Off Topic Politics Thread

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They are viewed differently because they are irrelevant. They don't participate in politics in any meaningful way, unless yelling at liberals on Bluesky to kill themselves counts (it doesn't). They pose no threat because their beliefs are as deep as the thread on the hammer-and-sickle patch sown to their backpack, but also serve no useful purpose in the body politic, and thus should be accorded no more attention than an eyeroll.
 
Stalin killed more people than Hitler because Stalin won. It isn’t remotely complicated or remotely about right or left. The dictator called Stalin beat the dictator called Hitler, giving him a lot more time to murder people who he saw as a threat. If Hitler had won he would have killed more people than Stalin - because Stalin would have been dead.

Some of the points people try to make on here are just baffling.
 
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Schad said:
He didn't try to manipulate the results of a close election. He tried to overturn the results, first via fraud, and when that failed, by violence.

And I can't say that I know the mind of Trump, either. But I can say that it's really telling that so many people who worked closely with him have been sounding the alarm that, yes, he really wants to do these things, and will try to do these things.

Mark Esper is a Republican. Trump picked him to be Secretary of Defense, he served in that capacity until after the election, when Trump fired him because Esper pushed back on Trump's suggestion that they invoke the Insurrection Act. Here is his opinion of Trump:

https://thehill.com/homenews/campai...reat-to-democracy-on-capitol-riot-anniversary



Here is Esper's predecessor as Secretary of Defense, James Mattis, also Republican, also picked by Trump:




And here's the letter that ten former SecDefs, most of them Republican (including Dick Cheney!), wrote after the 2020 election, when it became evident that Trump wanted to use the military to overturn the results:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...23d52e-4c4d-11eb-a9f4-0e668b9772ba_story.html




So, yes. I am inclined to believe them. Whether he will succeed is unknown. Whether he will try his damnest seems really evident.
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Hahahahaha you genuinely believe this don’t you?
 
......loading...... said:
Stalin killed more people than Hitler because Stalin won. It isn’t remotely complicated or remotely about right or left. The dictator called Stalin beat the dictator called Hitler, giving him a lot more time to murder people who he saw as a threat. If Hitler had won he would have killed more people than Stalin - because Stalin would have been dead.

Some of the points people try to make on here are just baffling.
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Not just Stalin.

if you actually study history instead of getting your entire world view from left wing sources, the atrocities committed by left wing goverments globally far, far outweighs those of right wing governments. It’s really not even close. We are talking hundreds of millions of deaths and genocides all in the name of “the greater good”.
 
Osvaldorama said:
Hahahahaha you genuinely believe this don’t you?
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Only a fool blinded by the alt right wouldn't. The facts are there stacked up in front of you showing the lying arsehole to be the misogynistic pussy grabbing convicted fraudster and felon with outstanding charges to be answered that he is. But no, you and the crackpot conspiraloons who don't know **** from sugar crack on regardless. Your posts are of comedic value only, not a shred of truth or a verifiable source to be seen.
 
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Osvaldorama said:
Not just Stalin.

if you actually study history instead of getting your entire world view from left wing sources, the atrocities committed by left wing goverments globally far, far outweighs those of right wing governments. It’s really not even close. We are talking hundreds of millions of deaths and genocides all in the name of “the greater good”.
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Do you have any figures for this, and a source?
 
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Farage putting it out there that he would lead a merged conservative/reform party, that is “centre right”. Not sure either party is close to being centre right tbh.

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Osvaldorama said:
Not just Stalin.

if you actually study history instead of getting your entire world view from left wing sources, the atrocities committed by left wing goverments globally far, far outweighs those of right wing governments. It’s really not even close. We are talking hundreds of millions of deaths and genocides all in the name of “the greater good”.
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Go on then. Show your workings. Where is the tally chart? Factor into this, of course, that there really is no such thing as left wing before 1900 and that the barbarism of all human history before that must be declared right wing. Factor in genocides in Africa and Eastern Europe.

Mao may give you a slight lead here, but these are not the crimes of the left or right, but of dictators. You also need to stop doing the ‘you would know better if you read a book’ act, too.
 
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thereisonlyoneno7 said:
Complacent liberals are to blame for rise of right
Denouncing as bigots anyone concerned about mass immigration has fuelled this populist surge
Melanie PhillipsMonday June 10 2024, 9.00pm,
In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally won about 32 per cent of the vote, more than double the 15 per cent of President Macron’s coalition. In Germany, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) won 16 per cent, coming second in the popular vote despite a string of scandals. In Italy, Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy also soared, winning about 28 per cent ahead of centre-left parties. In Spain, Belgium and Austria, populists also gained. And the Greens took a hammering.

The shock is because these are all said to be parties of the “right”, “far right” or “hard right”; choose your epithet. And as all right-thinking (ie left-wing or liberal) folk know, the “right” are always wrong.

But what is the “right”? While the left is an identifiable thing supporting big government, universalist ideologies and disdain for the nation, the “right” supposedly includes conservatives and free-market liberals; “centrist dads” such as David Cameron and populist disrupters like Nigel Farage; born-again Europhiles like Meloni and risen-from-the-dead neo-Nazis such as the AfD. They are divided over social and economic matters, European enlargement, China, relations between the EU and the US and, most important, Russia and Ukraine.

