Comments by "Nigel Johnson" (@nigeljohnson9820) on "euronews" channel.

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  170. I see no reason to condemn Boris's comments. He is just stating the obvious, there is a geometric similarity with a letter box, The way these women move gliding apparently legless across the high street, I think they look like Daleks. Had he been arguing the case for banning the burka on the grounds that it covers the face and therefore represents a security risk, no one would have been able to object, as a number of EU states have already taken this measure. One might suspect that there maybe an ulterior motive in the burka bans across Europe, is the create a hostile environment for the most Zenith Muslims. In this respect the burka ban is very clever, in that by inclusion of all face coverings, such crash helmets, it makes objection to the law very difficult. I think it is a matter of freedom of speech that strange clothes worn in public should be open to comment. There would not have been any reaction if he had written about Goth or Punk clothing with their associated metal piercings. In the west, the burka is not only seen as an example of religious affectation but also as a political uniform, and as such is seen by some as threating as the leather jackets uniforms warn by the teenage motorbike rockers of the 1960s. It is worth note that the article written by Boris Johnson made a point of not calling for a ban on the burka, as this was against the British principle of freedom of expression and religion. A philosophy of life and let live. Should the same freedom not also apply to speech, when presented with outlandish garb on British streets. When the mini skirt appeared, were the general population forbidden to comment, less it offended the women involved?
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  316.  @biocapsule7311  your post shows that you have completely misunderstood Brexit. It is the EU that operates as a microcosm of globalisation, by extending its supply chains across Europe. Shop it the UK and you will find fruit and vegetables supplied from across the EU member states, despite the same being grown locally. The EU binds the member states together with these trading dependences. It is not surprising that it does so, since that was the intention at its inception, using coal and steal. The idea being that states that are co-dependent cannot wage war on each other. A direct attempt to shackle Germany from further war mongering following WWII. Now the same policy is used as a political policy to make leaving the EU increasingly difficult over time, as co-dependence risks the breaking if industrial supply chains. That is why product components criss-cross the EU repeatedly before being assembled and supplied to the final customer, resulting in environmental damage. Just as with globalisation, the wealth differentials across the EU are used to manufacture cheaply in poor regions and supply to the wealthy regions. A process that levels down to the lowest common denominator, with most of the profits being siphoned off by the trade facilitators of big business and the investment banks. Brexit will allow the UK to become far more self sufficient, by necessity cutting these supply chains. The greater the tariffs the EU applies on the UK, the more effective it will be. As for Brexit being an attempt to regain past glories, you could not be further from the truth. This argument could be better aimed at the French who have retained their grip on their colonies and are busy engineering the EU to act as a proxy French Empire. It is the French who want the EU to have an army to protect French interests in Africa. It is the French who plan to supply the weapons to the EU military and who expect to lead it. It is the EU that is empire building, blackmailing smaller states such as Switzerland. Like some Ponzi scheme, it is also recruiting new member states? Unfortunately for the older richer states, the new members are not of the quality of the originals and are likely to be net acceptors from the EU budget. They will also increase the wealth differentials in the EU. Good for big business, not so good for the older states who are likely to see their manufactures migrate to the new poorer regions. The Eurocrats like to perpetuate the myth that what is good for one member state is good for all, this is simply not the case. Federalist soon will not remove the wealth differentials, it will just make it more difficult for member states to do anything about it. It is going to be painful for the UK to adjust to being outside the EU, but in the medium to long term it will be a lot healthier to be free of the grip of the EU parasite. Such is the risk of UK collapse post Brexit, that the EU are panicking in its attempt to establish a "level trading playing field" with the UK. Level playing field being a euphemism for continuing to bind the UK to the EU to stop it competing with it, as it might as a truly independent state.
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  362. Nationalism is a response to globalisation. There is a global elite that make their money by exploiting the wealth differences across the world. It is not in their interest for nations to be self sufficient, they need trade spread across the world to make them rich. The supporters of globalisation do not understand the damage it is doing to the planets environment. It accelerates the consumption of the world's natural resources and does further damage transporting the processed resources across the world. The accelerated growth may feel like progress, but it means we are living on borrowed time, not giving the planet's environment time to recover and adapt. The web of co-dependence across the world that globalisation creates reduces the resilience of the human population, concentrating production of particular products in small regions of the world in specialist centres. This makes the whole world vulnerable to localised natural disasters. The world was a much safer place when nation states were in control and were largely self sufficient. It ensured that their populations had sufficient work and had a wide range of skills. Now the global economy is dominated by multinational corporations, driven by unfettered capitalism. This is creating a global ultra rich elite few, where most of the world's wealth is concentrated. The supports of globalisation point to the accelerating progress that it has brought, failing to realise that it is like an engine running without a speed regulator, it is accelerating towards its own thermal destruction, running too fast to be lubricated, it will eventually cease or simply stop, when the resources are gone. The system of nation states may result in slower growth, but it is more sustainable and resilient.
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  390. The europian court of human rights will now be complicit in any further deaths in the English channel. What exactly does the court not understand about the word illigal when used to describe migrants entering the UK iligally. The UK government must have the means to deter economic migrants from entering its border without authority. Current levels of migration are unsustainable, amounting to the population of a small city each year. UK resources are finite, and illigal migrants are taking away resources that could be used to support those migrants that enter legally. The UK must have the right to decide who is allowed into the country, excluding undesirables, such as criminals. So far every attempt made by the UK government to make the UK a less attractive destination for illigal migrants has been thwarted by legal challenges. Challenges which are made by people who do not have to pay for the consequences. It should be noted that these economic migrants are coming from a safe country, but have decided that they have a better chance of exploiting the social benefits on offer in the UK. By entering the UK iligally they have already committed a crime on entry, this alone should be sufficient to ban them forever from applying for UK citizenship. The UK government has done its best to provide a humane way to make the him a less attractive destination for economic migrants. In every case so far the measures have been subject to legal challenge. Maybe the UK should simply not provide any support for those entering the country illegally, and make the offence the subject of long term imprisonment, with release dependent on successful deportation, with no possibility of gaining UK citizen ship.
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  403.  @TooleysTakes  I think you are conflating more than two points. It is unrealistic for average people with work interests outside EU politics to understand the details, but that applies to populism and democracy. I qm not going to comment on Nigel Farage knowledge or lack there of. There is an imbalance between how easily the UK joined the common market and was sucked into he EU and the difficulty it is having in leaving. Many of the instructions you mention post date the common market that the UK joined and have been created in the era of the EU. In some ways the electorate(s) in the UK and across Europe have acted as absent landlord, allowing the politicians with vested interests to play. Populism is a sign that they are waking up and taking notice of what the eurocrats and politicians have been doing in their absence and they don't like what they see. They may not understand the detail, but they understand the principles and they want change. It should be noted that in the UK, brexit was the first chance since joining the common market the public have had the option to express an opinion on the direction the EU was taking the UK. No matter which side of the brexit debate you sit, it cannot be denied that the referendum was a large scale display of democracy in action. In the referendum every one of voting age had a chance to vote. Every vote counted equally on a single issue question. No matter the complications in implementing the result, the question was simple; remain or leave the EU. Article 50 provided a similar unambiguous option. The UK voted to leave the EU, applying the principle that It was a free independent sovereign country before it joined, it was reasonable expect to return to that state, everything else is noise. The UK public were ask to give a directive to government, they did and they expect it to be carried out, if there are complications, they are of the politicians making. The politicians have exceeded their authority and mandate and have just been found out.
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  490. If Tump has one good idea, it is the identification of globalisation as a problem. The way globalisation works is to allow goods to be made in low wage, low cost, low regulation economies and exported to the historically rich but decadent West. It is argued that this boosts the wealth of poorer economies, in practice it is the super rich few who facilitate the trade who take the lion share of the profits. It is no consolation to US workers that their exported jobs are taking Chinese or even Mexican peasants out of poverty and making them into a new middle class. The US has delegated its manufacturing offshore to such low wage economies in exchange for cheap imported products. This has decimated it's industries and atrophied it's technology. The effect is that the US is exporting the wealth it built up in the twentieth century to the point it is now in a exponential debt spiral. This rapidly converts the mantra of "we do not want to do that" to "we can't do that" as it loses the skills and technological advantage it once had. Nations do need tariff or standard barriers to protect their internal markets and their manufacturing base. This protects jobs. The danger is that tariff barriers protect local inefficient and outdated manufacturing, discouraging the investment needed to make its productive competitive on the world markets. Trump's error is to apply tariffs to a few selected older industries, because they employ his supporters. The US needs a strategy to use tariffs and higher standards to protect all it's industries. No country should export its means of production, only the products it makes. This philosophy urgently needs to be applied to the UK economy, but it will be resisted by the super rich who are using globalisation as a means to increase the wealth gap between the super rich global elite and the rest of the world's population. This exploitation is not only making the majority poorer, moving them to the lowest common denominator, but it is also what is destroying the earth's environment. So Trump may be right for once, but I doubt if he understands why.
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  634. China is attempting to trigger a reaction, so it has an excuse for invasion. Its likely China will invade Taiwan in the next few months. Taiwan needs a powerful deterrent if this invasion is to be avoided. China has been emboldened by the lack of international reaction to the oppression of Hong Kong. In the case of Hong Kong, the legal basis for international condemnation was relatively weak, this is not the case for Taiwan. The question is how much damage is China willing to inflect on Taiwan to gain control? The damage to China's international reputation could be considerable if it takes military action. The Chinese are banking on the US being unwilling to risk conflict over Taiwan. However, an attack on Taiwan would show the real face of China to the rest of the world, resulting to a severe long term political and financial reaction, turning China into a pariah state, reminiscent to that of the Nazis. Is China willing to risk a conflict similar to that in Syria, with Taiwan reduced to smouldering ashes and rubble? So what will China do next? Maybe a blockade, more likely a private blackmailing threat of the use of overwhelming military force if the Taiwanese government refuses to accept Chinese rule. Faced with the threat of obliteration, will Taiwan decide to fight or surrender. No doubt the Chinese government will be hoping for a nice quiet, no fuss, takeover. The world stood by and did nothing when China annexed Tibet. At what point will Chinese aggression trigger a global reaction? It is said that all it takes for evil to prosper, is for a few good men to do nothing.
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  693. Microsoft supports engineered in equipment obsolescence, making fully functional computer hardware obsolete in a marketing department bid to increase profits. Microsoft has consistently failed to address the fundamental security flaws in their operating systems. Why fix the bugs in the old software, when it is so easy to simply issue a new version with a completely new set of bugs.. Microsoft boasts about its intention to reach net zero carbon emissions, while failing to acknowledge the mountain of electronics waste generated by the release of each new version of its operating system. It has the unique ability to render its old software, and the computers on which it runs, obsolete, with new software that has functionality that is essentially the same as that which the customer has already purchased. Not only are personally computers rendered obsolete by this marketing strategy, but so is much of the peripheral computer hardware, which suddenly lacks the necessary software driver compatible support. Is it any wonder that users have become so reluctant to follow the upgrade path Microsoft would like them to follow. Forced into expensive hardware upgrades, simply to maintain access to the computer functionality afforded by the last iteration of the OS. One might conclude that real hardware security improvements are hampered by the requirement of Microsoft to maintain unfettered access to the customers data, software applications. The Microsoft marketing model has evolved from selling products to providing services, in an attempt to create a permanent revenue stream. In general the price users pay for keeping up with the latest software iterations, is accepting the increasing erosion of their privacy and providing access to invasive advertising. No days, when it comes to software upgrades, it can be said "the improvement is no better". What can be guaranteed is ever more bloat ware, demanding ever faster processors, more volatile memory and huge increases in storage memory.
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  771.  @myail2026  it is not just the eu that needs to stand up to China, it is the rest of the world. I often accuse the EU of empire building, but in China's case it is overt and dependent on the iniquities of globalisation. What is disturbing is the Chinese attitude to the environment and life on the planet. It appears that in the view of the Chinese government all the world's resources are their to serve the Chinese communist party and its goal of world domination. China is dangerous on so many levels, it is a nuclear power well prepared to use its weapons to get that it fails to achieve via other means. For all its scientific development, its government allowed its people to cling onto primitive beliefs, such as traditional medicine, which irrationally demands the use of the body parts of endangered species. A classic example is that of rhino horn, which is believed to be an aphrodisiac, the justification for which is simply based in phallic symbolism. Ironic, given the size of the Chinese population. China refuses to stop the trade in ivory. This vile trade kills beautiful endangered animals, to turn their body parts into useless dust Gathering ornaments which could be just as easily be produced as plastic mouldings. In the quest of industrial domination, China has shown a willingness to destroy its own environment, driving many of its own animal species to the brink of extinction and beyond in the case for example of the river dolphin. It uses its military power to aid its fishermen to fish in the protected waters of less powerful countries. It is building artificial Islands to claim territory in the south China sea. Islands that it has militarised, so that it can extend its control of the international shipping lanes in the area. The world has turned a blind eye to this Chinese expansion because most western countries have abdicated responsibility for the manufacture of the products their consumers demand, preferring to delegate the task to the Chinese. This is a serious error, since it has deindustrialised and deskilled western economies, making them dependent on Chinese exports. It is one of the reasons why so much of the west is in debt and is forced to print money. If the western nations fail to recognise the danger of feeding the oriental beast, they will soon find that the attentive servant has become the demanding master. This will be a disaster for the global environment which will be consumed by Chinese greed. Perhaps the country will suffocate on its own filthy air pollution, but this is unlikely to happen before its contribution to global warming has brought the planet to the brink of destruction and precipitated a mass Extinction event.
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  855.  @gertscheper9653  so it is possible for farmers in the UK to use new technology to make the UK far more self sufficient in food supplies, including this items we have in the past imported from the EU. What is more the effects of climate change, may make the EU far less productive in the near future. Now to address some questions: I am not a farmer, I am a retired electronics designer. However, my farther was supplied by the local farmers, and my grandfather was a farmer. I live in the heart of the English Fans, and have had a chance to watch the damage EU membership has done to Finland agricultural, with the loss of productive farmland to a combination of EU regulations and unfair competition from the EU. The fans were once described as the breadbasket of the UK. Supplying fruit and vegetables across the UK. Successive europhile UK government's sold out the farmers allowing property developed to buy up and build on productive farmland, producing poor quality, non productive housing, that now increases the risk of flooding in the region and destroyed the local environment and wildlife. The CAP proved a disaster for the UK, topped off by regulations that destroyed fruit and sugar beet production. EU regulations on live animal exports were cruel. I am glad to see the back of EU interference in UK farming, but it will take decades to repair the damage EU membership has done. I hope the UK puts up trade barriers to EU farm imports. If tariffs are restricted, there are ample ways for the UK to build hidden trade barriers, on such things as animal welfare, chemical use, and disease control. Brexit was not an end in itself, but a means to an end, but it requires a government that understands what is required and how to implement it. Unfortunately, we still have vested self interest groups, who did very nicely out of UK membership of the EU, and do not care the damage it has done to the country. Cheap low wage Labour from the EU was never an answer, particularly when the produce was destined for UK supermarkets. This just exports money offshore into the EU economy. The same was true of selling UK assets to foreign investors. The clue is in the name, an investor expects to take out far more than they put in. At least today, the government has gone a little way to closing that loophole, allowing it to veto takeovers that are not in the national interest, both economic and military. It is only a small step, as vested interests will still try and stop the UK government from using the new law. A law that could not be implemented while the UK was an eu member. Being the lowest bidder is no longer a guarantee of getting the contract, if it is in conflict with the national interest, taking into consideration of the wider impact on the economy.
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  881. France is making a bid to be the titular leader of the EU and further its federal super state wnbitions, thanks to its nuclear weapons. Unfortunately it is a paper tiger that would be no match against a determined Russia attack. The only reason NATO worked for so long was because of the US overwhelming military superiority and it willingness to fight a limited nuclear war with Russia on the soil of Europe, notably in Germany. There was a long held NATO plan to stop a mass russian tank advance with tactical nuclear weapons. While the Russian might believe that European states would be reluctant to turn their own soil to nuclear ash, they could not be as sure about the Americans. French nuclear weapons are for the defence of France, not other EU member states, as would become quickly apparent if ever the EU was challenged by one of the other big power blocks, most likely Russia of China. Trump is the main reason NATO is being derided in Europe. The view is that the US can no longer be trusted to defend its NATO allies. ( Bit like France in that respect). This is only partly true, as the selfish reasons why the US supported NATO have not gone away. France is exploiting the doubts about NATO to advance its own agenda for a EU military force, inevitable commanded by France. This would greatly increase the status of France within the EU. This forms part of Macron's imperial ambitions. Also, the French military industrial complex is no doubt hoping to make money supplying arms to the other member states as they become part of the EU military defence force. One of the reasons France might veto any further Brexit extensions is to avoid the UK returning as a full member of the EU, as this would mean that France would again no longer be the only nuclear armed EU member state. A further reason the French want a EU military is to fight police actions in Africa. They would like to use such a force to defend French interests on that continent. Given the above is it any wonder that Germany and US do not support Macron's views. Both have a lot to lose if Macron's view of NATO gains traction with the other EU member state.
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  905.  @mrgrizzlyrides  UK professional management does seem to have a propensity for filling their pockets at the expense of the companies for which they work. The exception tends to be the small and medium family run business, who do all they can to keep the company running and serve their customers, while fighting the UK banks for working capital to invest in the business. It is the myopic short term management of the larger companies who fail to invest. They are notorious for failing to invest in their people and equipment for the future, preferring to make the company attractive for a sell off, and a big golden handshakes for their efforts. They often raid the company pension fund to provide the cash for their leaving bonus. Some just award themselves huge salaries, and drive the company into liquidation, leaving the state to pick up the tab. Providing the workers with a fraction of the redundancy money they are due. This has become the standard Modus operandi for UK CEOs. Having destroyed their company, they then retire to some tax haven or move on to do the same to yet another company. If challenged in the UK courts, a very infrequent event, they claim the failure was nothing to do with them. If convicted, they plead poverty, with all their ill-gotten gains safely salted away in some tax haven numbered bank account. What is particularly irritating is that the UK banks are often complicit in this destructive legalised industrial vandalism and theft. The UK LAW MUST CHANGE to hold them to account, with long prison sentences and confiscation of assets to act as a deterrent to such behaviour.
