Bel and Keir's duet at the Labour Party Conference Musical:
🎤 Bel:
I’ve read your memos, seen your polls,
Can justice come in electoral goals?
You say we must be prudent, smart—
But Keir, just means-test my heart.
I’ve read your memos, seen your polls,
Can justice come in electoral goals?
You say we must be prudent, smart—
But Keir, just means-test my heart.
🎤 Keir:
I fear the headlines, fear the spin,
They say compassion’s not how you win.
But your voice cuts through the party chart—
And maybe I should means-test my heart.
🎤 Both:
Let’s raise the rate, let’s raise the roof,
Let’s tax the rich and tell the truth.
No more half-measures torn apart—
Tonight, we means-test our hearts.
Tonight, we means-test our hearts.
Like a super-size Kemi Badenoch,
Keir Starmer was the interviewee of the morning, winning my heart with his sweet little smile and touching little donkey story.
The Sunday Times broke a story that Keir bought seven acres of agricultural land behind his parents' home in Surrey so that his parents could set up an animal sanctuary, and gave the land to them through a structure designed to exclude the field's value from their estate after they died. You can imagine the glee with which the Sunday Times was all over the story - especially after Angela Raynor's recent stamp duty difficulties. But Keir smiled a little sadly as he told the nation the Times had got things wrong. "I was a lawyer at the time and the land was only £20,000". Laura jumped in to say £20,000 is a lot of money to a lot of people - she could have added that when sold, in May 2022, Keir's share of the proceeds was around £295,000.
But Keir continued that he gave the field to his mum and dad, because they loved donkeys.
'My mum was very ill and she couldn't move around anymore. She, by the end of her life, had her leg amputated and she could barely communicate. She was very, very ill. She loved her donkeys and I wanted her to be able to see her donkeys.' He gave the field to his parents but retained the title - which kind of sounds like a life interest trust. He should have declared the field in the Register of Members Interests and an investigation by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards in June 2022 into his failure to register the field ended in Mr Starmer apologising and the register being retrospectively amended.
So that got conference off to a good old fashioned money scandal start. Not that he did anything wrong. He's a lawyer, after all.
Back to Bel Ribena-Addy. She is at odds with Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves concerning their handling of the economy and she never hesitates in setting out her economic position - that the Government should invest in the public sector to stimulate growth, Reeves should junk her fiscal head-roomery, the two child cap on Universal Credit benefits should be removed and the Winter Fuel payment fully restored.
No, come on - it's a legitimate economic theory. Post-Keynesianism. Basically, give the poor money and they will spend it and that is a good thing because it stimulates the economy - more goods are made and sold, more take-aways consumed. Whereas, if you give the rich money - or don't stop them from grabbing it for themselves, they will hoard it. Rich and poor will drift further apart, the middle-class will be beggared and Austerity will drive down growth.
Time for another song from the Tax the Rich Musical:
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| Dancing Civil Servants |
🎤 Civil Servants:
We shuffle funds from here to there,
Pretend we’ve got a plan to spare.
The numbers dance, the figures prance—
It’s time for the Budget Waltz!
🎤 Chancellor (spinning):
I cut, I freeze, I allocate,
And blame the poor for the interest rate.
I twirl through debt, I leap through loss—
While dodging every moral cross.
|
🎤 Chorus:
Oh spin the stats, disguise the pain
And waltz through cuts like summer rain.
The rich applaud, the poor revolts—
But still we dance the Budget Waltz!
Gary Stevenson, former trader, author of the Trading Game, is of very similar view.
“We’re heading for collapse if we don’t act.”
“I’ve seen the numbers. The rich are getting richer at a pace that’s unsustainable. If we don’t tax extreme wealth, we’ll end up with a society where the top 1% live in luxury and everyone else is in economic freefall. It’s not just unfair—it’s economically suicidal.”
“Bel is absolutely right to call for wealth taxes. We need to stop pretending that billionaires are job creators. They’re asset hoarders."
Passport stamps for travellers to two-state Britain:
Travelling to two-state Britain? Here's some Tips to help fit in:
Language: In Rich Britain, “we’re tightening our belts” means switching from Dom Pérignon to Veuve Clicquot. In Real Britain, it means skipping dinner.
Dress Code: Rich Britain wears tailored suits and moral ambiguity. Real Britain wears school uniforms bought two sizes too big to last the year.
But, Bel and Gary, what about Trickle Down? You know, the more they have, the more wealth is in the economy:
The Trickle Down Tango -
We dance in suits, we dine in jets,
We say the poor should pay their debts.
We build our wealth on borrowed hope,
Then blame the poor who cannot cope.
Trickle down, trickle down, we swear it’s real—
Just ignore the hunger, and sign the deal.
Bel and Gary take the view that Trickle-Down Economics is horse-shittery. That wealth inequality is systemic and dangerous, that a wealth tax is essential to rebalance the economy, that austerity has failed and deepened poverty, that public sector investment is key to long-term growth and stability and that without intervention, collapse is likely. The we're all doomed argument.
Well, what of the Laffer Curve?
What indeed? the Laffer curve illustrates a theoretical relationship between rates of taxation and the resulting levels of the government's tax revenue. The Laffer curve assumes that no tax revenue is raised at the extreme tax rates of 0% and 100%, meaning that there is a tax rate somewhere between 0% and 100% that maximizes government tax revenue. The more you tax, the less incentive there is to work and the more likely it is that your whoreson millionaire will bugger off abroad. It was made up by Arthur Laffer in 1974, when he sketched the curve on a napkin to illustrate his argument, during a meeting with Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, and has been held in due reverence by economists ever since. But is there any evidence in practice of it working? Most countries are not near the “revenue-maximizing” point. In other words, cutting taxes often leads to less revenue, not more, and critics argue that the curve has been weaponized to justify tax cuts for the wealthy, without evidence that these cuts benefit the broader economy. The Kansas Experiment was a tax-cutting policy initiated by Governor Sam Brownback in 2012, citing the Laffer Curve which aimed to stimulate economic growth through significant tax reductions. The experiment involved the largest tax cuts in Kansas history, but it ultimately led to budget shortfalls and economic challenges, prompting the Kansas legislature to repeal the tax cuts in 2017.
Ribeiro-Addy advocates higher taxes on the ultra-rich to fund public services, the opposite of Laffer’s tax-cut logic and Stevenson argues that concentrated wealth is economically destabilizing, and that redistribution is essential—not optional.
Welcome to The Curveball: Laffer versus Reality:
Host:
“Tonight, we welcome the man who turned tax theory into a cocktail napkin legend—Arthur Laffer!”
(Applause. Laffer enters holding a napkin framed in gold.)
🧠 Arthur Laffer (smiling):
“Let me be clear: if you tax people too much, they stop working. It’s basic math. Or napkin art. Either way, I’m very good at this.”
💼 Gary Stevenson (guest economist):
“Arthur, with respect, Kansas tried your theory. They slashed taxes, and the economy tanked. Schools closed. Roads crumbled. The only thing that trickled down was despair.”
🏛️ Bel Ribeiro-Addy (guest MP):
“And let’s not forget the UK. Austerity didn’t unleash growth—it unleashed food banks. Your curve is less economics, more economic fan fiction.”
🎤 Arthur Laffer (defensive):
“But Reagan loved it! And he had great hair. Besides, the curve is elegant. It’s shaped like a smile. Don’t you want a smiling economy?”
📈 Audience Member (shouting):
“Your curve looks like my mortgage graph—up, then disaster!”
“The Laffer Curve”
A full-cast number featuring Arthur Laffer, hedge fund managers, and a confused Treasury intern.
Style: Vaudeville meets cabaret, with tap dancing economists and a chorus line of tax forms.
🎤 Arthur Laffer:
I drew a curve upon a napkin,
Said, “Cut the tax, the cash’ll happen!”
They cheered and clapped, the rich got thrilled—
While public services got billed.
🎤 Chorus:
It’s shaped like hope, it dips like lies,
It’s sold as truth in bow-tie guise.
But every time we slash and swerve,
We crash into the Laffer Curve!
🎤 Treasury Intern:
I studied graphs, I did my best—
But this one failed the fiscal test.
It’s not a plan, it’s just a squiggle,
And now my pension’s just a giggle.
Les Misérables: Political Edition
In foreign news, we are delighted to report that the Dwarf Sarkozy has finally been sent to prison. You remember Sarkozy? Former President of France, and, as Wiki so elegantly puts it: "Nicolas Paul Stéphane Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa, born 28 January 1955, is a French politician and convicted criminal who served as President of France from 2007 to 2012." Ha ha, ho ho, hee hee. 
Well, m'siur, they finally did, and le dwarf, like any other convicted prisoner, is now saying his nightly prayer: "and that's another one up the Judge's arse."
Le petit provocateur, Sarkozy, was charged with passive corruption in the long-running case involving alleged illegal campaign financing from Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. However, in September 2025, the Paris Criminal Court acquitted him of passive corruption, along with other charges like illegal campaign financing and concealment of embezzlement. He was found guilty only of criminal conspiracy - he allowed close associates to seek Libyan funds for his 2007 campaign, but there wasn’t sufficient evidence to prove he personally received or knowingly benefited from corrupt payments.
It's like getting Al Capone on tax irregularities.
Passive corruption, by the way, is a Frenchism, meaning the intentional act of an official, directly or via an intermediary, who requests or accepts benefits of any nature for themselves or a third party, or agrees to a promise of such advantage, to behave or abstain from acting according to their duty or in carrying out their roles in violation of their formal duties in a way which harms, or has the potential to harm, financial interests.
Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.
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| Five years. Merde. |
There are four splendid anthologies of the writings of stanislav and mr ishmael, compiled by his friend, mr verge, the house filthster. You can buy them from Amazon or Lulu. Here's how:
Honest Not Invent, Vent Stack, Ishmael’s Blues, and the latest, Flush Test (with a nice picture of the late, much lamented, Mr Harris of Lanarkshire taking a piss on a totem pole) are available from Lulu and Amazon. If you buy from Amazon, it would be nice if you could give a review on their website.IIshmaelites wishing to buy a copy from lulu should follow these steps
please register an account first, at lulu.com. This is advisable because otherwise paypal seems to think it's ok to charge in dollars, and they then apply their own conversion rate, which might put the price up slightly for a UK buyer. Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links below (to either paperback or hardback) or type "Ishmael’s Blues" into the Lulu Bookstore search box. Click on the “show explicit content” tab, give the age verification box a date of birth such as 1 January 1960, and proceed.
Link for Hardcover : https://tinyurl.com/je7nddfr
Link for Paperback : https://tinyurl.com/3jurrzux
https://www.lulu.com/shop/ishmael-smith/flush-test/paperback/product-9yjvn7.html?q=Flush+Test&page=1&pageSize=4
At checkout, try WELCOME15 in the coupon box, which (for the moment) takes 15% off the price before postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.
With the 15% voucher, PB (including delivery to a UK address) should be £16.84; HB £27.04.
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