A Political Thread

[Rockradar]

So another nutcase tried to assassinate trump this time. You lot arent content with knocking off your own pollys obviously?

I thought Obama would get shot but no. Hes been too busy organising the shooting of others.

Im not surprised Trump is marked with him speaking out against gays and muslims. My heart goes out to Ivanka.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

Clinton has a campaign budget of $42+ million how is that allowed.

I mean for all its flaws our election budgets is so much better.

It is a sickening amount

 

[Gavin]

I don't see how our intervention in Iraq caused the situation in Syria. I would say our operation to stop Iran backed groups from destabilizing the south of Iraq did the opposite of what you are suggesting. As for Afghanistan the situation there is more tribal and is completely isolated to Syria. The Syrian civil war started because of the Arab spring and a brutal dictator unwilling to compromise. ISIS has risen from the old Sunni Basc party backed by the Saudis who were frozen out by the elected shiite government backed by Iran. The whole thing is a middle easten power play and to say it's our fault is ignoring the facts and the history of the middle east

I do dislike the term 'intervention' when talking about Iraq. It wasn't an intervention it was an invasion. The premise for the Iraq war was the big scary weapons of mass destruction Saddam had and would use against the USA - I am still waiting for the evidence these weapons existed though.

I see the fall of Saddam as causing a domino effect in the Middle East and North Africa. Even though Saddam did harm him own people etc, but he did keep the religious nut jobs in check. When he was removed from power there was a substantial vacuum, which meant that various groups began to fight for power. You have the Saddam supporters, the Western supporters and the various other ethnic tribes who want a deal.

Then look at Libya and the mess the West. For years Gaddafi was our mate and then suddenly he was now an enemy. The rise of the rebels in Libya have been linked to the CIA and the fact that Gaddafi was not friendly enough to Western powers, in fact I think I remember reading that he was more close to Russia and that Putin actually backed Gaddafi's idea to create an African currency based on gold(?) which would have seriously affected the US Dollar. The UK and USA opening backed ethnic, radical groups who wanted Gaddafi out, as he had been keeping them in check for so long. Libya was a wealthy country and it is now a mess.

Turn to Syria now. After Gaddafi was removed there is evidence to suggest that the CIA helped transport weapons from Libya to Syria to arm the rebels against Assad.

The Wars since 2000 in the Middle East have been proxy wars between the USA and Russia but it appears that, and say if I am wrong, but I do not know of many proxy wars started by Russia recently (except maybe the issue with Ukraine).

The war in Iraq allowed the USA to invade and destabilise countries for their own benefit.

 

[austingtir]

I do dislike the term 'intervention' when talking about Iraq. It wasn't an intervention it was an invasion. The premise for the Iraq war was the big scary weapons of mass destruction Saddam had and would use against the USA - I am still waiting for the evidence these weapons existed though.

I see the fall of Saddam as causing a domino effect in the Middle East and North Africa. Even though Saddam did harm him own people etc, but he did keep the religious nut jobs in check. When he was removed from power there was a substantial vacuum, which meant that various groups began to fight for power. You have the Saddam supporters, the Western supporters and the various other ethnic tribes who want a deal.

Then look at Libya and the mess the West. For years Gaddafi was our mate and then suddenly he was now an enemy. The rise of the rebels in Libya have been linked to the CIA and the fact that Gaddafi was not friendly enough to Western powers, in fact I think I remember reading that he was more close to Russia and that Putin actually backed Gaddafi's idea to create an African currency based on gold(?) which would have seriously affected the US Dollar. The UK and USA opening backed ethnic, radical groups who wanted Gaddafi out, as he had been keeping them in check for so long. Libya was a wealthy country and it is now a mess.

Turn to Syria now. After Gaddafi was removed there is evidence to suggest that the CIA helped transport weapons from Libya to Syria to arm the rebels against Assad.

The Wars since 2000 in the Middle East have been proxy wars between the USA and Russia but it appears that, and say if I am wrong, but I do not know of many proxy wars started by Russia recently (except maybe the issue with Ukraine).