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  955.  @donquixote5912  I think you have mistaken culture differences for a superiority complex. We have similar feeling about the French and the Germans. Both seem to want to tell us what to do and what is in our best interests. The French give advice whether we like it or not and have not asked for it. The Germans simply issue orders and expect compliance. Both result in the UK population responding with belligerent resistance. To use the common vernacular, we dig in our heels and say No, but maybe in a less polite manner than I wish to post. We resent being told we got it wrong. It is not the intended people who have made mistakes, it is successive UK governments. Before you say the UK people voted for them, it is important to understand that in most cases the UK people are presented with a Hobson's choice, between two parties that really only represent the vested self interests of themselves and an elite few. One of the reasons for brexit is the wish to throw a spanner into to the plans of the elite, mainly in the UK, but also in the EU. We do not really distinguish between the elite who control the EU and our local corrupt government and with good reason. Those who control the EU are the same kind of animal, but on steroids. We know the UK is undemocratic, the house of lords is a feudal joke, but at least there are elections which exercise some control over our politicians. Similar levels of control are completely missing from the EU, partly because of the dilution that results from the size of the electorate. Better to have a limited voice in a population of 66 million, than a even smaller voice in a population of 502 million. Such a dilution is bad, but the EU is run like a fascist plutocracy, cloaking itsself in benign socialism. The government does not listen it dictates. In a "we know best fashion". Like all incompetent corrupt governments, it clearly does not know best and covers it's mistakes with obfuscation, denial and propaganda. The conclusion is: the EU IS ARROGANT.
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  994. The greatest contribution to mobile device waste is the design feature of a sealed for life battery. The relatively small service life of the battery effectively defines the life of the product, consigning not only the battery to the rubbish heap, but also the entire product, including its expensive and complex electronics. To claim that is ok because the product will be recycled to extract the raw material it contains, is a smoke screen, as only a small fraction of these raw materials will be successfully recovered, and this takes no account of the energy and polution generated by the process. Battery life is being used to design in obsolescence, so that the manufactures can churn the product and sell more devices. Any argument that this will stifle innovation are felonious. The technological development of mobile technology has reached a plateau, with manufactures trying to justify the purchase of the latest model with ever small incremental improvements. If anything is stifling innovation, it is the drain on the consumers financial resources, which force them to repurchase device functionality they already own in order to keep pace with designed in product obsolescence. In other words, consumers cannot afforded to invest in real new technology devices, offering new functionality, because they must spend their money replacing working electronics that has been made artificially faulty, either by a sealed for life battery failure, or some software upgrade incompatibility. The cost to the economy must be huge, given that these devices are made and imported from the far East, and the electronic waste is exported for "recycling".
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  1054. Migration will continue while the UK remains attractive. The effects of civic-19 and brexit will be to produce a short term severe down turn in the economy. While the UK economy is being rebalanced, unemployment is going to be very high, with insufficient jobs for the indigenous population, so illegal migrants will find it near impossible to obtain legal gainful employment. It could be argued that those who arrived here unlawfully have already shown disrespect for UK laws and may be prepared to continue to do so. If migrant numbers are to be reduced, those who arrived illegally should be deported at the earliest possible moment, and should receive none of the benefits give to residents and those who arrive lawfully. Those crossing the channel in small boats are not refugees, they are economic migrants, who must view the UK as a better option than any of the other safe countries they crossed to get here. Rumours that the streets of the UK are paved with gold have never been true, but during an economic depression we will be lucky if the streets remain paved with anything other than pot holes. The government must stop an industry developing to support illigal migrants, that includes property developers and landlords who profiteer from local councils by providing accommodation for migrants. Arriving in the UK unlawfully should be an immediate bar to ever gaining UK citizenship. Though out the above, I have been at pains to make a distinction between those who are legal migrants and refugees. and those who arrive unlawfully. Migrants forcing there way into the UK from the EU cannot be described as refugees or desperate people, nor are they victims, they are making a choice to leave a safe country to come to the UK without permission to enter, that makes them criminals, and they should be treated as such.
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  1077. Kaiser Fuher you are correct, the more the EU ignores the objections of the citizens the more likely they will turn to the extreme nationalist. I can argue than there is a form of benign nationalism, where nation states return to their roots in terms of trading relationships. Many of the problems of the world can be traced to globalisation, which is being advanced because it makes a few very very rich and powerful, but is a disaster for the majority of people. If you want stable and prosperous societies it is necessary for states to be as self sufficient as possible, making and growing most of what they need and only trading for that which geography and climate has denied them. This is the only way to ensure full and productive employment of their population. Globalisation centralises production in low wage economies were environmental protection is a minimum. It then exports the products made to the historical wealthy but indolent rich states. The result the rich get poorer and fall into a debt spiral, the poor get slightly richer and the facilitators cream off the wealth of the transaction and become the super rich. The planet's environment is destroyed in the process. Like a fractal structure, the internals of the EU mirror globalisation in microcosm. Only independent nation states can halt this move to damaging globalisation. From a philosophical point of view, the concentration of production in only a few places is a bad idea, because it makes the global environment less resilient to external shocks. It also stifles innovation as few nations are working in parallel on the same technical problems.
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  1170. Putin has now engineered a way to instigate an aggressive war. By recognising the independence of the Donbass separatists regions, he can pour his forces into these regions, under the pretence of a police action. Continued attacks by the Ukraine military on these regions will provide the justification for an all out invasion of the rest of the Ukraine. Effectively the separatist paramilitaries will be able to continue to attack the Ukraine military, while under the protection of Russian military forces. At worst Putin will have secured yet another piece of Ukrainian territory to add to that of the Crimea. At best he will invade the whole of Ukraine, while arguing that he was provoked. Putin may have miscalculated, as not only will Russia suffer crippling western sanctions, he will have shown himself to be a liar to the Chinese. It is impossible to threaten a nuclear power with nuclear weapons, that way is the path to mutual assured destruction, however even a major nuclear power is vulnerable to asymmetrical warfare. If the Ukraine is invaded and the people decide to resist, Putin may find his gains to be far smaller than his losses. His strategy has already invigorated an aging NATO, and sparked a new cold war. He may also have lost his gas market in the West, allowing the east to drive a much harder bargain for the supply of Russian gas. Putin's goal is clearly to rebuild the Russian empire, the former USSR. He said as much in his television address. No one in Russia can now be in any doubt that Putin has taken the position of Russian tsar. The televised meeting of his senior officials, showed them to be nothing more than yes men to The absolute power of the tsar, a true dictator, who is following that path last taken by Hitler.
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  1238. stoufer2000 it is not really surprising, the EU has sucked the UK economy dry. The UK is effectively bankrupt. It should have been in receipt of money from the EU budget from day one, but it suited both the UK government of the time and the EU to perpetuate the delusion that the UK economy was healthy. It was not healthy when we joined because, unlike Germany, the UK was paying off the cost of WWII. When we joined the UK had assets, these have been sold over the years to fund our EU membership. Now the only this can continue is by borrowing and increasing UK debt. The remain camp has consistently failed to grasp this fact, expecting our continued membership to be the same as it always was. In practice the UK has no choice to leave, as it cannot afford to remain. Outside the EU it standards a chance of recovery, but only if the UK government makes the right choices. Foreign oners of UK assets such as utilities and critical infrastructure may find the good times are over, since it is vital the UK stops leaking money overseas. The UK must become more self sufficient. That means EU imports must be reduced. Tariffs and internal standards will be required to protect the home market while UK industry has a chance to recover. The UK is far too dependent on financial services and banking, hopefully the EU will solve this problem by attempting to steal this poisoned chalice. With luck they will do as much damage to our competitors economies as they have done to ours. The UK should certainly nolonger attempt to act like the world's policeman. For years now it has been involved in expensive overseas military adventures. Following the reverse of the Roosevelt advice by carrying an increasingly small stick and speaking very loudly. The UK needs time to rebuild it's military capabilities. There is a lesson to be learned from the nation's defeated in the last world war. They made money from not being allowed to have a military and not getting involved in costly conflicts, a lesson the EU seems to have recently forgotten. The important thing is for the UK to become profitable again and this will take time. But it will only happen if government makes the right decisions and the agenda of vested interests is resisted. The above should put pay to the myth that brexit was about Britain reliving past glories, in fact it is about survival.
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  1244.  @popelgruner595  no ,but I cannot say the same for Macron. Have you not been watching him. France cannot compete with Germany economically, but they are using the exit of the UK to compete based on their military capabilities. Without the UK, France will be the only nuclear power in the EU. Macron is really keen to see France lead the fledgling EU military forces, wanting the headquarters to be on French soil. France wants to command any police actions in Africa, they like asymmetric warfare, where their superior fire power guarantees a quick victory. Macron is very keen to ensure UK forces do not have access to the secure parts of Galileo and insists that as a third country, British forces fall under European control when acting together. For European read French. This will turn UK military into nothing more than mercenaries acting in Mrs May's interest. Macron is using this military power to make a grab for Merkel's titular leadership of the EU. Macron has spent most of his presidency global trotting in an effort to convey the impression he is "the" representative of the EU. With the above in mind, I suggest you review his actions as french president and reassess his motives. He is empire building for the glory of France, neglecting the French people in the process, he has introduced austerity measures in France to show he is acting as a responsible EU leader. If the EU military developed into a credible force, Macron will become dangerous, as at some point he will take the EU into conflict with one or more of the other big power blocks, most likely Russia, but possible China.
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  1259. This does not explain the trade deficit. The US is simply importing more than it exports. The UK has a similar problem. In the case of the UK, it allowed too many of its industries to be either taken into foreign ownership or to die as a result of cheap foreign imports. It effectively delegated the manufacture of the products it uses to overseas suppliers in the ridiculous belief that the economy could survive by providing services alone, mainly in the financial sector. This produced a predominately low wage, indebted economy, with a very few individuals "earning" huge amounts of money in the financial sector. The result is a very divided society of many poor and a few obscenely rich. Unfortunately for the government, the majority on low wages and in debt also vote. They expressed their disapproval by voting for a rebalancing of the economy away from financial services and back towards production that once provided well paying jobs. Globalisation was the main cause of the problem, however the EU set rules and directives that were politically motivated and designed to create an interdependence between member states to bind them together. In the UK's case, this favoured a huge trade deficit between it and the UK and enabled migrants to take up the low wage low skilled jobs on offer in the UK internal service sector, hence BREXIT. It is worth note that internal services industries do little for the UK economy, apart from suck in imported consumer products to be sold on the internal market. This goes a long way to explain the UK's poor productivity figures per worker man hour. Essentially it is due to a majority of people on low wages, working very hard to produce not much of any value to the rest of the world. For years the UK has been involved in a fire sale of UK assets and utilities to pay its debts. It has padded its GDP figures with construction. Again this sucks in raw material imports, but produces very little of value to the rest of the world. I suspect that the UK's problems are very similar to those of the US.
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  1267. The Ukrainians are, unstandable, asking for NATO to implement a no fly zone, arguing it will save many lives, but consider the following scenario: NATO implements a no fly zone and shoots down Russian jets. Putin determines he has lost his chance of taking over Ukraine and decides if he cannot have it no one will. He then launches tactical nuclear missiles and vaporize one or more Ukraine cities. The death tool would be horrendous. Putin might instead decide to attack the NATO bases from which the air cover is being provided. He could attack either with tactical nuclear weapons, but more likely chemical weapons. If he attacked with a nuclear weapon, NATO would be forced to respond in kind. If he used a chemical weapon, he might just avoid a nuclear response, given the confusion that would result from a chemical attack. The former would be the unstoppable prelude to WW3 The mistake NATO and the west made was not responding sufficiently early to the Russian invasion. The West should have triggered its current level of sanctions when Russia invaded Crimea, it could then preserve the condition of mutual assured destruction for any Russian attack on a NATO state. The error was allowing Russia to keep the western alliance off balance, by always gauging its attacks below the MAD threshold, turning the tables on the western allies by then claiming their response would be above the MAD threshold. For MAD to work, it must be set on a hair trigger, so both sides know that any military attack on the other will result in a massive response. It was the reluctance of the western allies to response with strong economic measures to earlier Russia lesser infractions, that has stopped MAD from keeping the peace. Now NATO can only wait for Russia to attack a NATO member before it can react. To regain the initiative, it must convince Putin that the hair trigger on the western nuclear response is still set. This will be very hard, and dangerous, to do, given that Putin has been allowed to get away with so much.
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  1372.  @1935rmb  to be fair it is not really our thing or we would not still have the feudal house of lords. Because of our first past be post election system, most electors are disenfranchised because their vote does not count. We elect a candidate supposedly to represent us, but their real loyality is to their political party. We elect them based on promises given in a party manifesto, promises that are usually vague and which can be prioritise post-election, or ignored as we would usually say. Only the referendum delivers real democracy, it is about a single issue and every vote counts. In an ideal system we should be able to expect our representatives to make decisions on our behalf and in our best interests, but it is obvious that government works for vested self interest and the interest of a small elite. One of the reasons I voted for brexit was because it would throw a spanner into the plans of this elite. The are many reasons for voting for brexit, more than I can list here. A pertinent one is that the size of the EU dilutes the democratic power of the individual making it far easier for the ruling elite to do as they like. In a way it is similar to a thermodynamics problem, it is far more difficult to marshall the population to act in common cause. This becoming an increasingly unlikely event. When it does happen to the EU it will result in a violent revolution, with the eurocrats and bankers first against the wall. I do take your point about Europeans being uses to being ruled by dictatorships, but this phenomena is more prevalent in the middle East. Given democracy, the first thing they do is hold an election and elect a dictator, usually in the form of a self serving theocracy.
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  1510. This is the start of a very bad weather year. The significant of this tornado is not that it happened, it is its severity. No one can say if this is the result of global warming, but it is consistent with the increasing intensity of such weather events. The failure of COP26 to agree the measures necessary to hold the average earth temperature rise to 1.5 degrees C, is really not relevant, as the weather over the next 12 to 18 months is likely to change the minds of even the politicians who are in the pockets of the fossil fuel industry. The industry itself is also likely to start to suffer from climate change, with extreme weather events damaging their infrastructure and therefore their profitability. The shame is that leaving the necessary measures so late, is that the environmental damage will be all the greater. Unfortunately the only actions we can be sure about, is it is essential to cut green house gas emissions to zero as soon as possible. What is not clear is what we will use to replace this energy source. For the fossil fuel investor, who is going to lose a lot of money, if they continue to invest in this industry, there is a sure fire alternative that will be showing growth, that is green technology, since either this tech is made to work, or we are all going to die a premature death. So it's a safe investment. In fact its the only investment. Green not only covers energy generation and energy saving, but food production in a warming world and the re-wilding of the global environment, increasing bio diversity. The cost of repairing the damage of this single weather event is going to run into billions of dollars, imagine the cost if this become a regular event, the norm across the world.
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  1649.  @peabase  safety in numbers, tell that to the animals in the factory farms. For the circling wolves the EU is a huge market in which to sell not to buy. The EU common standards work against it. It is far more cost effective to engineer products that meet the standards of a big market, than it is to engineer products to meet the standards of much smaller markets. The EU is huddling together for safety, but its economic success is based on not having to pay much for its own defence, it is throwing that advantage away with its rejection of NATO in favour of its own military. In doing so it is making its self a potential target. How will the alliance hold together in the face of Russian aggression. The US had a scorched earth policy towards Germany, dont you think the French will implement the same, fighting over every inch of German soil until the Russians endanger French soil, at which point the French will surrender. In practice this will not happen, as the French want a largely symbolic EU military with which they can fight little "Peace keeping," wars and bluff a place at the top table. The real problem of the EU is that member states are expected to believe what is good for one is good for all. In practice it is of no real benefit for the Greeks, Italians or any of the smaller states if Germany and latterly the France gets rich on the back of EU trade. Even in the federal Europe there will be winners and losers, just look at the American model. The EU is creating an undemocratic plutocracy designed to serve the needs of a super rich few. Much is made of its tariff barriers that stand against globalisation, but again in practice the globalists need a few large power block to play off against each other. There is no money in the monoculture of a single world government, the money is made in the trade between blocks. Lastly the EU is empire building and history tells us that all empires come to a bad end sooner or later, the EU will be no different. Better to watch from the side lines than be involved in the mess.
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  1757. alek Rawls I am not stating my position, I am stating what I suspect is the position of the US, and untill recently, the EU. I believe that if the EU had not supported ukraines entry into the EU, Russia might not have annexed Crimea. I think it suited both sides to use Ukraine's ambiguous independent status to allow it to be a buffer between the two. From the western news point of view, it was the EU who change the balance by offering membership. Russia did not want NATO that bit closer and did not want to lose control of the Crimea Port, making the EU the aggressor, but I am willing to accept that Russia might have been attempting to take control of the Ukraine by installing a puppet government, before EU intervention. I think it likely that Putin has a policy of rebuilding the sphere of influence that the USSR once had. I suspect that Putin sees himself as a a new tsar rebuilding the former Russia empire. I am not in a position to tell if the Ukraine's status was stable or changing before the EU's intervention. As I recall Russia was in dispute with Ukraine over the transport costs applied to the oil pipe line that runs through the country. This is where apportioning blame is difficult, as I really do not understand or have access to the details. What I am attempting to determine is the Russians willingness to get involved in a war with the west, and if the EU's move to establish its own army to replace NATO had emboldened Putin. It is all about cost/benefit analysis and what are the chances of a nuclear war. The worst case choice for the ukrainians maybe between being an uncomfortable buffer zone or being turned to nuclear ash. Putin appeared to be happy risking a conventional war against the west, was this because he identified a weakness in NATO due to the EUs plan for a defence force? Is Putin willing to fight for control of the pipeline, the port, or to regain control of the region or a combination of any or all? This matters because of the EUs policy to replace NATO with its own defence force may have destabilised the region and created the recipe for war and all the deaths that followed. Has Putin stopped?
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  1787.  @gbjanuary  I doubt if many will bother to down load and read the exit document. It is very hard going because of the legalese and the cross references toother documents. This leaves the general public open to fake news manipulation. In the case of the BBC it will just be very selective about which parts of the document they report and how they interprete it. The idea of a television debate with Jeremy Corbyn is clear!y a publicity stunt. Both are supporters of closer union with the EU. It would be better if she debated with an articulate brexiteer politician. It is ironic that Corbyn, who is Eurosceptic is leading a europhile party, while she, a europhile and remainer, is leading a Eurosceptic party. I suspect she will call in a number of back bench MPs, get them to sign the official secrets act, and then tell them the blackmail that the EU is really using to force her to back this treasonous deal. The MPs will emerge from these one on one meetings as reluctant converts to the exit deal. One can only imagine what the blackmail might be, maybe a blockade of UK ports by the EU. An orchestrated attack on the pound. If the UK people were told the real threat, I think they would be incensed. On Thursday the ECJ rules on if the UK can unilaterally withdraw the article 50 application. It will be interesting to see which way this goes. It maybe this dreadful deal is intended to frighten the UK into voting to remain in a second referendum. I think this is unlikely, as the French have a considerable vested interested interest in the UK leaving. The current exit deal puts the UK in an extremely weak position, which is just where the French and Germans want us. The UK returning to EU membership is not attractive to the EU, because it will bring 17.5 million people into the EU who hate it and are bent on its destruction. My guess the court will rule that the brexit process has gone too far and will require all the 28 to vote in favour of reversing article 50 and this will come with a punishment attached. Most likely the inability to trigger article 50 again. The EU will certainly be trying to close the article 50 exit door and increase majority voting to stop the UK throwing a spanner into the EU super state ambitions.
