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E.U: Leave or Stay? Your thoughts.

Discussion in 'Serious' started by TheBlackSwordsMan, 22 Feb 2016.

  1. walle

    walle Minimodder

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    I think many people have lost confidence in the system entirely – and who can blame them – I also think that as a result of that many has gotten so numb and so jaded that they can't bother to participate. I also think that many of them have come to realize that their votes count but that their votes doesn't really matter in terms of changing the overall direction of travel, because what ever party they vote into power the same direction of travel seem to continue.
     
  2. Risky

    Risky Modder

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    I like your "It's not Goodwin's law because I'm right" footnote. Works every time no doubt :rolleyes:

    To be honest if you take off the red-tinted glasses you find a government who many would validly criticise for being too far to the left in place. Things like the economically dubious living wage which will just get low-skilled 25 and overs fired in place of students and youngsters. The excessive pension promises which smack of vote buying, failure to enact any radical reform of the tax system when it is crying out for a merger of income tax and NI and radical simplification. All that HS2 nonsense and this "northern powerhouse" talk that sounds like industrial policy. Talk about intervening with Tata Steel that is bound to be pouring money down a drain.

    Still it was better than the alternative. As usual Labour left office with a huge budget deficit to fix and won't admit that anything was wrong with their management of the public finances to 2005. At the general elections the electorate decided twice that they didn't want them in charge for now.

    Now they could conclude that they need to rethink their polices but no, they, as you, have blamed the electorate for being wrong and stupid. Oddly enough I don't think that will be a winning message in 2020.
     
  3. Corky42

    Corky42 Where's walle?

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    I agree in general but if you can come up with a better alternative than democracy I'm all ears, the problem is you're presented with choices that may not suite your own vision of how things should be but i hate to tell you that's how democracy works, for your vision of how things should be it has to have wide spread appeal, it has to be something that chimes with society as a whole.

    Take my own personal bug bear as an example, the Snoopers Charter 3.0, i can't vote for a party that oppose it because (afaik) there aren't any, but that doesn't mean i should stop voting for any of them as if i do it's going to happen anyway and without any input from me, no matter how small that input maybe.
     
  4. g1lgamesh

    g1lgamesh Minimodder

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    Good call!

    Calling someone a racist is usually the first resort of the uneducated! They lack conviction or even knowledge in a particular subject so they play the race card. This then forces the individual being accused to defend himself, instead of dealing with the subject matter at hand.

    In my opinion those whom call people racists as they wish to leave the EU... ARE the racists themselves!

    I wish to leave the EU for many reasons but I dare any of the pro-inners to accuse me of racism:p Hmmm am with an Indian girlfriend and have a a daughter whom is half Filipino, that is just for starters. The racism card is one of the MANY low-down and uneducated comments made many of the 'Lord Haw-Haw like quislings:p

    My point on leaving is that it is simply too soon. We in Europe have been FIGHTING each other for over 1000 years, so do you really think 70 years of peace is enough to justify us coming together that way? I do not think so it is simply FAR too soon. Perhaps in 200 years time then ask us that question again and remove the TTIP from the equations sure.

    We LOVE EUROPE as a series of cultures and as peoples, but as a political entity no way!

    BTW unlike many of the youngsters here I LIVED in Belfast during the 1970's and I have seen what hatred and prejudice can do. So when you call someone a racist for offering their own opinion then I say 'Nay Sir it is YOU whom is the racist for playing that card!'

    As I said those pro-inners that play the racism card are the lord Haw-Haw's of the modern world and are nothing short of quislings.
     
  5. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

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    Almost as well as putting words in people's mouths. I said it was a valid comparison, not that I was right. Feel free to challenge.

    None of those policies are remotely 'left wing'. They are --as you yourself point out-- not even Conservative, which is exactly my point. The current government is pandering to its known voters, pursuing ego projects and basically just making it all up as it goes along based on some hazy ideology of letting market forces do their thing with minimal state accountability for the outcome. That is not Conservative government.

    Sure, that budget deficit has got nothing to do at all with having to bail out a financial sector to the tune of £113 billion after the biggest worldwide economic crash since the Great Depression in 2008 (and let's forget that it was Gordon Brown who almost singlehandedly saved the day on that one. Yes, really).

    Fun fact: the current government has already borrowed more than the preceding Labour government did in its two terms (although that is not entirely their fault either).

    Whereas the current government tells them that they are right and wise to vote for them. Who cannot feel but reassured by such an endorsement?
     
    Last edited: 2 May 2016
  6. Corky42

    Corky42 Where's walle?

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    Just curious Nexxo but were you living in the UK during the 80's?

    I only ask as from my perspective, having grown up during Thatchers rein, this Conservative government seems to leans a lot more to the left than in the past.
     
  7. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

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    I must admit that I did not come to the UK until 1992. We were able to get BBC 1 and 2 television in the Netherlands from 1985 onwards (which was far superior to the local offerings), and I was tapped into bits of British culture via Computer and Video Games and The Games Machine, so I kind of knew about Thatcher, the miners' strikes, the troubles in N. Ireland and the British take on politics via their television and about British popular culture via the mags.

