Off Topic Politics Thread

Clowns serve a very important function in a circus in that they distract people between acts while the kit for one act is being removed and the next is being prepared. They also serve another very important purpose and that is should something go disastrously wrong they can be used to distract the publics attention while the mishap is being sorted. That is what has happened over the last few days with Covid 19. In order to distract people away from the Cummings affair the government has jumped from stage 2 of its steps to easing lockdown straight to stage 1 without an explanation other than like the clowns it is designed to distract people from the disaster that is Cummings. The problem for them now is when the infection and death rate start to rise again as they invariably will they have no way left of distracting peoples attention from their utter incompetence. As they sing at the end of the song "Where are the clowns? Send in the clowns. Don't bother they're here".

 

You do know that technically we are still a member of the EU with all the same membership rights as before until 31st December don’t you?

 

I agree with a lot of that Ian, but Corbyn enabled Brexit by his stupid seven out of ten comment at the referendum. A wholehearted endorsement would have prevented several of my acquaintances voting Leave to give Dave a bloody nose. Admittedly it worked and gave him a very bloody nose indeed, but at what cost?

We are now heading for a very hard Brexit and that will really put the kibosh on an already sick economy.

 

Perhaps we have been relying on Europe’s manufacturing far too long. Maybe time to do things ourselves. Think about the manufacturing we used to have which has been in the country for years then transferred out to various European and other countries. Mainly because Europe gave the country money to set up the business therefore inspiring the company to transfer from us. It can’t be argued we haven’t lost most of our manufacturing since joining the common market. Let alone the other changes........that should put the cat among the pigeons....ha

 

It was the Thatcher government in the 80s that cynically run down manufacturing in this country and we haven't recovered from it.

 

Of course you are right, but that completely misses the point about the Single Market, which evolved so that manufacturing processes and production of different components didn’t have to be duplicated in every member state. Then there’s the practical difficulty of starting everything from scratch again. Think of all the different items you have to bring together in one place, to build a car for example. Of course we could do it ourselves, but how long will it take to set everything up?

 

Totally agree!!!

 

oh with that I agree..........yes it is going to take time.....but it shouldn’t have needed to, we had what we needed in this country. The problem was in the early days we dealt with countries that Europe were not so had to stop. Very narrow thinking on our part

 

I wonder how far England is away from seeing riots like the ones in America?

It feels like more people are finally waking up to the fact we have lying idiots in charge.

 

Hasn’t there also been an issue with successive governments buying products from abroad, cutting out British manufacturers, thus hurrying their demise?
If we have to start from scratch then those companies just have to be fully supported by the government of the day, even if it might be cheaper buying from abroad. AND the public will have to suck up higher prices resulting from this.
The old saying “You don’t know what you have, until it’s gone” will never ring truer than the realisation by many that Brexit will screw us over.

 

That simply isn’t the case. We have always dealt with the Commonwealth countries, China, the USA and so on. What we haven’t necessarily had is a tariff-free trade deal with those countries.

And on the manufacturing question, as Saints_Alive says, it was Thatcherism that shut down pretty much all our manufacturing base because they wanted to turn the UK into a service-based economy and dominate the financial sector. The EU didn’t play a part in those decisions.

 

A college professor in the US has come under fire from leading figures in the Republican Party after he allegedly assaulted a number of completely innocent Trump supporters during a visit to the Middle East.

The alleged incident took place on the roof of a Trump tank during a camping trip to the desert outside of Alexandretta earlier this year.

 

But not the KKK

 

Trump going to give a live statement now from the Rose Garden of the White House...

 

Had to tear gas and fire rubber bullets at the peaceful protesters first though...

 

Trump has just announced that he is immediately putting the military on the streets to bring an end to the rioting.

If Governors don't fully utilise the National Guard, he will be sending in the US military himself.

Did Trump just invade his own country?

 

Even though I knew he would be a terrible president, he keeps continuing to surprise me with just how terrible he is.

All he needed to say was 3 words. Black lives matter. Then try and work to bring some calm. Instead hes just pouring gasoline on the fire, as usual

 

Country’s going to hell in a handcart and what do you do?

Invoke something from 1807 so you can tear gas and push protestors out of the way, so that you can nip over to the church for a quick photo opportunity with the Bible.

****ing hell.

 

Just an incredible image.

 

This is something of a stand up and be counted moment. The police are brutalizing civilians, they are intentionally brutalizing members of the press in full view of the world, and they have the full and unabashed support of the President of the United States. The rubber has met the road on all of his authoritarian fantasizing, I'm afraid.