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  1789.  @redred7289  I did not say that, I pointed out that it was not adequately funded in the forty years we were a member of the eu. That is under both labour and conservative governments. Why do you think it would be any different if we remained in the EU? One definition of madness is repeatedly doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome. Brexit is a catalyst for change, with the prospect of doing things differently. It is not clear which way post brexit Britain will go, but there is the potential for positive change. Certainly the last forty years have been a disaster for the uk. The apparent economic growth of the uk economy can be attributed to creative accounting in the calculation of GDP and a huge fire sale of uk assets to fund our membership and pay the day to day bills. Necessity is said to be the mother of invention, and brexit will force the uk economy to be more inventive. I maintain the view that the uk must become much more self sufficient and reduce its dependency on imports. We have become a nation of consumers, buying rather than making. If the NHS is to be funded, then the uk must produce and sell goods and services abroad to fund it. We cannot make money by selling each other expensive imports or building houses with expensive imported raw materials. When faced with a financial crisis, there are two priorities, cut outgoing expenditure and increase income. The UK has been living on debt, and has been forced to introduce austerity measures in an effort to control that debt, but the real reason for it is that we no longer do things for ourselves, preceding to import goods and services and allow foreigners to do our manufacturing for us. We must be like those who do DIY rather than pay for a tradesman to do the work. We must sell the thing we produce, not the means of production.
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  1833. paranoidx9 prior to joining the EU in 1981, Greek GDP was positive. The recovery of the Greek economy post wwIi was described as the Greek miracle. It is interesting that things started to go wrong the same year Greece joined the EU. (Source Wikipedia the Greek economy.) It is difficult to say what the economic trajectory would have been if it had not joined the EU, but I suspect, given the pre joining data, it would have been better than it is now. Capitalism is the best way to arrange for an economy to self organise and the supply and demand feed back loop ensures consumers receive what they require without government intervention or a central plan. However, capitalism is driven by the profit motive and it should be the job of government to control and regulate capitalism to limit its excesses, protecting the consumer and the environment. The system goes wrong when government changes its role to that of facilitating capitalism's quest for profit at the expense of the consumer and the environment. That is what is happening in a gross way in the US at the moment, and to some extent in all the world's economies. The trigger for the change is the depression in growth following the last crash. Rather than getting on with the job, companies bleat that they cannot work under the regulation regime and want it to be relaxed. This is ironic since the financial regulations were tightened to reduce the chances of a further crash. So I accept that it is not a companies primary job to protect the environment, it is the job of government. It is also the job of government to hold to account, companies who behave in a reckless fashion towards the environment. (If news reports are true Trump has just authorised the extraction of minerals, mostly coal, for the US national parks.) In the US the fox has been put in charge of the hen house and soon there will not be any hens left.
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  1838.  Denise Bond  I think you maybe right, but maybe not for the reason you suggest. The longer the EU exists, the more likely there is of a civil war. A war between the states of a federal Europe. Before that the French may precipitate a war. It is not their intention, Macron sees military power and sabre rattling as a way to gain control over the EU. I think he would also like the Prestige that might result in being seen as an equal partner in some limited police action of the US. Had plans for the EU military been more advanced, the EU might have been more involved in Syria and certainly in facing the Russians over the invasion of Crimea. The latter could easily resulted in a nuclear war, though some might claim the Russia would have backed down if faced with a euro army. I suspect not. The EU military project is potentially very profitable for the French/German military complex, with lot of weapons sales to other EU states, justified by the need for necessary standardisation. The Galileo Project is an example of advanced planning for such a force. Initially the french just want EU validation for small police actions in Africa, in defence of French interests. The risk is that the Europeans manage to convince themselves of their military superiority and competencies. In practice they are no match for the old players, such as Russia and the US, both of which have a seventy year technical lead over a unified EU military. The Chinese could easily out class an EU military. Then there is the risk of the rogue players such as North Korea, Pakistan, India and potentially, Iran and the hidden players such as Israel. The temptation for the EU is to try and play international policeman, as the US has done, and to some extent the UK. The EU might be so over confident that it backs up its mostly ineffective diplomacy and sanctions with the threat of using its new found military forces. At best this will involve the European continent in a bloody conventional war, at worse it triggers a limited nuclear exchange. Certainly confronting Russia or China could do this, but so could the mad man in North Korea. It is not difficult to think of scenarios where the EU unintentionally involves itself in a war. They might confront Chinese expansionism in the south China sea or russian expansionism as it tries to regain control over the USSRs former acolytes. The EU itself is expanding, which is why Russia invaded the Ukraine. The point is that the EU (Europe) has largely avoided war because it was considered to be mostly harmless. The French plan will change the status of the EU to slightly dangerous. Before accepting the French as the EUs new protector, the other member states must consider if France would really fire its nuclear missiles in their defence, thus making France a prime target in any exchange. I suspect the answer is no, as french weapons are for the last resort defence of France. This is in marked contrast to NATO and the US. Where the Americans always planned to fight any limited nuclear war with the Russians in europe.( Well documented in declassified cold war records). Perversely the US willingness to sacrifice Europe, particularly Germany, to nuclear fire is what made Europe safe for 70 years, that and the fact that Europe was not a real threat to anyone. Change that status and war is inevitable.
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  1859.  @bca-biciclindcuaxel7527  your choice of example does your case no favours. To justify an EU army based on Hitler's military ambitions is particularly stupid, and rather crass given the date. I would also point out that he lost. The real reason the EU army is being advanced is for the benefit of the French. Macron is using French military strength to justify his claim to lead the EU. The French also have a large munitions industry, that will benefit for lucrative arms contracts from other member states and EU grants for military R&D. Brexit has given the French a unique position of being the only nuclear armed state in the EU, but they are backward compared with the US, Russia, and maybe even China. In the post WWii world of mutually assured destruction, it was the willingness of the US to use nuclear weapons in Europe that ironically kept Europe safe for seventy years. It was the freedom from providing for its own defence that gave the German economy its power after the war. Paying for your own defence puts a huge strain on a countries economy, as is also demonstrated by the post war boom in the Japanese economy. The EU army is going to be a major liability for the EU, consuming increasingly greater amounts of its GDP. The French only want the army for symbolic reasons, with the intention to use it in small police actions in Africa securing access to natural resources, where asymmetrical Warfare ensures a minimum of EU casualties. The real danger if like you they begin to believe in their own hype and decide to confront the military forces of one of the big blocks, such as the Russians. If the EU had already established an army during the Ukraine crisis, the EU might already be involved in a shooting war with the Russians. Do you really think the French will be willing to make themselves a nuclear target in defence of Poland? A deterrent is only of value if the enemy really believes their opponent is prepared to use the weapons at their disposal. The French will only be willing to use its nuclear power in the last ditch defence of France. Make no mistake any shooting confrontation with one of the big piwers would quickly escalate to a nuclear exchange.
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  1900.  @antonysmyth2464  the reports conclusions are unlikely to still apply, given that UK school hours have been changed, moved from an 9 o'clock start to 8 o'clock. You have still not explained why dark mornings should be safer than dark nights This is not really about safety, but about moving to European time. There are not few hours of daylight, it is just when the hours of daylight are reported by the clock. Global time is divided up naturally by lines of longitude that define the hour time zones. The UK defines a reference by setting the Greenwich meridian. Logically time in the UK is set by this meridian, defining GMT. There is no reason why the citizens of the UK need to modify this system to provide adequate daylight for their activities. They are perfectly free to get up at a particular time, go to work at a time that suits their employer, and spend their leisure time when they like. So rather than campaigning to stop accidents by changing the time on the clock, it would be far better to simply change when these activities take place, as has happened with school daily start and end times. In fact such staggering of activities would greatly improve road safety by spreading the rush hour over a wider time period, with fewer people traveling at the same time. Your obsession with moving the clock time away from that defined by the UK longitude is therefore a nonsense. Modern life is now run 24 hours a day. The 19rh century need for a 9am to 5pm synchronised working day, no longer exists, as is evident by modern factory shift patterns, of 6am till 2pm, 2pm till 10pm and 10pm till 6am.
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  1937.  @belindakennedy5828  the problem the government has is that for decades the true state of the UK economy has been hidden by creative accounting, a matter of smoke and mirrors.GDP on nonproductive services and the value of house building, a property bubble. Successive UK governments have failed to rebalance the economy towards producing goods that we can sell to other countries. There has been an extended fire sale of the UK's utilities, infrastructure and means of production. One of the purposes of Brexit was to force the government to face the problem and do something about it, rather than continuing to live on debt created by borrowing against our fictitious wealth. It can be argued that these structural problem with the UK economy can only be address outside the EU, as EU rules and its own self interest discourages the UK government from doing anything. Outside the EU necessity will be the mother of invention, and the UK will be forced to be more self sufficient and pay its way in the world, something it has not done for forty plus years, not since we joined the EU. One of the problems with Mrs May's deal is that it allows the unacceptable status quo to continue at the cost of losing get more UK sovereignty. At this point Mrs May's deal is the very worst option. I am a strong supporter of leave, but at this moment I think we may have no choice but to remain and try again once the UK economy has been made stronger. The dangers of remaining and many: we may end up going back to our old ways and not fixing the economy. The EU may close the article 50 door and trap us in an EU that has a very bleak dystopian future, dragging us down with it. Leaving is going to be a very painful process, as we will be recovering from the EU parasite infection. The EU has had forty years of making the UK dependent upon it, removing the parasite from all aspects of UK life is going to hurt. Remain has the advantage of adding 17.4 million citizens to the EU who have and want to see it's destruction. Inside, the UK can halt the EU super state ambitions. Suspect that the ECJ will decide that the UK cannot unilaterally revoke its article 50 application for this reason alone, however there is the other reason, it would open the EU up to blackmail, with member states applying to leave, knowing they can withdraw their application at the last minute. As I pointed out in a post yesterday, Italy is most likely to use this weapon, given it has an even more Eurosceptic population than the UK. The conclusion is that we may have no choice but a hard Brexit, maybe with a Canada plus deal. It has been said that the EU will not provide a deal without the Irish backstop in place, but if there is a hard brexit, the Irish border problem will be firmly at the door of the EU as neither the UK or the RoI can put a hard customs border in Ireland. Suddenly a technical solution will become very attractive to the EU, as the only other options are to impose a border in Ireland or a border between Ireland and the rest of the EU.
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  1941.  @miguelmelchior986  no one wants a war, but if Putin attempts to invade the Ukraine, his troops will meet strong resistance. The west will apply significant sanctions on russian and there is a good chance that the west will get dragged into the conflict, first through military support and then direct involvement. Putin is banking on a decadent west being week and no longer willing to stand up to russian aggression. His tactics are straight out of Hitler's play book, but at some point the west will react, just as they did before. The difference is that the stakes are much higher, with the risk of a nuclear exchange. It is worth noting that during the cold war, Russia was thought to have military superiority in conventional weapons, it is was the American plan to stop any mass tank advance with tactical nuclear weapons. It is a matter of principle that Russia cannot dictate who its neighbours chose as their military allies, or how they chose to defend themselves. They are soverign nations and have the right to make these decisions. If press reports are to be believed, Putin wants disarm his neighbours, so that Russia can exert pressure on them when ever it likes. It has been obvious for some time that Putin sees the fall of the old Soviet Union as an embarrassment, and intends to rebuild it,even if the former USSR satellite countries, who are now free, do not want any part of it. Otherwise, it is difficult to see what Russia is concerned about. There is absolutely no chance that NATO forces are going to invade russian territory, or even set foot on it. Russia is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons and has deployed hypersonic missiles, so the range of NATO weapons is really not an issue. Just as during the cold war, it would be madness for the west to conduct a preemptive strike on Russia,so that is not going to happen. But if Russia attacks it's neighbours, the west will see it as a threat and respond. The wild card, is the actions of the extreme nationalists on both sides, who could trigger a war. It is these people that each side must control. It is unfortunate that the EU destabilised Ukraine by encouraging it to apply for EU membership. Prior to this Ukraine was acting as an unofficial buffer between the west and Russia, now it is impossible to go back to that status without one side or the other losing face. And that is important, as so much of the former quasi stability was about uncertainty and bluff.
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  1946. I wonder if Putin's inner cycle realise that Putin's strategy has handed Russia's sovereignty to the Chinese. Russia is quickly losing its customers in the West, as Russia disappears behind the new iron curtain, into isolation. China does not really need Russian gas or oil, it can take it or leave it. Russia however is no dependant on Chinese support. At the very minimum, China is now in a position to drive a very hard bargain with Russia. So China is now in control. Would not be so bad for Putin, if he had managed to achieve any of the stated goals of this invasion, but he has succeed in revitalizing, what was a moribund NATO. His actions have been the best recruiting sergeant NATO has ever had, with many former Soviet states reconsidering their neutrality in favour of NATO membership. Putin has united the EU and persuaded the member states to greatly their investment in their own militaries. The US, Canada, EU and UK are acting in unity, both military and economically against Russia. Even Switzerland has put aside its neutrality, to impose sanctions on Russia and it's elite. The Russian currency is in free fall and western companies are racing to get out of Russia. There has be an almost unanimous vote at the U.N. General assembly against Russia and it's illigal war. A similar United vote at the U.N. security council. Putin has single handedly, taken Russia back to the 1960s cold war. As a Russian leader, Putin is a complete failure, a pariah and laughing stock. So much for making Russia great again.
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  1966.  @KB-uy3lv  the EU needs to bind all the member states together and suppress national and cultural differences between the member states. One way to do this is to flood the eu with migrants who will dilute the culture of the member states making the EU population more homogenous, creating a future monoculture who own their allegiance only to the EU and it to the host state. A monoculture makes the EU population a far more mobile work force, allowing wages to be kept low by the law of supply and demand. The miscalculation may have been the disruptive nature of bring on a large number of adult migrants with a alian culture to that of most member states. Many of the economic migrants have not received the same level of education as the citizens of the host nations, making them almost unemployable. Some are escaping from war torn and broken countries. A significant few will have played a part in breaking these countries. A greater number will hold beliefs that are considered extremist to the host nation. The problem is really a question of numbers. A few migrants can be integrated into the host nation with adquit support and education. Greater numbers are likely to fail to integrate and form ghettos of resentful unemployed. These will form a reservoir for crime and radicalisation. While Germany may have a need for an influx of new workers, it is doubtful if many of the migrants will be suitable candidates simply because they have not been through the German education system. Other EU states already have high unemployment and do not require new workers. The only way the EU can absorb the numbers involved is with a massive free education and training program, but this will be resented by the indigenous population who will have to pay for it, while having their own wages suppress and jobs put at risk. This is not about race, it is about numbers and the problems resulting from dumping a large number of people from an alian culture upon another.
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  1976.  @Kalimdor199Menegroth  while Poland is burning coal there will not be an incentive to change to another source of energy. But coal burning contributes to global warming, and as I said Poland is not immune from the effects of climate change. So how cheap must coal be if it is going to lead to human extinction. I cannot say which climate change natural disaster will affect Poland first, but it is certain that it cannot escape the effects of a 2 degree centigrade rise in average global temperatures. Maybe a heatwave leading to crop failures and deaths, maybe flooding or severe storms. You can be sure the ultimate economic cost will out weight any temporary savings Poland is receiving from continuing to burn a fossil fuel. The EU may not have the right to tell Poland not to mine coal, but the EU and the rest of the world can decide not to trade with Poland while it does. The smoke from your bonfire is affecting the health and well being of your neighbours, do not be surprised if they refuse to speak to you or trade with you. And do not expect them to come to your rescue if you are hit by unseasonal bad weather. I do not believe in religious doomsday prophecies, as I am an atheist. I do however believe in the predictions made by science, based on observations and mathematical calculations. Though it is no longer necessary to base conclusions about impending climate catastrophe on the information given in scientific papers, it is only necessary to watch the news, or look out of the window to understand that the climate is changing for the worst. I can no add the phase " The so called climate disaster is no where near in sight" to other famous last words, such as "no its not a bomb" and "icebergs are not a threat, we are unsinkable"..
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  2173.  @stuartpaul9995  it very much depends on your definition of nationalism, what you describe are right wing fascist governments. And as you say they failed, which is why a super state, like that proposed for the EU, built on the same principles will also fail. What I am describing is the nation state that has existed in one form or another for thousands of years. What is about this concept that offends you so much. It is that it is opposed to globalisation? Nation states have been trading for as long as they have existed. The difference is that they decided if it wanted to buy or sell produce and what was for sale. In most cases the trade was based on surplus to need and a requirement to import those raw materials that geography and geology denied it. Returning to maximum self sufficiency is not nationalism, it is common sense. You do not buy that which you can make your self. You only sell your surplus not the means to produce it. The only reason globalism and free trade is being pushed as the best way to organise the world is because some very rich individuals make there money from global trade. It is nonsense to transport products over vast distances if they can be made locally. Concentrating production of particular types of product in small relations of the global reduces the resilience of the system. Again the only reason for doing it is to exploit the wealth differentials that exist across the world. Allowing products to be made in low wage countries with poor environmental protection law and exporting the products to wealthy countries that have lost the ability to manufacture and have become captive consumers. The result of this trade is the poor countries get slightly richer but very much dirtier and the wealthy countries become poorer and spiral into debt. The one common factor is that the super rich few who facilitate the trade get fabulously wealthy. Hence the enormous wealth gap that now exists between the super rich few and the rest of the world's population. That is the system that you wish to support.
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  2174.  @stuartpaul9995  the EU is nationalist and fascist. It is nationalist in as much as it considers the whole of the EU yo be one nation and is going its best to bury the differences between the member states to create a EU monoculture with citizen loyalties only for itself. If the UK is heading for a halt down, it will be one of the EU's making. It is very reasonable that the UK should wish to leave, there is very good reason for doing so. So why should leaving be do traumatic. The only reason is because the EU wants it to be. There is no reason why the UK should not exist as an independent country, if this is now difficult it is because of the damage the EU has done to the UK over the past 50 or so years. You persist in associating the wish to be an independent nation state with nationalism in its most pejorative sense, why. Is it impossible for you to think of the UK as being I dependent of the EU. We do not have a Hitler waiting in the wings to invade Europe, so why does the EU feel so threatened? Your support for globalism is presumably based on some idealistic liberal values that see the world as one United happy place. In practice globalism is a mechanism for a global elite to exploit the wealth differentials that exist In the world to make huge amounts of money for themselves at the expense of the global environment. It is what is powering the growing wealth gap between the super rich few and the rest of the world's population. It is the engine that is destroying the global environment and it is very clever of the super rich to recruit those ideologically opposed to their action to be so supportive of them.
