Golden Brown (He will be after his book)

[sunnysan]

I personally am starting to find this career path from politician to distuigished speaker and author quite irritating.

TB,Mandelson and now Brown all releasing books and getting paid stupid money to give public speeches.

Which is going to make them very rich, which means they will have more money to roam the world giving speeches and write books.

So what do a fly by night snake oil salesman, a thrice disgraced public servant and a dictatorial control freak have in common?

They have all become authors and are all public speakers and are set to do very well out of it.

Scepticism aside, are these men worth listening to? Do they have wisdom and intellect that now that they dont have demands of power, is worth taking note of? Does the fact that they have held high office mean that whatever they say is worth paying 6 figures for?

I personally would welcome the old days, when politicians who fell out of favour where grusomely tortured and executed publically. Bit of bloodletting and we all move on. Certainly would be more entertaining than reading Browns memoirs

[HairyArsedBloke]

I personally would welcome the old days, when politicians who fell out of favour where grusomely tortured and executed publically. Bit of bloodletting and we all move on. Certainly would be more entertaining than reading Browns memoirs

[Paddy]

These politicians have nothing worth listening to, it is just away of laundering dirty money.


1. Lobbyists approaches politician and asks for a favour: eg. Change of law, government contract etc. Lobbyists promises payment after politician retires so there is no hint of corruption.

2. Politician does favour for a corporate lobbyist.

3. Politician retires and gives speeches, becomes puppet director etc and gets paid an enormous amount out of proportion to what he is doing.


Unlike countries like Russian where corruption is crude and open the likes of AtW are too dim to notice corruption in the UK.

[Pondlife]

Scepticism aside, are these men worth listening to? Do they have wisdom and intellect that now that they dont have demands of power, is worth taking note of? Does the fact that they have held high office mean that whatever they say is worth paying 6 figures for?

Coleen Rooney has at least 3 books out.

[SupremeSpod]

Coleen Rooney has at least 3 books out.

I'd rather see her tits than Gordon Brown's.

[Doggy Styles]

Two things to remember:

1. Nobody buys Gordon Brown's books. I think his last one sold 22 copies.

2. However much of a s**t we think Mandelson is, someone telling us what really happened behind the scenes within his party is unusual, and welcome to those of us who suspected all along that they were just a bunch of incompetent c**ts. We just need someone to dish the dirt on Mandelson himself, as he obviously wasn't going to.

[AtW]

Unlike countries like Russian where corruption is crude and open the likes of AtW are too dim to notice corruption in the UK.

"MOSCOW -(Dow Jones)- Russian corruption now generates an amount equal to at least 50% of the country's gross domestic product, an anti-graft watchdog said.

The annual report from the Association of Russian Attorneys for Human Rights, released Friday, comes on the heels of President Dmitry Medvedev's admission earlier this month that his year-long crusade against corruption has produced few results.

Russia's GDP last year was 39 trillion rubles ($1.2 trillion dollars), making the estimated turnover of its corruption economy around $650 billion annually. (AtW's comment: very crude corruption indeed.)

The most corrupt zone in Russia by far is financial nerve center and capital Moscow, the study found, followed by the surrounding Moscow region, with the republic of Tatarstan coming in third.

The volatile North Caucasus republics, many of which are rife with soaring unemployment and home to Islamic insurgencies, weren't represented in the study because "complaining about corruption or exploring the matter can be dangerous to the lives of citizens or researchers," said Yevgeny Arkhipov, head of the association.

Recent anti-corruption measures adopted by the government would come to nothing, Arkhipov said, because "there is still no real interest in achieving victory over corruption."

Russia finished in 146th place on Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index in 2009--a much lower ranking than its emerging market peers. Brazil, China and India finished in 75th, 79th and 84th place, respectively. "

Source: Russia's Corruption Generates Equivalent Of 50% GDP - Watchdog

[TimberWolf]

These politicians have nothing worth listening to, it is just a way of laundering dirty money.

WHS.

I imagine it also allows them to get together to conceive their next abominable ventures and to a have a good laugh at previous ones, and to sacrifice the odd virgin.

[Moscow Mule]

... snip...

And it still only costs $50 to be let off any sort of minor crime.

[AtW]

And it still only costs $50 to be let off any sort of minor crime.

The price raises steeply as you have to deal with higher echelons of power, their appetites are measured in billions of dollars.