Coming so soon after gary speed’s wife found his body after he had committed suicide in his house, this is doubly horrible.

I’m amazed that anyone takes that professional buffoon seriously.

“I mean how dare they go on strike when they have these gilt-edged pensions that are going to be guaranteed, while the rest of us have to work for a living.”

I’m sorry, Mr Clarkson-whose-publicly-funded-pension-is-3x-my-16%-cut-public-salary, could you please clarify which “rest of us” have to work for a living, because I suspect it is not you. Also, please point me to these gilt-edged public sector pensions, I who will get about £3000 a year if I’m lucky (and your bleeping buddies don’t take it off me by the time I’m 67) would really like one.

He’s funny.

In Clarksons defence I would say that at least he is honest. Because this is what most tory brownshirts think. It is what tory politicians really believe, but don’t have the guts to say openly.
But if you want class war Clarkson ,then bring it on baby.

Personally, I am against teachers going on strike because it means children miss a day’s education. Also health workers because they are often dealing with people who are in life threatening situations.

That said, Jeremy Clarkson is a racist, disablist idiot who has, yet again, gone way too far.

I lost a close family member to gun crime 5 years ago, so I also hate guns and think the only person who should be shot is their inventor.

I take it as a threat, not a joke. Prosecute!

And I refuse to get involved in scams, including the current “pension” system. The cash will do better for me sitting in my bank account.

Never mind, Clarkson looks quite ill and unhealthy and he may be dead soon.
Was I being ironic there ?
Or was it an ironic double-bluff ?

The words don’t look like comedy, but to me his delivery of them does. He is reflecting the view people would expect him to have in an extreme way – to the amusement of the people in the studio, who presumably get the joke.

He says “while the rest of us have to WORK for a living!” in the same way he does when he says something intentionally absurd on Top Gear. I think he’s joking (as if calling for people to be shot wasn’t a big enough clue), and just on the basis of that 15 second clip I’d expect most regular viewers of Top Gear to come to the same conclusion. The camera is on the presenters when he mentions the ‘gilt-edged pensions’ and I don’t think the ‘quite a serious face’ immediately prior to that is anything more than him keeping a straight face in the middle of his rant.

I’m not generally a defender of Clarkson but unless the rest of that segment (which is not on YouTube or iPlayer) shows he seriously pursued that line, I’d call off the hounds on this one.

I’m no fan of Jeremy Clarkson, but at least look at what he said in context.

The first thing he said was “we’re on the BBC, we have to be fair to both sides” then he said that he loved the strikes because it meant there was no traffic and he could get around much more quickly. Then he said what he said. I agree with Phil above, he was being sarcastic and joking, hence the emphasis on “WORK”.

No doubt he opposes the strike, but he was being sarcastic and jokey about the BBC’s “fair to both sides” policy.

yes but his fair to both sides comment was equally scathing… his comments ‘in favour’ of the strike were deliberately trivial. Whereas his true feelings then came out immediately after. Not funny at 7pm prime time… just back from a demo with my 3 children. They didn’t need to see this from someone my son sadly admires because of all the car stuff. After all, given the company he keeps, there can be little doubt that he is at best a populist bigot

Clarkson gets paid £1 million a year by the BBC.

The BBC is largely funded from what in any other language is a poll tax, payable on pain of fine or imprisonment.

Maybe he’d like to rethink that statement…especially on BBC 1 at 7 pm, when strikers children might well be watching, and not know who this buffoon is.

He should probably be prosecuted.

That said, the producers of the show know that he is a stupid man who says outrageous immature things to impress his right wing nut job immature friends. They shouldn’t have him on when kids might be watching.

I’d like to think that this time he’s gone too far, but I suspect that next year he will be off with another million of our money.

he was being sarcastic and joking

Thanks, Phil & Joe, for that dazzling insight.

Because everyone else here obviously took Clarkson’s words at face value, and believed that he was genuinely calling for mass executions on the streets of Britain.

I was personally more offended by his throw away comment about people who take their own life, particularly in light of the loss of Gary Spend.

He’s funny if you like Viz like humour and the BBC give him way too much airplay. Time to really challenge the regulators I think. How many free passes are they going to give our ‘national’ channel for this bigoted, racist, arrogant xenophobe (and that’s just some of his good points) in the name of ‘humour’?

Funny man jokes about murdering strikers in front of their families! Hohoho. So droll.

He’s funny if you like Viz like humour

Speaking as someone with a large collection of Viz back-issues, no he isn’t.

He has made a name for himself as a loudmouthed, offensive idiot. Fair enough. But it’s ridiculous to invite him on mainstream politics programs to discuss a topic which is extremely sensitive to a lot of people, and then immediately apologise when he inevitably says something offensively idiotic. Just keep him where he belongs, crapping on about cars, or on late-night comedy slots where other people can respond in kind.

Ken wasn’t joking. He was merely debasing the Holocaust for a cheap point.

Nor do I think most people who look forward to Thatcher’s death are joking.

But was Clarkson? I think this is John Stewart’s point again – it is a mistake to mistake him for serious comment. Unlike JS, Clarkson doesn’t really ever take his clown nose off does he?

So what if he said the strikers should be shot? The Guardian continues to shelter and employ a large number of people who think large numbers of us should be shot. Not just people who think Stalin was a great man, but people who took money from Stalinist regimes. Even the KGB. To further their plans to shoot many of us I suppose. For that matter LC gave their front page to Kate Hudson who was and is a long time member of the Soviet-funding party of Quislings that hoped to see the Soviet Army “liberate” Britain. The Guardian continues, along with much of the Left, to support people like Azim Tamimi who has defended suicide bombing.

