Off Topic Politics Thread

Once again, Imps, I am grateful for your intervention/correction. I almost certainly over-stated Thatcher's European credentials. However, she would certainly have let sleeping dogs lie while ignoring the yapping of the far right.

While I will always lay the death of the trade union movement at the door of MT, other mad reforms of public services were down to those Tories that followed her and the so called "Labour Government" of 1997 onwards.

Taking the sword to the trade unions was populism at its best/worst. The press had done a decent job of creating the hate figure of the TUC and Maggie rode the wave. I do, however, think that she wouldn't have touched a proposed exit from the EU, even if it had simply been on pragmatic grounds.

 

I mean that as the ones with the power it’s down to the police to lead by example on breaking down the us and them attitudes. You can’t blame a disempowered community for lacking trust

 

The problem is that I would agree in the first half of her tenure that indeed she had full control and your above statement is correct. However in the latter half she became weakened and far from being able to ignore the yapping (of any direction) it was the far left of her party (Centrists Pro EU) that ended up hounding her out of the job. She couldn't ignore people at that point and they took every opportunity to further weaken her until they got her out.

May's trouble is that she is in that latter stage in terms of strength and was from day one because she is no Thatcher. And under current Tory "no confidence" rules it is now almost impossible to topple the leader of the party (in government) because of the vast size of the government payroll. Playing by the rules at the moment of the 317 Conservative MPs, 200 or so of them are on the government payroll and thus almost* guaranteed to vote for the PM. It is known as the "payroll vote."

*which showed that far from May achieving a victory in the leadership campaign, she failed to win virtually anyone that wasn't in a government job. Thatcher would have resigned with much less than that.

What we currently have is a system where anything that comes up the government creates new posts all the time. Of course that must be a good thing. A minister (and PPSs) for suicide. A minister (and PPSs) for women. The "payroll vote" increases each time these new positions are created and thus mean that even a useless leader has a "banker" vote and is very hard to get rid of.

The official figures for the payroll vote (Ministers, Whips and PPSs) after the 2015 GE was 142. May has created a vast amount more on top of that.

As a comparison Blair's 3 governments had 134 in 1997 and 135 in 2005.

The media were trying to say May did better than Thatcher did however Thatcher got 204 votes against 152 in her vote of confidence. Of that 204 she had a "payroll vote" of 123. She resigned.

May got 200 votes against 117. A better percentage - yes. However her payroll vote is in the 200 region (some say more but there is no info available or provided yet) so she gained no-one that was not on the payroll. A much worse result.

 

Had to read poster name to see if this was Ide's satire for a moment.

Who has blamed Corbyn for International terrorism? No-one.
Who has blamed Corbyn for the collapse of the Venezuelan economy? No-one.

He has been constantly asked about his support and his actions. No-one has said he had a hand in either of the above.

 

That would depend on whether that lack of trust was warranted. There are always benefits for some for keeping that sort of divide open. "safety in numbers" etc which for those who the police would be after is beneficial if they can stoke the rest of the community to add to their defensive numbers.

I also blame some leaders and politicians like David Lammy. Politicians like him could do so much good but instead they use subject matter they know they can abuse to push their own agendas....

Instead of utilising their positions to bridge the gaps and solve problems they jump on these issues, stoke the fires higher and the result id the problems get worse.

I used to find it strange how people on the estate I was living on would constantly talk about "pigs, filth" and much more derogatory names. If you did see a pair of police on patrol on the estate you could see people watching them as they were walking and you could feel how tense the situation was and what could happen.

If they actually had to go to an address to arrest someone they would always do it with a very heavy police presence because 2 or 3 of them would be useless as "community"* backed up their own. *Community normally younger generation. " riot vans to arrest 1 or 2 people and then you get all the social media stuff about the police being over the top, making fun of how many officers it takes to arrest one person etc. the reality being that 1 of those coppers could easily arrest the person they were after but they needed 20+ to make sure that they didn't get overpowered by community members trying to "protect their own."

Then of course you get moans about "why do they do it at 4am in the morning" which of course is so that there is a smaller chance of every young lad from the area getting in on the act. Even so every attempt to arrest 1 normally means 3 or 4 are taken away once "assaults on a police officer" have added to the "bust." And then this is put on social media too.

