Ignore The Media And The Left Squealing Like Stuck Pigs, Osborne Has Not Robbed Pensioners

Forget all the howling coming from left field, the mainstream media and the Liberal Democrat bit of the Coalition. In last week’s budget, Chancellor George Osborne did not impose a stealth tax on pensioners. What he has done is abolish an age related tax allowance for new pensioners. So anyone turning 65 and claiming their pension with get the standard allowance before paying tax of £9,200. The raised alowance of £10,500 will continue to apply to those already on pensions. Nobody living on a pension will be getting less than they are now.

Here is what one level headed commentator (in The Independent of all places) said:

Existing pensioners will still avoid paying tax on the first £10,500 of their income, rising to £10,600 for the over-75s, but those benefits will now be ­frozen until the basic personal allowance catches up.

Pensioners groups, it is said, responded with fury. But pensioners groups always respond with fury. If a chancellor gave pensioners an extra hundred pounds a week they would still furiously claim they are hard done by.

What everyone has overlooked here is that the budget raised the basic old age pension that we pay for through national insurance and should all be claiming if we are on pension age (my wife is over 60 and because we kept our tax and earnings separate she already gets her pension while I have a year to go. So I have done the numbers).

Pensioners who will be hit by the new tax will be paying “up to £322 a year more” but will be getting £275 more in their state pension Now that actually means people who get a state pension and an occupational pension, not the poorest pensioners scraping by of their basic state pension. And note that “up to”. A few new pensioners with good occupational pensions giving them income of around £18,000 a year will pay £47 a year extra in tax over what those who retired before the deadline will pay. Big deal. For many whose taxable income is only slightly above the income threshold the difference will be trivial.

Pensioners who only have the basic state pension will not be affected as their total taxable income does not exceed the tax free personal allowance nor will people who get disability allowances as those payments are not taxable. Meanwhile the government faces a mega crisis of debt that has been building since the first Labour government after World War 2. There are signs that problem is going to get a lot worse very soon.

Any chancellor of any party faces an almost impossible task in trying to stop us being Greeceified by an unnafordable welfare systeminst the efforts of a profligate public sector and keep the professional whiners like pensioners, public sector workers and the unions quiet.

Good luck to George Osborne with his tightrope walking career. He may not be anywhere near the best Chancellor we have had but if Labour were in power, buying votes with borowed money while throwing tax revenues into the pockets of their very very rich supporters things would be a whole lot worse.

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Killer Red Meat Report Was Faked By Researchers Says Analysis.

Last week, in Frying Pan Fascists Want To Steal Your Steak we reported one of those health scare things scientists cook up now and again in order to get money from Big Pharma, Big Agriculture or in the latest scare promoted by Big Government.

Cut read meat consumption or you will surely die a painful, lingering death, they screamed at us as if even looking at a burger would take twenty years off our lives.

The press releases were big on sensation, light on detail, which is not surprising as the details did not bear out the conclusion (after climategate, cutletgate?)

What the details did show is that the conclusion of this gigantic, very long term study was dishonest.

Cut red meat, they said. We already had reduced red meat consumption considerably since the exercise started so there was no oint telling us how many extra years we would live if we cut just one portion of read meat a day from our menu. You see the avergage male (and men tend to eat more meat than women) consumes less than one portion of red meat a day.

So really this was just an attempt by the left wing neo nazi bansturbators who have hijacked the public sector to remove red meat from the menu.

Read the full analysis showing how the data was faked, manipulated and tortued to give the required answer at Straight Statistics

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Now Frying Pan Fascists Want To Steal Your Steak

Scientists Warn ‘Red Meat Can Be Lethal’, it is not only unhealthy but can increase the risk of death, according to a major US study:

Now you quickly get to the nature of this science in the line above. “can increase the risk of death”. Unscientific, scaremongering BOLLOCKS. We are all going to die, forget the delusional belief among scientists that they can immunise us against death, nobody lives for ever. So the risk of death is 100%, it cannot get any higher, it will not get any lower. Therefore you should read reports of this type of research with the appropriate degree of scepticism.

