I can see where you are cóming from. Perhaps you are/ were a tradicional Tory that has seen his party take.up the policíes of Farage's UKIP.thus rendering the current Tory party as unrecognisable compared with former times. Or maybe you are/were traditional.Labour but find it hard to fathom.out their policíes and direction. For me, I will vote for the party that is least divisive. As far as I can see, the Tories have been hell bent on división. The prime example being their very divisible "protocol" regarding Northern Ireland. I don't think Labour.would have been as divisible. On the other hand, if we want to see a fairer voting system, then the Lib Dems or Greens or even Reform have to be considered.
Off Topic Politics Thread
- Thread starter ChilcoSaint
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You cannot be serious, I've never put anyone on a pedestal how can you post such bollocks, utter bollocks and expect belief and respect is beyond me. Worse than Trump? So outlandish it beggars belief. If you have had a university education it was a complete waste of time and money.
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**** the Yanks it is to Spain we need to look for ideas on how to run a 21st century economy.
This article is from today's Times by Roger Boyes.
Give the young a say or they’ll start revolting
Spain shows how to offer millennials an economic future — and avoid going the way of France
It is not 1968. The war of 2023 is in Ukraine, not Vietnam. The baby boomers are not hurling Molotov cocktails on the streets; certainly not. They are focused on hanging on to their still-cushy jobs and their precious houses. Or perfecting that golf swing.
But it lingers nonetheless, the crackling tension of 1968 between a young disgruntled generation and the slippered classes. Across Europe, the young are being told to work longer and harder to pay for state pensions by stumbling governments that don’t pay attention to their needs. As President Macron is finding out, that’s a recipe for revolt. He’s ramming through a plan (some would say a decade too late) to raise the retirement age from 62 to a still inadequate 64. It is a reform being sold with patronising clunkiness. There’s the echo of 1968 again. François Mitterrand, then the left’s star candidate for the French presidency, told student rebels at the time: “Being young doesn’t last very long. You spend a lot more time being old.” Grow up, in other words, pull up your socks.
Renegotiating the generational contract is the big challenge of the age for complex democracies; it’s more than getting the sums to balance or leaders demanding more discipline. And it needs a different approach, one that recognises that young people were whacked by the 2008 financial crisis, by Covid and lockdown and the massive consequences for government spending, for public debt, inflation and rising interest rates.
Some countries fared worse than others. OECD figures for 2020 show that Italy, Spain, Greece and France recorded significantly higher than average numbers of 18 to 24-year-olds who were neither studying nor in work (known as Ninis in Spain: ni estudia, ni trabaja).
It seemed sensible, then, to ask the super-smart Spanish first deputy prime minister, Nadia Calviño, how and where a new balance should be struck.
“Fairness,” she says, “needs to be at the heart of the social contract if we want to preserve social peace and have sustainable growth.” Both market reforms and pension reform have been introduced by Calviño’s Socialist government, led by Pedro Sánchez, after intensive negotiations with the unions. The results are already beginning to show, she says: a million extra jobs (helped by a 50 per cent rise in the minimum wage), stable, better-quality contracts. The precarious nature of jobs for young people has been a big source of youth discontent across mainland Europe. “We have focused on creating more and better opportunities for the younger generation,” says Calviño. “Record investments in scholarships, the revamping of professional and vocational training, modernising and digitalising it all. And then there’s investment in accessible housing for the younger generation.” All the weaknesses that emerged during the pandemic are being addressed: poor internet connectivity in rural areas, the lack of digital devices.
The point is to rebuild trust in the power of the state and free entrepreneurial talent (small companies are given digital toolkits complete with vouchers prodding them into using high tech). It could be construed as a kind of bribe: an incentive for young people, dangled before them as the December general election approaches, to fork out for the older generation. Retirement age has been pinned at 65 for decades in Spain. Now the country plans to tug new money into the pensions pot from companies and the highest-paid, and then deploy it, for example, to soften the blow to women who gave up work to look after children.