The term “right-wing” is used chiefly as an insult for anyone who stands against the groupthink of received liberal opinion. I myself have skin in this particular game. When I successively opposed progressive education, defended the traditional family, sounded the alarm over multiculturalism and Islamisation and defended Israel against demonisation and delegitimisation, I became in short order “right-wing”, “very right-wing”,“hard-right”, “racist”, “Islamophobic”, and then a “hard-right, racist, Islamophobic Zionist Jew”. It was enough to turn a girl’s head.

The attitude was that anyone who defied the liberal consensus on anything wasn’t just wrong but positively evil and beyond the pale. Now, however, millions of Europeans have voted for “hard-right populists”. So are all these millions also beyond the pale? Yes, say the liberals, and the reason is that evil right-wing people have manipulated them because the public are credulous and stupid. Apparently. One is reminded of the line in Bertolt Brecht’s satirical poem about the East German uprising of 1953 that the government should “dissolve the people and elect another”. It never occurs to the liberal establishment that the problem might be them.

What the “populists” have in common, and what is bringing them to power, is that they represent a revolt against a homogeneous political establishment that ignores, scorns or punishes eminently reasonable, and indeed necessary, concerns. This establishment has turned immigration and the related issue of Islamisation into a taboo. Anyone who opposes mass, uncontrolled immigration and the rapid growth of a minority of which a significant proportion want to Islamise western society is anathematised as a racist or Islamophobe.

Yet it’s reasonable to cherish a culture that you recognise as home, that upholds values you hold dear and that you share with others. It’s reasonable to want this not to be taken away by politicians who have never asked if you wanted your culture and nation to be transformed. It’s reasonable to want your borders to be controlled and the rates of mass and uncontrolled immigration to be scaled back. It’s reasonable to object to being denounced as a bigot or Islamophobe if you want any of these things. The liberal establishment, however, refuses to attend to these concerns and instead terms them unreasonable and “deplorable”. That’s what has fuelled this “populist” surge.

Liberal society has created a vacuum in which has arisen an anti-establishment insurgency with a range of political parties. Some of these are quite reasonable; others are a potential menace. The liberal establishment is responsible for them all. This insurgency is, of course, precisely what Farage represents. It is precisely what Brexit was all about.

Those who provoked this insurgency possess zero humility and maximum arrogance. They professed shock and disdain over Brexit, over Farage’s return to the political front line and now over the European election results. But this is all their own doing.

The EU parliamentary elections won’t themselves change much. The EU is anything but democratic, and the nomenklatura of the European Commission and European Central Bank will continue to call the shots. But what the results illuminate is the fracture between leaders and led. The implications of this go well beyond the EU as an institution. Panicked by Le Pen’s advance, Macron has called a snap electionto call her bluff. Maybe his ploy will work. Equally, maybe France will soon have a “populist” prime minister.

Ultimately, this insurgency will threaten to transform other national governments too. The liberal nose-holding classes have only themselves to blame.
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Thanks? I think you said this was 'balanced', it really isn't. I think loading's response is very good
This doesn't acknowledge the Tories pandering to populism (e.g. 'stop the boats') or their major part in encouraging Farage to come back

However, we have needed a grown-up debate about managing immigration for a long time
It should clearly benefit the country AND respond to legitimate human rights issues
I think what the left have struggled to do is manage this balance and this is partly because of the media love of populist headlines (e.g. 'STOP THE BOATS!!!')

It is now also incredibly difficult given the level of conflict and people who are becoming stateless
This requires a pan-european discussion and acknowledgement that the numbers we deal with are far smaller than some other countries
It should be noted that most refugees end up in neighbouring countries and that's never us
 
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StJabbo1 said:
Only a fool blinded by the alt right wouldn't. The facts are there stacked up in front of you showing the lying arsehole to be the misogynistic pussy grabbing convicted fraudster and felon with outstanding charges to be answered that he is. But no, you and the crackpot conspiraloons who don't know **** from sugar crack on regardless. Your posts are of comedic value only, not a shred of truth or a verifiable source to be seen.
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Come on Jabbo, say what you really mean, don't sit on the fence <laugh>
 
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StJabbo1 said:
Only a fool blinded by the alt right wouldn't. The facts are there stacked up in front of you showing the lying arsehole to be the misogynistic pussy grabbing convicted fraudster and felon with outstanding charges to be answered that he is. But no, you and the crackpot conspiraloons who don't know **** from sugar crack on regardless. Your posts are of comedic value only, not a shred of truth or a verifiable source to be seen.
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Not sure there’s any need for that.

I think your opinions are ridiculous too, but I’m not rude to you
 
Osvaldorama said:
Not sure there’s any need for that.

I think your opinions are ridiculous too, but I’m not rude to you
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Yes you are rude to me and anyone else who has the temerity to disagree with and challenge your outlandish posts. You denigrate with your snide remarks along with attacks on intellectual capabilities whilst trumpeting your own.
 
tomw24 said:
But you are completely dismissive of other people's opinions and a lot of your replies are condescending. So really, you're not in a strong position to say "Not sure there’s any need for that".
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Yeah fair. Can’t expect low IQ people like Jabbo to have high IQ conversations. I understand
 
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Osvaldorama said:
Yeah fair. Can’t expect low IQ people like Jabbo to have high IQ conversations. I understand
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You’re pushing your luck now. I know you would jump up and down with glee if you were banned from this thread but that doesn’t mean it can’t happen if you insult people.
 
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