The State of the Nation -

I have not been writing all that much in recent times, for a number of reasons connected mainly with work (and staying employed) along with several other events in my personal life that will not be discussed in any forum.

But there are two events that do inspire some comment, and they are connected; in many ways including that they impinge in a small way on my personal past.

The first of these (in temporal terms) actually passed me by until I went looking for the second in order to re-read it and to précis at least in my mind. So, with your (the reader’s) consent I shall start with the article in Friday’s Herald concerning a group calling themselves the BroFiles, and what is being described as “institutionalized racism” in the Far North.

When Rapine Robert (Rob) Murray went to his doctor with heart problems, the doctor drew a sign on Murray's ample belly and wrote: "Nil by mouth".
To the South African-born doctor in Kaitaia, it was a light-hearted way of telling Murray to get serious about reducing his then 224kg bulk.
But he didn't know his patient. Murray, 45, is a partner in a company with 20,000 beehives, exporting manuka honey around the world for medicinal use.

At its very best, unthinking perhaps. But I am not going to make excuses for either side.

Around the same time, school maths adviser Makoare (Mak) Parangi, 51, started a new job as principal of Te Kura Kaupapa Maori o Rangiawhia, a small Maori-language primary school on the Karikari Peninsula where many children had switched off education.
"When I started, the absenteeism was really high. I was lucky to get one student with 70 per cent attendance," he says.
"They didn't think they could do it."
His friend, Rocky Manga, 53, a former Telecom technician, says many Maori kids can't understand the relevance of a subject like algebra.
"Our parents do labouring jobs. We don't have to smarten up to do that, do we?" is the thinking.
Pakeha teachers respond by "putting them all in the same boat".
"No one's listening, so they just show off," says Manga. "They shut down."
These grassroots experiences, repeated from Kaitaia to Bluff, have national consequences. Last year 45 per cent of the babies born in this country were Maori or Pacific. [I have reported that directly; I am still trying to determine the relevance of that last sentence.]

Now that differs slightly from my personal experience. I am in no position to argue that to be invalid; my experience is not as wide nor as direct as the report. The impact of the difference on the overall consequence though is minimal to nil.
The point behind this is the reflection of the “pakeha teachers”; Maori are a bunch of no-hopers, the dead-weight of the country, the culture of unemployment and dependency, fit only to be the curios of global peeping toms and tomettes.

Significantly, Te Puni Kokiri researcher Paul Hamer found signs of much less "waste" when he surveyed the one in every six Maori who now live in Australia.
"People move there because they feel that by doing so they can step outside those limiting expectations that Pakeha have of them and the limiting expectations they have of themselves because of that environment," he says.
"Some said that when they lived in New Zealand, their whanau accused them of being 'white' or 'Pakeha' if they sought to enlighten themselves or enrich their lives in any way," he wrote in his 2007 report.
A woman in Perth told him: "It's not a crime anymore to try and be financially comfortable or to have stability or be intelligent."

And this is the point with which I most heartily concur. Of those with whom I went to college with in the final three years nearly half – 8 out of 18 - were Maori. Of those 8, at least three hold higher qualifications than I, two are reportedly teaching at university. The failure is not the consequence of inate inability, there are far more important forces at work.

Tariana Turia, the Maori Party co-leader who is associate minister responsible for both Maori health and Maori/Pacific employment, believes Maori are held back in their homeland by "institutional racism".
She points to research showing, for example, that Maori suffer higher rates of heart disease than Pakeha, yet doctors request lipid and glucose blood tests at lower rates for Maori than for non-Maori in the at-risk age group from 35 to 64.
In the Ministry of Health's 2002-03 NZ Health Survey, Maori were three times as likely as Europeans to say they had been treated unfairly in the health system because of their ethnicity, and 13 times as likely to say they had been treated unfairly in the housing market.

At that point Turia and others involved, wander off into a reverie of “Poor people needing everyone’s help and support” that does no good at all.
More importantly, relate the findings of the 2002-3 report with the comments of Rapine Murray earlier. Equally as importantly, relate those findings to the earning capacity of Maori, and the earlier comments from Makoare Parangi on the problems of teaching in what is a largely disadvantaged community. If any person’s education standards, and qualifications, are at the bottom end of the scale then (unless they live in the US of course) their ability to earn, and consequently to afford to buy a house will be extremely limited.
As direct argument against Turia (and I say here that I have always had respect for her) the experiences, and successes outlined in the article are compelling.