A couple of years ago there was a lad (22ish) that the police wanted because his partner had reported him for domestic violence. He "went on the run" but kept posting on facebook himself in front of various police stations. In the day, at night. This went on for several weeks. All of those that knew him on the estate cheered him on etc. when the police eventually got hold of him he was in a house 100 yards from his own and had been sofa hopping around the area for those few weeks. Again the police were attacked* when they went to arrest him. Not a riot or anything but pushing shoving, lots of verbals, spitting etc. Then there was a week or 2 of accusations flying around facebook r.e. "betraying our own."

The reality is that most of this hatred towards the police is from the younger generation. London might be a higer grade of problem with all the knife crime but it is across the country. When I was a kid if a policeman, teacher, figure of authority spoke to me I would be polite. If they told me to do something I would say yes sir. Yes there were the odd few that were rebels but these days it just seems that there is a huge problem with lack of respect.

I would suggest this is due to leaders or influencers that push the agenda rather than kids themselves deciding to be rebels.

 

If you missed the obvious implications in the coverage of The Mail and The Sun Imps, it's no surprise that you missed any hint of nuance in my post.

 

The mess may be due to the mis-handling of the whole affair granted.........I would like to remind you though in previous elections under the Cameron Government it was in the Tory manifesto regarding the referendum. The Tories won handsomely. So I would argue that the people wanted the referendum. You have to admit the way the referendum went was the surprise ?? No one was expecting that, so were not ready for the out vote. Why May chose to have another Election is a mystery to all of us!
As for Corbyn....You think if he were to get into power things would be better ???......Not a chance...... I'm no Tory but I no Corbynite either....... he doesn't have a clue. He will drag us into the **** just as quick and probably break the country just as the party did nearly before. Oh and he'll blame the tories for everything as the party normally does........

 

The problem wasn't May choosing another election. It was a no brainer on the polling figures. The problem was May unveiling a manifesto made by here and her advisors, unseen by the cabinet including stuff like the Dementia tax. If she had actually developed it with the cabinet they would have spotted that one straight away.

It was May herself and her control freakery that turned what should have been an easily increased majority into a hung parliament.

Even now the media present a "blame the Tories" story when polling, they don't report on, shows that actually May gets most of the blame.

Of course that is dependent on political leanings as well as Brexit leanings but the reality was that in 2017 the Tories were aiming for the leave vote. It should have been a major success seeing as that policy wiped out UKIP and the other parties splitting the leave vote however she completely messed it up.

 

I think the people were offered a fool's choice, on which no one was ever going to be able to deliver, purely as an exercise by David Cameron to try to unite his party. And since the unexpected result of the referendum, Theresa May too has put the interests of her party ahead of those of the country.

Do I think a Corbyn led Labour party would have made a better job of these negotiations? Absolutely yes, though Labour is itself divided between those like Corbyn, who want to accept the result of the referendum, and the majority of his MPs who would prefer a second referendum. Either way, this whole mess is entirely the Tories' doing.

 

The way I see it is that this is not about party politics, it is about the country and all of our welfare and all of our future.

Unfortunately, it has become about in party fighting and party politics, with all sides trying to score points off each other. No winners in this I'm afraid.

 

Time to change the system, a simply majority for such a monumental decision is no way to go. Whoops, to late we're Donald.

 

I think you could argue that Corbyn has responded in good faith to Theresa May's belated request for his input as Leader of the Opposition, but has been met with her characteristic selective deafness.

 

There's a lot I agree with you in this script. Especially the 'we respect the result but....' people! I agree too that Mrs May has made some poor decisions, the election, the trigger timing etc., but I do have a great deal of sympathy for her in that as you rightly point out the H of C have made a bad situation even worse. I've lost count on how many 'options' ways through' etc have been or still being devised, so trying to satisfy any reasonable majority of the MP's is pretty near impossible. As others have correctly pointed out we have a 'remain' Parliament and a 'leave' populace vote. If anything the odds of getting something over the line now may have improved slightly but there is no-one there yet, in my view, more capable at present of bringing about a more cohesive approach than her, and I say that knowing full well that much of the present dilemma need not have happened if the aforementioned poor decisions had been much more wise.

