Citzen Cable speaks to the People.

It is interesting that the Lib-Dem Rally (sorry conference) ended with Business Secretary Vince Cable warned yesterday that banks could face higher taxes if “offensive” bonuses are handed out at a time of economic crisis.

This of course went down well with the Party faithful Cable was seem prior to the General Election as the Cassandra who foresaw the Banking crisis where no one listened to him and now as Business Secretary will be the man to punish them..

Cable reminds me of Orson Wells as Citizen Cane. Who in a election against a corrupt city boss.

[I entered this campaign]...with one purpose only, to point out and make public the dishonesty, the downright villainy of Boss Jim W. Gettys' political machine, now in complete control of the government of this state. I made no campaign promises, because until a few weeks ago, I had no hope of being elected. Now however, I am something more than a hope. Jim Gettys, Jim Gettys has something less than a chance. Every straw vote, every independent poll shows that I'll be elected. Now I can afford to make some promises. The working man, the working man and the slum child know they can expect my best efforts in their interests. The nation's ordinary citizens know that I'll do everything in my power to protect the underprivileged, the underpaid, and the underfed.

Orson Wells Citizen Cane (R.K.O. 1941)

Of course Kane was as bad as Gettys and his campaign was always about power but the rhetoric of Citizen Cable and other real politicians (where they are always on our side) never comes to fruition. Already the right wing press are rallying behind the money interests. Who whilst they were as critical as the rest of us a year ago now rally around the capitalist freemarket agenda, and the result of this will undoubtedly lead to him making only cosmetic changes to banking regulations.

Because the idea that he was a lone voice pointing out the failings in the economy is largely a myth which the Lib-dens gleefully have promoted since and particularly in the build up to the General Election. In fact like most politicians. Citizen Cable shifts with the wind.

Julian Knight in the Independent in April of this year got to the heart Citizen Cable right. He wrote.

Take, for example, the Government's quantitive easing programme. Cable chided this as Robert Mugabe economics – a good throwaway line but wrong. In 2003, when the first alarms were being raised internationally about Gordon Brown's massive spending splurge, Cable was openly supportive of the Chancellor. He has separately called for retention of the Bank of England's independence while calling on it to cut rates. And in the depths of the crisis, Cable first backed the takeover of HBOS by Lloyds and then a few months later said it was a mistake. I wonder if he still has the same view. Tony Benn – not someone I regularly quote – put politicians into two categories: signposts or weathercocks. Mr Benn says he has time for signposts who stick to their principles and are consistent, but none for weathercocks who go with whatever makes them look good and court popularity. Mr Cable is definitely a weathercock, and if he were to achieve the chancellorship in a hung parliament, we'd see this writ large.

The fact that Citizen Cable has already been sidelined whilst giving him the air of authority to prevent any true rebellion. He will be like Harri Webb's Our Budgie

"If you ignore him he'll squawk and Squawk
And rattle the bars of his pretty cage.
But he'll never get out
He'll never try it.
And a cloth on the cage
Will keep him quiet".

To parphase Harri's last lines.

"This futile bird
it seems to me
Would  mas perfect
Lib-Dem  MP"