There is plenty of brio in this kind of programme (paid for in part by EU funds) and if it works over the long term it makes more sense than simply shoving up the retirement age and running the risk of fracturing the electorate. Even David Gauke, who pushed for the accelerated pension age rise in 2017, accepts it doesn’t always sit well in the election cycle. Bringing forward to the 2030s the planned pension age increase to 68 would mean a longer working life for 5.4 million people aged under 45. That would build real disgruntlement into the system.
Spain doesn’t feel at the moment as if it’s on the brink of a 1968 2.0 and that may be because of the early successes of the Sánchez government in depolarising society. But as election cycles take place in Greece, Poland and Slovakia this year, and the US and Britain next year, politicians are going to have to find a new Youthspeak, one that isn’t just defined by appearances in the celebrity jungle.
If any country seems ripe for a revival of the soixante-huitards it seems likely to be the Turkey of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who faces a defining election next month. A recent poll showed that 58 per cent of 18 to 24-year-old Turks felt anxious about the future; only 18 per cent felt any hope; a bare 9 per cent admitted to pride in the country. Erdogan once had the young behind him and delivered meteoric growth. Now there is 80 per cent inflation and a very fresh memory of how the government mishandled Covid.
In West Germany in 1968, a young wannabe revolutionary in the dock for setting fire to a department store was asked his age: “I was born in 1789,” he declared. That was the spirit of the times: a kind of desperation about an entrenched old order making perceived victims out of the young. It’s not just the autocrat Erdogan who should watch his step. The young everywhere, seething about a lost decade, need to be brought urgently into decision making before things go really, really wrong.
This article is from today's Times by Roger Boyes.
Give the young a say or they’ll start revolting
Spain shows how to offer millennials an economic future — and avoid going the way of France
It is not 1968. The war of 2023 is in Ukraine, not Vietnam. The baby boomers are not hurling Molotov cocktails on the streets; certainly not. They are focused on hanging on to their still-cushy jobs and their precious houses. Or perfecting that golf swing.
But it lingers nonetheless, the crackling tension of 1968 between a young disgruntled generation and the slippered classes. Across Europe, the young are being told to work longer and harder to pay for state pensions by stumbling governments that don’t pay attention to their needs. As President Macron is finding out, that’s a recipe for revolt. He’s ramming through a plan (some would say a decade too late) to raise the retirement age from 62 to a still inadequate 64. It is a reform being sold with patronising clunkiness. There’s the echo of 1968 again. François Mitterrand, then the left’s star candidate for the French presidency, told student rebels at the time: “Being young doesn’t last very long. You spend a lot more time being old.” Grow up, in other words, pull up your socks.
Renegotiating the generational contract is the big challenge of the age for complex democracies; it’s more than getting the sums to balance or leaders demanding more discipline. And it needs a different approach, one that recognises that young people were whacked by the 2008 financial crisis, by Covid and lockdown and the massive consequences for government spending, for public debt, inflation and rising interest rates.
Some countries fared worse than others. OECD figures for 2020 show that Italy, Spain, Greece and France recorded significantly higher than average numbers of 18 to 24-year-olds who were neither studying nor in work (known as Ninis in Spain: ni estudia, ni trabaja).
It seemed sensible, then, to ask the super-smart Spanish first deputy prime minister, Nadia Calviño, how and where a new balance should be struck.
“Fairness,” she says, “needs to be at the heart of the social contract if we want to preserve social peace and have sustainable growth.” Both market reforms and pension reform have been introduced by Calviño’s Socialist government, led by Pedro Sánchez, after intensive negotiations with the unions. The results are already beginning to show, she says: a million extra jobs (helped by a 50 per cent rise in the minimum wage), stable, better-quality contracts. The precarious nature of jobs for young people has been a big source of youth discontent across mainland Europe. “We have focused on creating more and better opportunities for the younger generation,” says Calviño. “Record investments in scholarships, the revamping of professional and vocational training, modernising and digitalising it all. And then there’s investment in accessible housing for the younger generation.” All the weaknesses that emerged during the pandemic are being addressed: poor internet connectivity in rural areas, the lack of digital devices.