If none of this is beyond the Pale, how can Clarkson be so?

I don’t think that this is a contest the Left is going to win because much worse is routine Leftist discourse.

@17 – Of course you think they should. Blood, death, murder – the standard response of the far right.

Mr Clarkson may be unaware that throughout history many strikers HAVE died at the hands of the army and police- unarmed men and women slaughtered by their own governments.

Llanelli 1911, Massachuesetts 1912, Cateret 1915, and Ludlow in 1914

Let the idiot make his stupid ‘jokes’ but lets use it to remind people of the real history of the trade union movement, and the brutality it has faced from government.

19. badawo

Mr Clarkson may be unaware that throughout history many strikers HAVE died at the hands of the army and police- unarmed men and women slaughtered by their own governments.

Let the idiot make his stupid ‘jokes’ but lets use it to remind people of the real history of the trade union movement, and the brutality it has faced from government.

So to produce this martyrdom you have had to reach back over 100 years have you? Oh yes, violence against strikers is so common in the West. Half the cases are American as well.

Unarmed men? At Llanelli, the rioters drew soldiers into a railway cutting and then, standing on both banks, proceeded to stone the soldiers. Only then did they open fire – killing all of two. Unarmed they were not. The soldiers did not slaughter them either – they were clearly acting on the orders of the local Justice of the Peace and in their own self defense.

This is the real history of the Trade Union movement is it? Hardly one of massive oppression. You may as well say that because the Angry Brigade killed more people the entire Left has more blood on their hands.

@14 if you like Viz humour (which I do) you will then know that Viz hate this man. He featured in the free giveaway poster ‘Cunts of Britain’, he is often the target of harsh insulting letters on the letter page and his dick was incredibly small according to the list of Brits with the biggest cocks. Oh also Viz is actually funny. Clarkson humour is more like, ‘your German are you. HAHAHA! World War II, we won that.’ ‘France is great except it’s full of French people’ and ‘John Prescott should cut down on the pies!’ and saying outrageous things whilst forgetting to actually be funny, like what he has done here. Whilst I can happily watch Top Gear, it doesn’t stop me thinking that Viz might have a point.

@20 – And yet you keep calling for murder, death and violence. As usual.

I think anyone he was calling to be executed would be well within their rights to give him a slap if they saw him.

Meantime, here’s Victor Lewis Smith’s obituary of the ‘human toffee apple’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpL9a-5LFpI

It’s a joke, like they have on top gear.

Humourless lefties, etc, etc.

It was a poor joke, poorly delivered. But it was a joke (like Sunny’s Canute-like attempt to portray the BBC as a rightwing bastion – at least I laughed at that one).

LC is, once again, trying to stimulate the Left’s over-developed outrage gland. And like Pavlov’s dog, they are all responding.

If you don’t like Clarkson, ignore him.

@24 – Ah yes, because joking about death is always funny. Oh wait, it’s not.

I like your comment at the end – “Let’s not have Tories comment”.

Oh no, that would be a shocker, wouldn’t it, because some people, and especially comedians, might have to be a teeny weeny bit more respectful about Margaret Thatcher, because, as you do know, what goes around comes around.

Can we look forward to a Downfall-based mashup of this?

@27

You know we can all scroll up and read what it actually says, don’t you?

@26 I think 24 is doing a take on the Stewart Lee ‘Top Gear’ routine.

@28….NO! NO! NO! NO! or NEIN!NEIN!NEIN!NEIN!…leave that film alone do you hear. No more mash ups of Downfall please. PLEASE GOD NO MORE!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2fl-sHUwrc at least you are still on youtube.

News update:

“The BBC has apologised after Jeremy Clarkson said he would like to see striking public sector workers ‘shot’.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15977813

As anyone with a modicum of intelligence would have checked and appreciated, taken literally that would mean about two-thirds of schools would remain enclosed until replacement teachers could be recruited to teach in the schools.

@31 – Not at all. After all, they could just be made free schools and do away with the requirements for qualified teachers. If it’s good enough for some schools, after all…

(What, now qualified teachers are valuable? Nope, not in the public sector, where they’re grossly underpaid compared to the private sector!)

@6 “Personally, I am against teachers going on strike because it means children miss a day’s education.”

That’s a bit short-termist, kids will miss entire lifetime’s educations (and healthcare) when our World Bank-sponsored politicians have had their way. Line in the sand time, methinks.

A report in the Guardian shows official contingency thinking about the way forward:

“The Metropolitan police is considering the purchase of three water cannon at a cost of nearly £4m to cover London and the south east as part of a new approach to public order policing in the aftermath of the summer riots.”

No problem finding the public money for water cannon but pepper sprays come sooo much cheaper. Try this demonstration on video by the Police at the University of California, Davis – which is near Sacramento, the state capital.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGf9wEIXMns

Watch how that video ends – the Police go into a tight circle, presumably for self-protection, and then withdraw.

So, Jeremy Clarkson expressed one of the controversial opinions he has for money. I for one am shocked.

Cheer yourself up with this

I think it’s more shocking how many people took these comments at face value. How stupid are people?

Middle age is when your broad mind and narrow hips change places said Joseph Crossman, he didn’t mention a lucrative TV and print career as a professional bigot. By his own logic this public school bully should be taken out and shot as he has his hand so deep in the public’s pocket via the licence fee. You’d need armour piercing bullets to get through the vast gut that hangs over his jeans. And when is Clarkson going to be arrested to breaking his own super-injuction which he obtained by calling his ex-wife a blackmailer without providing any proof of what is a criminal offence?