    My wife is British so she had the full-flavour Thatcherite Britain experience. But when I get into debates on this forum she usually rolls her eyes and goes off to do something else. However I concede that I am comparing this government more to the one from 1992 - 1997, which was my direct experience of a Tory government.
     
    Last edited: 2 May 2016
  8. Disequilibria

    Disequilibria Minimodder

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    Osborne didn't do this because the he has a left wing labour market policy but to soften the blow that the planned tax credit cuts would have so they could get them through with the small majority the government has, whilst simultaneously looking like they outdid labour's policy of £8 an hour by 2020 and appearing to take the centre ground. It was to give Osborne a get out clause on any policy which would leave the poor worse off by stating "look at our living wage". (the use of the term "living wage" is beyond inaccurate and demonstrates the level of deceit Osborne is willing to use).

    The current elderly vote Tory (overall) and have high turnout if they didn't do this they'd struggle to get in. The state pension triple lock (highest of wages, inflation or 2.5%) is an unbelievably fiscally irresponsible policy, guaranteeing a state pension system that is going to cost more every year, even adjusted for demographics, than the general increase in the country's ability to pay. Contrast this with claims of fiscal responsibility because they wanted to decrease the government deficit during a liquidity trap which has nothing to do fiscal responsibility.

    It's politically irresponsible as well because any government that tries to repeal it knows they are likely to lose the following election, so we are likely stuck with it.

    This is not an issue of the left or right though is it.
    Nearly every government wants tax simplification (makes it easier to close loopholes) ,however the deterrence is how complex it is to simplify the system while making sure tax income remains similar and having to rewrite the rules of pension rate eligibility and so on.

    HS2 isn't really a left or right issue.

    This northern powerhouse crap on the fiscal side is no backed up with the spending to be an industrial policy. They are just calling infrastructure spending they were planning anyway part of the northern powerhouse. Take rail electrification as an example, that is simply so they can send redundant stock from the south east and London to the north.

    On the political side it is again more devious work from Osborne. The policy of devolving central government expenditure to an elected mayor and super council of a metropolitan area is firstly a way of moving central government responsibility for projects to the local level, knowing that local government fails in areas of infrastructure because local NIMBYs have more power the more local the government gets.

    Osborne also knows it is a poison chalice, all the cities he has chosen for this devolution are heavily labour voting. He calculates that the local government is going to balls something up sooner or later (as all forms and size of government do) and this will result in these areas losing labour support to other parties.

    Quite simply he is modelling this on labour's own unintentional self destruction in Scotland that happened as a result of the devolution there.

    Talk is talk.
    You can see how much they wanted to avoid this issue. It's not like they are going to nationalise it or massively publicly subsidise. It just looks like they are trying to facilitate a buyout.


    Look up the difference between structural and cyclical deficit. Over half that deficit was cyclical and stimulus spending.
    More so in the short run there was nothing to "fix" as far as deficits go.

    Because there wasn't. :wallbash:

    1997 to 2005 had the lowest government deficits and greatest number of surpluses than the previous 18 years of of conservative governments. Furthermore the labour government had a target of

    [​IMG]


    That's because they are.
    All electorates of every government are largely wrong and stupid, just depends on how much the winning person/party is willing to use that to their advantage.

    However I'd claim the bigger problem in electorates is ignorance than stupidity.

    No it won't be.

    Though the fact the people often would rather be ruled by a deceptive pair of plutocrats (who are betraying the very substance, morals and values of being a conservative for the substance, morals and values of a robber baron), who use the ignorance and idiocy of the electorate against their electorate, than be governed by people who think they're stupid for choosing those plutocrats to rule them says a lot about the intelligence of the electorate.
     
    Last edited: 2 May 2016
  9. Corky42

    Corky42 Where's walle?

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    @Nexxo, When compared to what happened in the 80's this government is tame in comparison, we had record unemployment, 18% inflation, coal miners and the labour party being branded the enemy within and outright war between the police and the miners, mass privatisation of nearly everything from housing, to water, gas, electric, telecoms, aerospace, railways, and shipbuilders.

    The list is endless but no matter what side of the political spectrum you fall one things certain, she was a very divisive PM as was seen from both the celebrations and sadness when she passed away.
     
  10. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

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    Well yeah, I concede that does make Cameron's government seem tame in comparison, but I'm worried that we'll go back to those days soon. And it will be worse because the UK's 'seventh largest economy' is built on consumer debt to the tune of the UK's entire GDP in 2012.
     
  11. Corky42

    Corky42 Where's walle?

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    That would be another thing to add to the list, consumer debt wasn't really a thing in the UK until the Thatcher years, it's probably why the older generation tend to be more adverse to taking on debt even to this day.
     
  12. theshadow2001

    theshadow2001 [DELETE] means [DELETE]

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    Something that I've observed is that people who go for powerful positions are often tenacious, ruthless and manipulative but not necessarily smart, balanced or rational. The ideal you've presented here is based on the fact that you work with smart people that try to help others. The reality is politicians aren't like that, they're just as dumb as the rest of us. The difference is they are more tenacious, ruthless and manipulative which is combined with a thirst for power. Your practical solution could never work because the world is run by power hungry morons trying to appease another bunch of morons who don't really care. That's what we've got to work with.
     