Even when dealing with children, [ Dr Lance] O'Sullivan and Parangi place themselves on the same level as their clients instead of treating them like children who have to be told what to do.
There are similar examples elsewhere. Almost 20 years ago, Professor Walker helped initiate a "tuakana" ("older sibling") programme using Maori, and later Pacific, university students to mentor others at Auckland University and at selected South Auckland colleges. The programme has halved the Maori/Pacific failure rates at some schools.
…
At Auckland University, Walker's co-director of Nga Pae o te Maramatanga, Dr Tracey McIntosh, says she has always advocated opening up the Tuakana programme to all ethnicities.
"When we do get successes, we have a responsibility to ensure that everyone who could benefit from these programmes should have access to them," she says.
Dr Evan Poata-Smith, a social scientist at AUT University, says any strategy of "closing the gaps" also has to go beyond healthcare and education.
"Can you feel good at school if you have to go home to the same environment where you are waiting for the landlord to evict you?" he asks.

If we hold Poata-Smith’s comment against the mirror of the “woman from Perth” then the very best place to start would be within the Maori culture.
The power, and conservatism, of that culture is illustrated by the second (earlier, remember?) article covering the release of Part One of the Waitangi Tribunal into the claims of Ngati Tuhoe. I confess that I missed this when it was published a week ago. I will have to download and read the 500 pages of the document myself to truly judge the accuracy of the report in the Herald; which report makes much of the history of the relationship between Tuhoe and the government.

To find out where the anger stems from, people could read the newly released first part of the Waitangi Tribunal's report into the troubled history of Tuhoe and the Crown.
The report, though incomplete, finds largely in favour of Tuhoe. People can learn about sweeping land confiscations and military actions which have, in the words of Tribunal judge Patrick Savage, "echoed down through generations and explains the anguish and anger evident to this very day".
The first substantial contact the geographically remote Tuhoe had with the English was when without warning the Crown seized much of their fertile land in 1866 as part of the confiscation of a large tract of Maori land in the Eastern Bay of Plenty.
There were devastating social, economic and cultural impacts, says the Tribunal.
The land was taken to punish not Tuhoe specifically but Maori involved in attacks in the region, including the killing of missionary Carl Volkner and government agent James Fulloon.
The Tribunal, though, makes clear Tuhoe were not responsible: "The time has come to lay this myth to rest. Tuhoe were not involved in the killings of either Volkner or Fulloon."
Their land was taken anyway because they were swept up in the hostilities of others.

So, until I get the chance to read Part 1, take a breather and go back read my several items written on the Urewera raids at Ruatoki. The trials of those arrested are due in the next few weeks and that will add considerable weight to the historical analysis of the Waitangi Tribunal.

ANZAC Day, 25 April

Today (yesterday?) we remember the fallen.

And that triggered a whole series of coincidences.

It started with that 2 minute sound-clip of Kerwi-Keith Holyoake announcing that NZ was sending troops to South Vietnam to support our allies, otherwise how could we expect them to come support us in our hour of need, and to defeat those terrible Communists so that Cambodia, Thailand, then Malaysia, and Singapore, did not likewise fall to communism.

I have to admit that (in the cold light of history, and the progress of recent events) the progress of communism into Southeast Asia may have been a valid and rational fear. What must be said at that point is that that progress has not come as the consequence of military action even in the form it took in Vietnam. It has been the result of political action, such as that being taken in Thailand at present by the Red-shirt peoples.

The obvious question that must come from that is "Why should people choose communist, or socialist government?" I don't know the answer to that one - the answers are probably manifold. But in my mind's eye, one of the leading replies would suggest that communism is perceived to give "me" more and better than I have at present.

That actually ranges wider than I intended. The thought now springs to mind that (irrespective of any other reason I might draw) Obama tapped that very potential with "Change" and "Yes we can!" (that is now being used by Chrysler to sell their junk cars and Jeeps in NZ).

So, we are now a long way from Remembrance and ANZAC. But perhaps when TF is wailing in the wind about Obama's attempted cures for the economic and international ills created by the beloved GWB and his predecessors he might remember that change came about in the search for something better. For whom? There is the rub.

We had a tax cut that took effect on 1 April, authorised in great haste by the new government immediately after the election. Some 80% of the benefit of that tax cut went to the top 3% of taxpayers. I received an additional $12 roughly per week. Half of that disappeared the same week when our electricity utility (a publicly listed company) announced increased prices.