@ 35 its a terrible terrible day Mister F.C.Cracker…. I liked the bit when he said something offensive…cheers for the link, thats going up on my facebook wall, just to annoy the hell out of my fellow top gear fans.

As someone who lost a loved one to a train suicide, I find his comments disgusting. He obviously doesn’t think about the real people behind the subjects he makes crude jokes about (strikers included) and although we can’t expect everyone to feel empathy with everyone else, as an employee of a public funded institution he has crossed the line. I suppose Top Gear is a big franchise for the BBC but it’s time he was sacked. He obviously can’t keep his personal or political opinions to himself, so goodbye and good riddance Clarkson, you sad little man.

Of course if I made a “joke” about wanting to bomb 10 Downing Street, I could expect a visit from Special Branch.

By his own logic this public school bully should be taken out and shot as he has his hand so deep in the public’s pocket via the licence fee.

Top Gear makes an awful lot more money for the BBC than the BBC pays for its production. It’s about their single biggest earning programme.

@20

“This is the real history of the Trade Union movement is it? Hardly one of massive oppression. You may as well say that because the Angry Brigade killed more people the entire Left has more blood on their hands”.

Laughable. My dad is bigger than your dad and he carries a gun.

How many alleged ‘communists’ did Suharto kill?

41
Well that justifies almost anything, as long as it makes money the world is well.

If nothing else at least the imaginary left wing bias of the BBC is about to be exposed for what it is when the spinless wimps refuse to sack him.

Tim J – but how much would it make without the BBC’s institutional goodwill?

I know, lets put the same programme on Channel 5 and find out… Aaaah…

45 – I’m sure it would make a lot less money on Channel 5. And that would be bad both for Top Gear and for the BBC. What point are you trying to make?

The point I’m trying to make is that it’s a bit of a stretch to depict Clarkson as scrounging off the state when he receives substantially less from the BBC than he makes for them.

There is a bigger issue than the buffoon Clarkson. It is the BBC s constant pandering to the right. Do we believe that a similar leftie would be allowed on to a primetime show before the watershed and say that Cameron and Osborne should be shot in front of their children? No way.

I noticed the other day Bbc news announced the death of Ken Russell the film director by saying in the headlines “controversial film director Ken Russell dies” Will they insert the word “controversial” when Thatcher dies?” ………”controversial former prime minister who 58% did not vote for has died” Hell will freeze over before that ever happens.

The BBC’s obsession with not upsetting te Right wing media, and the tory party has made it a pathetic animal. Still, won’t do you any favours BBC, they still want to destroy you.

Since when does what this overpaid idiot does been classed as working for a living?

It was no joke, Clarkson appeals to the Tory vermin via this type thing.

Let us imagine Jermeny Hardy said that bakers should be shot. The Daily Hate would have had a field day with that and so would the same Tory vermin that infest this board.

When Thatcher dies we will see people cheering and dancing in the streets and the fucking Tories will make no attempt to join in with the fun.

Tim J – thanks for refuting your own argument, it saves the rest of us time.

Let us imagine Jermeny Hardy said that bakers should be shot.

Not quite bankers (or even bakers), but Jeremy Hardy did rather famously advocate the summary execution of tens of thousands of people he disagreed with politically.

50 – I think you may possibly have failed to understand the argument I was making. Again.

@ Sunny

“PS – Let’s not have Tories complaining about ‘PC gawn mad’ and ‘have a sense of humour’ when they get so uppity and annoyed at even small jokes themselves. ”

TBH, I don’t see much difference between Clarkson’s comments (which you’re annoyed about) and the comments about Thatcher in the link (which you think it’s silly to get annoyed about). I’m pretty sure what divides “acceptable” and “unacceptable” here is whether the perpetrator or the victim is right-wing. Clarkson is right-wing, bad taste jokes by him are wrong, Thatcher is right-wing, bad taste jokes about her are fine!

As for Clarkson’s comment, it sits in the hinterland behind comedy and unpleasant fantasy. He wasn’t serious, but the remark will appeal to a lot of nasty people who love the idea of seeing strikers put up against the wall.

What’s happened to my comments?

Hot news update:

David Cameron urged to distance himself from Jeremy Clarkson ‘execution’ rant
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/8927752/David-Cameron-urged-to-distance-himself-from-Jeremy-Clarkson-execution-rant.html

That would be a wise move on Cameron’s part. The buffoon Clarkson is evidently taken seriously by some and execution of dissidents is more characteristic of deviant left-wing regimes such as the Nazis or the Soviets, which contracted a Friendship Treaty on 28 September 1939 when Britain and France were already at war.

Clarkson’s excuse is that he was confused.

Tim @ 41

Top Gear makes an awful lot more money for the BBC than the BBC pays for its production. It’s about their single biggest earning programme.

No-one will be suprised to see the amoral Tories support a call for people to be shot.

But hang on a minute. Weren’t the Tories all moaning about the huge wages the BBC talent gets? So now we are to believe that the Typical Tory Vermin are in favour of these salaries because they bring in more money than they pay out? So as long as ‘the office’, Russell Brand et al bring money then the wages they pay are okay?

Oh wait, that only counts if the person getting a million quid is one of them, i.e. a middle aged millionaire sociopath, who likes fast cars and despises science.

Come to think of it, I suppose by your ‘logic’ any public servant you can show a profit doesn’t really count as ‘public servant’ then? So does that mean that a traffic warden who covers his shift with enough fines or a VAT inspector can count himself as okay in your book?

. I’m pretty sure what divides “acceptable” and “unacceptable” here is whether the perpetrator or the victim is right-wing. Clarkson is right-wing, bad taste jokes by him are wrong, Thatcher is right-wing, bad taste jokes about her are fine!

