As the long-time readers of this blog know, I have always loathed Gordon Brown with a passion which is matched only by the Left-wing Loathing for George Bush, and that of my brother for Brussels Sprouts.

Since 2005, when I started this blog, and before when I used to say this to friends and family I thought that running a deficit when tax receipts are rising was the hight of stupidity. When the wheel comes off, said I, there will be hell to pay.

Not only has he borrowed, he has taxed the rest of us to penury, so the ability of the private sector to finance all these jobs - for it is the private sector who pays - has been diminished. State spending represents an absurd portion of the economy, and this is unsustainable. It is clear that across the developed world, Governments have caved in to demands to give jobs for life in return for electoral support, and being unwilling to tax sufficiently, they have borrowed. The public have finally worked out they can vote themselves largesse at the public expense. The origins of this recession lie in the private sector, but its depth and severity are the fault of an overmighty and overspending state. Here and in Europe (with the Germans being an honourable exception).

The state may not bear the ultumate blame, buth they have allowed "moral hazard" to creep into banks' thinking. It is clear that the regulatory system as currently set up implicitly has the UK tax-payer standing behind deposits. This freed banks to take big risks - with little oversight, they were allowed to overgear their balance sheets bringing core capital adequacy ratios to very low levels, confident in the cash-flow. This banking crisis was not caused by "irresponsible lending" but by irresponsible spending by the banks, without sufficient fear that the assets they were buying would hold their value. The bad debt numbers are not vastly worse than previous recessions, what is being written down is the assets bought against which the irresponsible lending was secured.

The state was active in forcing irresponsible lending - I have pointed out the Community Reinvestment Act before - if this crisis started in the USA, it started with this piece of legislation from 1977 which forced banks to lend to poor credit risks. "innovative products" were aplauded by the regulators, who were instead focussing on investment advisors' dilligence in form filling. "Access" to credit was the byword of banking regulation under Labour in the UK. If bad debts are the problem (and they aren't particularly) then the Reglator is at least as much to blame.

The idea that the banking and financial system was "unregulated" is just ludicrous.

Which is why I am so irritated with the suggestion that this crisis represents some sort of failure of "Lessaiz-faire" capitalism, or that "more" regulation is needed. Sure the banking crisis represents both a failure of business to adequately manage risk, and equally a failure of regulation to demand that those risks be managed sensibly. But what went on in the Banks - spending and gearing at the top of the cycle is exactly what Gordon Brown did with the national account. All that is different is the size of the credit line he has been afforded.

Just as it will be several decades before British Banks return to their pomp of 2007, it will be the work of many years to undo the damage that Brown has wrought on the UK economy. He has overseen a vast bloating of the public sector, which will fight hard to maintain its headcount. Any attempt to reduce the number of Diversity outreach co-ordinators will result in failure, because it suits the Aparatchiks' purpose to fire front line service providors rather than administrators in the long bureaucratic tail. They will do this in order to make the "Tory cuts" charge stick. Which is why any attempt to prune the client state will result in strikes, campaigns by "concerned residents" orchestrated by the Socialist worker - who will remain in the background, but their influence will be obvious by the distinctive Helvetica Bold Condensed font on the placards handed out in huge numbers by the men in donkey jackets.

I mentioned this to a Labour voter at the weekend. He said, and appeared to believe that a Conservative Government would be in the same mess had they been in Government. I disagree - the Labour party bankrupts the country at every chance. The Tories, as a rule do not. It is a matter of Psychology. This Labour voter could not see that deficit spending during a boom was foolish, pointing to the "benefits" of "investment" in services. There is a deep seated and fundamental misunderstanding of the role and origin of Tax reciepts. They are not "Governmnet money", nor is it essentially unlimited. Borrowing does eventually need to be paid back, ususally by tax-payers under Conservative governments, who will be forced to maintain punitive taxation whilst slashing services. There is no other solution to the mess we're in. It is like the Labour voters' view of profits: "the difference between what you should and what you do pay", rather than an incentive for the provider of the service. They cannot understand that a Billion here and a billion there for whatever is the ishoo du jour represents money which must be earned by business and handed over to the Government.

Whilst this crisis is a recession - a particularly nasty and sharp one - caused ultimately by the failure of risk-management in private oligopolies, and the agencies they are regulated by. But the long and painful fight-back from it will be worse and longer because of a decade of sovietisation of much of Britain (only 2 regions are positive contributors to the exchequer), and catastrophic economic mismanagement since 2000. The state will have to shrink, and it will be a Conservative government which will do it. It will be the North, Scotland and Wales which will bear the brunt, and strikes will be common.

Back to the 1980's, in fact.

The left will defend uneconomic left-wing jobs, and the Conservative Government will be trying to prune them, for the long-term good of the country. The question is whether Cameron has the stomach for the fight against the only industry where the unions remain strong? Whatever your doubts about his mettle (and I share them) Margaret Thatcher isn't on the Ballot paper, and Cameron is what we've got. He cannot be worse than Brown. Now that utilities are in private hands, and are not widely unionised, then so long as the bins get emptied people who pay the bills won't actually notice if the whole public sector goes on strike.

Digby Jones, who foolishly GOATed himself has made the first observation that the Emperor's got no clothes on, by pointing out that half the civil servants in whitehall are unessesary and "deserve the sack". The battle lines are being drawn. Nearly half the population work for the state and half of them deserve the sack, it is clear where the majority of Labour's 28% come from. I suspect this line of attack will resonate for the simple reason that it is true. For a Government spokesman to call civil servants "hard-working", doesn't make it so. As this gains traction I suspect Cameron's team will get bolder, but this is more hope than expectation.

The depth of loathing I feel for Brown is matched only by the inevitibility of his failure. Whilst the Tories are timid and lack the courage of their convictions, at least their convictions are in the right place. We libertarians need to be putting fire in their bellies; cheer for Brown's destruction and encourage the Tories too. The country needs you to.