Off Topic Political Debate

Membership again - another broken record. Means zilch these days. Sister parties but you could not tell me what the British Greens supported when I asked you as you rightly pointed out they are different and as I already have pointed out one German Green "dissed" the English/Welsh Greens.
How hypocritical is that - apparently we are not allowed to describe anyone as left wing but you can without your famous supporting evidence make the absurd claim that the Tory Party are "so right wing" They do not know why the Tories sit where they do - perhaps they do not like a European Coalition.
Oh - members members members again. Us poor voters who do not have a one party indoctrination apparently do not count. You have to nail your colours to one mast.
You may not be a loser COlogne but by golly you sound like an extremist. I would fear living in a country that you controlled.

 

You can keep on re-iterating your views on deficiency. PR has its own deficiencies. Nobody in this country gets to vote AGAINST anyone so stop pretending you have a clue on that. More people voted FOR the Conservatives and that is good enough for me. Our democracy has created the UK I love living in and I am happy if it carries on. You are very narrow minded and can only ever see things through your particular narrow perspective. The world is far broader and more complicated - and hence richer in the non money sense than you argue.

 

Leo, do democracies have riots the day after elections ? Do democracies have the vast extremes of regional voting which the UK has ? Do governments in democracies claim mandates with 37% and on the following day claim they want to better control what everyone writes on twitter etc. Do democracies want to withdraw from general European agreements on human rights ? If anyone called you 'narrow minded' you would jump straight down their throat so please don't use that type of rhetoric here. I have cast doubt upon Britain's claim to be a democracy and prefer the PR system - this does not mean that I am saying that other countries Germany etc. are more democratic than the UK (I could just as easily tear German democracy to shreads but that is not the subject here).

 

No German Green has any right to criticize the English Green Party unless they directly contradict the policy direction of the European Greens. Certainly not for how they conduct an election campaign. In any case the English Greens increased their share of the vote and no party can do more than that. The reason for referring to numbers is that it is one of the only ways of measuring how politically active a population is - how else can you measure political activity ? If the only contact point which people actually have to political decision making or influence is voting between a limited range of possibilities every 5 years then that is,for me, very little.

 

The thing that matters is that the British public are very happy with the present system, so no change.

 

This is why you have riots just after elections ?

 

You will always get a few hundred yobs who like yourself find it hard to accept reality. They need to whack a few really hard.

 

This, if taken literally, and in combination with a party who have expressed irritation at human rights regulations, tells us a great deal about the levels of some Conservative support.

 

Riots? Please!!! Demonstrations are part of a democracy - bet Russia and Belarus to name two countries at random - do not allow demonstrations. A few left wing inspired yobbos do not undermine a democracy in my book - surprised they do in yours.

 

We do not disagree with human rights in the UK but it is debateable that being told by Europe exactly what constitutes human rights make us any less democratic. I think the UK understands human rights better than most - and to take only one example - insisting that prisoners have voting rights when the population does not agree is not in my book either democratic or a valid human right. You get to vote if you stay out of prison for more than a year. Europe is dominated by forces that will push us down a path to a Federalism that has not been voted for or accepted by the UK. Hence the UK being very Euro-sceptic. And that comes from someone like myself who actually favours European Federalism

 

I suspect some do. We did not. A riot is an illegal expression of violent dissent - it is not a comment on whether or not a society is democratic. A tolerant democracy -like ours - deals with protest - it was not a riot democratically.
What relevance is there to where in a state support for a particular party arises. Regional variances are a product of many things but a reflection on democracy they are not.
Democracies have parties that introduce stupid things and yes therefore they do have parties that claim daft things about twitter. You confuse political thought with democracy. You evidence a total lack of understanding of what democracy actually means.
I do not see anything from you but a one party line on a series of things that are actually quite offensive to people like myself who enjoy our country and its democracy. I repeat my assertion that you have a very narrow perspective. You appear to be following some Green mantra. You are entitled to accuse me of anything you like Cologne - arrogance and being patronising seem the flavour of the month. You would not be able to find evidence that I am narrow minded though as I have on here argued for left and right, conservational and many other causes. If I admitted to a fault it might be being too broad minded and sitting on the fence whilst making up my mind (I only decided my vote on the eve of the election).

You just trot out the same Green mantra time and again - how many more times will we hear the exact same arguments. I used to think you were a fairly free thinking person but this thread shows otherwise. Prove me wrong.