Correlation != Causation.

@45 One wonders what a BBC less Top Gear would be like…. Today the lads on Top Gear ride a pedal go-kart down a hill, and the Hamster and Captain Slow put stunt nuts on a bike and go over a ramp…together!!! Whilst Clarkson gets a bus to the train station!….and the Stig tries to break his on personal best on the Top Gear test track…on Gran Turismo 5….on the PS3….cue ‘Jessica’

I would watch it.

@ 54 Buddyhell

“What’s happened to my comments?”

Comments tend to get deleted if either a) Sunny feels that you’re trolling or b) you’re engaged in conversation with someone Sunny feels is trolling (to prevent it looking like you’ve been arguing with nobody).

Oh, and what about this for a definition of ‘Working for a living’:

People who transport dying TV presenters from a race track to the A&E department that battle to save the self indulgent twats life, after his irresponsible stunt goes wrong.

What about those guys, Clarkson? You have a bullet saved for each on them? You weren’t berating those guys about gold plated pensions when they were patching your fucking halfwitted mate, were you?

Ungrateful Tory scum.

@ 57

“Correlation != Causation.”

Yes, but in this case I suspect it is the causative factor, plus Sunny has a track record of holding double standards when it comes to acceptable behaviour (e.g. when the president of the NUS had stuff thrown at him, Sunny said this sort of thing was never acceptable, only for someone to point out that Sunny had expressed enthusiasm when a right-winger got pelted).

56 – you’re shouting at the argument that you’d like me to have made, not the one I actually did make.

Tim j @61

Come on Tim, you are implying that because the BBC sell Top Gear on that somehow makes Clarkson not taking from the public purse. The BBC make and sell many of its programmes/formats, but that does not detract from the fact that he is very rich at the expense of the BBC. The fact of the matter is the BBC would sell on Top Gear for a profit, no matter how much Clarkson or his replacement was on. Lots of people work on top gear, not just in front of the camera, they all get paid from the license fee as well.

He is a millionaire because of the license fee & the BBC, I am not knocking him for that, but it is a bit much for him to take public money in one hand then berate others who do a damn sight more important job than he does for considerably less money than he gets.

Come on Tim, you are implying that because the BBC sell Top Gear on that somehow makes Clarkson not taking from the public purse. The BBC make and sell many of its programmes/formats, but that does not detract from the fact that he is very rich at the expense of the BBC. The fact of the matter is the BBC would sell on Top Gear for a profit, no matter how much Clarkson or his replacement was on.

I’m not actually making a terribly controversial point here. Both the Beeb and Clarkson do very nicely out of Top Gear, and it is, as I said, the biggest earner for BBC Worldwide. He makes far more money for the Beeb than he gets in salary from them.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/jul/06/top-gear-bbc-worldwide-profit

He also owns Top Gear (jointly with the Beeb and Andy Wilman) so it isn’t entirely straightforward to ‘replace’ him. It couldn’t be done without his consent.

None of this, obviously, has anything do with his right to make tasteless jokes.

Yes, but in this case I suspect it is the causative factor, plus Sunny has a track record of holding double standards when it comes to acceptable behaviour (e.g. when the president of the NUS had stuff thrown at him, Sunny said this sort of thing was never acceptable, only for someone to point out that Sunny had expressed enthusiasm when a right-winger got pelted).

Sunny may or may not be a hypocrite on the matter.

However, no amount of ill conceived homogenising alters the fundamental comedic fact that it’s broadly acceptable to take the piss out of the powerful, always has been; people who throw themselves under trains don’t fall into that category.

That there are very few powerful left wing figures doesn’t implicitly mean it’s unacceptable to mock them.

56 – you’re shouting at the argument that you’d like me to have made, not the one I actually did make.

Page 1 of the Internet playbook.

The bbc is in a difficult position now. Clarkson makes them a lot of money, and is beloved by the knuckle dragging right. Yet if they take no action it will give him the green light to say anything, at anytime on the Bbc.

They have created a monster that they can’t control. Not a good idea to then put him on a live show at 7pm and ask him about current affairs. At the last election the hypocritical tory scum that now defend him demanded that Alan Sugar should be taken off air because he supported labour. The fqct that th BBC caved in, and took him off the air while keeping many well known tories on air shows their bias.

Tim J @ 64

When I said his replacement, I meant when the programme was first commissioned, they could have plucked another journalist out of obscurity and made him (it was always going to be a bloke) a star. Clarkson owes his fortune to the fact that a publicly funded broadcaster make this programme.

At the last election the hypocritical tory scum that now defend him demanded that Alan Sugar should be taken off air because he supported labour.

Not quite – he was taken off air because he was an official adviser of the Labour Government, not just a supporter. Those glorious days of Enterprise Tsars…

When I said his replacement, I meant when the programme was first commissioned, they could have plucked another journalist out of obscurity and made him (it was always going to be a bloke) a star.

He was only one of lots of Top Gear presenters in the old days. Michelle Newman and Vicki Butler Henderson aren’t desperately starry. William Woollard ring any bells?

69 straw man alert.

He is going to get it aint he. Either that or he is going to have to make a very grovelling apology. A Christmas Special then its good bye Top Gear! If I was Richard Hammond, I would be pissing myself with fear.

“First, the BBC has major voices on the right that regularly opine about national politics (Andrew Neil, Jeremy Clarkson, Nick Robinson) – and those are just the major ones – while there are hardly any similar left-wing figures. ”

Now that *is* funny. A BBC which has Polly, Laurie Penny, Richard Murphy , Andrew Simms etc on every single damn radio program they broadcast* does not have any lefties on it?