Back to ANZAC Day.

I celebrated the remembrance by making (for the first time in years) a batch of ANZAC biscuits.

Nice.

probligo correspondence

Over the two past weeks or so there has been strenuous and strident debate about the RhinoHide announcement, backed by the Jonkey, of the amalgamation of the various local authorities (there are some 8 of them) that "drive" the magnificent metropolis of Auckland.

The probligo has had his say with this...

Sir,

The raruraru about the coming “super-city” structure for Auckland should not be limited to the single aspect of representation, or the aspirations of individuals for the positions of power within the new structure.

There is another fundamental which thus far has been ignored and which, if the proposed structure is foisted on the region, will become of far greater import than ever before.

The most defining problem of the present structure is not just political, it is not just bureaucratic. Both are joined by the requirement for appropriate accountability. The most recent example was the ARC, and its highly unsuccessful foray into the realms of reality entertainment. That was bad enough on a small scale, and there are many other equally rotten examples that could be dug out of the woodwork. Hide and Key are right in blaming the political forces and the structure of the region, but regrettably they do not concentrate on the true problem.

I can not see, in any shape nor form, how the proposals for the super-city will improve accountability to the ratepayers for results of the machinations of both the super-bureaucrats and the super-politicians. The ballot-box remains for the latter, agreed. The counter to that is the relationship between elector and candidate for such regional functions as District Health Board, ARC, and (in the past) electricity distribution authorities. Who really “knows” their local representatives to any of those bodies?

The thought of the introduction of the American system, where bureaucrats and politicians walk in and out of office hand in hand offers little comfort. Yes, that might be seen to increase accountability. It would however be a matter of closing stable doors and cleaning up after.

There is no question that the local government of Auckland is “primarily dysfunctional”. There is no doubt that “something must be done”. Is the super-city the solution that will promote greater accountability? I have strong doubts that it will.


The present “problem” is the product of years of political infighting prompted by the need to preserve and expand individual political interests.


It is in the legal structures created by passing governments; structures that may well have been created with the very best of intentions but which on reflection and experience have been inadequate to the task.


It is also in the “hospital passes” from government to local government of functions which have not worked at a national level; and for which there were increasingly vocal demands for greater “local control”. In many instances they included functions that were becoming increasingly unpalatable and politically dangerous.


It is in the increased delegation of responsibilities from elected representatives to the bureaucracy. That does not mean I would wish for the days when the Mayor or Chairman would arrive in the office each morning to open and read the mail. The delegation of responsibilities is the consequence of greater complexities in modern city life; greater need and desire for personal control; a desire to isolate the political from the unpalatable decisions that must be made.

Did the last major round of local government reorganisation improve the relationship between Councils and electors? Were the problems of dysfunctional bureaucracy resolved? No, if anything they got worse.


In my minds eye I see old Sam Minhinnik, sitting on his little stool and sketching his thoughts on passing clouds. There has been a change though. Where in the past Minhinnik used his “parish pump” image with a top hat, in future it will wear a six-pearled coronet.

Yours

Will it be published? I will let you know, tomorrow is unlikely...

A brief holyday...

The ol’ probligo’s Easter was quite enjoyable - slow paced, relaxing, not too much to be done. A good old-fashioned Easter break.

There is only one place that this could be achieved. Opononi, so that is where we headed.

Now as a small diversion and because it has relevance at this point, I want to introduce you to a film. It is an NZ classic made by Geoff Murphy (who also made “Quiet Earth” and “Whale Rider” “Utu” and others). It is now about 28 years old. It is hilarious, fun, irreverent, and pokes the borax at virtually all of ‘70’s NZ society. If ever you see, on a shelf, in a catalogue, a film titled “Goodbye, Pork Pie” buy, borrow or steal it. I believe that if you buy the DVD version, get the Region 2 and not Region 4 as the latter has about 12 minutes of the film “removed”.

It is the classic roadie movie – NZ style. Two societal misfits – a twenty-something teenager and a middle aged on the verge of divorce meet up, steal a car and drive it the length of NZ.

So, that is why (for no better reason) on our way north Good Friday we passed (heading in the opposite direction) 37 Minis (some of the new BMW ones included, yah boo!!) that were panting their way south in a re-creation, a commemoration of the film. One of the (proper) Minis had me in fits for the next ten minutes as the driver and passenger were dressed for the parts as well – yellow Mini, false glasses and mustache, old flying helmet, the works.