The war in Iraq allowed the USA to invade and destabilise countries for their own benefit.

Even the Ukraine one being started by Russia is debatable. There is a huge paper trail leading back to the USA of them funding all kinds of groups to effect the coup in Ukraine. Under the circumstances I happen to think Russia has shown remarkable restraint... for now. I see them in the news today saying their patience is wearing thin in Syria though......

 

[Gavin]

Even the Ukraine one being started by Russia is debatable. There is a huge paper trail leading back to the USA of them funding all kinds of groups to effect the coup in Ukraine. Under the circumstances I happen to think Russia has shown remarkable restraint... for now. I see them in the news today saying their patience is wearing thin in Syria though......

I quite enjoy watching Russia Today to get a view of Syria from the 'other side'. They did mention, though don't know how true it is, that NATO promised Russia that they would not move further into the Eastern Block but there was no contract, just a remark which has been recorded. On top of that the missile defence system in eastern Europe was originally put forward to protect against Iran, and now Russia as asking that it should be removed because now Iran is friendly (however that ain't happening).

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

So happy that the referendum is tomorrow it's nearly over.

It's so tiring listening to how stubborn both sides are, it's tiring listening to every comedian thinking they are soooo funny and saying the brixit cereal joke for the 100000000000000th time.

I suspect a remain vote hopefully by a close margin though, I can see a fair amount of people voting remain in the last minute. Hopefully we will have a high turnout.

 

[ncurd]

I'm glad it's all going to be 'over'.

Huge turnout will probably lead to a lot of back patting on engaging the public but reality is most understand how big a deal it is.

The decision as far as I can tell boils down to two options.

1) The status quo for those happy with current situation/wish further engagement with Europe/think we'll be worse off if we leave but don't really like Europe.

2) The Great Unknown because nobody really knows what will happen if we leave apart from likely a recession in the short to mid term. Nobody knows the form the treaties in place we will sign will look like, nobody knows about current migrants or future ones. Nobody knows how it will effect the economy long term (but the vast majority economists say it will be bad). It's pretty much a leap in the dark.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

I think more people will get to the polls and decide that we have more chance of leaving again than joining back with the same offer.

Similar to Scotland referendum.
In Scotland it went
Remain large lead in polls gets cocky and arrogant and downplays Leave
People in between start to get fecked off with remain lot with there patronising attitude
Leave gains more and more support
Remain panics and starts to scaremonger
Leave counters it with wishful thinking and making claims with no support and its own scaremongering
Becomes neck to neck
And when it came down to it those on the fence decided to vote for what they know.

TBH it is how every referendum of this importance will ever be and how I think it will be tomorrow.

 

[McTallshort]

I think more people will get to the polls and decide that we have more chance of leaving again than joining back with the same offer.

Similar to Scotland referendum.
In Scotland it went
Remain large lead in polls gets cocky and arrogant and downplays Leave
People in between start to get fecked off with remain lot with there patronising attitude
Leave gains more and more support
Remain panics and starts to scaremonger
Leave counters it with wishful thinking and making claims with no support and its own scaremongering
Becomes neck to neck
And when it came down to it those on the fence decided to vote for what they know.

TBH it is how every referendum of this importance will ever be and how I think it will be tomorrow.

Every referendum? This is the very first of its kind and no one in the polls has a clue how to measure it.

I think leave will win, in the end people like tigs said don't like being patronised by people like David Beckham and Eddie izzard and when you have the like of Blair and Brown wading in to the remain campaign you know it's game over. The jocks bottled their chance to go independent but don't think that will happen again.

 

[Tony Manx]

The English will go baa baa into the polling booths as they will favour the status quo in the end. The vast majority of the voting population do not understand and/or incapable of understanding what the arguments are or even the effect that their votes will have!

They will vote to remain despite the fact that they committing the UK to a federal state, which will include Turkey, which is all but bankrupt and in which the majority of countries refuse to take any action to reduce their ever increasing indebtness. Result - politically, economically and culturally, the U.K. is destined to have to pay dearly.....