* Hyperbole alert.

Watching Clarkson always makes me furious, so let’s deal with it through humour…

A banker, a school teacher, a Tory MP and a Daily Mail reader are sat around a table.

In front of them is a plate, on which there are ten biscuits. The banker scoffs nine of the biscuits, then the Tory turns to the Daily Mail reader and whispers in his ear, “Watch out – that teacher is after your biscuit.”

HAHA 17 is a joke right?

V good. Better than Clarkson!

Totally agree with you, but I don’t think there should be strongly left and strongly right critics to provide balance. Far better to have serious analysts. Whhat relevance is Clarkson on this matter. Makes as much sense as having non-drivers, cyclists, archeologists – whoever giving opinions on Top Gear.
Perhaps he should do community service, working in a special school cleaning out the toilets for 200 hours and then he would see what the vast majority of women who is castigating put up with.

why dont you post a video of the minutes leading upto this remark, that way you can better judge if they were made in jest. After all, he did say ‘as this is the BBC, we have to give a balanced view’ right after giving an opposing view.

@ 65

“However, no amount of ill conceived homogenising alters the fundamental comedic fact that it’s broadly acceptable to take the piss out of the powerful, always has been; people who throw themselves under trains don’t fall into that category.”

People who throw themselves under trains? What’s that got to do with it?

“That there are very few powerful left wing figures doesn’t implicitly mean it’s unacceptable to mock them.”

Who said that it did?

The issue is not Clarkson. He is a right wing motormouth who akes huge amounts of money off his army of pin heads by saying provocative things. He is the Anne Coulter of the Uk. No, the issue is why the BBC gives him air space when they are terrified of people on the left saying things.

If I went on the BBC and called for Cameron and Osborne to be executed in fron of their children, I would be taken straight to Special Branch. As always it is the double standards at the BBC.

72 – always the bridesmaid, eh Worstall?

@72 – always the bridesmaid, eh Tim.

Calm down. No different to Ben Elton in the 1980s; and he wasn’t funny either. Jeremy’s got a book to sell. You are helping him.

People who throw themselves under trains? What’s that got to do with it?

“‘I do sometimes use the train to come to London but it always stops in Reading. It’s always because somebody has jumped in front of it and somebody has burst. You just think, why have we stopped because we’ve hit somebody? What’s the point of stopping? It won’t make them better.”

Who said that it did?

You – the primary correlation isn’t political allegiance as you suggested, it’s power. Which when you overlay with political allegiance reveals itself to be a basic numbers game.

I’m a liberal and have always voted for the libs, but I have to say I think Clarkson has said in a crude way what alot of the public are thinking. Students have had there debt increased x3 before even getting a job so why should it just be the young that have to pay(for the rest of their working life) for mess we are in. Everbody has to contribute their bit and that means reduced pensions for the public sector. I’m a graduate for a private company on a modest wage which is very similar to public sector wage, I get no pensions, no benifits and because of the current climate no bonus either but i’m still grateful to be in a job. If my company decided they had to cut my salary then i wouldn’t be happy but i wouldn’t throw my toys out of the pram and quit there and then, I would except their reasons and look to see if i could find a better payed job, why dont the public sector workers do that?

@ 82

“I do sometimes use the train to come to London but it always stops in Reading. It’s always because somebody has jumped in front of it and somebody has burst. You just think, why have we stopped because we’ve hit somebody? What’s the point of stopping? It won’t make them better.”

Is that from the Clarkson vid? I’m at work so I can’t watch video, I’m getting my info from the article.

“You – the primary correlation isn’t political allegiance as you suggested, it’s power. Which when you overlay with political allegiance reveals itself to be a basic numbers game.”

That still doesn’t add up to me saying that it’s unacceptable to mock powerful left-wing figures. Or, in case this is what you meant, to me saying that Sunny says it’s unacceptable to mock powerful left-wing figures. I’m really unsure what you’re on about here.

@ 83

“Everbody has to contribute their bit and that means reduced pensions for the public sector.”

Why? Of all the possible ways of getting people to “do their bit”, why does cutting public sector pensions have to automatically be the solution? And why are you using inclusive language (“everyone has to contribute”) when calling for a policy that only affects one demographic group?

“If my company decided they had to cut my salary then i wouldn’t be happy but i wouldn’t throw my toys out of the pram and quit there and then, I would except their reasons and look to see if i could find a better payed job, why dont the public sector workers do that?”

I guess they’re just not as noble as you. Or, just maybe, they have mortgages to pay and kids to feed.

I wouldn’t want ALL public sector workers shot. How could the missus cook my dinner if she was dead!

Clarkson’s into the licence fee payer for about a million quid a year and nearly as much for sales on Top Gear branded crap. Now’s the ideal opportunity for him to take his vast talent to the private sector and see how it flourishes without a major national TV station to keep the public aware he hasn’t died. I must be old, I can remember when Top Gear was about cars instead of a fat, badly dressed bully and his two toadies having the world’s longest and most expensive mid-life crisis

@ 83. tim

Because it is considered progressive to redistribute resources from the young to the old. It is the political equivalent of stealing a kids lollipop and pretending it is for their own good. Taxing the meager wage of the 22 year old construction site labourer to pay for the pension of the prosperous headmaster is also considered progressive. I mean, how much worse off could he have been without the headmaster. The fact that this often results in a net transfer of resources from the asset poor young to the asset rich elderly is pretended to be progressive because they vote. Your demographic do not vote, so unfortunately you will be the one screwed. Without means testing this inevitably means a veritable redistribution from the poor young to the not so poor and often very prosperous elderly. The older voted to eliminate pensioner poverty on themselves and in a selfless act transfered it to the young.