Their story does not end there… News this morning of the arrival in Invercargill on Monday. 36 of them made it in time. The 37th car blew a piston in Middlemarch. So, nothing daunted (and in true GPP style) the car was trucked to Dunedin, a new (well worn, second hand) engine fitted overnight and they continued the last 200 kms arriving in Invercargill at about 10p.m. Obviously the end-of-run celebrations were already well under way, so in keeping with the spirit of the event the car was driven into the hall…

Reports too, that the police joined in as well. One car was pulled over by the police who suggested that they “go back a-ways and drive past again. Don’t stop and we’ll chase you and arrest you.” Which they did, and which they did, and everyone had a great time doing it, handcuffs and all… Flick back to the film where in one of the chase scenes the Mini outruns a Holden (Aussie GM) V8 police car. Caught him at last – only took 28 years…

Oh, and in the course of all this hilarity and high jinks they raised over $200,000 for the purchase of hospital equipment for Starship Children’s Hospital. Good going fellas.

There is one part of the film that would need explanation. The story follows on the back of the 70’s “oil shock” which those of the right age might well remember. One of the actions taken by the NZ government (led at the time by The Rt Honourable Robert (Mouldy) Muldoon) was the introduction of “car-less days”. The fundamental premise of the film is that it was being driven on the day of the week it was supposed to have been “left at home”. That was the reason for fleeing the police, which led to the car being listed as stolen…. And so the tale goes.

So it was a long weekend that got itself off to a fine start. To make matters even better, the weather behaved itself. There were one or two light sprinkles around with a fairly cool sou-wester passing by; not swimming weather by any stretch of the imagination but nice to be with. The sou-wester in these parts trail behind each frontal system on its way past in the westerly Southern Ocean Flow (the Roaring Forties). After running around the lower part of Australia these systems bust out into the Tasman and give us our weekly dose of strong winds and cold rain. They increase in frequency during the winter, hopefully decrease in summer. That is why we had rain, very conveniently and Camelot-like, on late Tuesday and Wednesday and showers Thursday and Friday dawned calm and clear.

Add to all that, the comforts of home (our own little pied-a-terre in Opo) and things could not have been better. The newspapers roll in at about 10:30, the ice-creams are ginormous, what more can a man ask for?

Change tack time…

As might be recalled, I play around (and kid only myself) as a photographer and I like to try and record the landscapes that I am in – when they are interesting. Now, remember here that NZ is a fairly small piece of dirt. Remember too that far more takers of photographs than can be numbered, most of them far more skilled than I, have passed through the landscapes and scenery of this unique land and the possibilities of “finding” new, unique, and above all interesting subjects is very difficult.

One of the beauties of a relaxing weekend is that one can allow (what little remains of) the intelligence to wander into paths not usually trod. Such a sojourn led to a minor epiphany that given NZ is a small piece of dirt then many of the landscapes are likely to be so as well. That is how I came across a small piece of “badlands” country , at least how I imagine badlands to be, while pondering on which of the “interesting” places I could look to find new and interesting scenery. One frame below…
The ol’ probligo’s Easter was quite enjoyable - slow paced, relaxing, not too much to be done. A good old-fashioned Easter break.

There is only one place that this could be achieved. Opononi, so that is where we headed.

Now as a small diversion and because it has relevance at this point, I want to introduce you to a film. It is an NZ classic made by Geoff Murphy (who also made “Quiet Earth” and “Whale Rider” “Utu” and others). It is now about 28 years old. It is hilarious, fun, irreverent, and pokes the borax at virtually all of ‘70’s NZ society. If ever you see, on a shelf, in a catalogue, a film titled “Goodbye, Pork Pie” buy, borrow or steal it. I believe that if you buy the DVD version, get the Region 2 and not Region 4 as the latter has about 12 minutes of the film “removed”.

It is the classic roadie movie – NZ style. Two societal misfits – a twenty-something teenager and a middle aged on the verge of divorce meet up, steal a car and drive it the length of NZ.

So, that is why (for no better reason) on our way north Good Friday we passed (heading in the opposite direction) 37 Minis (some of the new BMW ones included, yah boo!!) that were panting their way south in a re-creation, a commemoration of the film. One of the (proper) Minis had me in fits for the next ten minutes as the driver and passenger were dressed for the parts as well – yellow Mini, false glasses and mustache, old flying helmet, the works.

