Cuts! Cuts! Investment! Brown! Lies! Roma!

Liar Brown; when cuts are paraded as increases. And not just Brown:

Among some ministers, however, a cynical view persists that the truth or falsehood of the party’s position on public spending is irrelevant. All that counts is that the simple idea that the Tories are “cutters” is communicated to their core working-class vote.

“We don’t care if the commentators or the economists turn against us,” said one minister. “This is all about shoring up the base in the northern heart-lands, which we lost in the European elections. We don’t want or need them to understand the nuance of the argument. We just want them to hate the Tories again.”

Meanwhile Britannia shrivels under Gordon Brown.

Returning to the Roma issue, there's an article in the Guardian, Unhappy return: fear and loathing await fugitives from Belfast racism. Mention is made of the European Roma Rights Centre.

Gypsies, Roma, call them what you will, suffer discrimination and violence in many parts of continental Europe. What we have to question is the policy of the EU (and it is the EU driving all this) which allows groups of them to be dumped in countries where the aggression they arouse is less vehement, eg the UK. Or was, until recently.

Why should someone else's problem become ours? Because that is exactly what happened in Belfast. And all it's achieved is the stirring up of the very racism these policies are supposed to destroy.

This is another example of simplistic thinking by EU policy makers and their associates. They come up with a one size fits all approach, disregarding national and regional loyalties and self-identity and then encourage various authorities (through funding and campaigns) to enact their naive ideas. With the inevitable results - total failure.