88
In case you’re not aware, the 22 year old construction worker is already paying for the existing state pensions, that’s because consecutive governments have spent the money that people pay every week/month for said pensions.
The public sector pension is not free, it costs approx 4% of the wage/salary and, as someone else has pointed-out, joining is not compulsory. So if public sector pensions become unattractive, they won’t be taken-up. Then public and private sector workers will be in the same position, needing to claim from the benefit’s system, but I suppose the extra money in the, for example, nurse’s pockets, will help stimulate the economy.
83
People in the public sector have made a lifestyle decision in the same way that you have. If you want the same provision as those in the public sector then you can also make that choice.
Btw, during the next election you might think harder about where you put your cross on the ballot paper.

Clarkson has now made a mealy mouthed apology where he tries to link the BBC in as well. The BBC gave you air time dipstick, they did not utter the words.

This is not the first time he has had to apologise, and obviously thinks he is bullet-proof in terms of being sacked. Very dangerous animal to have on TV , someone who thinks they will never be called to account. He will keep pushing on the edge because he knows the BBC is terrified of his pin head army of knuckle draggers.

The problem’s not Clarkeson being Clarkeson – that’s his job, and he’s well paid for it – its asking him about a serious matter he isn’t qualified to comment on with the expectation that he would perform to type. That’s an editorial decision and its the editor who is at fault for trivialising a serious subject in the first place.

Not that I want the BBC to apologise anyway, it has been far to craven in the last decade or so and I’d rather it caused offence more often.

It’s a weird mindset, where someone who gets paid millions for cocking around in fast cars and occasionally gobbing off about the gays, can lecture teaching assistants and hospital orderlies about their workshy lifestyles & gilt-edged finances. Apology not accepted, shagsack.

@84

Is that from the Clarkson vid? I’m at work so I can’t watch video, I’m getting my info from the article.

Yes, though it’s not getting as much play for some reason.

That still doesn’t add up to me saying that it’s unacceptable to mock powerful left-wing figures. Or, in case this is what you meant, to me saying that Sunny says it’s unacceptable to mock powerful left-wing figures. I’m really unsure what you’re on about here.

“I’m pretty sure what divides “acceptable” and “unacceptable” here is whether the perpetrator or the victim is right-wing. Clarkson is right-wing, bad taste jokes by him are wrong, Thatcher is right-wing, bad taste jokes about her are fine!”

You were saying the variable is politics, I’m saying I disagree.

@83

Everbody has to contribute their bit and that means reduced pensions for the public sector.

Those pensions are part of a contract that they and their employer agreed upon, you’ve failed to specify how that defaults to ‘well you’ll just have to rip that contract up because I demand it’.

I’m a graduate for a private company on a modest wage which is very similar to public sector wage, I get no pensions, no benifits and because of the current climate no bonus either but i’m still grateful to be in a job.

Which is fair enough, you entered into a voluntary contract with another party.

If my company decided they had to cut my salary then i wouldn’t be happy but i wouldn’t throw my toys out of the pram and quit there and then, I would except their reasons and look to see if i could find a better payed job,

More pertinently would you enter into an agreement with an employer who you knew was prone to sacking entire offices purely because they woken up one morning and decided they’d made a bad deal with the employees there?

As a social worker friend said to me the other day – “is this pay freeze an extension to the current one, or concurrent to it?”

why dont the public sector workers do that?

725000 either have or are about to.

You think your conditions are ‘modest’ now? Watch what happens with that lot running around the job market.

@ Richard

“Because it is considered progressive to redistribute resources from the young to the old. It is the political equivalent of stealing a kids lollipop and pretending it is for their own good. Taxing the meager wage of the 22 year old construction site labourer to pay for the pension of the prosperous headmaster is also considered progressive.”

1) Nearly everybody pays tax, and nearly everybody benefits from it in some way or another, so it’s always possible to declare that the poor are paying for the rich.

2) It’s also very easy to use selectively-chosen examples to make something that’s generally good (taking a little money from everyone, based on ability to pay, to ensure that old people can spend their final years in comfort) and making it look it bad based on a biased case study (poor young construction worker pays for rich person’s state pension).

Means-testing for pensions causes a whole new load of problems, chief among them being the risk of penalising those who made the choice to save money in favour of those who blew all their paychecks on treats.

@ 93

“You were saying the variable is politics, I’m saying I disagree.”

Can’t prove it, but I suspect that if Clarkson had publically fantasised about the death of a famous and powerful left-wing advocate, Sunny’s reaction would have been similar.

It’s not the only possible variable; you’re right to say that there are plenty of other candidates, including the idea that powerful individuals are fair game. I wouldn’t have drawn my conclusion if this was my first time visiting LC. But an important prior here is my experience of Sunny’s pick-and-mix approach to what’s “acceptable” and what isn’t, and how it varies based on which of the people involved he likes more.

Applies to comments, too: you’re more likely to get deleted for abusive behaviour on this site if you’re arguing against Sunny’s beliefs (in fairness the abuse does normally have to be there, he doesn’t seem to make it up). Note how Sally’s still made welcome while her opposite numbers in the troll wars get repeatedly banned. As a left-winger, this actually benefits me in a pedestrian sense, but it’s still noticeable.

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/outrage-over-reaction-to-clarkson-reaction-reactions-201112014617/

95 You are talking gibberish.

I have had plenty of my posts deleted. Oh, and by the way this is a lefty site. You know wher we can have somewhere to talk without right wing censorship.