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  2178. There are arguements that such restrictions are unnecessary, or will be ineffective. It is reasonable to doubt the first and be wary of the latter. The world can ill afford the Chinese exporting their epidemic and there by reinvigorating the global pandemic. The world has good reason to be sceptical of Chinese data, and should proceed with caution until it has gathered its own data. It needs to confirm that the prevalent Chinese variant of covid is susceptible to the western covid vaccines and is already in circulation in the West. The R number of the reported Chinese variant is very high at around 18, making it incredibly infectious. The reported death toll is low, but there is apocryphal evidence that this may not be the case. Given the very high cost of the global pandemic, both in money and lives lost, the citizens of western states halve a right to expect their respective government's to fully adopt the precautionary principle and maximise infection protection measures, until it is proven they are unnecessary. A cynic might suspect that the Chinese government may have decided, that after the Chinese economy has been damaged so badly by covid, it is time to share their misfortune with the rest of the world, in an exercise to level the economic playing field. One further risk, given the size of China, it is not impossible that a more dangerous strain of covid is lurking in the provinces. The chinese practices of eating wild animals, that resulted in cross animal infection with humans, that gave rise to the original virus has not gone away. The prevalent strain, is highly infectious, it is not a significant risk to life. That does not mean that with so much virus in circulation, the Chinese population is not brewing, a more deadly mutation.
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  2316. I do not doubt that the future is electric but the technology is not ready yet. The only reason the car manufactures are "on board" is because of political pressure not the pressure of a new technology. I do not think the conversion of all vehicles to electric operation will result in grid rebalancing, the increase in load is too great. At the moment the percentage of electric vehicles is sub 2%, a long way from the 100% future. To rapidly charge a car, requires more power than can currently be delivered by the existing distribution system. The proposed solution is to build industrial battery storage banks at filling stations to provide the current necessary. These then need to be slowly recharged from the grid at a current the distribution system can provide. The efficiency of electric cars is apprixmatly three time that of petrol cars, but nowhere near the efficiency you are quoting. The best figures are about 62%. This as yet, does not make up for the deficit in the energy capacity of the fuel. Then there is the little matter of the life endurance of the current generation of batteries. Not only is this relatively short, they capacity fades over time. So while a new car might provide 300 miles between charges, this is not the case for a five year old car, and the battery will most likely need to be replaced after as little as 10 years. These figures are approximate because the figures are improving rapidly, but who wants to be an early adopter, stuck with an old generation of battery. Unfortunately this technology does not allow for battery upgrades, as each new battery technology demands different electronics to support it. Electric car races have just started, it is telling that these cars can only race for about half an hour before they must stop to be recharged, even with induction charging during the race. Such is the stress on these cars, they are effectively rebuilt after each short race. When the electric race cars can compete on endurance with traditional race cars, then the electric technology will be a viable replacement.
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  2361.  @abryan8117  this plot was far too complicated to have originated in the US, sounds more like a British plan. Given that the us has issued an seizure warrant against the Iranian ship that was freed by the Gibraltar court, so while he British have given up on this plan the US has not. But the US plan lacks any logic or legal validity. It must be assumed that the us strategy is to goad Iran into attacking US shipping. This is plan is crude by comparison to that of the British, which was designed to get the EU involved in sanctions on Iran. The British involvement may have been inspired by Iran continuing to hold a British woman hostage with the claim she was a spy. She was most likely completely innocent, as her imprisonment was originally supposed to be a bargaining chip for the return of arms payments to the British for tanks who's delivery was embargoed. That was another Iranian plan that completely underestimated the British government's indifference to this hostage taking. There was never any danger of the UK paying the money back and even less when threatened by hostage taking. In its defence, no government can afford to respond favourable to hostage blackmail, it would only encourage more. The Iranians are now stuck with a hostage they really do not want. There may be some cynics in the UK government who will be happy to use her death in Iranian custody to give a propaganda victory. The longer she is held, the worse it gets for the Iranians. If she is released now, the world press will be full of the details with lots of negative propaganda towards Iran. Really the Iranian machinations are no more sophisticated than those of the US, it's all about brut force and ignorance with little thought being given to future consequences.
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  2404.  @ozzie2612  and your understanding of economics is what got us into the current economic mess. It is a fundamental principle that wealth must be manufacture, grown, or dug out of the ground, yet while in the eu, the UK was allowed to measure its economic success by how many expensive imports we could sell to each other, or how many houses we could build using expensive raw materials. Even now we measure our economic performance this way, which is why November GDP figures can be boosted by the world cup. In practice, during our eu membership, the UK economy was funded by the sale of uk assets, and by borrowing, disguise by printing funny money. If the UK economy was in such a bad situation when we joined the common market, why was the UK one of the largest contributed to the eu budget? It is a myth that what is good for one member state is good for all. The UK ended up funding its competitors. The eu is run like a microcosm of of the iniquitous globalisation system. Poor states do the manufacturing and sell to the rich states, and wealth flows across the market, making a nice profit for a rich elite, who facilitate the trade. Until the eu is federalised, their are states that get poorer and others the get richer. The UK was set up to be the diner, leaking money/wealth to the eu. Even in a federal system, the flow of wealth is reversible, as is evident from the US system. The important feature is that the flow is tapped to make a very few very rich. You are really dumb if you do not understand this, it is why the wealth gap is still growing. The UK was never going to profit from being part of this system, it was just going to get steadily poorer.
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  2467.  @CantHandleThisCanYa  there are a number of examples of this happening in the past, notable the french and russian revolutions. No doubt the ultra rich will attempt to protect themselves with private armies, or similar security arrangements. They already seek to live in palatial isolation, some owning their own islands. The fewer they are in number, the easier it becomes to strip them of their wealth. One might expect that such moves would be associated with the complete breakdown of the economic system, where the value of money is no longer honoured, but it could be a pest dramatic event imposed by taxation applied by a radical government. To be effective it really would need to be applied globally. This is ironic, as it is globalisation that is fueling the wealth gap. But it is not impossible that as the wealth of these individuals exceeds the wealth of nations, that even governments take the view that enough is enough, and implement tax polices that shave the top 90% off the wealth of these people. Governments have implemented windfall taxes in the past. It might not even be necessary to target the individual, a change in the taxation rules could clip the ability of these people to grow their wealth by their current abuse of the existing system. Comments like the above might be considered as the politics of envy, but they are in fact more a reaction to the politics of excessive greed. I suspect that some billionaires have seen the writing on the wall, and are responding by setting up charitable foundations, such as that of Bill Gates, but not all are truly philanthropic, but just a smoke screen to cover yet more wealth accumulation or an attempt at vested self interest social engineering. The few only have power as a result of the tacit consent of the many. The ability to oppress the many ultimately relies on military power, but even this depends on a compliant military hierarchy. The generals of the dictatorships, who rob their country can only do so if their subordinates receive commensurate rewards. Wow betide the general who fails to pay his troops. The greater the wealth gap between the few and the many, the more untenable the position of the ultra rich becomes. There is an astute observation in one of the Douglas Adams Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe books, where a society adopts the deciduous tree leaf as the basis unit of their currency. The folly being that come the autumn (fall), everyone becomes a millionaire with the surfeit falling leaves, unfortunately this significantly devalues the currency to nothing, creating hyperinflation. The satirical point is that that is how the global economy is heading, with the ultra rich being left with nothing more than the biggest pile of rotting leaf litter.
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  2490.  @scarface999100  did you not far my last post? I am leave supporter. I voted not to join the common market in the first place because I could see what was going to happen. You do not win wars by ignoring what the opposition is planning or by disregarding your own weaknesses. It was clear as soon as the EU election result was announced what he remain campaign would do next, it is going to pursue the only option open to it and push for a second referendum. He logic is inescapable: The uk parliament cannot vote to revoke article 50 unilaterally as that would be undemocratic, and even the EU would not accept that outcome. Parliament is hopelessly deadlocked and cannot agree on anything. The EU election result implied that while the Brexit party had the largest vote of all parties, the remain supporting parties could have had a larger majority of they united, however the parties are hopelessly divided on other issues. What they can do is unite behind a single issue second referendum vote and hat is what they are going to do. With regard to the Brexit party manifesto, or rather the lack of it, this time round they cannot simply campaign to leave the EU without further explaination. The UK public are far more sophisticated,better educated, and a lot more suspicious. The case must be made why EU membership is bad and what the future in the EU probably holds. Likewise the case for life in a post Brexit Britain must be made with clear policies about how the UK can be made profitable again. Nigel Farage has made some public comments in the past that will no doubt be brought up by the remain side, most notable the wish to privatise the NHS. That alone, if not countered, is sufficient to swing the second referendum vote towards remain. The idea that a post Brexit Britain will be opened up to exploitation by American big business will also terrify the UK people,it does me. There is already a TV program planned to show how the post Brexit UK will be forced to import bad food in the form of chlorinated chicken. It must b made clear that far from lowering our standards we will raise them. There are a whole of such issues, all of which can be countered by having a philosophy of making the UK more self sufficient and protecting UK manufactures and producers from unfair foreign competition and in some cases fair foreign competition. I am concerned that Mr Farage is a free trade globalist. If the UK is to recover, he last thing it needs is to be further exploited by the globalist elite, that is what got us into this mess in the first place. I really like the idea of doing away with the unelected, feudal, house of lords and reforming parliament, but a party that associates itself with a single policy by calling itself the "Brexit party" is never going to get anywhere the UK parliament to carry out any reforms, let alone have a majority to do so.
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  2542. @not today that is not exactly what I said. I think it is more complicated than you imply. The politics is far too opaque to discover the motives of all those involved. No doubt self interest plays a big part. In the begining it appeared to be simple, a people fed up with the oppression of the dictator Assad, rising up to demand change and democracy. This was easy for the west to support, without getting involved. Then Isis became involved with the opposition movement, making it difficult for the west to choose sides. The choice being between supporting a dictatorship or a terrorist organisation. Understanding the motives of the US and Russia is difficult. The US had a problem supporting the opposition, with ISIS involved. The enemy of my enemy may not be my friend. Russia was just looking to expand its influence, something it could justify as a fight against ISIS. The Turks were doing the same, which they justified by a fight against the Kurds. This proved unfortunate, as the Kurds were fighting against ISIS,putting the Turks on the side of ISIS and therefore in conflict with Russian goals. The Kurds were just looking to annexe part of Syria to provide a century from Turkish attack. All this with Syrians fighting for freedom from Assad's control. Then there were just the captive victim Syrian population, who just wanted peace and the freedom to live their lives. I do not know how accurate the above short simplistic analysis really is, it is just what can be assembled from western media reports. The actions of the Turkish government appears to be dishonest and duplicitous. The Kurds appear to have been mostly honerable and brave, but they were betrayed by the US. The captive Syrian population are the true victims. They did nothing wrong and are being punished. They are the only true asylum seekers.
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  2670.  @gemstar8386  it is not in the interests of the French to stop the migrants, they do not want them. I doubt if some disaster mid channel would make any difference. Migrants need to be able to apply for asylum before they arrive in the UK, and have their claims processed before they attempt to reach the UK. Then the law must be changed to automatically reject, those who arrive illegally. There is a clear distinction between economy migrants, and refugees. All those coming from France, are coming from a safe country, their claims for UK residency could be processed in France. There is a place for the deportation to Rwanda, for rejected economic migrants who refuse to identify their place of origin. With the above changes, Asylum claims could be processed much faster, reducing the time potential asylum seekers need to be supported by the state. There should be a requirement for economic migrants to be selected by the U, with a requirement that they have a job to go to and sufficient funds to support them when they arrive. Economic migrants should not be entitled to free accommodation or living expensive. This would free up much need resources for the support of true refugees. Much has been made of the fact that the Rwandan deportation scheme has not worked as a deterrent, but in practice it has never been tried. It can only work as a deterrent if it is fully operational and not blocked before any flights leave. It must be obvious that the UK cannot expand by the size of a large town or small city each year. If economic migrants want to come here, they must be fully self supporting from day one. That means they must have paying jobs to go to , and have found their accommodation in advance. They must also be free of criminal record. By definition those arriving illegally fail the latter on arrival.
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  2671.  @gemstar8386  I suspect a tragedy, would initially result in a rise in sympathy for the migrants, and maybe a crackdown on the peop,e smugglers, but it would only last as long as the news story. Ironically the current news story will likely act as a deterrent for a short period. Those considering crossing the channel will not be looking forward to a long stay in such poor conditions. As I said, economic migrants should not expect any government support. They should have arranged their own accommodation and employment before arriving, along with obtaining a work visa and all the necessary paper work relating to staying in the UK, such as tax and national insurance. A failure to meet this requirement should be a criminal offence, resulting in immediate deportation. It should also be a criminal offence to masquerade as a refugee. Those passing through a safe country to get to the UK must explain why they have not sort asylum in the first safe country they reached. A failure to answer this question would make them economic migrants, subject to the above rules. It is only the true refugees who should receive government help. With massive tax rises and cuts to public services on the horizon as soon as November this year. The government will be under significant pressure to cut the support it provides to economic migrants. It is worth note that those arriving here illegally will have paid a significant amount of money to the people traffickers to get here. It would be far better if they arrived by more legal means, following meeting the above criteria, and kept their money to pay for their accommodation and living expensises.
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  2678.  @johnnyjjohnson116  there are a number of changes that have been highlighted by the Brexit deadlock. First, it is clear the fix term parliament act needs to be repealed. It has led to a zombie parliament and a zombie government that cannot be replaced or confirmed. I find it remarkable that the PM has managed to do so much with so little through simple force of will and positive enthusiasm. In better times I think he would be an excellent PM, despite his debatable character flaws. Second, it is clear that the house of lords should be replaced by a second all elected chamber. It currently represents an indefensible undemocratic relic of a feudalistic past. Third, there is a strong case for an English parliament to match the devolved institutions of Ireland Scotland and Wales. The latter having an unfair advantage of being represented in the UK parliament while also having their own protected institutions. The English need their own devolved equivalent to deal with English only issues, free of interference from the other nations in the union. Forth, require far greater accountability to their constituents whom they purport to represent. Fifth, there is nothing wrong with holding referendums on important issues, as they are the most democratic form of politics. But their votes must be binding. The idea that each nation within the union should have a vote, that is also a veto on any referendum decision is a nonsense, since it would lead to the smaller populations of some member states having a disproportionate influence on the majority, effectively allowing the tail to say the dog. It is a problem the EU is attempting to solve by forcing majority voting by member states. This is not the same as the EU does not hold EU wide referendums with every voting counting equally.
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  2762.  @ZIGZAG12345  James lovelock reached the conclusion sometime ago, that nuclear power was currently the only solution to global warming that would save the human race from extinction. His argument was very compelling. Since I am not in russia, I have no choice but construct my views of reality from the western media. Fortunately the diversity of this media gives some hope of getting at the truth. Certainly is is likely to be more reliable that that likely to be generated by Putin's propaganda machine. His actions betray his future intentions. There is no denying he is a dictator, who has made himself leader for life. He has certainly a record of violently eliminating his opposition, sometimes by using WMD. Russia cannot play the moral card, it has a history just as dark as any of the western powers, and it has its own problems with radical Islam and Muslims. Before the us was in Afghanistan, the Russians were the occupiers. Its possible that Merkel think she can control Putin's russia and will not be blackmailed, but that has yet to be proven. It is clear all the big power blocks have expansionist plans, but like China, Russia's are very destructive. I firmly believe that Putin's intention is to rebuild the russian sphere of influence back to that of the soviet-era. All the indications are that putin runs russia like the Mafia organisation. His acquisition of new weapons has started a new cold war arms race. I am not so naive as to identify the US as the good guy. Its greed and failings are obvious. While applauding cooperation between free independent democratic sovereign states, there is reason to be concerned about the possibility of the establishment of a global federal system or the rule of an increasingly powerful ultra rich elite few. These are the nightmares of twentieth century science fiction, which are rapidly becoming a reality, thanks largely to technological developments.
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  2777. @Razor Mouth☘️ Britain can only live on imports when it has a means of paying for them by matching exports, but membership of the EU has striped it of the ability, or will, to produce the goods to pay its way in the world. The economy needed to be rebalanced, and that was not going to happen while in the EU. It has had forty plus years to make the necessary changes while a member, it failed to do so. It is living on debt and the sale of critical assets, the means of production. Only now has it the opportunity to make the necessary changes, the option to maintain the status quo has been removed. Not the the status quo was ever that stable, as sooner or later you runout of family silver to sell. You are incorrect to say that the UK can't produce sufficirnt food, it couldn't, but that fails to take into account agricultural improvements, and a lack of will to do so. It does not need to produce all the food it needs, just a lot of it. The problem with the world economy is that money has lost its connection with production. Countries can live on debt for years without consequences, storing up trouble for the future. I have described the EU as a Ponzi scheme,because it must continue to expand to hide its deficiencies, but the US is the ultimate Ponzi scheme, as it now prints money in the from of treasure bonds, just to service its enormous debt. The chance that it will ever be able to pay back the capital involved, disappeared years ago. The debt is self sustaining because no one wishes to face the losses that will result if the debt is ever called in as a result of a default on interest payments, so the us continues to borrow to fund these payments.. As a default will certainly crash the world economy, plunging the whole world into a depression.
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  2794.  @captaincapslock8654  well there was no chance of a review while a member of the EU. The UK has introduced new rules and laws to protect the UK from the sale of companies that might damage the national interest, both military and economic. The problem is they are reluctant to uses these new powers. As for the pound and stock market. The pound losses happened while a member of the EU, not helped by a europhile bank of England move to force down the value of the pound following brexit. One might suspect that this was an attempt to ensure the banks dire predictions would be validated. Unfortunately for them it did not work. Before you mention the growing inflation rate in the UK, this has little or nothing to do with brexit, and a lot to do with an engineered global energy crisis, and a failure of the UK government to stock pile gas when the sun was shining. A failure that can be equally applied to many EU countries. One might speculate on the reasons for the current energy crises and the lamentable response of many governments. The crisis maybe the fossil fuel suppliers trying to make money while they still can, or Putin using energy supply as a weapon. The government lack of response, might be because it wants to use higher energy prices as a cheap way to make consumers cut their energy requirement, addressing that other great problem of global warming. No doubt some see it as market forces cutting energy demand, and making consumers take the difficult decisions to cut their energy requirements, and therefore their bills. The only problem with this strategy, is that it reduces the amount of money consumers have to invest in energy saving measures. It will be interesting to see which is the real reason for the current energy crisis. Will prices drop when Putin pulls back from the Ukrainian border? Will prices fall when consumers reduce their spend on energy saving measures? Will the UK government decide that it will open new oil and gas fields in the North sea. There are a lot of potential vested interests in play.