Good luck with that guys!!

 

[ncurd]

The English will go baa baa into the polling booths as they will favour the status quo in the end. The vast majority of the voting population do not understand and/or incapable of understanding what the arguments are or even the effect that their votes will have!

They will vote to remain despite the fact that they committing the UK to a federal state, which will include Turkey, which is all but bankrupt and in which the majority of countries refuse to take any action to reduce their ever increasing indebtness. Result - politically, economically and culturally, the U.K. is destined to have to pay dearly.....

Good luck with that guys!!

Considering we had to explain how European Parliment was democratic in an indirect democracy I find this a bit rich coming from you.

Also Turkey are nowhere near joining the EU and it will likely be at least a decade probably longer away.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35832035

So yeah I'll stick you uninformed idiot camp you chucked anyone voting remain into.



Tallshort, God I hope the people voting based who they don't like being told to do by stay away from booths tomorrow. But first of it's kind you mean apart from the one on the EEC in the 70's? And the Scottish one is hardly a million miles away.

 

[McTallshort]

Considering we had to explain how European Parliment was democratic in an indirect democracy I find this a bit rich coming from you.

Also Turkey are nowhere near joining the EU and it will likely be at least a decade probably longer away.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35832035

So yeah I'll stick you uninformed idiot camp you chucked anyone voting remain into.



Tallshort, God I hope the people voting based who they don't like being told to do by stay away from booths tomorrow. But first of it's kind you mean apart from the one on the EEC in the 70's? And the Scottish one is hardly a million miles away.

I remember back in 93 ( I think it was) a triumphant Neil Kinnock was expected to sweep to power at the expense of the grey and dour John Major and the country was exposed to a labour party singing, dancing and generally feeling the race was won and that stuck in lots of people's throats and was a big reason Kinnock lost the election and had to go to Brussels and take a well paid job making laws for no reason.

British people don't like being told by rich pampered types what to think and they also don't like being labelled in a negative way just for having a few concerns and yes it does influence people because this referendum is going to be down to gut feeling because the economic arguments are at best a guess from both sides.

 

[ncurd]

British people don't like being told by rich pampered types what to think and they also don't like being labelled in a negative way just for having a few concerns and yes it does influence people because this referendum is going to be down to gut feeling because the economic arguments are at best a guess from both sides.

I know it influences people I just wish people influenced in that way didn't vote it's a terrible reason to vote one way or the other especially when it will have dramatic effect on the country.

Try (I do emphasise try) to read everything you can, sense out the bias and try to come to some sort of informed position. If you do that I'll respect you if you vote differently to me otherwise you get none.

Honestly don't know how I'd have managed without the BBC fact checker (yes they are probably left leaning in what they choose to fact check) on both sides claims show how much nonsense they've both been talking.

 

[McTallshort]

I know it influences people I just wish people influenced in that way didn't vote it's a terrible reason to vote one way or the other especially when it will have dramatic effect on the country.

Try (I do emphasise try) to read everything you can, sense out the bias and try to come to some sort of informed position. If you do that I'll respect you if you vote differently to me otherwise you get none.

Honestly don't know how I'd have managed without the BBC fact checker (yes they are probably left leaning in what they choose to fact check) on both sides claims show how much nonsense they've both been talking.

I believe I am currently in an informed position and the arguments I have put across on this tread are in my mind correct and you have even admitted that yourself. As for you wish certain people wouldn't vote well that's the political system we have and most of the decisions we make in life are from a mind set or feeling we have so why should voting be any different? The alternative is obviously a democracy like they have in Kuwait where only the informed rich land owners get a vote which is a bit like a dictatorship.

 

[ncurd]

I believe I am currently in an informed position and the arguments I have put across on this tread are in my mind correct and you have even admitted that yourself. As for you wish certain people wouldn't vote well that's the political system we have and most of the decisions we make in life are from a mind set or feeling we have so why should voting be any different? The alternative is obviously a democracy like they have in Kuwait where only the informed rich land owners get a vote which is a bit like a dictatorship.

