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Off Topic General Election

Discussion in 'Watford' started by Jennings60s, Apr 18, 2017.

  1. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    Are we going to have to put up with your cheap jibes and attempts at humour right up until June 8th ?
     
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  2. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    Most certainly.

    I'm desperately looking for better script writers, my wife tells me my jokes always fall flat. :emoticon-0100-smile
     
    #42
  3. Jennings60s

    Jennings60s Active Member

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    I am assuming this is meant to be humorous too. The Guardian is easily the most left wing of the media leaving aside Socialist Worker etc - certainly not middle ground. For me all newspapers are toxic. I try never to read their opinions so focus on news reports on TV and switch when they get to their opinions - even this is dodgy as the choice of what to report has in-built bias.
     
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  4. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    It depends on your own place on the political spectrum what you regard as left or right wing - for me the Guardian occupies very much the middle ground.
     
    #44
  5. Bolton's Boots

    Bolton's Boots Well-Known Member

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    Not to mention 'how to report it' or 'what not to report' - though I'm thinking specifically of BBC Scotland, known locally as the Biased Bullshit Corporation, having no idea what its southern counterparts are like.

    Ditto to that.
     
    #45
  6. Jennings60s

    Jennings60s Active Member

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    I don't really agree with you. I will probably vote Green because I Iike their philosophy if not really their policies. But if you line up papers on the old left - right spectrum I am sure you would not find the Guardian in the middle. I do not read papers but on things like Question Time their reporters always express views against the right and pro the left
     
    #46
  7. colognehornet

    colognehornet Well-Known Member

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    This still depends upon your own personal definition of left and right - and, also how the term has changed through time. What was considered centre in the 70s is now considered as left, because the middle of politics has shifted to the right since then.
     
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  8. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    The Guardian is well to the left, in fact it is a journalist training ground for the totally biased Newsnight.
     
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  9. Jennings60s

    Jennings60s Active Member

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    I still cannot agree. Although individuals might argue over specifics of left and right I think overall there is a generally understood idea of what the terms mean. That is why it has stood the test of time - we understand it. Yes over time a society can move up and down this spectrum but putting it very simplistically the left wing favour society over the individual and look for "social" good while the right believe that society should step back and let individuals make society good. Yes you can argue massively with that but take it as a very simple hypothesis. It does not matter where my personal position is on it as if I am not stupid I can look at it objectively. I believe if you took a thousand people they would come up with a general spectrum. So if you are right, then all you are saying is that the UK ( I guess you are talking about the UK) is now a bit further towards the right end than it used to be. Maybe all newspapers also have shifted their ground towards the right - I don't know - but unless they have crossed over the Guardian which always was, still is, operating on the left end of that spectrum. Since my Uni days it has always appealed to the intellectual left, teachers, professors and the like. I don't comment on whether that is good or bad but find it strange that you seem to view it differently. Can you name many papers that you consider to have amore left wing stance than the Guardian?
    I also am aware that you can split political positions on far more than simply left and right but it is the left/right spectrum that started this bit of discussion.
     
    #49
  10. yorkshirehornet

    yorkshirehornet Well-Known Member

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    Where is your evidence... or is this another example of your pre-judice?

    If you think Newsnight is 'biased' spend a week watching channel 4 news.

    How is it that when people dont like what is written or broadcast they seek to trash it and not engage with the debate?
     
    #50

  11. oldfrenchhorn

    oldfrenchhorn Well-Known Member
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    I find it hard to believe that the two party system in the UK is not changing. Generally you would say that it is Tory right/Labour left. Here is where the problem starts, with probably the majority of MPs in both parties clearly looking at the middle ground, where little separates them. Nice long periods of calm, maybe even boring government, over my lifetime have generally brought about the greatest stability and the population have by and large profited from it. This of course is not good for newspapers who like, indeed in the age of the internet, need headlines that sound exciting. The newsprint may disappear from the streets eventually, but the on-line version relies on what some call click-bait to satisfy the advertisers. An example would show that as the Daily Mail sinks closer to financial oblivion, the headlines have become more extreme. It comes down to people using some thought to see that very often what is in an article is nothing like the headline, but I think that maybe lots of people do not have the time now to read beyond that banner, and all newspapers know it.
     
    #51
  12. Scullion

    Scullion Well-Known Member

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    This is the very same organisation who said it would be a catastrophy if we left the EU. Hopefully they have got it right this time.
     
    #52
  13. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    The Head of the IMF is Christine Lagarde, French lawyer found guilty of negligence over 403million Euro payment to individual.

    Previous head, Strauss-Kahn, stood trial for 'aggravated pimping'. He organises very interesting parties (allegedly!!)

    Very anti Brexit, The IMF have looked particularly silly over their Brexit doom mongering.
     
    #53
  14. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    James O'Brien, he describes himself openly as 'coming from the left' and a 'Champagne socialist' He is openly anti-Brexit with his bias for all to see.

    Nick Watt, political editor, former chief political correspondent at the Guardian.

    Paul Mason, a previous news night business editor and presenter, a former member of the Trotskyist Workers Party, and a self confessed 'leftie activist'.

    I suppose if you read the Guardian it would hard to spot the bias.
     
    #54
  15. yorkshirehornet

    yorkshirehornet Well-Known Member

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    Hang on you said it was a 'training ground' for the 'totally biased' newsnight

    You know both of those assertions factually incorrect.

    Again such assertions would fail you in any academic test
     
    #55
  16. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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    You are desperately struggling with the presented evidence.
     
    #56
  17. Jennings60s

    Jennings60s Active Member

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    Bias exists mostly in the eye of the beholder. We tend to see bias when someone says something against what we believe. If a vast majority of people accuse someone/thing of bias then you can tend to trust it but for an individual ........ it is just a point of view. I see the BBC accused of bias from both sides so guess they are roughly unbiased. They have a charter and plenty of resources, regulatory people to keep them unbiased. Newspapers on the other hand can adopt whatever position they choose.
     
    #57
  18. superhorns

    superhorns Well-Known Member

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  19. Jennings60s

    Jennings60s Active Member

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    #59
  20. Bolton's Boots

    Bolton's Boots Well-Known Member

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    Interesting that someone from France has gone to bother of creating a 'How to vote to stop the Tories' spreadsheet. <laugh>

     
    #60

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