You can have a listen to the Ãsland Eurovision entry http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSXRZOfDLog or even sing along with the words http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjZcDyh8N98
There is an argument which suggests political bickering does have advantages over consensus. Given that you can't impose consensus, it can only be agreed with significant compromises on all sides. This results in very conservative decision-making which ultimately results in stagnation. I'm not saying I agree with the argument, but countries governed by constant coalitions do have their own governmental problems.
Willful misunderstanding there vic, do you never experience the feel good factor? I take it that you want everyone to live a miserable hopeless existance. All I can say is that if people are happy and/or feel fulfilled they will have a better life. I can only talk from my own experience and certainly I did a lot better for my family, and myself, when there have been Conservative governments. I know there are people, and I take it you are one, who would disagree.
Yes, I desperately want everybody (including myself) to live a miserable hopeless existence, of course.
please log in to view this image You could have a parliament like ours where some people face each other and some do not. I do like the idea of the political parties facing each other but from what I see of the British parliament if the members were to behave themselves more and not act like they were still at junior school the political system you have would be more respected.
I find the whole Westminster circus acutely embarassing - I cannot bear to watch Prime Minister's Question time, not least because the 2 main protagonists sum up all that is wrong with our main parties. On the one hand you have an arrogance and conceit - on the other, wishy-washyness, petulence and snide. It's pathetic.
Must be a socialist then. It's a fact that the leftist governments drag economies to their knees rewarding laziness and aligning society to its lowest denominator. Without the tough medicine provided by Maggie and Cameron this country would be in the hands of the Scargills and Kinnocks, socialists who take take take from an ever diminishing fund caused by their lack of ability to manage a p*ss up in a brewery. When it comes to Nationalists all they are doing is playing on the weak minded through the use of populist policies to appeal to those who have little or no understanding of how to drive wealth. If you believe wealth to be evil by all means vote labour or SNP, if you believe in an ever more civilized society built on the values of hard work = reward then vote conservative. Tory medicine can be tough but it's fair and the only way to move forward. If we can avoid labour for the next couple of decades I'll be happy on my death bed.
This is the best comment I can find. You do not need to understand anything except helvÃtis is hell. [video=youtube;Ik66THWLlM4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik66THWLlM4[/video]
BB - You seem to be happy with the SNP and the Yes campaign despite that lack of detail, so fair enough for you. I have a huge concern that if the inhabitants of Scotland vote Yes, the period between 2014 and 2016 will be full of bitching and fighting about how some of these services and institutions will be managed. If I was in your position, that would be my concern as I do not trust any politicians - of any flavour. BTW - I think the Faslane question has an answer in the SNP WEB site. Apparently the SNP would follow the Danish model for not asking any visiting Navy if their vessels are carrying Nucleur weapons - so hear no evil, so no evil. That can work for Faslane as well - they just will not ask the UK government if their nucleur sub's are carrying nucleur weapons and everyone will be happy. UK gov will just pay rent and provide a few thousand jobs.
Not all the time, as Australia has just found out to its cost. Under the ALP leadership of Julia Gillard, the country had the balls (or should that be Balls?) to attack Murdoch's predilection for tax avoidance and had his company actually pay. Now under the stewardship of the Tory equivalents, the sleazeball PM Tony Abbott has caved in and handed back what was paid - $882m. True to form, he hid this from the public who had to find out courtesy of New York journalists.
Quite a lot of interesting discussion going on during my w/e break. A few comments from me on the various topics for what they are worth. Aid I read at the w/e that we give aid to Argentina - why? When I worked in Africa over 30 years ago the Chinese were already there providing infrastructure, I came across them building roads in Rwanda/Burundi, why they thought these poor little (beautiful) countries where strategically important I don't know, if nothing else it bought them house-points and got the door open. I worked for ActionAid for a bit and if you are going to give aid then you need to manage what it is spent on so as much as possible goes to where it is needed. In my view it should be "I am going to give you some aid, but I am going to spend it for you and give the benefit to the people who I think need it, if that it not acceptable then you won't get any". In other instances in Africa I was told that a politician had to bribed to accept the aid we wanted to give! On another occasion I discovered that tractors purchased by the British government were going to a politicians farm. Scotland I have lived in Scotland for over 30 years simply because I like the quality of life - fewer people, fantastic scenery - but the attitude of the Scottish people sucks when it comes to the English. This is a generalisation as I have many good Scottish colleagues & friends. However I have been discriminated against, which would be illegal if I were not white, and have had to put up with this attitude. I and most English folk do not really get what the problem is, English folk do not have the same attitude to the Scots as far as I am aware although I detect a response growing in the English who are wanting to promote their own nationality, eg the St Georges Cross is more prominent, the singing of Jerusalem etc. I don't think the English really care, they just accept we are all British. I am very seriously thinking about voting for independence because of this (and then moving if it is a yes vote!). Politics I am a Conservative or as my socialist English best friend says a "social conservative" which I think most of us are. I dislike anything to do with socialism for the reasons given above by Cornish, Vic & Aberdeen. Socialist leaders are in it for the power and they keep this power by creating a dependency on the state and by trying to reduce everyone to a lowest common denominator and destroying wealth. Conservatism is not the best answer to government, but it is the best solution we have come up with to date. Until we can come up with a political system that minimises self interest and greed but promotes self determination, wealth creation, hard work, saving and support for the genuinely needy then we are stuck with it. The community charge was an excellent local tax because it was levied on the person who used the services not on the value of a property. Oh Maggie why did you try it out in Scotland first, big mistake. I think we need less politicians too. Set a reduced number, then divide that by the (voting?) population to determine the geographical area covered by one political seat. This would mean that the political make up cannot be distorted by a minority population segment. I agree the childish antics that one sees in parliament is truly pathetic, it should be a place of serious debate. Enough for now, thanks for reading.