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  2796.  @captaincapslock8654  you would like me to agree that EU buying power is reducing its energy bills, but this is really not the case. The EU size has simply made it a target for out in blackmail. Putin wants Germany to open the Norstrean two pipe line. This will make the EU even more dependent on Russian gas, making it easier for Putin to make demands in other areas without risk of protests from the EU. The UK and Germany are caught in a trap of their own making. Both are committed to reducing green house gas emissions, this has stopped the UK developing new north sea oil and gas deposits, that would largely solve the UK dependence on gas imports. At the same time to emphasise its green credentials, the UK cut its bulk gas storage facilities, stopping it from buying cheap gas when the price was low. Germany has a similar problem, in that it has switched off working nuclear power plants. While nuclear power is dangerous, it does not contribute to any significant degree to green house gas emissions. Even James Lovelock is reported as saying that nuclear energy is humanities best chance of avoiding significant global warming. So both are held in an ideological trap of their own making. The uk government has vasalated for years over building a more resilient power network. I would argue this has only been made possible by the crutch offered by EU membership and gas imports from the EU. The solution is not EU membership, but building a better power network in the UK. It might be argued that allowing north sea energy reserves to be developed, would not increase the UK's use of gas, or necessarily add to CO2 emmisions, as the UK will use the gas anyway, the only difference is where it is sourced, home produced or imported. The counter argument is that the UK needs the pain of expensive gas imports to force the change to greener energy supplies.
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  2844.  Jan Schlossar  no you are wrong, Iran wants the EU to defy US trade sanctions, but the politicians cannot force EU companies which are already putting trading with the us to put that at risk. It is true that if a war breaks out between the US and Iran, the US will find it hard to recruit allies, but then Trump wants a small war at the moment as a war president cannot be impeached and there are those in the Trump adminstration with vested interests in arms manufacture who stand to make billions out of such a conflict. Iran is an easy target, as it does not yet have nuclear weapons,it also has regional enemies who would be happy to watch a fight between the US and Iran. This is one of the reasons why every one should be very sceptical about evidence linking Iran to attacks on ships in the gulf. Iris not impossible that Iran is being framed by one of its hostile neighbours. Would the Iranians be so incompetent as to be videoed taking limpet mines off a tanker ship? The only reasonable justification for such an action would be because the mine failed to explode and they were attempting to hide the evidence of the bungled attack less it identified the perpetrators, but this argument could equally apply to anyone wishing to frame Iran for the action. The next obvious question is why would Iran want to hide its involvement in such an attack, after all they are the most likely to be blamed in any case, so they might just as well admit to such an action. It is interesting that neither ship was destroyed and there are no reports of loss of life, was this intentional?
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  2909.  @momissimo4087  I don't recall that a quorum was required when we joined the common market, and I don't think we were consulted when the uk government signed the Maastricht Treaty. The turn out for the Brexit referendum was very high by UK standards and the leave vote won by a comfortable margin. Following the vote there were calls for a rerun by those who were to lazy or indifferent to vote in the referendum, mostly students I suspect. I am not concerned at the possibility of a second referendum, as I am confident of the same outcome as in the first. If some deal is cobble together by Mrs May, there is a danger the leave vote might be split by a referendum that asks three questions, Remain, Accept the Deal and Leave with no deal. But a simple remain or leave vote would most likely produce the same result as last time. There really is not the time for either a second referendum or a general election. A general election will never resolve the question as it covers so many other issues and there no guarantee that the new government would change brexit policy. Certainly if the EU are hoping a labour government will reverse the brexit vote they are deluding themselves. Labours policies are at odds with EU laws and rules, so they can only be carried out if the UK is outside the EU. Should a second referendum reverse the decision of the first, it will not be the end of the matter, since simply holding a second referendum has set the precedence for further referendums on the subject, maybe once every few years.
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  2962. Epsilon the trick is for everyone to know who authorised the attack, but without providing any proof. By using a high tech weapon, in this case a nerve agent, it make clear that a state must be behind the attack, since only a state has the resources to manufacture the weapon and the organisation to carried out the attack. By denying responding the onus is placed on the UK to produce definitive proof of guilt. All the circumstantial evidence indicates Russian involvement, so all concerned know who ordered the attack, they just can't prove it with indisputable evidence. The message is sent without any real risk of retribution or justice. So Russia cannot be held to account as there is always an element of doubt. The Israeli government is thought to use similar methods. There enemies have a habit of dying in mysterious circumstances, but there is never any evidence linking back to the Israeli state and they always deny involvement. The most obvious examples are the assassination of the inventor of the super gun or the elimination of those in involved in the attack on the Israeli olympic athletes. The purpose of such messages is to act as a deterrent, warning those who might betray the state that they will be killed no matter where they seek sanctuary. One reason the UK is so often involved is because the UK accepts so many of these dissidents/(criminals?) Into the UK. These Russians are often very rich former oligarchs who have fallen out with Putin and are now critical of the Russian state. They bring with them Russian money which is stored/(laundered) in UK banks, out of the reach of the Russian state. The UK has nothing to gain from picking a fight with Russia. As to Iraqi wmd, In that case I was never convinced by the UK government arguments and campaigned against UK involvement in that war. One reason for believing the government this time is that the UK is very unlikely to want to a war with Russia, it would almost certainly lose without NATO involvement and if NATO became involved it would quickly escalate to World War III.
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  2965. The royal family do not have any real political power. There is no evidence that they have every exercised any power to resist the policies of the elected government. They might exercise soft power behind close doors, but such action has not been converted into direct action to force a change in government policy or a change in government. Such power is reserved for the defence of democracy, and it is questionable how effective it would be to a government determined to usurp the rule of law, and govern without legitimacy. While the monarchy is an historical anachronism, a relic of a bygone age, it still serves a useful function of protecting the UK from the vicissitude of an elected term presidents, and the potential corruption of a permanent president. The purpose of the monarchy is to provide the continuity of having a head of state who is above politics and has no reason to become embroiled in political or financial corruption. It is said, for good reason, that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, so there is good reason to have a head of state with no day to day political power. They are the referee who enforces the rules of democracy, and can represent the state no matter what the political flavour of the current government might be. Governments come and go, but the monarchy preserves long term continuity, representing the permanence of the state, untainted by any nefarious activities of the most recent government. In that respect they represent the innocent of the UK people. It is not an ideal system, but it is significantly better than the alternatives. It is however dependent on having a monarch with integrity who is beyond reproach. The UK has been extremely luckily in that respect over the past 70 plus years, we must pray that our luck continues. Those who call for the abolition of the monarchy have really not thought through what the alternative would be, and the consequence that might arise as a result.
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  2971.  @eedragonr1576  the whole of the EU military is tiny in comparison to that of the US. The US budget is huge and has been for decades. That is decades of military R&D. There is no doubt that some EU countries could produce nuclear weapons given time, but there is a significant difference with having the capability of developing the weapons and already having a fully developed arsenal with a range of weapons from small handheld devices to ICBMs. I doubt if many EU countries would have this level of commitment. It might be true that the end f the cold war has blunted US resolve. We no longer live with the threat of nuclear annihilation at twenty minutes notice. In practice, nuclear weapons were never intended to be used, they are a deterrent. Unfortunately this deterrent is used to back up more conventional warfare, escalating from conventional explosives, through to chemical and biological WMD, to the ultimate thermonuclear weapons. Without this full range of capabilities an army would be forced to backdown when facing by foe with the full range of weapons at their disposal. In short to deter Russian or Chinese aggression it is necessary to match their capabilities to the point where further power becomes irrelevant. In effect nothing happens because both sides know it will end in mutually assured destruction. It becomes a virtual test of strength. It will be decades before the EU military reaches a state where its strength is sufficient to deter potential aggressor. That assumes that the EU member states are willing to waste so much money and energy to achieve this level of military fitness and maintain it. Consider a scenario, Russia or China make territorial demands, annexing once independent areas, in the case of China say in the South China sea or Taiwan. What is the EU going to do about it? Suppose North Korea decides to invade the south, who will stop them, given NK has a nuclear arsenal. Such attacks do not happen, because of the virtual power play that results from US overwhelming military power. When Russia invaded Crimea, what could the EU do other than raise political objections and impose sections. EU troops on ground would have been forced into a hasty retreat. If the US had a base close by, I doubt if Russia would have chanced its hand. I agree that the US has degraded its deterrent effect by showing itself to be fallible in so many small conflicts, something that Putin is taking advantage of at the moment. But I doubt if would have been attacked if the Ukraine had it been in NATO, with NATO troops on the ground, the risk of escalation would have been too great.
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  2995.  @aldwim661  one of the problems have had defending Brexit is the deplorable UK government's the UK has suffered over the years. Many of the decisions taken by the Westminster parliament are more in line with those you would expect from an occupant force. It is certainly a case of one rule for them and another for everyone else. This is summed up by do as I say, not as I do. One only needs to look at the pay, holiday and pension arrangements for MPs or the indefensible house of lords, where they think it's ok to claim a daily £530 just for attending. This has not changed throughout the UK membership of the EU, implying EU membership is not a solution to the inequity. In general the UK has a law abiding population that has been trained over the centuries to show deference to the "ruling class". In the past this was justified by the inequity of educational opportunities between the classes, resulting in the mistaken view of the majority that " they know best", something which history will show to be untrue. Future governments should be aware that migration may have changed the demographic to the point where violent revolution is more likely, as the UK has imported people with far less respect for government. The rise of the surveillance Society, increased control of the media, and an increase in oppression is the response to the risk of a popular uprising. Unlike other countries, the ruling class has had centuries to perfect its grip on government. It was once said that the only difference between the USSR and the British government, was that in Russia they shoot dissidence, in the UK they simply ignore them, the latter being far more effective means of control. Things will need to become very bad indeed for the placid UK population to take to the streets with the intent of removing or even executing the ruling class. Part of the problem is that those in government are not the faces of those who are in control. Maybe the closet the UK ever came to revolution in recent times was the Brixton riots, but even there the ambition of the rioters did not extend beyond burning a few shops and stealing some televisions. They lack the imagination and ideological drive of say the French. Maybe it is the cold climate. The last time we destroyed the establishment was following the English civil war, and then we only managed to cut off the head of a king.
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  3004. aleksander suur globalisation does not benefit the majority, it benefit the super rich elite that makes money from facilitating the trade between the rich regions of the world and the poor. The elite take the bulk of the profits by exploiting this wealth differential. That is why the wealth of the world is being concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer people. The old weather of the decadent western nations is being transferred to the poor parts of the world in exchange for products made in low wage factories. The poor nations get slightly richer, but their environments suffer. The bulk of the money is syphoned off by the super rich who own the coorporations that own the factories the mines and the plantations that make the products the west imports. As the old money in the western countries are used up, they spiral into debt because they are addicted to the cheap goods that support the life style to which they have become accustomed. The western nations cannot compete with the low wage economies, they are simply priced out of the market. The EU is a microcosm of this global trade scam. The trade wars we are starting to see are a reaction to the effects of globalisation. It is the reason the US and UK are in so much debt, they above all others embraced the free trade philosophy where everything is for sale. The idealistic liberal elite welcomed globalisation because they saw the slight improvements in the wealth of the poor nations and because it fitted in with the idea of one world working together. What they did not understand was the damage that was being done to the environment and the earth's resilience to recover from natural disasters.. That also failed to attribute globalisation to the growing wealth gap between the super rich elite and the rest of the population. In the west, resentment is growing, hence the emergence of extreme political parties. The liberal ideas of creating codependence to eliminate wars is a flawed concept, it is creating the very conditions for conflict and violent revolution. One must assume the super rich have made contingency plans for the coming apocalypse, presumably they have luxury bunkers around the world in which to hide. One must wonder why they are not exercising some level of control to overt disaster, my guess is that greed is there main motivation and the pursuit of power. A one world government is not the goal of the super rich. Money cannot be made when everyone is equally poor. Globalisation only works if there are wealth differentials to exploit, so the world is being divided into large power blocks that will be played off against each other, the EU, US, Russia, China with Africa and the Middle East becoming their battle field play ground.
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  3045.  @pcuimac  that will simply not happen. Public transport is far too inefficient to act as a replacement. Car ownership may be reduced as more people work from home, an idea that was rejected by businesses for decades. Autonomous taxi services may provide a substitute in some cases, but again it is inefficient because of the number of such vehicles required to meet the potential demand. The advocates for public transport do not understand the difficulties of using it, and invariable have good reasons why they should be exempt from such rules. Try carrying the weekly shop on a bus. It is necessary to travel very light if you wish to be a passenger on such a service. Cambridge, uk, has a regular bus service, but most of the busses travel most of their route with only a few passengers. Until recently, these buses were diesel powered, and belched out thick black smoke, while block the flow of car traffic. There was nothing more annoying than being stuck behind one of these busses, badly parked at a stop, while a passenger loaded with cases negotiated with the bus driver for ten minutes. Unless the public transport service is running in a big city, it is simply uneconomic to run a reliable timely service that can be used for regular commutes to and from work. It is ridiculous that the NHS expects hospital patients to travel to and from hospital by public transport. In order to optimise the bus service, the route invariable take it through all the bus stops in the surrounding villages, turning a 20 minute trip hospital into a two and half hour journey or more journey, bad enough for a healthy person, completely unendurable for people with serious illness or injuries. The last thing a cancer patient wants is repeated long bus trips, and yet the definition of what qualifies for special transport, often does not include such regular trips.
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  3061.  @buzzhawk  I have certainly advocated a second referendum over May's deal or a general election. May's deal is worse that no deal or a second referendum. A general election decides nothing regarding brexit, as the result may be determined by local issues unrelated to brexit and all vote do not count equally. The result of a second referendum is not a foregone conclusion in favour of remain. The is a 50:50 chance that it will only confirm the result of the last referendum. However, should it result in a vote to remain it contains a number of advantages for he brexiteers. First it sets a precedent for holding a third referendum at a later date, when the UK may be better prepared to leave. Second it further calls into question EU democratic credentials, fairly or unfairly, a second referendum will be seen as the EU engineering repeatedly asking the UK electorate the same question until it gets the answer it wants. Thirdly, it will put 17.4 million citizens back in the EU who do not want to be there and will be seeking the destruction of the EU. Forthly, it puts the UK back exactly where it started, but now with a far more Eurosceptic population, who will have noted how the EU operates in blackmailing and coercing member states. The EU negotiating style will have won no friend in the UK. The EU must expect the election of a troublesome Eurosceptic UK government and even more Eurosceptic MEPs. Lastly, it will give the UK the chance to block any further EU plans for greater integration or the formation of an EU army. So the only possible loss for the brexiteers is if Mrs May's deal is ratified by the UK parliament. While very unlikely, it is not impossible. Then you might see similar scenes as those recently experienced in France and other states across the EU. Brexit will still not be settled. It is convenient for the EU establishment to divide the protestors into left and right and play them off against each other, while denying that they really are protesting against EU policies. In each member state a common theme of protest against the local state government is the impression of austerity measures, but these measures can be traced directly back to EU policy to make the EU competitive with third world economies, which are attacking the European market through globalisation. This is an example of globalisation reducing all the world's economies to the lowest common denominator. It could be argued that economic migration to Europe is just another manifestation of this effect.
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  3063.  @nickatanassov104  even in ancient Greece, democracy was limited, but I agree that democracy is an illusion in most, if not all, countries. For some there is a pretence of democracy ,as in China , but other just do not bother. The larger the state, the greater is the dilution of the weight of the individual's vote, ( Another reason to leave the EU). Referendums are far more democratic than elections. In the former case,Irish a single issue vote and every vote counts equally. In the latter case, certainly in the UK, most votes make no difference because of the regional control exercised by the two main political parties. Proportional representation improve the power of the individual's vote, but at the cost of not being able to select their representative. Elections are also decided on many issues, given the winner the opportunity to select which policies in the party manifesto to emphasise and which to quietly ignore. In the UK the elected candidate is not the representative of the electorate, but represents his or her party, and must follow the party line, often against the interests of the constituents. So I agree that there is little real democracy, but what make the situation worse is that must governments are riddled with vested self interest and corruption and serve a small super rich ruling elite. If here is any hope is that wealth is also an illusion and can disappear if the mass of the people refuse to recognise it, something that might give the super rich a few sleepless nights.
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  3105.  @Soordhin  yes the EU is changing, but in the completely wrong direction. Almost all economists agree the euro zone is unstable because of its lack of central financial control. One of the drivers to federalisation is the need to stabilise the euro zone. The purpose of a federal government is to impose fiscal control on all member states, making it impossible for them to adopt policies of self interest. This is really bad news for the Germans, as they do very nicely out of the current system. All understand that federalisation will result in a significant loss of sovereignty and cultural identity. Many are not willing to take that step. Macron sees the path to controlling the EU in Frances military advantage, not being able to compete with German economic power, hence the push for an EU military. There is little doubt that French military ambitions will get the EU into serious trouble in the medium to long term. When the EU was formed as the common market, the governments of the member states were in control. Slowly as the federal project has developed, power has shifted to the EU civil service and the unelected eurocrats. As there power grows the EU becomes every more undemocratic, with the EU parliament rubber stamping the policies made by the commissioners. The more dictatorial the EU becomes the more the resentment grows among the populations of the member states. It is this that has resulted in the growth of the extreme parties, essentially as the eurocrats refuse to listen, the populous becomes more frustrated and shouts louder and becomes more extreme in their views. Then there is the little matter of migration. I suspect that the EU has used the oppertunity provided by the migrant crisis to dilute the cultural differences between member states with the migrant population. It is EU policy to do everything in its power to bind the member states together by forcing co-dependence and suppress the cultural differences that might otherwise lead to conflict. I am sure the ambition is for the EU to be a monoculture with national loyalties replaced with a single loyality to the EU super state. Unfortunatly it has not worked, as the migrant arrival has further accelerated the rise of nationalist feelings. There is much that can be written about the folly of dumping a large number of ill educated, and therefore unemployable, adult migrants from alien cultures into the EU population. It is reasonable to assume among this number will be militants and extremists. This does not bode well for a stable civilised society, particularly when unemployment is already very high in the EU, with the unskilled facing the greatest difficult in finding work due to advances in industrial technology. Essentially the migrants are likely not to integrate and form ghettos of unemployed resentment and crime. All the above suggests the EU is not the stable utopia you would like us to believe, but is at real risk of falling apart. (You will note that I have not mentioned brexit.)
