Plan B From Outer Space

In the 1950's, US film-maker, Ed Wood, produced a number of low budget, “B” films that have since become cult classics, mostly because of them being so bad. They were characterised by “their campy aesthetics, technical errors, unsophisticated special effects, use of poorly matched stock footage, eccentric casts, idiosyncratic stories and non sequitur dialogue” (Wikipedia) One of the best known is “Plan 9 From Outer Space” (1957). Johnson's government has produced a political equivalent in the form of its Plan B.

For weeks, Johnson has been resisting the siren calls to introduce a Plan B of further restrictions on rights and freedoms such as the right of free movement, association and assembly in response to an increase in COVID infections, and now the discovery of the latest, Omicron, variant. He has been quite right to do so. The reality is that all of the lockdowns, lockouts and so on, as with Ed Wood's films, have been based on technical errors, eccentric casts, idiosyncratic stories and non sequitur dialogue. The argument for lockdowns and lockouts was irrational, and the actions themselves repeatedly and inevitably ineffective, in respect of their stated aim.

As I wrote some time ago, in the current conditions of widespread herd immunity, and the availability of vaccines, those measures are even less rational. Such passports do not protect the vast majority who, even if they were in an at risk group, now have the security of immunity by vaccination to protect them. There is no reason why their liberties should now continue to be infringed. The same is true in relation to those who have chosen not to get vaccinated. It should not be that those that have done the rational thing and got jabbed have their liberty again restricted, but those that have chosen not to do so. If they choose not to get jabbed, then they have the choice of either avoiding contact with others, or else taking the risk of infection and ill-health. For the large majority of them, i.e. those not in the at risk 20% of the population, their actual risks from the virus, especially from the Omicron variant, which appears to have even more mild effects than its predecessors, are very small.

In fact, all the data continue to show that the risks continue to decline markedly. As was recently disclosed, hospital doctors are themselves increasingly annoyed by the fact that virtually all of the people occupying hospital beds, as a result of COVID, are people who chose not to get vaccinated. But, the numbers, even on that basis, now being hospitalised, are tiny compared to what they were last year. The same is true of deaths of people WITH Covid, and, as I have set out before, the numbers in respect of deaths are a farce. Only about 10% of the people listed as dying WITH Covid are people who actually died FROM Covid. The vast majority died from other causes related to old age such as Alzheimer's, Dementia, Stroke, Heart Disease and so on. Many of these actually contracted the virus AFTER they had gone into NHS hospitals for treatment of these other conditions.

The reason that deaths have risen, in recent weeks, has nothing to do with COVID itself, but everything to do with the fact that, during Winter, these deaths of the elderly always increase, and so the numbers continuing to die from them, but who coincidentally also pick up a COVID infection – often after admission to hospital or care homes – have also risen. Lock downs, lockouts, vaccine passports, mask wearing have no logical relation to that in any way.

But, what changed for Johnson was the fact that his chaotic and dysfunctional government has come under increasing pressure, as a result of Johnson's political ineptitude. On a range of issues, his government has been covered with a slurry of sleaze, reminiscent of the last years of the Major government. On the back foot, attacked by sections of the Tory press, and from inside his own party too, Johnson reached for his familiar tactic of distraction, by introducing the Plan B that the media, and opportunist opposition MP's had been calling for.

Johnson has always had a schizophrenic relation to these issues, as he has with Brexit – remember his two essays on the question of Brexit. In reality, Johnson is not a Brexiter, and nor is he a proponent of the petty-bourgeois interests that underlie it. For Johnson, Brexit was merely a vehicle to set him up against Cameron, and to seize the leadership of the Tory Party. But, having done so, he found himself captive of those very same petty-bourgeois interests that dominate the Tory membership, and its voter base, and also which, now, following the 2019 election, have strengthened inside the parliamentary party.

Johnson, is really a conservative social-democrat, no different to Cameron or Blair. It is the different material conditions, including those he has contributed to himself, via his opportunist support for Brexit, that constitute the difference between his actions and theirs. As a conservative social-democrat, Johnson knows that the future of the state depends not on that plethora of small private capitals that constitute the ranks of the reactionary petty-bourgeoisie, but on large-scale, multinational capital. He knows that Brexit stands counter to those interests. Johnson might be under the delusion that Britain is a large enough economy that it could still cater for the interests of that large-scale, multinational capital outside the EU, and, certainly, he would have hoped that a deal with the US would have facilitated that. In reality, it isn't, and it wouldn't. He almost certainly knows, therefore, that, in the end, Britain will have to come to an agreement with the EU that keeps it closely tied into it, and acts to provide the bridge to a future re-entry.

Johnson can't say that, or act in any way that implies it, because, for now, there are a large number of Tory MP's, sitting upon the support of a large number of petty-bourgeois party members, who really do suffer under the delusion of the small business myth, and think that it is that small private capital that constitutes the basis of the UK economy. As representatives of that reactionary petty-bourgeoisie, they have no interest in whether a return to economic growth leads to rising interest rates, and a crash in asset prices, (those like Rees-Mogg, who represent the interests of the stock and bond traders - as against owners - would actively favour such a crash, because it is from such volatility that they make money, and the Libertarians/Austrians, have been predicting such a crash for a long time) because the small business interests they represent do not hold their wealth in the form of such assets, of fictitious-capital. They own their wealth in the form of industrial capital, real capital, tied up in their businesses, and they have a very real interest in the economy growing so as to expand that wealth, by expanding those businesses. So, its no wonder that this material interest in economic growth fits well with their libertarian views in respect of individual freedoms when it comes to opposing restrictions upon it, represented by the various authoritarian measures imposed via lock downs, lockouts, and other restrictions on freedom of movement and so on.

Indeed, in that, their interests are aligned with all real industrial capital, and against the interests of fictitious-capital, i.e. the dominant form of wealth of the top 0.01%. Over the last ten years, at least, the latter have shown that they have no concern for the real economy, and for economic growth, which they have been prepared to systematically undermine and destroy, via austerity, and measures of QE, solely for the purpose of holding back the rise in interest rates, and so artificially boosting asset prices. As a conservative social-democrat, Johnson may also be more concerned with the interests of the owners of that fictitious capital, rather than the interests of real capital, which could explain why, at every stage, he has ended up implementing the kinds of authoritarian measures such as lock down, that have limited the economic expansion, and so acted to boost asset prices. He has done that to the increasing dismay of those in his party who looked to him to do the opposite, hence the growing opposition he is finding within its ranks.

But, Johnson also knows that, faced with the growing economic chaos caused by the Brexit strategy he was forced to front up, to put himself in Downing Street, and with growing disaffection on the streets to the continual prolongation of restrictions on civil liberties, his government actually needs some good economic news, to bolster itself within the ranks of its members and core voters. Such good news is not going to come from the imposition of yet more restrictions, such as those called for under Plan B. Indeed, its for that reason that the catastrophists and opportunists have been demanding them, in the vein hope that any such economic misery will benefit them. Its why, having agree to Plan B, the same elements are now talking about demanding a Plan C! The truth is that any economic misery is only likely to lead to a weakening of the working-class, and to aid the forces of reaction.

Johnson will face a growing rebellion on his own benches, as he implements these new Plan B measures to again restrict rights and liberties, but he will have the backing of the conservative social democrats of the LP, to help him push those authoritarian measures through, in the same way that Starmer has acted as Johnson's loyal lieutenant, in all such matters, consistently over the last two years.