 

Open your mind for goodness sake. We are pulling out of the European Human rights legislation, it IS a deeply faulty act used to protect extremism not its original purpose. Pseudo academic diatribe does nothing but make me so sad that people can't see the reality of what this world needs for the betterment of all. Its narrow minded left wing and greens who have ******ed the human races development in the western world. I really wish we could find another planet to move to and leave the left, the Islamics, the liberals to their ultimate goals....

 

We could fire you up there in a rocket on a scouting mission?

 

No - but when the trouble is started by yobbos in uniform using batons against unarmed citizens, I'd say that goes some way towards undermining democracy.

 

No - democracy is about people voting and elections and the ability of the populace to say what it wants and accept the verdict.

Yobs in uniform are as bad as any other. Why defend one bunch of yobs by saying there is another bunch - why never accept criticism of some of these people but instead try to deflect it. People who do this just cause ordinary people to a conclusion that they condone mob behaviour. Condemn the protester yobs and then we can listen to the accusations against uniformed yobs

(As an aside I am just watching the Albuquerque police attack a defenceless man who camped in thewrong place - they shot him to death and then set dogs on him. Thankfully we are nowhere near that.)

 

I will quote here - 'You evidence a total lack of understanding of what democracy actually means'. How the hell do you think this comes over ! And what conceited arrogance such a claim portrays. As if you know what democracy is and everyone who disagrees is of no relevance. The word democracy has never really been defined although it is used by most countries to decribe their systems. I use it to describe a state in which the population are active in shaping their environment - all the time, and not just once every 5 years, others will use it in other ways but my useage is every bit as valid as yours. I have expressed my reasoning for why the UK does not live up to my definition of a democracy and that is all - that is not toeing any party line, just expressing my own opinions. I lived through the Thatcher years and saw the way my country was torn apart and the scars are still there. I am afraid of the same party once again having a majority when they themselves have not distanced themselves from Thatcher (in the same way that Labour have distanced themselves from their past). I know that my dream society (call it Anarcho Communist - Kropotkinist whatever) will never happen. Partly because it would be a movement from below, which by definition could not come via the agenda of a national party. I joined the Green Party because I believed in about 70% of their platform, which was about 10% higher than the next placed party. I joined it because I was a beekeeper and well knew the damage caused by present agricultural practices. I joined because I knew that it was unsustainable for Germany to produce 25% of it's electricity from open caste mining (Lignite - the worst of all). I joined because I thought that we had a duty to hand over the World to the next generation in some kind of orderly state and that we could not do that simply through replacing one technology with another but only through fundamental changes in our consumer practice. This is why I sided with the English Greens (there is no British Green Party by the way) their economic policies are irrelevant to me because they are the only party in the UK taking Carbon emission reduction seriously - and this last point is decisive. Naturally they will make mistakes, but they are asking the right questions which is a start. I think that they positioned themselves according to the existing political landscape - ie. thought they could fit into the void which Labour had left - just as the German Green Party has been pushed towards the centre by Die Linke. Naturally it is a mistake to allow other parties to write your manifesto in this way but that is the way things have turned out. Personally I would not turn down the support of an environmentalist such as Prince Charles purely for ideological reasons and would embrace environmentalists of all shades. Because a poisoned fish in a river is not concerned whether the pollution came from a state owned firm, a cooperative or a private firm. I favour the cooperative however because if a firm is run by local people then the chances are higher that they will have a democratic structure and will respect my environment.

 

I'll condemn the idiots that disrupt a peaceful protest and the slap happy Police officers (accepting they were not all doing it). The problem the protesters may have is it is unlikely this was an official protest so the Police may argue that they had to act more quickly to contain it. Doesn't really justify it especially if those who got hit hadn't done anything wrong.

 

No, we only have one planet Aberdeen. Although if the so called progress made by the Western World were replicated by others we would need the resources of 4 and a half planets to sustain it.

 

I lived through the Thatcher years and was appreciative of the hope and the sense of restored order she achieved.. Until she got to grips with the soviet financed union barons we were the laughing stock of Europe. I accept some areas lost manufacturing jobs but they were being lost anyway from the late 60's. Interesting that none of her labour laws have been reversed since.

 

No, but how long before we get to that? http://www.channel4.com/news/policeman-accused-of-framing-student-at-tuition-fee-riot