  13. aramil

    aramil One does not simply upgrade Forums

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    And yet you are saying that we can do exactly that within the EU.
     
  14. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

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    This is true: most politicians are not necessarily very intelligent (they just think that they are as befits their narcissistic personality, nurtured in public schools where the myth is peddled that it is ability, not privilege, that got you in), but they are smarter than the average population who therefore perceives them as intelligent and capable.

    People are herd animals --they submit to the alpha male: the charismatic bully.
     
  15. Corky42

    Corky42 Where's walle?

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    Yes, just like you can do that at general elections only with the EU you get more choices not less.

    Why would you want to opt out of a system that gives you more chances to voice you opinion, more chances to find someone that chimes with your point of view, more chances to act as a counter-balance for a government that you may not agree with.

    Take your example of having to choose between having your left or right toes cut off, why would you want to opt out of a system that gives you more choices than just left and right, why would you want to have less of a say in things?

    Sorry to keep referring back to it but take the Snoopers Charter 3.0 for instance, why would i want to vote to leave a system that may prevent politicians from both sides of the dived turning the UK into a modern day Stasi, why would i want to leave a system that gives me more chances to have a say in the excesses from either side of the fence.
     
    Last edited: 2 May 2016
  16. StingLikeABee

    StingLikeABee What's a Dremel?

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    I left school in 1989 and I remember the Thatcher years. The 80's brought in a new breed of people, called Yuppies (young upwardly-mobile professional) and it was during this period that consumer credit went mad, if I remember correctly. A lot of what we saw in the news was hype but there were people living well beyond their actual means, just so they could be seen as being a Yuppie. We were brought up to believe if you couldn't afford something you went without, that simple. I still live by that tenet today as do my children. No easy handouts, you want something you work for it and you never get credit, with the exception of a mortgage. If more people lived like that now, there would be a hell of a lot less problems within our financial systems. The financiers should take some blame though too!
     
  17. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

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    ^^^ See? There are things that we agree on. :)

    The 2008 credit crunch was almost entirely a product of people living beyond their means and banks encouraging them to (so that they, too, might live beyond their means), in a culture that glorified excess as an aspirational lifestyle.
     
  18. StingLikeABee

    StingLikeABee What's a Dremel?

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    That's a couple of things now, I see a trend forming here :rock:

    My parents used to tell us about the lay-away clubs they used to have in the 60's and 70's. People would pay weekly down payments on large items such as fridges or whatever and they wouldn't get the items till it was paid off. There was credit available back then though too but my parents never took advantage of or fell into using credit. We even used to have a rented TV when we were young kids because the cost of buying TV's were prohibitive. Would have cost much more in the long run, but they were so adverse to credit they just wouldn't get one on the tick or never never as it used to be called.

    It drives me mad with friends sometimes, when they are showing off their latest purchases, all on the back of credit. No-one knows what's going to happen in 12, 24 or more months so buying on credit is full of dangers that could easily be avoided with better personal finances management. I know some people become reliant on credit, especially some who are worse off, just to be able to buy essentials for around the home, but there are many more who abuse credit and then cry when it all comes falling down around them.
     
  19. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

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    Lay away is how I bought my watch. In 1997. :D

    Our fridge and range cooker were saved up for and then bought cheap in the sales. We only ever bought our washing machine on interest free credit, with one of those "interest free if paid off in a year, else a five year loan at 33% APR" setups.

    It was hideously deceitful: you could repay any amount you wanted, but the monthly repayment it always asked for was the minimum amount against the five-year scenario without reporting the outstanding amount left. Of course I set up an automatic repayment for the interest free scenario (by dividing the price in twelve, with a slight overpayment on top to be sure) so we avoided it, but it was quite clearly set up deliberately for people to lose track of what they should pay and how much they owed and end up in a five-year high-interest trap.

    Still got the washing machine 15 years later --it was worth its price. Like the fridge and range cooker for that matter; it pays to buy quality.

    Another thing: people don't fix things anymore. I repaired our TV once (capacitors), our fridge once (door hinge) and our range cooker three times (grille element. The company finally changed its design flaw at the third time). The latter two are still going strong; the TV eventually packed up beyond repair so we bought a new one --in cash.

    The one thing I did was get a credit card during the crazy boom years which offers a 6% APR for the lifetime of the card. I never use it --it's for dire emergencies only-- but we'll never see that sort of credit card deal again so I'm hanging on to it.
     
    Last edited: 2 May 2016
  20. aramil

    aramil One does not simply upgrade Forums

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    No you misread it, you said that without wide spread appeal you could not change anything in the UK system, in the EU, the UK's view of Europe and where it should be has no wide spread appeal within mainland Europe, so we will be unable to make change because (as you say) " it has to be something that chimes with society as a whole."

    Because it ignores the democratic right of each country to self determination.
    Wether you agree with it or not they won, using your own statements, you will have your say at the next election.
     

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