New research carried out in the USA and published today demonstrates eating red meat regularly, especially processed meats dramatically increases the risk of death from heart disease and cancer. Each additional daily serving of processed red meat, equivalent to one hot-dog or two rashers of bacon, raised the chances of dying by a fifth. Data from 121,342 men and women taking part in two large US health and lifestyle investigations were analysed to produce the findings, published in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine.

Now note the vagueness and obfuscatory tactics here. The do not say red meat eaters will die at 60 instead of 80. What they do appear to be saying is that for every ten people who eat red meat, twelve will die. The premise is irrational.

The study claims researchers found that cutting red meat out of the diet led to significant benefits but here again we see the way the issue is clouded in an attempt to manipulate readers. They find a problem with processed meat which in fact is not confined to red meat but, as has been known for years there is a problem with all highly processed foods, red or white meats, fats and they reduce it to appear as it it only applies to the food hate symbol of the limp wristed vegetarian Nazi party (“healthy low fat spreads” are the most dangerous things you can eat apart from the kind of stuff that comes in bottles with a skull and crossbones on the label).

Replacing red meat with fish, poultry, or plant-based protein foods contributed to a longer life, the study says although many other studies have shown vegetarians do not live significantly longer than red meat eater. Nuts are said to reduce the risk of dying by 20% – making a case for swapping roast beef for nut roast.

The studies monitored the progress of their participants for more than 20 years and gathered information about diet. In total, scientists documented 23,926 deaths including 5,910 from heart disease and 9,364 from cancer. Senior author Professor Frank Hu, from Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, said: “This study provides clear evidence that regular consumption of red meat, especially processed meat, contributes substantially to premature death.

“On the other hand, choosing more healthful sources of protein in place of red meat can confer significant health benefits by reducing chronic disease morbidity (illness) and mortality.”

Funny how the results of these studies carried out by leftie academics always affirm the moral prejudices of leftie academics and serve to advance their control freak agenda, don’t you think. When you read that cancer prevention charity the World Cancer Research Fund recommends that people avoid processed meat entirely and limit their consumption of red meat to 500g a week it’s easy to see the hand of health fascism at work. In fact the biggest problem we have with western dies now is the result of scientists meddling with so much of the food we eat for the sole purpose of boosting corporate profits. It is not the meat in processed meats, the ground grain in bread or cakes nor the oil in processed fats that does the harm, it is the added chemicals, the colourings, artificial flavourings, preservatives etc. Look at the list of ingredients on a pack of processed meat, a savoury snack, a pack of breakfast cereal. Food is not the problem, science is the problem.

Dr Rachel Thompson, the charity’s deputy head of science, said: “This study strengthens the body of evidence which shows a link between red meat and chronic diseases such as cancer and heart disease. The research itself seems solid and is based on two large-scale cohort studies monitored over a long period of time.”

And when you look at the length of time it becomes clear we are not talking about people living ten of five years less on average but a few weeks less. Ah well as the old saying goes, torture data long enough and it will tell you whatever you want it to.

We know that many other studies show there is no higher risk in eating red meat and that such results as are offered by this latest farrago can easily be obtained by manipulating data. Cult of Scienceology followers reading this will accuse The Daily Stirrer of being anti science. We are not, we are anti-pseudoscirntific-bullshit. And we are not the only ones..The study’s findings were challenged by Dr Carrie Ruxton from the Meat Advisory Panel , an expert body funded by the meat industry.

She said: “This US study looked at associations between high intakes of red meat and risk of mortality, finding a positive association between the two. However, the study was observational, not controlled, and so cannot be used to determine cause and effect. “The authors’ conclusion that swapping a portion of red meat for poultry or fish each week may lower mortality risk was based only on a theoretical model.

In other words, other lifestyle factors that could have ben significant were factored out of the study. And again we see the common preference of modern, politicised scientists for working with theoretical models rather than reality.

Dr. Ruxton went on to point out this study’s conclusion conflicts with evidence from controlled trials. She pointed out that meat and meat products were significant sources of essential nutrients such as iron, zinc, selenium, B vitamins and vitamin D. So as these are all essential nutrients following the advice of the report would result in people being malnourished. Good work guys.