Their story does not end there… News this morning of the arrival in Invercargill on Monday. 36 of them made it in time. The 37th car blew a piston in Middlemarch. So, nothing daunted (and in true GPP style) the car was trucked to Dunedin, a new (well worn, second hand) engine fitted overnight and they continued the last 200 kms arriving in Invercargill at about 10p.m. Obviously the end-of-run celebrations were already well under way, so in keeping with the spirit of the event the car was driven into the hall…

Reports too, that the police joined in as well. One car was pulled over by the police who suggested that they “go back a-ways and drive past again. Don’t stop and we’ll chase you and arrest you.” Which they did, and which they did, and everyone had a great time doing it, handcuffs and all… Flick back to the film where in one of the chase scenes the Mini outruns a Holden (Aussie GM) V8 police car. Caught him at last – only took 28 years…

Oh, and in the course of all this hilarity and high jinks they raised over $200,000 for the purchase of hospital equipment for Starship Children’s Hospital. Good going fellas.

There is one part of the film that would need explanation. The story follows on the back of the 70’s “oil shock” which those of the right age might well remember. One of the actions taken by the NZ government (led at the time by The Rt Honourable Robert (Mouldy) Muldoon) was the introduction of “car-less days”. The fundamental premise of the film is that it was being driven on the day of the week it was supposed to have been “left at home”. That was the reason for fleeing the police, which led to the car being listed as stolen…. And so the tale goes.

So it was a long weekend that got itself off to a fine start. To make matters even better, the weather behaved itself. There were one or two light sprinkles around with a fairly cool sou-wester passing by; not swimming weather by any stretch of the imagination but nice to be with. The sou-wester in these parts trail behind each frontal system on its way past in the westerly Southern Ocean Flow (the Roaring Forties). After running around the lower part of Australia these systems bust out into the Tasman and give us our weekly dose of strong winds and cold rain. They increase in frequency during the winter, hopefully decrease in summer. That is why we had rain, very conveniently and Camelot-like, on late Tuesday and Wednesday and showers Thursday and Friday dawned calm and clear.

Add to all that, the comforts of home (our own little pied-a-terre in Opo) and things could not have been better. The newspapers roll in at about 10:30, the ice-creams are ginormous, what more can a man ask for?

Change tack time…

As might be recalled, I play around (and kid only myself) as a photographer and I like to try and record the landscapes that I am in – when they are interesting. Now, remember here that NZ is a fairly small piece of dirt. Remember too that far more takers of photographs than can be numbered, most of them far more skilled than I, have passed through the landscapes and scenery of this unique land and the possibilities of “finding” new, unique, and above all interesting subjects is very difficult.

One of the beauties of a relaxing weekend is that one can allow (what little remains of) the intelligence to wander into paths not usually trod. Such a sojourn led to a minor epiphany that given NZ is a small piece of dirt then many of the landscapes are likely to be so as well. That is how I came across a small piece of “badlands” country , at least how I imagine badlands to be, while pondering on which of the “interesting” places I could look to find new and interesting scenery. One frame below…


The clues are there, try to put that scene into scale.

And that too is why a roadie film, which in the US might last for a week or more (in terms of plot time), is all over in four days. In that four days, the NZ equivalent of Buffalo to San Diego has been covered.

Yes, we are small. And beauty can be found in small spaces.

On nothing much at all, cross words and crosswords...

One of the little pastimes in our house is doing the daily crosswords. I get a perverse sense of enjoyment out of the frustration of taking on the cryptic – something I am not at all good at – while my wife tackles the synonym version. There is a fairly heated defence against getting involved in the other’s cross word without invitation (note, that is an acknowledged one-way street). But occasionally there will be the frustrated “What are they trying to ask for?” outburst; for my part it is usually “Bloody Tossman!!”. Anyhoos, the other evening I am greeted, not quite at the door but very soon after, with “Bloody cross word” followed by the usual “You will probably get the answer straight away.”. The clue was “understatement”, in 8 letters. Well, I confess to two things. I took until part way through CSI or whatever to work it out; and that very often I get the required answer through letter sequence recognition rather than “knowing” the answer.

