UK libraries face devastation

More than a hundred protest events took place across the UK February 5, against the planned closure of over 450 libraries as part of the government cuts programme.

Protesters of all ages were joined by authors, musicians and artists in “read-ins” and demonstrations at libraries across the country....Published authors spoke at protests at the libraries they had used as children, or maturing writers. Around 40 library users occupied New Cross Library in southeast London. The protesters staged an all-night sit-in until midday February 6.

In addition to the assault on the public library system is that being waged on the national network of libraries in schools.

Birmingham City Council is the latest in an expanding list of local authorities to close its School Library Service (SLS). The authority, one of the biggest in the country, ended loans to schools in January and is now attempting to sell its book stock to schools.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/feb2011/libr-f14.shtml

happen in Britian. It leaves me speechless.

sweden instituted theirs years back.

africa as well.

it's a global thing, courtesy of the global ruling class.

how can the entire world be in debt, and who is it in debt to?

it's world economic/political leaders who put us all in debt, they also own the debt & now they're collecting.

really a cock-up all round.

I've heard they're also selling off their forests, amongst other nasty things. Nick Clegg's bunch might think they're in there softening the blow, and it's true it might be worse if they weren't part of the govt, but it probably would have been better to let them wreak all these slashes and cuts on their own and not put themselves in a position where they look like willing sidekicks...

But what is so frustrating is that we came so CLOSE this time to a far better government. Just a few more seats not lost to Tories; or a different LibDem leader; or a Labour Party not embroiled in its own leadership battles - and things could be so very different. Our very own Florida, in a sense.

At least, there is a lot of protest and resistance against the government policies and cuts. People have become much more active than I ever remember.

that Thatcher was absolutely nuts years ago, when she was PM. (I don't mean recently, which everyone knows about, but back then, kinda like how Reagan was suffering from dementia while he was president.)

Do you think this is true?

she was very clever and very much in control. She was a fanatic, so in that sense nuts; but a very successful fanatic. Whereas Reagan always seemed much less able, and more controlled by others.

With Reagan, we could always reassure ourselves, if so inclined, that he was a nice old man with good intentions and bad advisers.

Thatcher always seem too smart and firmly in charge for that to work. What drove her? Was it genuine belief in her theories or some kind of weird hatred for her own class? She seemed to take genuine pleasure in grinding working people into the dirt.

destructive than ours. nt

It's hard to have much sympathy.

Thatcher!

Because of our electoral system, he nevertheless came just short of an absolute majority; and then Clegg, the LibDem leader, sold out the country and his party and voters to join Cameron for the sake of a little bit of temporary power.

Bush stole his election. Cameron, like Thatcher before him, didn't have to steal an election. Our antiquated electoral system did the stealing for him.

can decide for everyone else, thanks to low turnout and winner-take-all election rules.

Is there a reasonable chance that Clegg might pull out?

but it's possible that some or all of the LibDems will reject him and pull out eventually. This won't happen till at least after May, when we have the referendum on changing the voting system, plus lots of council elections. Once the voting system referendum (a key issue for the LibDems, as well as, for somewhat different reasons - implied in my previous post - a key issue for me!) has been decided one way or the other; and especially if there are massive LibDem council losses, then all bets are off. I certainly *hope* the coalition will be brought down - but who knows; this is an unusual situation for British politics and there aren't real precedents.

If the LibDems persist in their present course, then it's political suicide for them. It's quite likely already too late for them to fully recover in the foreseeable future.

the first time I've seen a trifecta on the Greatest Page