanical Clegg puppet could be clearly seen, framed by the hall light.
“Please sir,” said Harry. “We should like to go to university so as to make something of ourselves.” Behind him, a great mass of people in ragged clothes pressed up towards the house.
There was a mechanical whirr, and then the Cleggbot’s mouth opened: “The country simply cannot afford it. In these difficult times we must make difficult decisions.”
“But sir, you promised…”
“The country simply cannot afford it…”
At this, Ghost Rayner raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain with such a dismal and appalling noise, that Osborne began to tremble.
“Mercy!” he cried. “Dreadful apparition, do not harm me!”
Again the spectre raised a cry, pointing to the giant flatscreen television. Osborne saw flickering images of his childhood. His head flushed down the toilet at his exclusive private school, his Bullingdon chums refusing to let him join their japes at Oxford University. Oh misery!
“Were they so very beastly to you?” the ghostly agony aunt whispered in his ear.
Osborne fought back a sob. “It was David and Boris! They were so terribly mean. I thought if I became meaner…”
“Hear me!” cried the Ghost. “My time is nearly gone.”
“I will,” said Osborne.
“I am here tonight to warn you, that you yet have hope of escaping a terrible fate.” And the ghost whispered to Osborne how he might redeem his vile self.
On Christmas morning, Britain awoke to the news that the most savage of the cuts were ended, and that the bankers who had caused the crisis would now be paying their fair share. A public holiday, Rayner Day was announced for Christmas Eve every year.
Osborne threw open the doors to his mansion and shared his giant Christmas goose with the poor and homeless. The Cleggbot was dismantled and Butler Cable was released. Students returned to the universities, nurses to the hospitals, and joyful children sang carols in the streets.
Osborne pledged to pay his taxes like any other citizen and announced that he, David and Boris were leaving politics for ever to form a boyband. And bells of joy rang out across the land.
“A Merry Christmas to everybody,” Osborne called out from his window. “A Happy New Year to one and all!”
Read more: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2010/12/2...
Edited by Laplandboss on Friday 24th December 11:53
Awwww, I love the ramblings of an upset lefty 'newspaper' 
I just fail to understand why they think we should treat the public sector as some sort of sacred cow? There's no money due to the amount wasted by the previous 'saviours of the universe' and the private sector cannot suffer further taxation, so what do they think should happen?
I just fail to understand why they think we should treat the public sector as some sort of sacred cow? There's no money due to the amount wasted by the previous 'saviours of the universe' and the private sector cannot suffer further taxation, so what do they think should happen?
The thing that wakes the Right from apathetic sleep into actually voting is cold harsh economic factors.
The thing that the left resolutely appear to ignore is cold harsh economic factors.
The Govt have been in power for 6mths. Yet you'd have seriously thought it was them who'd been in power since '97.
It's frightening really.
turbobloke said:
They could at least perforate the pages and have a loop in one corner to make hanging up easier.
And if it runs out the stranglers had a suggestionhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwP9kTMRM88
k-wits will vote for tory.
Was there any mention of Ebeneezer Blair's ample personal wealth, or does his generosity with our money absolve him of such scrutiny?
Fortunately anyone dumb enough to buy the Mirror won't have the wit to get the Dickens reference as such people tend to think Christmas day is to celebrate the invention of the television.
Fortunately anyone dumb enough to buy the Mirror won't have the wit to get the Dickens reference as such people tend to think Christmas day is to celebrate the invention of the television.
raharley said:
Simply amazing how many on this forum believe that 97-2010 was a period when 'the left' were 'in power'.
Here's a clue as to why.I don't think many would argue that NuLab were anarchists or communists, but "left" is a broad term (as is "right") and their belief that the state should control so much of our economic lives makes them a left wing party in my view, and apparently that of many others on here.
As for the well respected political compass - all the terms contained are still subjective. No two anarchists, communists, conservatives or libertarians will agree on everything, and both will believe their opinions are the more faithful representation of their core ideology. Neither is necessarily wrong about that either. Ideologies are evolving entities, shaped by the events, ideas and followers of the time.
Agree with you that the site is mostly libertarian - in my experience most people with a brain in their head and no political axe to grind or money to be made are libertarians - they don't want to be told what to do with either their money or their lives. The false Labour/Tory dichotomy is just a way of politicians keeping themselves busy by screwing us over at our expense.
Edited by AJS- on Tuesday 28th December 03:09
raharley said:
If only you quoted the whole graph, from 1900, instead of mangling statistics.
So you can see public spending was generally the same, since 1970.
I've yet to see a graph that includes PFI obligations or liabilities like public-sector pensions. Perhaps that's because it would be too frightening to create. Also, how do you get trillions on the Y axis on a piece of A4 So you can see public spending was generally the same, since 1970.
Edited by raharley on Tuesday 28th December 23:32
Edited by raharley on Tuesday 28th December 23:34
raharley said:
If only you quoted the whole graph, from 1900, instead of mangling statistics.
So you can see public spending was generally the same, since 1970.
So you can see public spending was generally the same, since 1970.
No it's not the same at all.
From 79 to 97 it fell, with a spike in the middle due to the early/mid 90s recession. Then it rose to 1970s levels during a boom because the Labour government was using our money to buy the votes of the scum and the stupid who simply didn't understand what they were voting for beyond an increase in their weekly handout.
That's why they are labelled as left wing. No it's not Marxism, but nor was Soviet Russia - it was a brutal and bloody mess because a bunch of ill educated, ill informed, foolish and optimistic people interpreted the central ideas of the left in the way that human beings do - they think how it can make them better off.
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