The BBC is under constant attack from the right wing over things they find offensive. The BBC tends to cave in. See Ross for an exampe.

If the BBC now thinks having right wing blowhards on a 7pm prime time to do jokes about shooting nurses in front of their children then they should end the watershed and let anything goes. But they won’t do that such is their fear of the right wing press.

94. Chaise Guevara

” 1) Nearly everybody pays tax, and nearly everybody benefits from it in some way or another, so it’s always possible to declare that the poor are paying for the rich. ”

Oh we can, Chaise.
http://gco2e.blogspot.com/2011/09/why-is-it-hard-to-tax-wealthy.html

” 2) It’s also very easy to use selectively-chosen examples to make something that’s generally good (taking a little money from everyone, based on ability to pay, to ensure that old people can spend their final years in comfort) and making it look it bad based on a biased case study (poor young construction worker pays for rich person’s state pension). ”

Yes, I agree that citing examples is a biased way way to extrapolate a wider point. The left are also currently doing it with cleaners, janitors and dinner ladies and comparing them to bankers. Those three seem to be the lefty version of the Poor Widow Bogey loved by the right. Even working within the context of our current pension system I would give those three low paid categories better pensions and take them out of the pension debate altogether. Pay for it by increasing contributions from those in the public sector earning well in excess of median wages. Redistribution.

” Means-testing for pensions causes a whole new load of problems, chief among them being the risk of penalising those who made the choice to save money in favour of those who blew all their paychecks on treats. ”

I don’t care how much people earn or how they spend their money. We have a terrible system that punishes the productive and rewards tax free unearned wealth. Therefore, my solution for the poor construction worker is to stop taxing his labour. Maybe then he will be able to afford to save for his own pension rather than working to pay for the pension of others. Money is not wealth and is only numbers on a bank account. Money only gives us utility when we turn it into the ability to consume something, so consumption is real wealth. Therefore, a progressive consumption tax, LVT and citizens income would solve all that load of problems.

@ 97 Sally

“I have had plenty of my posts deleted.”

Maybe so, there’s no way for me to tell. But your abusive attacks seem to survive a lot longer than, say, Davey Boy’s abusive attacks.

“Oh, and by the way this is a lefty site. You know wher we can have somewhere to talk without right wing censorship.”

Yes, and that’s a good thing. But I’m not particularly enamoured of left-wing censorship, either. To my mind, mods should delete those posts that contain content-free abuse, and possibly ban people who seem incapable of anything OTHER than content-free abuse (which I admit describes Davey Boy et al better than it describes you). Regardless of politics.

@ 98 Richard

“Oh we can, Chaise.
http://gco2e.blogspot.com/2011/09/why-is-it-hard-to-tax-wealthy.html”

Taxing land sounds like a bloody good idea, actually.

“Yes, I agree that citing examples is a biased way way to extrapolate a wider point. The left are also currently doing it with cleaners, janitors and dinner ladies and comparing them to bankers. Those three seem to be the lefty version of the Poor Widow Bogey loved by the right.”

Agreed, while the right are the pushing the idea of impoverished private sector workers paying for the pensions of bloated public sector fatcats. It’s a common trick, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t call it when I see it.

“Even working within the context of our current pension system I would give those three low paid categories better pensions and take them out of the pension debate altogether. Pay for it by increasing contributions from those in the public sector earning well in excess of median wages. Redistribution.”

Why not just by increasing contributions (via tax) from everyone earning at that rate, regardless of employer? Although I agree that your system would be an improvement from the current one.

“I don’t care how much people earn or how they spend their money. We have a terrible system that punishes the productive and rewards tax free unearned wealth. Therefore, my solution for the poor construction worker is to stop taxing his labour. Maybe then he will be able to afford to save for his own pension rather than working to pay for the pension of others.”

Fine, but we have to make up the shortfall somewhere. Land tax would be fine by me.

“Money is not wealth and is only numbers on a bank account. Money only gives us utility when we turn it into the ability to consume something, so consumption is real wealth. Therefore, a progressive consumption tax, LVT and citizens income would solve all that load of problems.”

Consumption isn’t wealth, you’re fudging the definitions. If I consume something (literally buy food and eat it, or purchase a car that then swiftly starts depreciating in value), I end up less wealthy, not more so. I can see that consumption is the POINT of wealth, what gives wealth its true value, but I’m not sure this statement translates into meaning that consumption tax is a golden bullet.

Apart from anything else, consumption tax and LVT leave between them a large gap as regards people who hold onto assets other than land (company shares, large savings accounts).

@98 – So, the person earning a living wage gets punished with having to pay extra for their pension, as you tear up yet more contracts. Next week you’ll find another reason to raid their pension, of course, making it even more of a scam.

And the construction worker? Your “solution” just means that his salary will be slashed, since he’s no longer paying tax, and his boss will point out we’re “all in it together”, and his take-home will stay the same.

After all, we ALL need to sacrifice, bosses will make sure of that for us!

” Apart from anything else, consumption tax and LVT leave between them a large gap as regards people who hold onto assets other than land (company shares, large savings accounts). ”

What I mean is the ability to consume is wealth. Having a large salary is a meaningless concept until those numbers are turned into consumption. Someone with lots of numbers in a bank account places no more demands on the resources of society than someone with fewer numbers who consumes all their numbers. It is only when someone consumes that any demand is placed on resources. Yet, we fret about people earning big numbers and demand that the numbers are taxed when it is the consumption that we should tax. Nearly all the literature points to the former tax being more harmful to the economy than the latter. The left have allowed themselves to become totally fixated on income when it is only part of the story. The rich almost by definition consume more resources and more expensive things than the poor. The point of earning a large salary is to be able to consume more. Therefore, I could not envisage a scenario where they earned large tax free incomes, but hoarded them to avoid consumption taxes. What would be the point. Even if they did their hoarded incomes would just be invested in productive uses by others.