The point is to rebuild trust in the power of the state and free entrepreneurial talent (small companies are given digital toolkits complete with vouchers prodding them into using high tech). It could be construed as a kind of bribe: an incentive for young people, dangled before them as the December general election approaches, to fork out for the older generation. Retirement age has been pinned at 65 for decades in Spain. Now the country plans to tug new money into the pensions pot from companies and the highest-paid, and then deploy it, for example, to soften the blow to women who gave up work to look after children.
There is plenty of brio in this kind of programme (paid for in part by EU funds) and if it works over the long term it makes more sense than simply shoving up the retirement age and running the risk of fracturing the electorate. Even David Gauke, who pushed for the accelerated pension age rise in 2017, accepts it doesn’t always sit well in the election cycle. Bringing forward to the 2030s the planned pension age increase to 68 would mean a longer working life for 5.4 million people aged under 45. That would build real disgruntlement into the system.
Spain doesn’t feel at the moment as if it’s on the brink of a 1968 2.0 and that may be because of the early successes of the Sánchez government in depolarising society. But as election cycles take place in Greece, Poland and Slovakia this year, and the US and Britain next year, politicians are going to have to find a new Youthspeak, one that isn’t just defined by appearances in the celebrity jungle.
If any country seems ripe for a revival of the soixante-huitards it seems likely to be the Turkey of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who faces a defining election next month. A recent poll showed that 58 per cent of 18 to 24-year-old Turks felt anxious about the future; only 18 per cent felt any hope; a bare 9 per cent admitted to pride in the country. Erdogan once had the young behind him and delivered meteoric growth. Now there is 80 per cent inflation and a very fresh memory of how the government mishandled Covid.
In West Germany in 1968, a young wannabe revolutionary in the dock for setting fire to a department store was asked his age: “I was born in 1789,” he declared. That was the spirit of the times: a kind of desperation about an entrenched old order making perceived victims out of the young. It’s not just the autocrat Erdogan who should watch his step. The young everywhere, seething about a lost decade, need to be brought urgently into decision making before things go really, really wrong.
Feel free to post your thoughts on the matter,some links to verified sources to points you think worthy of discussion and I'm sure due consideration will be given by those that give s ****.
The key word there being "depolarising." Since Sánchez has been PM, there.has hardly been a peep from.the Catalan Nationalists. For me he is a bridge-builder both domestically and on the international stage as seen by his visit to China, as well as his social and economic reforms made by his Government for the benefit of the Spanish.people. And could there be a greater contrast in the way the Sánchez Government deals with "boat" people and the UK Government? For me,Sánchez is everything You would want to see in a Prime Minister.
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It shouldn’t be the press that sicken you. They put stuff out that people click on. People click on the Trump stuff because (as you can see from here) it’s theatre. Press only survive these days on clicks, so they’ll headline the stuff that gets the most traffic.
- Arresting Trump before the primary is election interference
As others have said arresting him at any time is before something so a bit of a non point. Does it mean that you can't arrest him if he has deemed to do something wrong ever? They have taken 2 years to get to this point to make sure the arrest sticks
- Hiding hunters laptop them removing the story from social media was election interference
Again others have answered. On Trump's watch not Biden's
- The entire Russia gate hoax was election interference
Was it though?
- Deamplifying Trumps tweets was election interference
Whilst he was president and after he had already lost the election.
- Biden was openly racist in the past
I have yet to see evidence of this - maybe you could point me to a credible source (no I don't mean left wing either as I am not left wing)? Also, I really struggle to see how Obama, America's first Black president would have an open racist as is VP and then endorse one for presidency. Just doesn't add up.
There is no law against being a nasty little man, but there should be steps to bring him to justice. By definition leaders should be role models, not narcissistic hateful people.
All my opinion though and this opinion has been made from a few years of seeing what he has done and how he has acted. It may be the media as you say, and maybe he is a lovely old man and misunderstood.
Also, you do keep going on about Biden. My original post I don't think (I can't be bothered to look back, so I apologise if i am wrong - and I mean my original not the one you just replied to) didn't go on about how wonderful Biden was. Let's imagine that you are right that Biden is a nasty corrupt racist. Does that mean Trump is exonerated from any wrongdoings because Biden is just as bad (BTW I don't believe for one minute this is true). Let's imagine in this theory that Biden killed two people, but Trump killed only one. does that make it ok then as Trump isn't as bad? Biden isn't on trial (he may well be one day, but isn't now), so how bad he or Hillary or anyone is, is totally irrelevant to the Trump situation.
