PETER HITCHENS: Our panicking Prime Minister is bankrupting Britain

Thank you Mr Hitchens for your response to my questions about bankruptcy. Think our Economy is a lot bigger than Argentina's. Rishi Sunak has just said on Andrew Marr that His borrowing has been endorsed by the IMF and World Bank.
Think our leaving the EU in the way We plan to do does not help at all. I was in favour of staying, however I agreed with your suggesting We join EFTA. The Country is already poorer as a result of us leaving the Single Market or EEA. Many Companies have moved some of their operations to the EU. I understand and I can of course only take at face value that 900billion Pounds of UK Banking assets have been moved to the EU, so We are poorer, probably no longer the 5th largest Economy in the World!

Henry L Eplattenier | 20 November 2020 at 11:09 AM writes "Covid-19 vaccine causes no 'genetic modification'". Two points.

1. Only the vaccines developed by Pfizer and Moderna stand accused - not those of Oxford-Astra-Zeneca and Russia's Sputnik.

2. The accusation refers to the genes of the virus - not those of the recipient human - and this is the first time such an approach has been tried. Before
heaving a sigh of relief about that, reflect on the Law of Unintended
Consequences.

We are moving into uncharted territory here, and to do so on a vast scale with something which has received only superficial testing is just plain foolhardy.

There is an old saying in aviation:
"Never fly the Mark One version of anything".

I for one have no desire to fly the Mark One version of the products of Pfizer and Moderna.

I strongly recommend that Martin Grist | 21 November 2020 at 01:33 PM read "Planet Ponzi" by Mitch Feierstein, the British version of which was published by Bantam Press in 2012. Mitch is an occasional contributor to the MoS, though I haven't seen any of his work for some time.

Don't be put off by the fact that the book is eight years old. As you might expect, most of his figures are now out of date, but up-to-date figures are easily obtainable on the Internet. His basic thesis remains correct, and it is lively and well-written.

I also recommend older episodes of a TV show called "The Keiser Report", which may be found on the RT website. Max Keiser still broadcasts on RT, but has become something of a shill for Bitcoin. I'm not saying he's wrong about Bitcoin but it is not as interesting as his earlier analyses of what ails the West's financial system.

Peter Hitchens mentions Argentina as an example of what can go wrong, and that is quite valid, but my favourite is Zimbabwe. When Ian Smith handed over to Robert Mugabe the Rhodesian dollar became the Zimbabwe dollar and was worth
roughly the same as an American dollar. In July 2008 the price of an egg was an
impressive $50,000,000,000.

Don't think this can happen only in ramshackle Third World countries. Something very similar happened in Germany in 1933 and brought about the collapse of the Weimar Republic. In desperation Germany chose a new leader who could fix the problem - and to give the devil his due, fix it he did. No prizes for guessing his name.

@. Adeledicander
Why we are where we are is simple . Do the British public consider the price they pay. As long as their wages keep up with the retail price index.
Are they prepared to 50 pence a pound for potatoes picked by the English for a reasonable wage. Or a TV made in Britain or one made in South Korea. For a fraction of the price.
How many now enquire, where anything is made before purchase. Not many I bet
One reason our imports trump exports.
So given those choices even if the majority do not like mass immigration. The retail price index is their god . So God help us all.

If it is truly the case that no parliament can bind its successors, then shouldn't any debt a government incurs during its tenure be retired or abolished when that government gets voted out of office?

As it stands, if a government fears it will be voted out at the next election and replaced by another it despises, it can simply borrow and spend recklessly, and thereby ruin and bind its successor parliament to pay the debt incurred.