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  3106.  @Soordhin  to start other the end. The UK people were lied too when they voted to join the common market. The bit about ever closer union was not mentioned. A few knew the real consequences and voted against joining, as I did. The proof of this treachery was recently revealed by the declassification of the foreign office document FCO 30/1048. This treachery continues to this very day. You repeatedly hold me personally responsible for the treasonous europhilic policies of our current government with all its vested interests. Mrs May is so keen on ingratiating herself with Macron that she has commited UK armed forces to work as mercenaries for the French. For a long time financial vested interests have resulted in the UK speaking loudly while carrying an stick of every reducing size. The exact opposite of Roosevelt doctrine. Like the EU, the UK has an elite class that works for its own interest only. This goes some way to explain why the UK joined the common market, that and the failure of the UK to recover after WWII. In some part the result of the UK government's failure to insist that Germany pay Britain war reparations. To some extent, brexit is a fight against the elites of both the EU and those in the UK establishment. So many bad uk government decisions can only be explained by assuming that vested interest of an elite few played a part, since that level of gross incompetence seems so unlikely. The EU will break up because it serves the same corrupt vested interests that pervade the UK system.
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  3107.  @Soordhin  you are of course completely wrong and have read into my words thing that are not there. There was a conspiracy among the political classes to get the UK into the common market by any means. Those involved were well aware of the intention to turn the common market into a federal super state, but the information was not provided to the uk public, and any talk of a super state was played down with the preferred reference to a "free trade club". It must be remembered that this all predated the internet, where information about such things is very difficult to suppress. This is not some imagined memory on my part, the details of the conspiracy were recently made public in a declassified UK foreign office document of the time that very accurately forecast what has happened over the last 50 years, ref FCO 30/1048. The Irish question is a red herring, as it is being used by both the EU and those who want a united Ireland. Ironically neither the Irish government or the EU really want a united Ireland at this time, as neither wants the liability it represents. It is just being used as a tool to keep the UK within the EU costume union and therefore under EU control. The factions that conspired to make the UK join the common market still exist and are behind the much of the organised remain campaign. With regard to the UK voting system. Attempts have been made to reform it by converting to some form of proportional representation system, but this was rejected in a referendum vote. The argument being that proportional representation was the system used to get Hitler elected in Germany. A far better reform would be the abolition of the feudal undemocratic house of lords, replacing it with a house of elected people's representatives outside political party control.
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  3108.  @Soordhin  give thst there was a conspiracy in the uk the population did not have much choice inthe mattrr of joining the common market. Much has been made of the alleged mis selling of brexit to the UK public. But far more information was made available this time, then was provided when we joined the common market. There may in fact be a connection between the mis selling then and now. In the former case the government was all in favour of joining the CM, playing down any possibility that it might lead to a federal Europe. This time the government issued a booklet to every household, making dire warnings about leaving the EU. This time the UK public did not believe them. With regard to the UK political system, elections are about many issues, leaving the winning party the opportunity to Interpret the wishes of the electorate anyway it has to bias it. The first past the post party system means that most seats are safe and play no part in deciding which party forms a government. The electorate do not really vote for a candidate, they vote for a party manifesto, which covers a wide range of issues both local and national. The manifestos can be loaded so that the electorate are tricked into voting for an important issue close to their heart's, such as the NHS, while simultaneously voting for a much less popular issue such as supporting the EU. It is only in a referendum that the will of the people is expressed without ambiguity, which is why the politicians hate them, and why we have so few. The succinct nature of the referendum question dose not allow the electorate to express a view about how their answer is to be implemented. In the brexit case, this was the ambiguity the politicians were seeking, providing the wiggle room to do as they liked. I am not surprised that you support a hard brexit, you are clearly a member of the group that wants the UK to be punished. The only reason that this is even possible is because of the insidious way the EU has positioned itself as legal arbiter of international standards and professional organisations. An area that should have been above EU control in a truly international court where all those subject to its decisions are also automatically represented. But the EU runs a closed shop in these matters. Without a deal the EU is certainly likely to suffer equally with the UK. Philosophically it should be pointed out that that which does not destroy us, makes us stronger. The UK will undoubtedly suffer a hard few years, but the EU may come to regret the creation of a vengeful competitor. A hard brexit will put the UK beyond EU control.
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  3160.  doni i  during WW2 the russian state took a duplicitous path. First signing a non aggression pack with NAZI Germany, and then switching sides when attacked by the Germans. After the war russia switched again, with a military standoff with the western allies. I do not think russia today can play the victim, it is far more likely that russia will attack Germany than the other way round. That said, both are very unlikely unless brought about by Russian attempts to occupy the former soviet satellite countries in europe. Should the eu manage to acquire its own military forces, Germany might be emboldened to defend against any russian advance into such satellite countries, by leading a combined EU military force. Certainly the power of NATO is currently waning, due to the weakness and loss of engagement of the US resulting from the actions of the Trump administration. Any war between Russia and Germany will be the result of expansionist actions of either Russia or the EU. I believe that if the eu already possessed its military force at the time of the Russian invasion of Crimea, the EU and Russia would have been involved in military conflict. Since any EU military will lack cohesion for years to come, any such conflict will most likely drag a reluctant NATO into the conflict once the Russian forces start to advance into Europe. There can be little doubt that an newly formed EU military force would be no match against russian forces, unless backed up by US military power. Fortunately, the formation of the destabilising EU military seems more far off now then in any time over the past few years. One must hope that Russia does not attempt to take advantage of this latency, since any such action might reinvigorate the NATO giant, particularly as the trump administration is on the way out.
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  3170.  @martinnolan4800  I am sorry, I do not see the EU as a democracy. Its intention is to become a plutocratic super federal state. Power has already shifted away from the member states towards eurocratic control. With the former masters now being forced to follow the rules of their servants. Structurally the EU is set up to serve the interests of big business and the multinationals. To easy social pressures it must suppress the cultures of the local member states to produce a monoculture. Federalisation is essential to control, not easy, the pressures that result from a diverse set of economies in the euro zone. The EU is bound together by co-dependent trade relationships which inefficiently force manufacturing supply chains to criss-cross Europe. Not really surprising, as the progenitor of the EU was designed to make war between member states impossible as a result of such co-dependence. The EU is now a microcosm of the global economy, where globalisation allows the super rich to exploits the wealth differentials between regions, manufacturing in the poor areas and selling to the rich, with the bulk of the profits from this trade being pocketed by the super rich few. Hence the growing wealth gap between the super rich and the rest. It is this trade that is destroying the environment, as the human race uses a year's worth of the world's resources in a few months. The EU is engineered to perpetuate this system. The well publicised and over hyped environmental good that it does is more than outweighed by the hidden damage that its systems perpetuate, and must continue to perpetuate as it strives for ever higher GDP growth. I firmly believe a more sustainable system is small independent states operating as self sufficiently as possible, only trading raw material that geology and geography deny them, in exchange for the surplus produce that their economies generate. This greatly shortens the supply chains and makes human society far more resilient to existential threats, since it creates diversity and duplication. This does not preclude the sharing of knowledge or cooperation in areas of mutual advantage, such as climate change. The one side fits all system has repeatedly been shown to fail, and results in bigger failures because they are implemented on a far larger scale. Current the EU is empire building, and we all know the long term fate of empires.
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  3217. I really want Ukraine to push the Russians out of Ukraine. It is a just war for Ukraine, however there must be concerns that Putin is being pushed into a corner, from which he can only lash out with WMD. It has been obvious sometime that Putin cannot win a conventional war with Ukraine so long as the West is supplying modern weapons in quantity. This leaves Putin with few options, he is either defeated or uses nuclear or chemical weapons. He could use his considerable missile stock pile to destroy Ukrainian cities, killing untold numbers of civilians, but such a tactic will not win the war for him, and will attract world condemnation without the shock impact of using a nuclear bomb. The world, most likely including China, will condemn Russia if it uses a nuclear weapon. So Putin might still lose his war and be completely isolated from the world. So Chinese reaction to the uses of such a weapon is critical, as there is little that India would sever its relations with Russia if it committed such a war crime. India has good reasons to want to keep nuclear weapons as a deterrent only. The US will react to Russia using nuclear weapons, but the Russian nationalists extremists that surround Putin are not looking beyond winning the Ukrainian war. Thus it seems likely that Putin will cross the line and use a nuclear weapon, most likely in the annexed regions, and on Ukrainian troop concentrations. The only thing that will prevent this is Putin being removed from power by factions in the Kremlin. Putin is clearly a mad psychopath with serious delusions and paranoia. It is ironic that before the war, no one was out to get him, now his paranoia has some justification.
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  3229.  @oldcremehelian3708  you are deluded if you think federalisation will add strength. You only need to look at other federal systems to see the problems this will bring. Examples such as the former USSR or the current problems in the US. The clue is in the misnomer of the first letter, U for united. Strength is in the diversity of the many independent sovereign states coming together, where their interests coincide, not in a forced amalgamation which just create internal tension and a bigger external target. If the EU gets its own military, it will not be long before it is at war with one of the other big blocks. The eu has imperial ambitions, maybe seeing its self as the seed for a world government. Unfortunately for the eu, this ambition is shared by the other big power blocks. In order to survive the eu must suppress the identity of the member states, which a recipe for internal tension, the only way to contain this pressure is by becoming increasingly autocratic. I suggest you read some Orwell to see the future of the EU. Leaving will not guarantee freedom freedom from eu rules. The eu is a cowardly bully,that likes to impose its rules on those it sees as weaker,like poor Switzerland or even the UK. The EU has taken unto itself the guardianship of what were once international regulations agreed between equal independent sovereign states. Now these regulations are set by the eu, may be the first grab at world government. You are the proverbial turkey, voting for Christmas, because of all the good things it will bring to eat.
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  3246.  @SlickVoyager  it is not the membership fee that is the issue, it is the trade deficit. The fee just adds insult to injury. Simply looking at the economic position, the UK has no future within the EU. The total cost of being the EU is £100 billion per year. The UK government has had forty plus years of membership to address the costs and has failed to do so, partly as a result of EU laws and directives that make this impossible. If the political future of the EU is taken into account, the majority of the UK population has no appetite for greater EU integration or the EU super state that it is intended to produce. The EU already has a reputation for a lack of democracy and endemic corruption. Many of those who voted to leave see the dystopian future ahead of the EU and want no part in it. I doubt if the UK will be any more diminished by leaving than it will be by being subsumed into the EU super state. Even if it is, it may result in the UK being less involved in the world's wars, requiring its military only to defend its shores. Once the EU has its own military, it will only be a matter of a few years before it will be involved in major conflict, which is very likely to lead to its destruction. If not destroyed by existential threats, the EU is very likely to succumb to internal rebellion as a result of the oppression it will be forced to apply to hold it's empire together. This is the fate of all empires as has been repeatedly shown by history. Extricating the UK from the EU parasite is going to be a painful process, something that would have been a lot less painful had we had a referendum before the Maastricht treaty was signed by our treasonous government. The UK's future is by no means certain after brexit, but at least it has the possibility of being much better than that which it faced within the EU. The EU future is still unfolding, but it is going to become increasingly bleak, hopefully we in the UK will not be part of it.
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  3279. @TheFastAndThe Dead I think you will find that in the EU Scotland will be required to pay for everything, including its sewage system. Tell me are the products made in England any better distinguished than those made in Scotland, I don't think so, both are part of the GDP of the UK. If we are just talking about labels, Scottish whiskey is identified as such because it is a selling point. I think you are applying a victim culture that can just as easily be applied to England or Wales. I will leave out NI because they too lime to play the victim and thus have their came and eat it. The brexit referendum was voted on by individuals with every vote counting equally, as such it was probably the most democratic vote the uk has ever had. What you are pointing out is that there were regional veriations, on that basis London should be applying for independence and rejoining the EU. The Scots make much of devolved powers, but where is the devolved powers for England? Where is the devolved English parliament? It has suited the Scots and the other nations in the UK, to ignore the West Lothian question, allowing the other nations to have a say in English affairs not reciprocated in theirs. The Scots wanted devolved powers, but they still want the uk grant. More money is spent per capita in Scotland than in England, and then the English money is concentrated in London. The Scots have always claimed they are poorly represented in Westminster, but how Scots have held the two highest offices in the uk government? If having a Scottish PM or Chancellor cannot fix it for Scotland then I do not know what can. Before jumping back into the EU, assuming the eu will let you, it might be worth considering what the eu has dine for the uk economy for the past forty plus years. If we remove the creative accounting that measures uk success by the value of foreign imports we sell to each other, the eu has been slowly ducking the life out of the uk economy, Scotland included. Do you really want to rejoin this parasite? Do you think tiny little Scotland will do any better. It is likely that Scotland will only be allowed to rejoin the eu if it is a net contributor to the eu budget, so the parasite will continue to feed.
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  3306.  @mattthorn4789  FYI, legally the EU did not exist until 2009, when the EC ,or common market, became the EU. There are many ways of drawing the political spectrum, but the circle explains why, for all practical purposes, far right dictatorships are indistinguishable from far left dictatorships. The all involve an oppression, autocratic, and violent government that rules through fear. The governments are invariable a corrupt kleptocracy of oligarchs, with one rule for them and another for everyone else. The central character, is invariable the beloved leader, who is a megalomaniac, obsessed with power and the acquisition of personal wealth. I do not accept your analysis that liberal and conservative are at right angles to the circle, I would place them at the 90 degree positions in opposition to each other. The liberals identify with the left, degenerating from socialism through to communism. The conservatives move towards fascism via a route that takes them through an extreme for of capitalism. I would reserve the circle at right angles to the political spectrum for religious politics, dividing Christianity from islamism. The reasons for selecting these two religions, rather than any others, is simply because of their political dimension through history. This is nothing more than a model, but it is a useful one. You are correct when you suggest it could be expanded into a sphere, to encompass other social extremes. If up and down is assigned to the sphere, then I would place true democracy at the top, and the convergence of dictatorships at the bottom. This places true democracy in the unstable top position, where any deviation to left or right places the society on the slippy slopes to the bottom. Democracy is inherently unstable, because it can be given away by a cross on a ballot paper, where as to escape from any of the perversions of dictatorship usually requires a civil war, with lots of blood and suffering. It is interesting that sime of the most oppressive regimes, like to label themselves as democratic, and have people in their title. As in the peoples democratic republic of .... Returning to the subject in hand, the eu is not there yet, but it is a long way down the slippy slope, and is willfully trudging in a downward direction.
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  3307.  @mattthorn4789 in answer to your question, because legal incorporation of the three components did not happen until 2009. Please reread my post, I did not put conservatism and liberalism at 90 degrees to the circle, I put them at the 90 degree position on the circle, but their exact position is rather subjective, it depends on how intolerant the ideology. The point about a political spectrum is that it is a graduated scale, from one extreme to the other. My contention is that at the most extreme of left and right, they are practically indistinguishable in terms of policy. To answer your question, I consider Brazil to be both fascist and capitalist, I think I could have applied this to Chile, or any if the many military governments around the world, where the generals rule as a result of a coup d'etat. It is interesting that at the extreme, governments can oscillate between being on the extreme left and right, alternating between the two as a result of successive revolutions, as an example consider Cuba. You are being obtuse in the misunderstanding of the reference to a sphere. I put Islam and Christianity on a circle at right angles to the political spectrum. You cannot argue that Islam and Christianity have not been at war. In american they talk about the religious far right, and Islam has a political dimension in the formation of governments based on a theocracy. It would be a mistake to confuse the religious ideological differences, I am only concerned with the political aspects of religion, where state and church coincide. Looking back into history, the Catholic church had its periods of extremism, where the church used the state to impose its views. Today there many examples of Islamic theocracies which fall close to the bottom of my defined circles, being authoritarian dictatorships. In confusing communism and capitalism, you are again being deliberately obtuse. Communism and capitalism are clearly opposits, but taken to extreme they converge from opposite directions, resulting in authoritarian dictatorships. The purpose of both is to serve a rich elite and maintain them in power. The USA is lurching in this direction,with a super rich elite that makes the laws to preserve their wealth and power. Had Trump remained in office, this would have become increasingly obvious. It certainly meet the criteria of being a kleptocracy, putting it close to the bottom of the political spectrum. If you want an example of the other extreme, look at China. The EU likes its acronyms, so confusion will ensue when the same letters are used for different meanings. With regard to EC, here is a clip from Wikipedia: (The European Economic Community (EEC) was a regional organization that aimed to bring about economic integration among its member states. It was created by the Treaty of Rome of 1957. Upon the formation of the European Union in 1993, the EEC was incorporated into the EU and renamed the European Community (EC). In 2009, the EC formally ceased to exist and its institutions were directly absorbed by the EU. This made the Union the formal successor institution of the Community.)
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  3334.  @habi0187  I think there was a golden age of German engineering with high quality medium size manufactures, but as you say they are disappearing, I suspect not as a result of generation changes, but simply because they are being priced out of the market, with high wages eating into the profit margin. If Elon Musk was cultivating German government support, we may see another high production factory being built in a much poorer sector of the EU or even outside it. Maybe Mr Musk needs some approval for his Space Program ? It is true that the UK appears to have lost out on this investment, but then I do not see foreign investment in the same way as you might. By definition, foreign investors expect to take out a lot more than they put in. It is a form of colonial exploitation. It will be interesting to see where the profits from this enterprise end up. The problem with modern day entrepreneurs is that they lack inherent national loyalty. In the past the UK entrepreneurs invested in foreign lands, but brought their profits home to fund industries in the UK. Now the super rich investor see themselves as citizens of the world and their nation of origin may not benefit from their activities. This is the true effect of globalisation. The EU is a huge market in which to sell, but not necessarily to buy or manufacture. The advantage of Its common standards outweigh the disadvantage of its tariff barriers. If the UK plays a clever hand post brexit, it will use higher and different UK standards to protect its home market while still selling into the EU market. This is what many EU politicians fear, and why there is so much talk about a level playing field in trade.
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  3350. It appears if you take the country to war based on a dodgy dossier, and cost the country lots of money and get its service men and women killed, you get away with it. If you serve food and drink after work, to boost the morale of No 10 staff, who are working long hours dealing with a national pandemic emergency you get sanctioned. It is worth asking, if the covid protection measures were not followed sufficiently well, why did the UK government not stop working as No10 staff all succumbed to a local epidemic? Were No10 staff so ignorant about the dangers of covid infection, that they were prepared to be reckless not only with their own lives, but also the friends and family? Did the virus male a distinction between the working day and the time shortly after. Only infecting staff after meetings had ended? Would those working at No 10, been so keen to work long hours, if some effort had not gone into making their working conditions a little more tolerable. It is understandable that those who were not allowed to visit loved ones dying in hospital of covid, should feel aggrieved at the percieved hypocracy of those in government who made the covid rules, might not have been following them to the letter. But the situations are not really comparable. Visiting someone severely infected with the virus is a very high risk of carrying the infection outside the hospital. Similarly bring together pale from diverse locations for social gatherings, even funerals, is a high risk of spreading the virus. Those working together all day do not greatly increase their risk of infection by spending a short time together after work, even if food and drink is involved. It is good management practice to do your best to improve the working conditions of your work force, if you are making great demands of them. It is pragmatic management to reduce stress. Boris Johnson may be guilty of many errors, but this is not one of them. Political opportunist are seeking to use poorly directed public anger at the pandemic to remove the former PM from politics. If such a sanction is to be applied, let it be for the right reasons, particularly as a former Labour government should have been subject to similar senture, for claims about iraq's weapons of mass destruction.