As a former and wise PM once said, 'events dear boy events' (determine/change things), perhaps there is an event we have yet to see which will come and get this sorted. My conversations with people have moved during recent months from taking a certain view and trying to persuade others towards it, to more about whatever happens after whatever happens, all have us have got to get on with life and make whatever the new situation is, work for the good of all. That may be too much of a step for some, I appreciate, but I think it's a worthwhile journey to offer the hand of friendship to friends and foes alike when the battle is over.

 

This sounds like something written by my parents who are in their 80s (who tell me there was absolutely no crime in Southampton in the 50s) Sounds no different to when I was a teenager in the late 70s. There must have been a quiet period in the 90s?

 

I'm not for a minute trying to suggest there was more crime years ago. If anything I would suggest there is less crime now than there was in the 70s, 80s, 90s etc.

Yes there may be a spike in certain crimes and of course there are changes in what crime there is.

All I am suggesting is that there used to be much more respect for authority figures and the elderly. Yes when I was a kid we would do naughty things, yes others would go past the line. But there would be politeness. The old man moaning about us making too much noise or playing near his house. But we would be polite and respectful then of course once he went back into his house or we moved on we would be talking about the grumpy old man.

What I am trying to say is that there is more of an "anti-authority" stance these days where the grumpy old man would not be respected or polite conversation but more likely told to f*** o**.

It isn't so much about age groups or kids being kids. My generation and before do tend to respect figures of authority. Yes we can complain about how things are handled but ultimately we do respect the police. We did when we were kids.

When you see the police have to turn up every time in force with numbers just to apprehend someone, for shoplifting or any other crime, then loads of young lads that have nothing to do with it from the area turn it into a mini riot (every time) it is more a case of "who cares what the crime is, he's one of ours and you are the enemy."

I never saw much of this when I was young. I would suggest generations before me saw even less of it. Yes it probably still happened but it wasn't every single time.

It is also telling that parents and friends don't behave like this. If it's their child they aren't the ones trying to batter the police.

I'm talking about young adults in the main here not kids. 16-30 sort of age. However what young kids see they emulate and there are often very young kids repeating what they hear the young adults saying and thus that vibe continues.

I'm not sure how you thought it was me being a grumpy old man speaking like grumpy old men before me. I was a kid in the 80s, a youth in the 90s. Things were really tight back then and the world was much more grim and grey. There was a lot more respect for authority back then though. Much more crime as well.

The oxymoron with all this is that in the 80s/90s I wouldn't have felt safe walking around the council estates whereas I do now, because there is so much less crime. If I had a policeman's uniform on though I wouldn't.

 

My point was specifically about non-white communities and I certainly wasn't wanting to blur or complicate it with the general relationship between the police and the white working (or non-working) class community. That would open up a whole lot of other complex issues

This is about historical discriminatory treatment by the police

 

I think I would Add to Imps point too.......... There was more respect for authority and the elderly going back a while. Sadly the media over the years has highlighted what was isolated incidents and through that comes the copycat individual.
Lets also not forget that individuals caught when they were young feel that they were let down by the system and educate their offspring to not trust people. The more that are caught the more this happens. They tend to blame everyone else rather than themselves. Not all it is true........
Until more is done in the education system to thwart this the more it will increase.
Certainly as it seems a lot of people leave it to the schools to not only educate but also to teach some discipline. Again I say not all but a lot........

 

Here, here. Always thought this should be an open vote. Not sure that would have actually helped but certainly the idea that all politicians should be doing their best for the country is a base line.

 

I understand that. But the reality is that I think the problem we have nowadays is much more of a class thing that is trying to be utillised by ethnic minorities to continue that argument. I think most of the argument is about "class" and of being "non white" you are much more likely to be in that "lower class" living, socialising etc.

I find it very hard to believe that there is the institutional racism within the police that some activists try to insist there is. Of course there will be some racism. Will be hard ever to eradicate all forms of discrimination because there will always be nasty people out there.

 

This is crazy. I know all sides have their crackpots but this one is pretty bad: