This article explains how it came to pass that we know what Rupert and Elizabeth Murdoch, Oleg Deripaska, George Osborne, Peter Mandelson, David Cameron and Nat Rothschild were doing on and in the sea around Corfu during the summer.
It's interesting that the press gave the impression of David Cameron enjoying a rain-drenched and wind-blown holiday in Cornwall for his summer break, but more importantly it shows whose company our leading politicians choose to keep. It could hardly be otherwise. The population now takes very little interest in politics. They accept what they are told in The Sun and The Times, and what the various press offices of the main parties choose to communicate to the press. This all requires them to be on good terms with the media and with people who can give them money. No longer is it sufficient to get your wife to drive you around the village halls of England to get your message across. You must now, at the very least, set up WebCameron.
It's quite clear why politicians behave like this. People imagined that Tony Blair was some kind of aberration for being so obsessed with raising money for his party and himself, but really he, like the rest, is a creature of his environment. The unhappy thing is that it will inevitably lead to what we see in the USA: that is the systematic skewing of policies in favour of the selectorate - the people who actually choose the leaders. This selectorate is not exclusively wealthy businessmen. Certainly the unions remain powerful in the USA and in the UK. We will never see any kind of voucher system or realistic choice of schools because the teaching unions are opposed to it and they give a lot of money to the Democrats and to the Labour Party in their respective countries.
I am not a socialist, but do look for a level playing field in society. There will always be a conflict of interest between the haves and have nots (or maybe it is now the 'haves and have yachts'). Generally, a liberal economic agenda will result in a better outcome for everyone in society, but if the wealthy are seen to hijack decision making and tilt the playing field to their short-term advantage we will forever be bound into an economically inefficient organised society. It doesn't seem to me that there is a natural 'thermodynamic equilibrium' to which societies tend. If we allow the likes of Deripaska to exert the political influence they seek we will end in the UK like most of the pseudo-democracies of South East Asia or Latin America or, indeed, Deripaska's own Russia. I am not entirely sure that America, where democracy is more worshipped than practised is safe from going down this route.