So it was this time. I was confronted with an 8 letter word with “_i_o_e_”. It took about two hours, one in deep meditation (asleep in front of the box), to realise “litotes” as the answer. I confess that the “knowing” of the answer was deeply buried in an English grammer class, year 13. The teacher was a young fella rather unceremoniously nicknamed “Chook” by the class comedians because of the way that he moved his head as he walked. Had he not copped that moniker it would likely have been “gee-raff” as he was well over 6’6”. Hauling the answer from so far down in the Mires of Information Past was not a conscious act but an epiphany that might rival that of Paul’s on the road to Tire (or was it Tyre?) You could actually see the lightbulb!

But let’s ride a bit further.

I am presently reading a Victorian era novel, “Sybil”, written by one Benjamin D’Israeli. No, that is not the name he is usually known by, but his given name with his father’s family name. The book is fairly tough going, but worth it. I must make a point of going back and re-reading some of the bits that I have skimmed, along with the accompanying explanatory notes.

“Explanatory notes in a novel?” I hear? Yes, written by someone other than Benjamin D’Israeli to explain and put into historical context the very many side references to events current in the 1830’s. Someone reading the story at that time would have known immediately what those references were, common facts and names lost in the past.

It is also hard going because of D’Israeli’s style. I read one paragraph to my wife. It was the description of a ruined abbey, central to the story although not mentioned in the next 60 or 70 pages I have read. This particular paragraph is about 17 lines long, in Times 7 print, one sentence of about 120 words. And I was conscious of my own tendency to being long in the wind.

Al, I would commend it to you, as a not-so-light read. Mr D’Israeli spends at least half of his time discussing and describing the people, the living conditions, politics, economics and social attitudes of the times. It paints a very clear picture of just how he saw life in Britain in the second quarter of the 19th century.

Speaking of Al, and English history in the same breath raises the next item as well. “Standpoint” (thanks to ALD) has a review of sorts of Adam Smith which raises some very valid questions in my mind. A brief quote from the beginning sets it out very well –

…the present global financial crisis has made the godfather of classical economics [Smith] look strikingly irrelevant in comparison with Keynes, the inventor of modern disequilibrium theory. Even worse, now that bankers are being castigated as the incarnation of greed, blindness and irresponsibility, the man who wrote in his famous Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations that "it is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker" - or perhaps the banker in our day - "that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest" is again accused of being the chief advocate of heartless laissez-faire capitalism, a system that failed and had to fail. In this view, capitalism is nothing but a false religion, with Mammon as its god and Smith as its high priest.

The crux is in the criticism, and as Horn points out, its misunderstanding of a very important part of Smith’s economic.

It reflects too in my statements that Capitalism as a system is not immoral, or unworkable; nor is Socialism as a system a total failure. The innermost failings of both systems is not an inherent fault in either; other than the fact that they necessarily require the participation of humans.

Smith did not tolerate immoral behaviour. It would never have occurred to him that selfishness and greed might be viewed as being just normal - and even less that they might be morally laudable, let alone negligible. This differentiates him from Thomas Hobbes, in whose view man is a wolf to other men, and also from Bernard Mandeville, well-known for his poem "The Fable of the Bees", in which he - half satirically, half seriously - claims that private vices result in public benefits

It is this point which gets me (as Treebeard might have said) “somewhat hasty”. Very many of the people who quote the Smith mantra proceed to use it to justify the dishonesties, the selfishness, and the greed of their particular brand of capitalism. That amongst anything else was one of the main disagreements I had (have) with Ayn Rand

The Wealth of Nations is no ideological pamphlet - quite the contrary. It is an analytical treatise on the logic of the market, taking individual actions as the starting point of observation and explanation. Smith explains the workings of incentives. He differentiates between individual morality and the deontological laws applicable to complex systems. He sheds light on the rise and use of the division of labour. He justifies free trade, arguing still in terms of absolute advantage, however, not "comparative advantage". It took several decades and David Ricardo to find that out. Smith also attempts to construct a theory of value - his one big failure. Based on the cost of labour, this approach later opened an avenue for Karl Marx.

So, there goes one of my ambitions. If Smith was unable to construct a theory of value, then what hope has an average, unskilled, and untalented accountant such as myself?
I have tried, also, to argue the “sum of the parts” approach to the relationship between economic systems and markets on the one hand and society on the other; without any measure of success. Dave Justus might recognise that, as might some of the other more rabid right-whingers with whom I have attempted reasoned discourse. But enough of this histerical (intended pun) nonsense.