In the UK, red meat was “critically important” to zinc intake, contributing 32% of the total for men and 27% for women. Red meat also contributed around 17% of total dietary iron intake in the UK.

We give the last word to Dr. Ruxton: “In summary, this paper should not be used to dissuade people from reducing their current intake of red meat when it provides essential nutrients that are required as part of a healthy balanced diet.”

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Despite The Debt Crisis Euro Nazis War On Democracy Goes On

While we are on the subject of the EU’s creeping fascism, Bruno Waterfield has also posted an interesting comment on Sp!ked, where he argues that the EU is doing everything it can to ensure that Ireland’s referendum on the new “fiskalpact” is stitched up before a vote is cast:

It has been little noted, but the treaty text contains an innovation, described by European diplomats as ‘a very unusual step’. As opposed to all other EU treaties, the fiskalpakt will enter into force when only 12 out the 17 Eurozone member state signatories have ratified it.

[…]Once upon a time, the EU operated on the principle that its rules must be agreed by all its members, through democratic ratifications held according to national principles. Today, individual nations and popular votes cannot be allowed to stand in the way of the EU, which is emerging as the instrument by which elites pit their statecraft and institutions against changing European societies.

[…] Even the previously euro-friendly François Hollande, the grey French Socialist leader, has become too much for the EU establishment. There have been reports of murky (and completely backfiring) pacts to sabotage his bid to win the French presidency. His crime is that he wants to renegotiate the same treaty that Ireland is voting on. France, one of the most powerful EU countries, is creating more ‘nervousness’ than Ireland, senior EU officials have told me. ‘If he wants to significantly renegotiate the pact on debt brakes or sanctions then that will stop the process of ratification in a number of countries. The French elections are a big worry for Germany’, said the senior European source.

You may remember last time there was a vote on a change in EU rules that affected the sovereignty of member nations, Irish voters, the only elctorate to be allowed an opinion due to their contritution’s clauses on national sovereignty, voted the proposal, The Lisbon Treaty, they rejected it. The Treaty was a thinly disguised version of the European Constitution, a document which would have trodden the sovereignty and cultures of member states into the mud of the first world war battlefields where so many millions died. The European Consitution had previouusly been thrown out by big majorities in France and The Netherlands with referenda in the UK, Germany and Sweden set to follow suit.

The smooth faced bureaucrats are not really in denial about the fact that further integration of nations is deeply unpopular with ordinary people eerywhere, they are now confident enough to openly display the contempt for democracy they have previousluy kept hidden.

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You didn’t really think it would stop at Greece did you – Spain’s debt causes worry

World on the Greece – y slope to financial ruin.

According to news reports, finance ministers from the world’s leading economies worked on through last weekend to line up a deal that will see the world embark on a second global rescue package worth nearly $2 trillion in April this year.

They claim this is needed to stop the euro-zone sovereign debt crisis from spreading and putting at risk the tentative recovery.

Germany said it would make a decision some time in March on strengthening Europe’s bailout fund, a move other Group of 20 countries say is essential to clear the way for throwing extra funds into the International Monetary Fund.

I have been doing a little research and found that the nations coping best with the economic slump are those that did not join in the first money priniting exercise stimulus. The point about such a project is it contains the seeds of it’s own destruction. Printing money is not a question of revving up the printing presses. Money these days exists computer databases and only shows up in spreadsheeds.

There is very litle real money around.

So when we say ‘printing money’ it means governments borrowing money on which they must pay interest. And the more money governments borrow to finance their profligate spending, the more interest they must pay.

This is how Greece got into it’s current state. The interest that nation must pay on its €1,7 trillion debt at current interest rates of around 7% is €120 billion. With a GDP of about €220 billion and falling the nation is in a spiral of debt. It must take on more debt by borrowing to pay the interest on existing debt. Simples.

So long as economists and politicians choose to ignore this we are all on the Greece – y slope to the same fate.

What makes matters worse is nobody in their right mind would lend to governments these days so governments are buying in their own bonds, i.e. borrowing from us poor punters. And they are not giving any guarantees when or even if they intend to pay us back.