Scully - a few more comments! Aid I'd like to know who decides where aid money goes and how the decision is justified. For example, why was an Ethiopian girl band given £4m of UK aid funds recently, and why did the same person/people who authorised that see fit to donate £15m to Colombian ranchers to help them find out why their cows fart? And why was nothing made available to those in Somerset Levels when they needed it last year? Scotland You say "However I have been discriminated against, which would be illegal if I were not white, and have had to put up with this attitude. I and most English folk do not really get what the problem is, English folk do not have the same attitude to the Scots as far as I am aware..." My experience is a tad older than yours (the 60s) and is just the opposite. When I moved from Edinburgh to Watford as a child, my early experiences at school (WBGS would you believe) and in the streets was one of open hostility from the English. From day one at school, I constantly had to defend myself from attack by groups of thugs - never by singles strangely - all because of my Scottish background. I eventually saw no choice but to fight back against all comers - earning myself an unfortunate reputation amongst the staff who had blithely ignored what was happening in the playground until I started damaging those thugs. That's not say that all English are the same - I have a circle of friends from those days that still exists today, mainly as a result of supporting Watford I might add. When I left England to move to Australia, the same treatment was meted out - this time because I was apparently English. At least the Aussies didn't take too long to discover their mistake. The common factor there is ..... the English - not once was the hostility ever explained by them. Growing up in Edinburgh, I was relatively unused to meeting 'coloured' people, although there were two Jamaican boys at my school who were accepted by everyone without question. Imagine my surprise upon moving to England and encountering a totally opposite state of affairs.... Politics; I admit to having swayed with the breeze over the years - for a long time I couldn't understand why the Unions and Labour party acted in the way that they did, so was probably a Conservative sympathiser then. But watching - even from afar - first Thatcher's antics, then Howard's in Australia, then Blair and Brown and now Cameron, the whole thing disgusts me. The only leader that I had any time for in all those years was Bob Hawke, the ALP's PM - unfortunately, when he decided it was time to go, things went downhill steadily. I can only say that, at the moment, I do support the SNP as I see in them some signs of a sense of social fairness/justice - to which most Scots aspire. How long that will last for though, I have no idea - and when it disappears, I will probably join the ranks of those who can't be bothered to vote.
I love it when people say things like that. And how, please tell, is that true in the world we live in today? Let's change that to: And things are starting to look a bit more accurate. If your system is so flawless, how do you explain the recent study proving that the top 1% as worth as much as the bottom 3.5 billion people? I'm sure they all work hard too?
I think it takes all sorts........ we are not all the same.... so the entrepreneur should attract wealth for the community etc etc. I did some work with a clinic for people suffering from the terrible illnesses post-union carbide in Bhopal...... and there they had a pay formula: nobody earned more than 3x anybody else..... and it did great work. The differentials between bosses and workers and many Japanese factories are I think similarly small.... Unfortunately the Tories all have to be better than the rest and the Labour party think we all should be the same ( gross exaggeration I know).....
Simple to explain, many of those poor 3.5 billion live in countries that are or have been afflicted by socialist governments. Many of the remainder are further back in the evolutionary chain, all people are not created equal... equal opportunity does not exist across the globe due to many factors the principal ones holding nations and peoples back being evolution and corruption. No system is flawless but on a scale of 0-100 capitalism scores ann 85 whereas socialism scores at best a 5. Nationalism or National Socialism (NAZIsm) is the worst system or affliction of all, it's what Alex Salmond is at the end of the day time will show, I was right with Chavez and I'm right with Salmond, cut from the same cloth as Adolf Hitler and polpot.
Now I finished my ak coffee (reheated of course) and eaten my ham sandwich, then I can give a more measured response than in my earlier diatribes. Neither rampant capitalism nor insidious socialism will work in the longer term in any society, and I am sure that both major parties realise this. It is in the detail of how the "unacceptable face of capitalism" is curbed (if you can curb a face) and how the worst excesses of socialism can be prevented (Stalin anyone?) that the parties differ. It is difficult to find a happy medium where greed in human nature is harnessed for the good of all in society. I don't know the answer and don't pretend to know unlike some in Westminster.