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  3392.  @r2ba435  as I said before politics really does not come into the matter. You could argue that it is the extreme right wing of the political spectrum that have a lot to lose by recognising the danger of climate change. They are the super rich with considerable investments in things like the fossil fuel industry. It is true the global climate has changed over the millions of years of the planet's existence, and there have been extremes of hot and cold, most linked to global extinction events. What has changed is the speed with which the climate is changing now. According to scientific data, temperatures have risen faster in the last 150 years than they have done in the previous several million years. As the planet ages and our sun gets older and hotter, the climate becomes increasingly unstable. The apparent stability of the planet's temperature is largely due to a complex web of feedback mechanisms that have evolved over the period of its existence. Biological life has been woven into these feedback networks. Human activity is eroding the phase and gain margins of these negative feedback systems to the point where they become positive. These are the so called tipping points that could result in the planet's climate switching rapidly into a new state. Life on this planet is not equipped to deal with such rapid changes and there is no guarantee that the new state will be compatible with any form of life. So your attude of burying your head in the sand and saying it is not my problem is illogical. Even if the changes were natural, which they are not ( based on overwhelming scientific evidence), it would be reasonable to do all that is possible to preserve the temperature stability of the climate, for as you point out the planet's climate has changed in the past and it has resulted in mass extinctions.
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  3411.  @230sergio  I take issue with a number of point you raise. First, Russia action in the Ukraine is illegal under international law and is not exactly a sign of friendship. You are being simplistic to equate international relations with personal relations. You can be friends with people from Russia, you cannot be friends with the Russia state. States do not have friends they have alliances, sometime with very unpleasant states, such as he Saudi regime. In the case of Russia, It's actions suggest it has an agenda. I suspect that Putin wants back the states that were under its control when it was the USSR. In the case of the Ukraine, it was attempting to protect a buffer between it and the west. I think the EU precipitated the war in the Crimea and Ukraine by attempting to extend its influence there. The EU quest to for. Its own military is at odds with your view it wants to be friend with everyone. What is it going to do with its own military? Either it is going to use it or it is a waste of tax payer money. I can spectate what it will be used for, it could be to keep internal order. It could be used, as the French want, to act as a police force to protect EU interests in Africa. The French certainly want it to further their imperial ambitions for the EU and cement their position as the titular leader of it. It could also be used in defence against Russia and Chinese expansionism. The Germans, who for so long were denied their own military force, know the financial advantages of not paying for your own defence, something the Japanese also learned post WWIi. This advantage will disappear if the EU exchanges NATO protection, based on US military power,for its own military. Once the EU has a military force, it will be required to use it to justify its cost, sooner or later the EU will be involved in an ill advised military adventure, that may lead it into a serious conflict with one or other of the big power blocks. Your comments about the potential of the US is interesting, because the fledgling EU super state is showing all the signs of evolving into the US of Europe, driven by the same financial ambitions that will see a few super rich haves ruling over a majority of disenfranchised have nots, a true undemocratic plutocracy. That brings me back to using the EU army to suppress insurrection.
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  3412.  @230sergio  not sure hat you man by privilege of people or law. When identifying conflicts between power blocks, you miss maybe the most obvious, hat between Russia and China. They have a history of such conflicts. I note your reservations about French intentions. But I suggest the France is using the departure of the UK from the EU to further its Imperial ambitions through its military power. With the departure of the UK, the French are currently the only nuclear power in the EU. This is the starting point for their bid to lead the EU. I believe that Macron has stated that he wants the EU army to act as a police force in Africa. It must be assumed that this is to protect extensive French interests in the continent. The French also want its military manufacturing industries to profit from supplying weapons to the rest of EU member states. It was the French that were determined to exclude the UK from access to the Galileo satellite network post brexit. This may yet back fire if the UK government goes ahead with developing their own system. The euro is a currency built on sand. Until there is true fiscal union of the euro zone with federal control of the economy, the currency will always be unstable. You assume hat Putin is only motivated by wanting to make Russia profitable, but just as Macron wants to be the next emperor Napoleon. Putin seem to have ambitions to be the next tsar of Russia. Both are empire building. I think Putin maybe motivated by the humiliation that he thinks Russia suffered when the USSR fell apart. Hence the need to put it back together again.
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  3425.  @yooscripts5947  no, it is gambling linked to greed, as are all the other coup d'etat that have happened in that region of Africa. Recently some posted that Africa was doing so well that westerners should not comment. But what is obvious is that greed and corruption is rife in Africa, and the majority are not doing well. The west is told to mind it's own business, except when it is providing the humanitarian aid that the ruling elite are too greedy to provide. It is likely that there will be war across Africa, and the arms dealers will again make a killing ( pun intended) supplying all sides with weapons. It has always amazed me that when food is in such short supply, due to high prices, there is always money to buy RPGs and AK47s. There are videos of heavily armed soldiers guarding the starving. We're I religious, I might begin to believe that we are in the end of days, and true evil has been unleashed on the world, but the rational can ascribe the nightmare mess the world is in to the pure greed of the superrich elite, who can never have enough wealth, whatever that is. Putin is the personification of evil, being motivated by greed and the quest for power. I have no doubt that the generals leading these government takeovers are corrupt. They will have Swiss numbered bank accounts, where their bribes will be deposited. Bribes for allowing the extraction of Africa's mineral wealth. Africa has always been riddled with corruption. It is why the leaders live in palaces surrounded by starving people. It is why the former breadbasket of Africa can no longer feed its people. Wars of rebellion against these injustices are regularly waged, but somehow they just result in one corrupt ruling elite being replaced by another.
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  3541. @Alessandro F. that assumes that all are entitled to a visa. If applying for and obtaining visa was just a formality, there would be no point having them. A visa would be a comp!Steph redundant document and there would be no restrictions on entry. This is equivalent of saying the the locks should be removed from every home. The harsh reality is that the Western nations have a right to say who can enter and how long they can stay. Rather they leave their country of origin, maybe they should try and improve them. Some migrants come to the west with a sense of entitlement and the intention to change the host nation government. By analogy, this is not only removing all the lock on home doors, but allowing anyone in who wants access, and then allowing them to totally change the décor. Migrants can not seek refuge in a host country and then demand it changes its culture to match theirs. Another point is that even life rafts have a limit on the number of people allowed onboard. Without these restrictions, the life boat sinks and everyone drowns. Some who come from broken countries played a part in breaking them. Are they then to be allowed to set up home in a new country and return to their old ways? There must be a distinction between an economic migrant and a true refugee. The latter have no choice but to seek shelter or they risk immediate death, as a result of war or natural disaster. The former and just not happy with their current circumstances and want to try their luck elsewhere. The fewer refugees the better, as then the host nation will have sufficient resources to school and integrate them into the host society with minimum social and economic disruption. A mass wave of economic migration will just spread destruction around the world. If you are looking for reasons for the migrant crisis, look no further than globalisation, crime and greed. It is the iniquity of globalisation that has allowed the poorer parts of the planet to be exploited and natural resources destroyed. It is the mis-functioning of the global economy that has allowed the world's wealth to be concentrated in a decreasing number of the hyper wealthy elite. It is corrupt governments, making unfair laws, that has allowed this to happen. All compounded by mediaeval superstition masquerading as religion, perpetuated by selfserving zealots.
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  3565.  @logik100.0  I am not a border, the very opposite, this makes it difficult to argue in these post as I cannot away immediately produce the FACTs that I used to form my opinion. You should consider why a business ceases to be viable. You want facts, the current relationship with the EU is not viable, it is slowly putting the UK into debt. The UK cannot sustain a £80 billion a year trade deficit. To fix this it is necessary to export more and import a lot less. This is difficult to do when your trading partner is setting the rules. Your ignorance of history is blinding you to what is possible. You are like the brain damaged people who have amnesia and cannot form new memories. You believe what you have been told because you have no memories of your own. EU membership has proved toxic for the UK, like some recreational drug, the EU has made some parts of the UK feel good for a short time, but the cumulative effect on the whole of the UK has been negative, and before you say where's you proof, consider the last forty years of membership with the slow destruction of UK industry and it's growing dependence on debt. Some farmers may be doing well out of EU regulation and the CAP. But what about all the others who have been forced to give up. It is a nonsense if you believe importing fruit and vegetables from Europe is better than growing our own. The fens were once a source of pears, apples, strawberries, carrots, cabbage, potatoes, among many other fruits and vegetables. Now the local out of town super market, built on productive farmland, sells the same but imported from France, Italy and Portugal, to name but a few. All this stuff, cost the country as the money is exported into Europe rather than remain in the UK economy. To be successful, it must first meet its own demand and then export the surplus. Now you will say this is a UK government problem, which is partly true, however the EU have facilitated bad management of the UK economy. We cannot continue to do what we have been doing and expect something to change.
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  3566.  @mrspone1000  according to an interview with a farmer's representative on the BBC today. The reason we do not produce sufficient food is because we are not allowed too, we are limited by EU quotas. While I cannot verify this it seems likely, as EU policy is to foster co-dependence between states in order to bind them together. It is one of the reasons why industrial supply chains are spread across the continent. It is clearly not efficient to transport components back and forth over great distances as the parts are assembled. As I have pointed out before, it does not help uk farming productivity to have so much productive farm land buried under concrete, a process that has been going on for years. The UK needs the ability to protect its home markets and the farmers that supply them. This is not possible while the UK is in the EU, where farmers are told what they are allowed to produce, typical example is sugar. I am really not interested in providing benefits to French or Italian farmers. The UK needs to only buy what it cannot produce. If, as you say, UK farmers cannot produce all the UK eats, then all UK farm production should supply the local market first. This at least would reduce the amount we import. There is a very good chance that climate change is going to shake up the farming industry over the next few years, far more than brexit ever will. The important point is that the UK economy must be rebalanced to bring it back into profit. This is only possible outside the EU, if it were otherwise we would have already done it.
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  3583.  @peabase  the republic of Ireland is most definitely a puppet of the EU, something made clear by the Irish freedom party. It was obvious that the NI protocol was not going to be accepted by the loyalists. It is also the case that the EU sort to use the NI issue as a means to frustrate a brexit which freed the UK from EU control. It is also on record that the EU would seek to punish the UK for having the temerity to leave, and the terms of the NI protocol reflect this. Well the EU as well as the UK must now deal with the consequences of attempting to divide off NI from the rest of the UK. So much attention was paid to the nationalist militants threats of a return to violence if there was a land border, no one bothered to consider the possible loyalist reaction to a sea border, that looks so much like a precursor to defacto reunification. Something the EU chose to ignore when negotiating the NI protocol. Brexit cannot be made the scapegoat for the return to violence in NI, the UK was exercising it's legal right to leave the EU after a democratic referendum of all its citizens, on the basis of a single issue vote, with every vote counting equally. The UK cannot b held hostage of the EU due to the action of a tiny minority of militants from either side of the NI religious and political divide. It no doubt suited the EU to force trade between NI and the UK to NI and the EU, whilst expecting the UK to continue to support NI financially. This fits the goal of punishing the UK for leaving the EU. Well the EU may yet get more trouble that it had bargained, if the loyalists in NI make the sea border control unworkable. The EU may expect the US to exert pressure on the UK, but I doubt if Irish diaspora in America will be keen to see UK troops back on the streets of NI, and that maybe the only way the UK has to keep the sea border under control. The political option of holding the UK inside the EU customs border is not an acceptable solution, no matter how much the EU tries to engineer it.
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  3587.  @peabase  it does not go without saying. Mays backstop was rightly rejected, because it was an EU attempt to turn the UK into a vassal state of the EU, forcing it to remain in the customs union and therefore forced to adopt EU trade rules, without any say. The EU has used the WA to try and separate the UK from NI, or rather separate NI trade from the UK while allowing the UK to continue providing financial support to NI. The WA was badly managed by the UK, largely due to the europhile, sycophantic views, of Mrs May. A prime minister who jumped even before the EU asked, the negotiation style of Mrs May was that of someone agreeing to a surrender, not someone standing up for the UK. The WA should never have been signed, and the divorce payment should never have been agreed. Given how much time was wasted by Mrs May and how much she had already conceded, and the selfserving EU fifth column operating in both the UK civil service and the UK parliament, Boris was left with little choice but to sign the WA, but there are sufficient loopholes in it to provide significant room for the UK to circumvent much of it,as with the brexit deal and the NI protocol. It's possible that the militant loyalist reaction was calculated into the equation, since it was obvious to any observer that the NI protocol would rapidly become unworkable, and the GFA had already been effectively breached by the actions of the nationalist paramilitaries. Heads of EU member states, notable Macron, had made it clear that the UK should b punished for leaving the EU, and the negotiations that followed showed that to be the case. As I said the NI protocol was designed to separate the rest of the UK from NI trade. However the last thing the EU or the republic of Ireland wants is Irish reunification, as this would not only shift NI financial and political liability onto the republic, and hence the EU, but also completely free the UK for the EUs most powerful blackmailing tool. No doubt the EU still thinks that the UK can be forced into the EU customs union by the border issue. This could backfire, if NI holds a referendum on reunification, as either way the vote goes, it will be bad for the EU. As it is the EU is effectively dependent on the UK to solve its leaking border issue. As anticipated, the UK news papers today reported that British special forces have now been deployed to NI, presumably to show that the UK is protecting the sea border, as demanded by the EU. This will defuse any possible criticism that the UK is not meeting its obligations under the NI protocol, however this very action will only inflame the militants on both sides of the political divide, and by implication place the blame on the details of the NI protocol agreement, and thus the EU. What the UK government is not considering, is the EU preferred option of the rest of the UK joining the EU customs union. So this is not exactly win for EU strategy. Far from following the EU's Machiavellian plan, the next likely step is likely to be engineering a reunification vote. In theory this can only be initiated by the people of NI, but the effects of the trade barriers of the sea border, will likely reduce UK financial support for NI, and make life difficult there, as it already has. The EU either reconsiders the details of the NI protocol, or risk growing resentment among the population there. The only other strategy open to the EU, is to preferentially offer support to NI, to assuage the problems its policies have produced. I don't think, in the current economic climate, that will go down well with the many of the EU member states, with maybe the exception of the republic. What the EU will not be able to do is force world opinion to back the UK joining the EU customs union, as this is clearly not what a independent sovereign state should do.
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  3659. Darlene Sjostrom what you regard as glaringly obvious may be the result of fevered paranoia. I do not have sufficient evidence to draw any real conclusions, I am speculating based on the published information and the political history. This generates many possible scenarios of different probabilities. I was reluctant to concede that this could be a false flag operation because: A) the risks of such an action backfiring were too high. B) the outcomes were to unpredictable to be of value. C) the potential gains for a third party were so small. On thinking about it, the UK military and espionage services could potentially gain from such an operation, with a reasonable chance of success. There funding has been cut to the bone in recient budgets, this is a potential fund raiser. Such an operation could not be sanctioned by the government, as they are the ones authorising the cuts, so this would need to be organised deep in the security services. Given the departmental organisation of government this plot would have serious difficulties to overcome, not least the procurement of the poison agent used. There is little doubt it is a version of the Russian nerve agent, as for the plot to work those investigating the event would need to have no knowledge of the plot itself and be convinced of its origin in ruesia.. One reason for obstructing the supply of samples of the agent to russia might be because it's chemical structure differs from that of the genuine Russian WMD. It is reported that Western experts know the basic structure of the poison but not the details of the Russian compound. Their are variants and the poison may well work with different side chain chemicals attached, maybe as a result of the manufacturing process or engineered to facilitate delivery or stability. The Russians would be able to identify such differences and know if they made it. There is the arguement that they would deny manufacture no matter what, making the supply of samples pointless. The UK might also argue that it gives too much information away about their detection capability. I note the comment about the proximity to Porton Down being suspiciously convenient. But Porton is highly regulated and open to international inspection, making it unlikely to be the place for manufacture in such a plot. However, it could be argued it is an ideal investigator. I suggest this plot scenario, not because I believe it, but because I am willing to admit it's possibility. The UK being a small country, I do not think its security/espionage departments are sufficiently large to contain a hidden sub group with the caperbilities to carry out such a plot. Appling Occam's razor, Russian still seems the most likely culprit.
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  3711.  Francisco Martinez I maintain there is little to distinguish between the extreme left and right, both are fascist by the definition of the word. Rather than there being a linear spectrum of political views from left to right, I view it more as a circle, where the extremes meet head on at the opposite side of a circle to the liberal middle. This is because it is very difficult to distinguish between the actions of a left wing dictatorship from that of a right wing dictatorship. In both cases there is a ruling elite with a sense of entitlement that allows them to live in luxury while their people starve. It is a truism that any state with democratic in its name is anything but. The same rule tends to apply to socialist. Are we fighting against Muslim nations?? I think if we are fighting anything it is an extreme religious ideology with violent intolerance built in. The west's attitude towards Muslim nations is conflicted by money, leading to a very poor choice of friends, for example Saudi Arabia as opposed to Iran. On the friendship scale, neither have much to commend them, but the latter could be argued to be the least extreme and oppressive, unfortunately they lack the wealth of the former. Both hold the west, or rather its values, in contempt. What is strange is that so many from Muslim states wish to migration to places that they hate and hold in such contempt. The refugees always seem to want to migrate to the evil, liberal, decadent west, never to the more religious Muslim countries. Now why is that?
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  3885. Paul Aiello you do not say how the EU solution is any different from the US solution. I agree that China plans strategically, however that was not what I consider their main advantage but also their main disadvantage. China is effectively a dictatorship, this means that it is unnecessary to consider objections raised by the people. It was once said that the only difference between the USSR and the UK, was that in the USSR they shoot dissidents,in the UK the government just ignored them. The EU operates in much the same way to the latter, it notes the objections and promptly ignores them and carries on with the grand project of federalisation. For years the UK government got away with ignoring the people, then it imported a whole load of migrants who come from countries where government's are regularly overthrown and minsters shoot, chopped up or hung. The EU has this problem too. In most western countries democracy is an illusion, either because it has just a few political parties who largely agree and are equally corrupt or because elections are contested on a range of policies, that give the politicians room to manoeuvre. With a single vote it is mpossible for he electorate to express what they do and do not want. This leaves the politicians room to interpret the result any way they want. Unfortunately for politicians in so called democratic countries the idea of referendums has caught on, leaving the politicians no room to massage the result, hence brexit. The EU has the same problem, only if they go against the wishes of the people they will end up on the wrong end of a firing squad. Democracy is an interesting concept, it is easily given away at the ballot box, but it is usually won back with a gun.