So what if people turn income into shares and leave it in bank accounts. It is then just deferred consumption and will be taxed when they consume. I mean consumption as in everything we buy including consuming a house. Pass it onto children and they will be taxed as they consume. We don’t like it that people do not save enough and have too many debts. Yet, the whole of our system is geared towards that outcome. I think we need to rethink our whole tax system to make it fit for the 21st century, because our 20th century thinking is failing us.

We need to forget about labour taxes that discourage work and give everyone a minimum ability to consume, then tax all consumption with the richest obviously paying the most. Some ideas here how consumption taxes can be made progressive.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-04-27/left-right-can-love-taxes-commentary-by-laurence-kotlikoff-andrew-weiss.html

Scott Sumner explains things a lot better than me.

http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=7091

http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=10232

Caring even a fig about the utterances of one Jezza Clarkson is a sure sign of that our hysterical celebrity culture has finally driven us all mad.

Life doesn’t have to be about being buffeted from one celebrity gaff to the next, honestly?

40. buddyhell

Of course if I made a “joke” about wanting to bomb 10 Downing Street, I could expect a visit from Special Branch.

Bet you wouldn’t.

42. buddyhell

Laughable. My dad is bigger than your dad and he carries a gun.

That is an impressive complete failure to get the point isn’t it? I am impressed.

How many alleged ‘communists’ did Suharto kill?

Quite a lot it would seem. Given the Party, once the third largest or so in the world, has more or less disappeared. But what has that to do with the price of Wensleydale?

Caring even a fig about the utterances of one Jezza Clarkson is a sure sign of that our hysterical celebrity culture has finally driven us all mad.

Quite, for all the hysteria over this I’ve heard far worse things out of the mouths of the rotation of war criminals that they casually parade through newsnight like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

And they’re certainly not ‘joking’.

Clarkson’s into the licence fee payer for about a million quid a year and nearly as much for sales on Top Gear branded crap. Now’s the ideal opportunity for him to take his vast talent to the private sector and see how it flourishes without a major national TV station to keep the public aware he hasn’t died. I must be old, I can remember when Top Gear was about cars instead of a fat, badly dressed bully and his two toadies having the world’s longest and most expensive mid-life crisis

Excellent rant.

Stewart Lee has the final word on the motivations of the Top Gear threesome.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0i0RXMvzMs

A long clip, but worth the watch. The bit on Clarkson particularly is 10 minutes in, and Lee’s observations are very relevent for his latest “joke”.

I hope Clarkson is upping the security bill on his 3 daughters…

…and if people were worried by my last point, like Clarkson, it was only a joke…

99.9% of people are working up outrage without seeing the full clip.

He says he supports the strikes because of the lack of traffic. Then there was some jibbering about impartiality and he was like “oh yes BBC neutrality, have to have both sides, I think they should be executed in front of their families.’

It’s the sort of joke David Mitchell or Mark Steel could have made (only it wasn’t funny).

Clarkson is a twat. He isn’t funny or clever. And I support the strikes.

But anyone complaining about this ‘joke’ is making a collossal fool of themselves.

Liberals again taking things out of context to create sympathy for the strikers and manipulate the public – as usual. Nice snip snip there, you should help out Michael Moore or John Pilger!

He didn’t say those things. Try again.

I think Unison, maybe inadvertantly, have made this whole epsisode hilarious.

The outrage and indignation and scorn directed at them for saying Clarkson should be sacked…. makes obvious the hypocrisy of Clarkson’s braindead supporter’s who are afterall defending one person’s right to joke about killing millions of people and on the other being offended about the rather modest call for an individual to be sacked. The irony and stupidity of their position makes Unison’s actions worthwhile just for that comedic effect.

@111. Dave: “The outrage and indignation and scorn directed at them for saying Clarkson should be sacked…. makes obvious the hypocrisy of Clarkson’s braindead supporter’s…”

Why presume that Clarkson’s supporters are braindead. Is it possible that they might disagree with you and that the world might be more enlightened if you talked politely.

Charlieman, I say braindead because they have no sense of perspective when they think mass murder is acceptable inoffensive humour, but that calling for the oaf to be sacked from a public broadcaster is offensive. It is not like they would be offended by my strong use of language surely, it is afterall, the Clarkson style they find so funny – lol

Bigmouth strikes again http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/dec/03/jeremy-clarkson-people-trains-selfish I don’t object to this ancient pillock trying to whip up controversy even though he is now the voice of the establishment, I do object to him being paid by the BBC licence fee. However much money his supporters claim he makes for the BBC, I’m sure it could survive without it, the departure of Ross, Brand and Boyle didn’t make it collapse. We now have a new defence for anyone who’s an offensive prat “its only a joke, haven’t you got a sense of humour”. The Clarkson defence, remember it when the Nurmberg defence just isn’t working.

If Clarkson wants to be a professional right wing controversalist and dreadful comedian, give him an appropiate show, not one that’s supposed to be about motoring. Or have Top Gear presented by a variety of comedians. I vote for Jeremy Hardy but only if they replace The Allman Brothers’ Jessica with Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Freebird and make him sing it

It’s obviously a joke. And you haven’t actually included the line beforehand here he says (And I’m paraphrasing here) “It was great there was no traffic in London, and since this is the BBC I have to be balanced…” That’s when he says I’d have them all shot.

He doesn’t think he has a proper job.