I didn't say you weren't I was just generalising. And yes your one of a couple of leavers I know whom I consider have actually thought about how they are going to vote and have real reasons for doing so, sadly I wish you in the majority not a vast minority.

I'm firmly of the belief of everyone having the right to exercise their vote. I just want people to be informed when they do so.

Whilst experiences and what not will always go some way into the decision making process what your describing is others going "I don't like such and such because they're a pompus arrogant ****, even if this is what's best for me/other people (someone I have little respect for once said to me that you should vote for who benefits you personally best I thought it was a very selfish way to think) I'm going to vote the other way because he's on that side."

 

[j'nuh]

British people don't like being told by rich pampered types what to think and they also don't like being labelled in a negative way just for having a few concerns and yes it does influence people because this referendum is going to be down to gut feeling because the economic arguments are at best a guess from both sides.

Leavers have been banding about the "we don't know what will happen' argument ever since they truly lost the economic argument. At this point, the economic argument is pretty much a slam dunk for the remain side. The question isn't whether leaving will be worse for us economically, but by how much.

Ignore everything said, just look at how the markets are reacting to the swings in voting intention polls. The pound saw it's biggest one-day rise in 8 years after the weekend shift towards remain. Whereas the value of the pound kept dropping last week as Leave was gaining ground. The value of the pound has been decreasing for the last year, ever since the referendum date was set.

The truth is that investors hate uncertainty. With good reason; why would you choose to invest in a time where it is unpredictable whether you can make a return on your investment? It's an entirely self-fulfilling prophesy - investors don't invest, causing a drop in the markets, which investment-holders then worry about and start selling. And these are only the effects from investors following polls and headlines. Particularly anxious investors sell following polls; most will start selling when we have left the EU. If we leave the EU, expect an immediate and sizeable drop in the pound.

As for trade... imagine you have a company where you have sourced your materials from a European nation for the last 10 years. Your expertise, your contacts, your knowledge of your suppliers all come from having spent years working with EU-based partners. The EU may or may not impose trade tariffs, and there may or may not be new avenues to source your materials from as the UK may or may not succeed in improving deals with other countries. But how can you run a business effectively with that uncertainty? A year from now, you have no idea where you will be sourcing your materials from and you have no idea who you will be marketing your products to. You may have to abandon a market you have been making in-roads in for years.

For example, alcohol. You have been importing a Belgian ale for 10 years. The locals love it, you're making a tidy profit off it. We leave the EU, it becomes less practical to order that ale, so you import from USA instead. Now you need to find a new supplier, find a way to import it, predict how fast the locals will take it up in order to know how much to order etc. The Belgian ale was steady; the States ale is unpredictable.

"Not knowing what will happen" is in itself a bad thing for business owners and investors. Which is why the short term picture looks fairly bleak for the UK if we leave.

 

[McTallshort]

Leavers have been banding about the "we don't know what will happen' argument ever since they truly lost the economic argument. At this point, the economic argument is pretty much a slam dunk for the remain side. The question isn't whether leaving will be worse for us economically, but by how much.

Ignore everything said, just look at how the markets are reacting to the swings in voting intention polls. The pound saw it's biggest one-day rise in 8 years after the weekend shift towards remain. Whereas the value of the pound kept dropping last week as Leave was gaining ground. The value of the pound has been decreasing for the last year, ever since the referendum date was set.

The truth is that investors hate uncertainty. With good reason; why would you choose to invest in a time where it is unpredictable whether you can make a return on your investment? It's an entirely self-fulfilling prophesy - investors don't invest, causing a drop in the markets, which investment-holders then worry about and start selling. And these are only the effects from investors following polls and headlines. Particularly anxious investors sell following polls; most will start selling when we have left the EU. If we leave the EU, expect an immediate and sizeable drop in the pound.