There's also zero question whatsoever that:
- Trump did the thing that he's being accused of here, and;
- The thing that he is accused of doing is illegal.
That's basically settled. The facts of the case are basically incontrovertible: he has admitted to having done the thing, his lawyer went to jail for doing the thing, his signature is on the documents and the cheques signed to execute the thing.
What is unsettled is the inside baseball legal stuff: namely, that the illegal things he did are only a felony if they are in furtherance of another crime. And that's interesting here, because he wasn't charged with that crime personally (because his own DOJ dropped the case), and that crime was at the federal level rather than state (these charges are state-level). But two separate parties admitted guilt in that crime: Michael Cohen went to jail, and the National Enquirer admitted guilt and paid a large fine in exchange for not being prosecuted. There's also some statute of limitations murkiness, though everything I've read suggests that would resolve in the prosecution's favour.
For a reading of what goes into this, here's a thread from a legal expert who is by no means a deep state liberal shill (he's a contributor to the prominent Federalist Society, the conservative legal group):
I'm hardly a US constitutional lawyer, so I have no idea how the procedural questions will play out, but charging someone with a crime that they 100% committed and everyone acknowledges that they committed hardly seems like some kind of lawless action likely to undermine democracy.
- Trump did the thing that he's being accused of here, and;
- The thing that he is accused of doing is illegal.
That's basically settled. The facts of the case are basically incontrovertible: he has admitted to having done the thing, his lawyer went to jail for doing the thing, his signature is on the documents and the cheques signed to execute the thing.
What is unsettled is the inside baseball legal stuff: namely, that the illegal things he did are only a felony if they are in furtherance of another crime. And that's interesting here, because he wasn't charged with that crime personally (because his own DOJ dropped the case), and that crime was at the federal level rather than state (these charges are state-level). But two separate parties admitted guilt in that crime: Michael Cohen went to jail, and the National Enquirer admitted guilt and paid a large fine in exchange for not being prosecuted. There's also some statute of limitations murkiness, though everything I've read suggests that would resolve in the prosecution's favour.
For a reading of what goes into this, here's a thread from a legal expert who is by no means a deep state liberal shill (he's a contributor to the prominent Federalist Society, the conservative legal group):
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I'm hardly a US constitutional lawyer, so I have no idea how the procedural questions will play out, but charging someone with a crime that they 100% committed and everyone acknowledges that they committed hardly seems like some kind of lawless action likely to undermine democracy.
Look, I don't agree with a lot of what Os says on here but who are we to say his university education was a waste of time and money? It sounds like he's got a good, well paid job from what he's said in the past so I'd say you're making yourself look a bit silly with a statement like that. Regardless of someone's opinion, people work bloody hard to get a degree and I don't think that should be treated with disdain.
Having been described as a moron with an IQ of 4 by someone who has assumed with no grounds I put Biden or any politician on a pedestal deserves all the disdain I can muster.
Yet another example of a grooming gang targeting vulnerable children:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-new...-victims-baltim-rcna78378?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-new...-victims-baltim-rcna78378?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma
I used to wonder but an astounding outburst on here (long deleted) in early January (oddly enough, on January 6th, perhaps he was mourning!) clarified that these are core beliefs.
That was the point when my attempts to argue largely stopped; I've met too many people in that particular echo chamber and I know they are unpersuadable. I now read, laugh and (generally) shrug my shoulders bar occasionally pointing out when he contradicts himself. Nobody is ever going to change his mind. Once you've realised that it just flows over you.
Vin
There are an estimated 9 million people missing from the electoral roll, who are eligible to vote, double the 2010 figure.
I’m surprised that the forms of ID for the 60+ group doesn’t include a picture drawn by their 5 year old grandchild, given that a young person’s railcard is inadmissible.
