I've been re-reading this thing from Penguin Classics. The actual manifesto is relatively short. There are reams of writing in the introduction part of the book trying to contextualise the thinking and social forces that made the important points of the book so important to so many for decades.
Why am I reading this now? Partly because I like reading Penguin Classics, but also because I'm about to read Thomas Piketty' book' Capital in the 21st Century'. The Manifesto is a thunderously loud book as it pronounces so many things about testate of capital, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. I'm getting the whiff of 1848. I'm also getting a mechanically-minded refresher on how Marx thought the Revolution was inevitable. When you read this as an older person, you tend not to be persuaded by the energy of the thing.
Speaking of which, I've actually got Piketty's book on Kindle - I'm trying something new. I'm trying to read big serious book electronically. My experience of trying to read books on phones has notion great. At the end of the day, no matter how big the phone screen gets, it's still not quite size of a proper book so you get tired all the squinting or flicking. I've read PT Barnum's book on the iPhone but I haven't had the patience to read Pete Townshend's autobiography - it's just too big.
So far the Kindle is proving to be a delight. It's a very different experience to reading a fat book, but that's probably the best thing about it. I'm slow on the uptake when it comes to gadget-gizmos so this might strike others as incredibly backwards but basically, I'm barely getting to understanding the upside of digital ownership of media.
Greek Referendum
It's the day of the vote as we speak. For a nation that could be the undoing of the European Union, the government has a weird sense of due diligence about it. The vote represents the government seeking a final mandate to tell the Troika to stick their non-deals where the sound doesn't shine. During the week it came out from IMF economists that indeed if Greece were ever to get out of its position of debt it would need more money for a bailout and its demands to have some debt reduced would ave to be taken aboard. One imagines the boffins in the ECB and by extension the German finance ministry thought this was a bit of friendly fire, while Tsipras and Varoufakis did a little fist pump in being validated.
That being the case, it would be a crazy Greek voter to vote 'yes'; they all ought to vote 'no' and get on with either getting a better deal out of the troika or doing the Grexit. In any case, the Germans are surprised that the home of democracy has a leftist government that actually went to its people for a mandate. They should've seen it coming, given that they gave no ground whatsoever in the five months they've been talking to this sam government.
I'm not a betting man on things like this, but my best guess is that the Greeks do vote 'no' and put the Grexit on the table for Tsipras. I imagine that around lunch time Sydney tomorrow, we'll be seeing the results.
UPDATE: And it's looking like a resounding 'No'. Markets are going to open to chaos today, they think. The view is the 'no' vote puts the entire country at risk, but then, a 'yes' vote with continued austerity was not going to make things better in Greece either. Caught between rock and a hard place, then' option allows the Greeks to have a sense control over their doom. The reports also say that the Euro negotiators have lost faith in the Greek leadership, but when you think about the logic of the bailouts, it was inevitable that Greece was going to walk away from an arrangement that does not actually help ordinary Greek citizens.
Insisting On Being Stupid
I don't know what more ca be said about all this 'Q&A' business, but Tony Abbott has ordered his front bench not to appear on the ABC's panel talk show. Yes, he ordered them, and by god they will obey their Fuhrer of Foolishness, the Sultan of Stupid, the Master Moron, the Id Yacht himself. Hooray for Australian politics.
"The Prime Minister has communicated that he does not want any frontbencher to appear on Q&A," the spokesman said.
"Barnaby was told this tonight and apologised to Q&A that he would not be able to appear."
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull - who has said he opposes a boycott of the program - is scheduled to appear on next week's episode of Q&A. The Prime Minister's stance leaves Mr Turnbull with a difficult decision: to defy his leader or to act contrary to his previously-stated position.
Mr Abbott's parliamentary secretary Alan Tudge withdrew from last week's episode ofQ&A, saying it was inappropriate for him to appear while a government inquiry into Mr Mallah's appearance was underway. The Department of Communications inquiry has been finalised and a summary of its investigation was released on Friday.
Fairfax Media understands the ABC will not seek to replace Mr Joyce with another government frontbencher. Host Tony Jones is expected to address the issue on air on Monday night.Good grief. The shame of it is more petulance rather the evasiveness and the desire to be unaccountable that is driving this boycott. But that's what you get when your politicians know no shame.
Meanwhile it appears Bill Shorten has nose-dived in his popularity in the polls. Mr. Shorten now has a negative approval rating, much like the fine PrimeMinister of the land. I don't know that Bill Shorten is doing such a bad job, given that his jobs to give the government as small a target as possible until the election is called, and then go and recite and reprise all the slip ups the government has made when the election comes. I'd imagine it was the fallout form 3 weeks of 'The Killing Season' bringing back memories of his role in the Rudd Removal and the Gillard Removal as well as how he lied to the media saying he was backing the Gillard as he quietly switched horses to Rudd in 2013. Yes, it was dastardly business for all involved, but you can't expect that one to stick.
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