Bins, roads, unwinnable wars - this is a chancellor with money to burn

[LeftishBrit]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/03/bins-roads-wars-george-osborne

(By George Monbiot - quite thought-provoking):

This column is about the cuts the government has failed to make. It's about the profligate, pointless spending that has not been slashed, and the money Osborne could have raised but has instead decided to fritter away. For the sake of argument it accepts his estimate of the amount that will need to be saved. But it will show that over half of it could be found with much less pain.

Let us begin with the easiest cut of all: one that would hurt no one except a few grasping corporations. By cancelling its planned re-organisation of the National Health Service, the government would save £2bn. That would allow it to drop three-quarters of the cuts to the NHS's capital spending budget planned for the next four years...

The strategic purpose of the war in Afghanistan changes by the week. Its prospects of achieving any of its fluctuating aims recede by the day. Pulling out would save us £4.5bn a year. That's equivalent to the entire cut in the government grant to local authorities, plus the entire cut to the housing budget, which will raise social rents to impossible levels. So here's the choice: Sure Start centres, libraries, Citizens Advice bureaux, affordable housing, all the other services that give the poor a chance of a decent life; or an unwinnable war likely to sow further conflict...

Far from running out of funds, this looks like a government with money to burn. While the poor and middle struggle to survive the crisis that George Osborne bewails, he's giving away our money to those who need it least. So let's support him when he calls for cuts, but demand that he directs them at the welfare state he's running for corporations and billionaires, which is turning this crisis into a calamity