To Register To Vote You Can Either Contact Your Local Authority Or Register Online
To register to vote you can either contact your local authority or register online at gov.uk/register-to-vote
If you do not have the correct ID you can apply for a Voter Authority Certificate at your local council office or online at
gov.uk/apply-for-photo-id-voter-authority-certificate
The best way to make sure your vote counts and to avoid having to show ID at the polling station is to use your postal vote.
To vote in this year’s local elections by postal vote, you need to make sure your postal vote arrives by 10pm on May 4. The deadline for applying for a postal vote is April 21.
Accepted forms of ID
Passport issued by the UK, the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man, a British Overseas Territory, a European Economic Area state or a Commonwealth country
Driving licence issued by the UK, Channel Islands, Isle of Man, or an EEA state (includes provisional licence)
Blue Badge parking pass
Older Person’s Bus Pass funded by UK Government
Disabled Person’s Bus Pass funded by Government
Oyster 60+ Card funded by Government
Freedom Pass
Scottish National Entitlement Card
60 and over Welsh Concessionary Travel Card
Disabled person’s Welsh Concessionary Travel Card
Senior SmartPass issued in Northern Ireland
Registered Blind SmartPass or Blind Person’s SmartPass
issued in NI
War Disablement SmartPass issued in NI
60+ SmartPass issued in NI
Half Fare SmartPass
I’m surprised that the forms of ID for the 60+ group doesn’t include a picture drawn by their 5 year old grandchild, given that a young person’s railcard is inadmissible.
To Register To Vote You Can Either Contact Your Local Authority Or Register Online
To register to vote you can either contact your local authority or register online at gov.uk/register-to-vote
If you do not have the correct ID you can apply for a Voter Authority Certificate at your local council office or online at
gov.uk/apply-for-photo-id-voter-authority-certificate
The best way to make sure your vote counts and to avoid having to show ID at the polling station is to use your postal vote.
To vote in this year’s local elections by postal vote, you need to make sure your postal vote arrives by 10pm on May 4. The deadline for applying for a postal vote is April 21.
Accepted forms of ID
Passport issued by the UK, the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man, a British Overseas Territory, a European Economic Area state or a Commonwealth country
Driving licence issued by the UK, Channel Islands, Isle of Man, or an EEA state (includes provisional licence)
Blue Badge parking pass
Older Person’s Bus Pass funded by UK Government
Disabled Person’s Bus Pass funded by Government
Oyster 60+ Card funded by Government
Freedom Pass
Scottish National Entitlement Card
60 and over Welsh Concessionary Travel Card
Disabled person’s Welsh Concessionary Travel Card
Senior SmartPass issued in Northern Ireland
Registered Blind SmartPass or Blind Person’s SmartPass
issued in NI
War Disablement SmartPass issued in NI
60+ SmartPass issued in NI
Half Fare SmartPass
Nepali security guards who protected British embassies in Afghanistan and who were airlifted to the UK in August 2021 are in detention and facing deportation.
https://www.theguardian.com/politic...rlifted-from-kabul-to-uk-now-face-deportation
What has our once-welcoming country become?
Vin
https://www.theguardian.com/politic...rlifted-from-kabul-to-uk-now-face-deportation
What has our once-welcoming country become?
Vin
One small morsel of good news. The NUS is creating an ID that's acceptable at the polls. Pass it on to students and ask them to pass it on to their friends: don't let the government disenfranchise young people.
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Vin
Or maybe most people don’t care about Scottish politics unless they live there? US politics is different as what goes on their echoes around the world and especially the west. The US is also a bulwark against a much more dangerous multipolar world - whether we love it or hate it. What goes on there matters more than what goes on in Scotland in such an order of magnitude it is almost not worth discussing in the same sentence
Scotland’s current importance is that if it left the U.K. the balance of the “anti conservative” seats in the House of Commons would be tipped to where, under the current voting system, we would effectively be a one party state for a considerable time. But that even might not hold based on current polling
Also - 48% for Kate Forbes suggests that the SNP might not be as left wing as it would appear on the surface. At least among the members. There are some fault lines there
Whether he means what he says or not, it gets the desired effect because there are some posters on here who are so full of themselves they have been queueing up to put him straight. He's been leading them by the nose for weeks but their puffed up egos can't see it.
Excellent work from Os and very entertaining to watch.
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