As for trade... imagine you have a company where you have sourced your materials from a European nation for the last 10 years. Your expertise, your contacts, your knowledge of your suppliers all come from having spent years working with EU-based partners. The EU may or may not impose trade tariffs, and there may or may not be new avenues to source your materials from as the UK may or may not succeed in improving deals with other countries. But how can you run a business effectively with that uncertainty? A year from now, you have no idea where you will be sourcing your materials from and you have no idea who you will be marketing your products to. You may have to abandon a market you have been making in-roads in for years.

For example, alcohol. You have been importing a Belgian ale for 10 years. The locals love it, you're making a tidy profit off it. We leave the EU, it becomes less practical to order that ale, so you import from USA instead. Now you need to find a new supplier, find a way to import it, predict how fast the locals will take it up in order to know how much to order etc. The Belgian ale was steady; the States ale is unpredictable.

"Not knowing what will happen" is in itself a bad thing for business owners and investors. Which is why the short term picture looks fairly bleak for the UK if we leave.

If the economy is the be all and end all of everything then let's just devolve democracy and appoint a board of directors to run everything.

Remain have pinned everything on the economy forgetting that it's all a theory and it's not the most important thing to everyone. As for importing Belgian beer etc how do you think we imported things before? Why would it be cheaper to import American beer (which we already import) and not Belgian?

 

[j'nuh]

If the economy is the be all and end all of everything then let's just devolve democracy and appoint a board of directors to run everything.

I absolutely agree. For example, accepting refugees would be a loss to the economy, but IMO it's the humane thing to do.

Everyone has to balance the importance of the economy against their own priorities. But know that the weaker the economy, the fewer the tax receipts, the more austerity/tax increases needed. A weak economy will produce a weak NHS, weak infrastructure, weak education etc.

I'm not saying that the economy is the be-all, end-all though, I just wish that leavers would stop being dishonest about how "we can't predict what will happen". We can, and it's not good. The honest point to make as a leaver (which you have made, so kudos) is that the strength of the economy doesn't sway your vote - that you'll accept a weaker economy in order to make these changes.

Remain have pinned everything on the economy forgetting that it's all a theory and it's not the most important thing to everyone. As for importing Belgian beer etc how do you think we imported things before? Why would it be cheaper to import American beer (which we already import) and not Belgian?

The nationalities of the beers are arbitrary. My point is more having to deal with change. Knowledge of a market is important, and for a lot of business owners, particularly smaller ones, that knowledge is going to completely dry up, as they will need to adopt new suppliers, reach new customers, and adopt new brands. They can't prepare for changes because they have no idea in how things will change legislatively. Uncertainty is a massive issue for preparation.

 

[Tony Manx]

Considering we had to explain how European Parliment was democratic in an indirect democracy I find this a bit rich coming from you.

Also Turkey are nowhere near joining the EU and it will likely be at least a decade probably longer away.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35832035

So yeah I'll stick you uninformed idiot camp you chucked anyone voting remain into.



Tallshort, God I hope the people voting based who they don't like being told to do by stay away from booths tomorrow. But first of it's kind you mean apart from the one on the EEC in the 70's? And the Scottish one is hardly a million miles away.

Sorry European Parliament democratic? It has no power to introduce legislation and is hardly even viable as a review body? The only power is exercised by the commissioners and their lackeys!

Several reports of huge British ambassadorial and ministerial support for Turkey accession (despite the traitorous Cameron's protestations) but as they now have visa free travel within Europe why would they bother?

If you believe that Turkey will not join for decades and believe that the EU is in any even small way democratic, you belong with the herd and I wish you baa baa!!

I do not have a vote incidentally.....the IOM has to rely on the UK for our foreign relations unfortunately!

Who would ever have guessed that a conservative government would be left of the previous two Labour governments and would be as "power corrupt" as Mugabe?

 

[ncurd]

Again for what must be umpteenth time the commission is appointed by democratically elected governments. How is that not democratic?

As for Turkey if you read the link I posted they first applied to joining the EU back when the EU was still called the EEC. It's barely any closer now than it was then. So how exactly are the going to imminently joint when all EU nations need to join and they've made none criteria anyone else had to? Ah yes the fantasy land of leave where we're all sunshine and rainbows when it goes back to the good old days that never existed!