Now here's an intriguiging one; accusations of astroturfing in the form of 'counter protests' outside a Tea Party event. I'll let the video speak for itself.

I would bet money that a very large proportion of 'protests' around the developed world (or in the US/UK certainly) from all corners of the political spectrum are in fact orchestrated by one body or another somewhere, to push some kind of other agenda. It's a shame, because repeated 'fake' protest dilutes the value of genuine protest on the occasion that it happens, making it very hard for genuine groups and causes to make themselves heard. it also makes very easy that a genuine and/or independent person putting forth ideas or arguments be accused of 'astroturfing'. No one can trust anyone or anything. Is there any way for this ever to be resolved, or it it something that in this age of instant media will only worsen? I fear the latter.

This post was brought to you by Sinister Inc.

Jerome Taylor, The Independent

Why doesn't he name the candidate whose mates beat him up in the article?

Via Guido Fawkes

Fake Gordon poster, FNS, 19-01-2010

Conservative party poster, Mar 2010

Great minds etc

I am personally wary of the idea of televised election debates between prospective prime ministers taking off in the UK. In my opinion, politics is already 'dumbed down' enough; with too many voters utterly unaware of the policies or ideological standpoints of the main parties or their leaders, ending up voting on the basis of 'first impressions' or similarly irrelevant bases. Another soundbite rich platform, with the best presented politician 'winning' and then forever lauded in a press that should know better will only make this worse.

People say that such debates would 'raise public awareness of political issues' but I disagree; people uninterested in politics won't watch the debate(s) anyway and will only have their preexising ideas reinforced by what they read about them afterwards.

Ho-hum.

Now, speaking as someone in small business, payroll isn't any particular headache; for our 7-or so staff we spend about 0.5 man-hours per week processing pay; of which very little is actually involved in calculating tax (our payroll software does that automatically. We spend an hour here and there (up to say 8 man-hours in a year) sorting out any problems that arise with HMRC, inputting new tax codes etc. It generally wouldn't be any quicker or easier to do without deducting tax.

The other implications of the government having direct access to one's bank accounts are rather worrying*. I forsee situation where tax disputes are 'resolved' by the disputed monies being drawn directly and instantly, leaving the person in question skint while trying to prove their tax case to an uncaring HMRC who already hold the money anyway! No doubt this is where mch of the '£1bn' of increased government revenues under the scheme would come from.

Personally I'd rather have a little bit of extra bureacracy than the ever-creeping increasingly powerful state having a direct line to my bank, and thats even speaking as a proposed 'beneficiary' of this scheme.

*This already happens; people have had their bank accounts frozen or drained by the government pendng tax or criminal investigations, leaving them with no funds to pay for legal representation in the cases in question. Institutionalising government access to bank accounts can only make this situation worse.