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  3887. Paul Aiello in the UK, the first past the post election system is rigged to maintain a two party system. In many constituencies, the electorate are deterred from voting because one party has a traditional large majority, meaning voting for any other party results in a wasted vote. On many issues the party manifestos agree, so nothing changes no matter who is elected. By including many issues in the manifesto and only allowing the public to select a candidate who represents the manifesto the elected government is able to cherry pick which parts of the manifesto to emphasise and which to ignore,( kick into the long grass). Similarly the lossing side is free to interpret the result to emphasise their pet policy, usually claiming it was not sufficiently extreme. In general elections, the lossing party will usually claim that local issues affected the vote and in local elections the reverse is true. Thet electorate choice is often made on the least worst option between the two parties. The process is further rigged by the fact that the political candidates do not represent their constituents, but the party that sponsors them. Once elected, the MPs are forced to follow the party line by the aptly named party whips, who see that MPs vote on party lines. He government is lobbied by the rich and powerful and those who represent the interests of big corporations. So government usually only represents the interests of the top 5% of the population. All the above ensure extremely poor turnouts for general elections and even lower for local elections. The only time a government gets a clear unambiguous message from the electorate is during a referendum, when the electorate vote on a single issue, as in the UK brexit referendum. This really taxes government's ability to spin the result using all the tricks in the book. The first is to rely on the electorates poor memory, claiming that the facts were not well explained before the referendum. Then they play with numbers, those against the result pointing out the only 4% margin of the result. Failing to note the extremely high turnout and the huge numbers who voted for the winning result. They also fail to mention that there legitimacy to govern is based on an even smaller margin with fewer voters involved. In the case of the brexit referendum what is particularly galling is that so much intellectual effort has been involved in leaving the EU when practically none was involved in joining. The joining process might as well been conducted in secret, it was certainly done by stealth. So what has been described as an logical decision by the people is in fact them waking to find that their country has already been partly consumed and they have been deceived by those that represent them and the monster that is slowly devouring the country. To quote Walter Scott, "Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive"
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  3891. Harrisonъ Khwordъ we all share misgivings about the position of Germany in Europe. A cynic might think that Germany acheived by financial means what it failed to do by military means. It would be grossly unfair to identify the current government with the evils of the Nazi regime. In a way the war did give Germany an significant advantage, though they might nothing so. After the war, the German infrastructure was totally destroyed with the result that everything was rebuilt with the new technology. The US provided money for the rebuild process, largely driven by the demands of the cold war. For years the Germans did not have the financial burden of funding their own military, they were not allowed it. The Americans provided defense, largely because that wanted to fight any limited nuclear exchange with the Russians on German soil, rather than US home ground. All this combined with not insignificant German ingenuity has made the country the financial power house it is today. Interestingly, at the behest of the French, the Germans are slowly giving up these advantages. Certainly the formation of a EU army and the move away from NATO, stands a good chance of bankrupting the economy, particularly if the French manage to get the Germans to pool financial resources in a federal government super bank. Add to this the pressure on the euro of all those member states that are not doing so well or are net recipients from the EU budget. There is a lot of resentment building against Germany, some of it underserved. I think it is a cultural thing, the Germans like to give orders, they believe they have built a superior society and EXPECT others to follow their example. Behind all of this is the murky machinations of the super rich world elite who make their money from others misery and the facilitation of trade through globalisation. There is certainly a connection between the big power blocks, Trump's US, Putin's Russia, the Saudi's ,China and the emerging African Nations (who provide natural resources).. The EU is just another brick. Interestingly a true world government, ruling a global monoculture would not make money. The profit comes from playing the big power blocks off against each other and controlling the trade between them.
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  3955.  @timbow03  idiot, the referendum was an example of democracy, what we had was an illusion of democracy. We have an unelected house of laws who want to remain in the EU to preserve their own vested interests.bwe have a two party system, elected by a first past the post system that disenfranchise is most voters. Our elected parliamentary representatives owe their loyalties to the party and stand on a manifesto that covers multiple issues, most of which can be conveniently neglected after the election. The main policies are shared by the parties, offering the voter absolutely no choice. In a general election most votes do not count and the winning party is elected by a very small minority of the total population. Compare this to be referendum,which was on a single issue, with a simple question being asked. Every voted counted and a large proportion of the population decided to participate. What we had before was a subversion of democracy with government policy controlled by an elite of vested interests intent on maintaining the status quo. I voted leave and have absolutely no concerned about a second referendum. From he pavers point of view it represents a win win situation. There is a very good chance it would confirm the result of the last referendum, given that the EU has now shown its true colours. If it reverses the last vote as a result of EU blackmail, it will set the preceedent for a third referendum at a later date. It will put 17.4 million people back in the EU that what to see it's destruction and will vote accordingly. It give the UK time to prepare for when it triggers article 50 next time. Second referendum, bring it on!
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  3971.  @Ibn_Abdulaziz  you would be very unwise to invoke history as a defence of religion. Religions of different faiths have been responsible for the greatest number of unnatural deaths, resulting from simple murder to death by torture. The origins of religion can be traced to the limited knowledge of natural phenomena and a human need for comfort when faced with mortality. By their nature all religions are based on irrational and primitive ideas. A philosophy of live and let live is not necessarily a mandate for hedonistic behaviour, just an acceptance that any behaviour maybe acceptable provided it does not involve harm to others, including other creatures. That make many religious practices unacceptable, since at the very minimum they involve imposing religious beliefs on others, in the alternate form of fascism. It is an observable fact that the weaker the faith the more extreme the religion, and the greater the need for affirmation of beliefs by imposing them on others. Throughout history religion has been used by the state elite to control the general population. The threat of he'll fire and damnation has always been a good way to enslave a population. There have no doubt been many a king or cleric that did not believe a word of what the preached. One question worth asking is why are all atheists not also hedonists? Morality is not the sole province of the religious. In fact one could argue that some religions are so extreme they lack any morality, given that murder is the ultimate sin. I am unsure if there is such a thing a good, but I am certain there is such a thing as evil, and much of it can be linked to organised religion.
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  3972.  @Ibn_Abdulaziz  in the modern world extreme religion is a destablising force, since different faiths cannot peacefully coexist. By their very nature they cannot accept that there is more than one faith. The ancient world provided a degree of isolation between religions, allowing them to be used by the state to control the people. But this control is challenged by the knowledge of the existence of people with other faiths and beliefs. It is the reason for the Crusades and the Inquisition. In fact a great number of wars can trace their origins to religious differences. The other reasons for wars are greed and the quest for territory and resources. If you accept that war is evil, then religion as a justification for war must also be evil. As war is responsible for untold suffering, untimely death and wide-scale destruction, there can be no doubt it is evil. Then so to must that which is used for its justification. Decoupling the state from religion appears to be a good idea, in that the state is then unable to use religion as a justification for its power. It is a deceit that kings and clerics are chosen by God, and it could be argued that those who make this claim are committing blasphemy, since they are claiming a preferential communication with God. This is either the result of a mental defect, or they are lying. Most gain their place in society by luck, chance of birth, or ruthless ambition. A few by virtue of natural ability, but these are unlikely to feel the need to evoke patronage by God.
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  3982. Peter FKE my comment is not racist and I resent you interpreting things I haven't written. The EU wants to expand, but it also wants new members who will pay more into its budget than they taken out. The latest list of potential members meet the former requirement, but fail to meet the latter. This is one of the reasons they wish to join. The pressure being applied to Greece to recognise Macedonia comes both from the EU and NATO, as for some reason this dispute allows Greece to block the membership of Macedonia to both organisations. It is likely that the EU is applying more pressure than NATO, because it has more leverage. It is a fact that Greece was a small successful country, growing slowly, with a positive trade balance before it became involved with the EU. It also still had control of assets that it has now been forced to sell to pay its debts. Debts that can be traced to the contrived way in which it joined the EU and the euro zone. The marked differences between the Greek economy and the much richer members if the euro zone should have warned Greece that this was not a good idea. Many economists have highlighted the difficulty of having a shared currency without the fiscal control provided by a federal super state. The one size fits all cannot work for a currency union which has both Greece and Germany as members. As a minimum the Greeks should not have joined the euro zone, even EU membership was most likely a step too far. Now they are trapped, because they need the financial guarantee protection the euro provides. While there are positive signs of growth, the remaining dept is so large it will take life times to pay it off. In effect the EU has acted as the very worst form of loan shark, using similar tactics.
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  3984. Peter FKE Peter FKE 1 is not a question, so I cannot answer it. 2 Greece was betrayed by conclusion between the EU and the banks. Greece should never have been allowed to join the EU and certainly not the euro zone, but the EU was keen on expansion for political reasons. The mismatch between the rich economies and the poor in the euro zone was a Recipe For Disaster. Much is made of the bailouts, but in practice the money is not spent on Greece, but travels in a circle paying back Germany banks. So EU generosity is in fact a bailout not for greece but the German banks. The EU facilitated the sell off of Greek assets at a cut down price, in a form of asset striping. A cynic might think that was the intention in the first place, there was certainly some unhealthy conclusion between the banks, the culture funds, the IMF and the EU. 3 had the Greeks defaulted on the debt and left the EU at the start of the crisis. They would have been in control of the debt and the repayment process. The would most likely not been forced to sell there assets. They would have returned to using their own currency and not be shackled to a currency who's value is set by the most successful economy in the EU. They would again have been free to set their trade policy. There is no doubt the process would have been painful, but the imposed austerity of the EU would have been avoided, Greece would have been in control of the process. The EU would most likely have been forced to write off the debt as they really would not have had much choice in the matter. As this is hypothetical,it is difficult to offer proof, but I refer you to the comments of the Greek government at that time. 4 I am not sure I have a solution now. I have not claimed to have a solution. I refer you to 3. It can be argued that membership of the euro zone is not a good idea as the Greek government cannot set the value of its currency. In the long term, I do not think EU membership is a good idea. 5 being shackled to the high value euro made Greece uncompetitive. 6 a loan shark takes a vulnerable victims who is just managing financial and promises to improve their financial position, and then does the opposite. The EU membership allowed Greece to borrow more money than it should at a low interest rate until it was hopelessly in debt.
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  4170.  @leherion4276  I am not defending the Chinese system, I am pointing out the flaws in what the west has done to make a quick profit. I prefer the model of independent sovereign states cooperating where their interests coincide. This is much closer to the common market that the uk originally joined. There are significant advantages in states being as self sufficient as possible, not least for the environment. Diversity produces resilience, all be it through a certain amount of duplication. It is globalisation that has allowed China its dominant position, making it the source for all manufactured products. The EU supports globalisation because it believes there will be big power block who will trade with each other. In practice the system is unstable favouring the growth of just one that will come to dominate all others. It is unlikely to be the EU or even the US, as both made the early mistake of contracting out their manufacturing and failing to protect their home producers The only way to win this battle is to refuse to play the game. Only the very smallest nations are too small to developed all the technology they need. The defence of the home market producers must be based on a divergence in technical standards. Until now the Holy Grail has been global standards adopted by all countries, this is a mistake, since it plays to the needs of the dominant producer, such as China. The alternative to different technical standards are trade barriers, designed to protect the local market and its producers. In the absence of both options many western countries will become nations of consumers, with little understanding, or control, over the technology on which they depend. In terms of giving up the fight, it is easy to accept that China, or the US, has a commanding lead in a particular technology and simply decide it is no longer cost effective to compete. It being far easier to import what is required. This would be a serious error on many levels, not least because it puts all the world's technological eggs in the one basket. Defining a direction of development right or wrong. The winners from globalisation are the super rich few who facilitate the trade and finance it. My argument is that the world is going in the wrong direction, rushing towards destruction, consuming finite natural resources at an unsustainable rate. One of the reasons why China will become dominant is because of its complete lack of concern for the natural world and its limited resources, profit at all cost is the priority. Neither the EU or the US can compete with this destructive mentality, thought Trump is attempting to make the US do so by adopting the same regulation free environment.
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  4171.  @leherion4276  I do not draw the political spectrum from communism on the left to fascism on the right. I see it more as a circle, where a fascist state is practically indistinguishable from a communist one. Diametrically opposite to these extremes is the liberal democracy, and somewhere at the 90 degree positions to the right is capitalism with socialism at the 90 degree position on the left. I suspect the liberal democracy is unstable, as it can so easily degenerate to either the left or right, ending in the communist/ fascist side of the circle. The purists of political theory will no doubt point out the significant differences between the left and right extremes, but in terms of government they both tend to be dictatorships of one form or another. Now to the heart of the matter, China is supposedly a communist system, yet it has embraced capitalism to make it efficient,but it is really no more than a dictatorship, with a parliament that rubber stamps what ever the leader wants. Russia is very similar, only in the case of Russia it is more like a criminal organisation like the Mafia. There are a number of analogies which explain how I expect trade will change. For example, if you put cannibalistic fish in a pond, very slowly the pond is occupied by just one very big hunger fish. Even the biggest of its competitors having been eaten. If you want a more benign analogue, consider how the little high street shops have been replaced, first by the super stores, and they in their turn by the multinationals such as Amazon. Soon only one will be dominant. If it is desired that the high street shops survive it is necessary to set rule that prevent the inevitable degeneration to one multinational supplying all the customers needs. The idea that there will be three or four world trading blocks is unlikely, as one will become dominant. As I said in my earlier post, this won't be the eu, the us or Russia or even India. China will dominate because it is ruthless and cares little about the damage it does, unless the world changes the rules to make a better system more likely evolve. There will be opposition to a change in the rules, because vested interests stand to make a lot of money on the way. There is always the possibility that military conflict between the remaining power blocks will halt the evolution, but with nuclear weapons that will reset the system back to the Stone age, assuming anyone survives.
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  4173.  @leherion4276  at the moment Switzerland's problem is the eu, who in recent years has been pushing Switzerland to follow its laws and rules, with threats of sanctions if it refuses. So placing your hope in the performance of the local bully o protect you from the greater threat of the global one seems to be misguided, particularly as the local bully is all bluster and no real power, when faced with a real thug, like China. In the 21st century, you cannot seriously be contemplating a military conflict with China, that boat sailed in the late 20th century, when China became a nuclear power. The best you could hope for is that a strong military force might limit China's expansion, by forcing to be the first to take action. This seems to be the policy that the US is taking. It is certain that if the Chinese government is pushed into a corner by military action, it will lash out with all the weapons at its disposal. China is already destroying the planet, I do not think they would stop at total nuclear war. The idea that the eu stands any chance of establishing a military to rival, Russia, China or the US, any time soon is ridiculous. The three have a seventy year lead and a determination lacking from the EU. An aggressor would just pick off the member states off one by one. Now the uk has left the EU, France is the only remaining nuclear power, and French nuclear weapons are reserved as a deterrent to protect France alone, not part of an arsenal for fighting EU Wars. The way to stop China is to make its economic power irrelevant. That means becoming sufficiently self sufficient to stop importing from China. At the moment the west is feeding the beast.
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  4240. paranoidx9 there are a number of problems with the Harvard document, though I do agree that tariff protection does need to be time limited. The biggest problem is the Harvard solutions are mainly fiscal, directed at workers, this fails to address the structural problems. It is possible to deconstruct their statistics argument by changing the way they draw biased conclusions. There is insufficient space here to demonstrate, but they take snap shots in time rather than looking at effects evolving over time. The biggest weakness in the argument is that these people already run American business and they have clearly failed to fix the problems. In the past the super rich in the US, the oligarchs, made their money by betting on the USA. If the US was rich so were they. They were very parochial. This has changed, they can now make their money, betting against the US, or not caring if the US succeeds or fails. To be fair, some increase their wealth by taking advantage of the banks new found power of creating money out of thin air, others are active parasites, making money by effectively legally stealing it from the mass of their fellow Americans. This new financial ecosystem is fed by globalisation, this is where the big beasts make their wealth, they no doubt consider themselves citizens of the world and have no allegiances to particular country. On this scale, Trumps business experience does not seem much greater than a local used car sales man or should that be property developer.
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  4244. The more I read of the Harvard document, the more holes I find in its arguments. It must have been written some time ago as it makes no mention of China. It uses the old statistical trick of switching between percentages and monetary value when it suits its arguement. It fails to recognise the strategic value of some product areas. It puts too much emphasis on the value of US savings in a world where banks creat money out of thin air. In places conclusions drawn in one paragraph are contradicted in another. It fails to take into account how competitors economies evolve over time. For example where a low wage economy initially represented no threat, but evolved its technical industry to become a threat. It confuses trade imbalance with spending. It fails to take into account the social and financial cost of having unemployed works. It dies not recognise the need to increase production to increase income to cover expenditure. The conclusion was that government expenditure is too high. The hidden implication is that it is expenditure on social issues that are too high, as this is the only area open to being cut. It fails to recognise that capital investment is free to move anywhere in the world and has no reason to support US industries preferentially. I could go on and in a lot more detail, but it appears to be out of date and wrong. That said, tariff barriers on just one or two items to one votes is not a good idea, it needs a holistic economic strategy. Something the US government has frown6 on since it was last tried by FOR.
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  4245. paranoidx9 your arguement is elitist and fails to recognise the long term consequences of globalisation, which I maintain will be very bad. It is elitist to assumes an entire population will aspire to high educational acheived and will therefore find work in advanced technology employment. All the evidence suggests this is not the case, with large sections of the population abandoned into ever increasing poverty. Regrettably it must be acknowledged that not all are born with equal educational potential, but for a society to succeed it must find meaningful and profitable employment for all. This is recognition of the fact that workers are also consumers, essential to drive the engine of trade. (This is one of the limitation of the robot automation revolution, as robots may be workers, but they are not consumers.) Then comes the question as to the sustainability of globalisation. If companies move to maximize their profits. This is best acheived by manufacturing in the poorest regions and selling to the richest. Over time this must have a leveling effect, as the rich get poorer and the poorer get richer. Now it is possible the system could develop oscillations with wealth sloshing about between the rich and poor nations. To some extent this can be seen to happen, with the rise and fall of empires, but there is a constant dampening effect of the parasite trade facilitators who take a profit from the trade. I contend it is this that is fuelling the growing wealth gap between the super rich global elite and the rest of global population. There are two effects that enhancing this effect, the historic formation of dynasties and the speed of global trade. In the past, the wealth an individual could accumulate was limited by the length of a human life, because of the speed of trade in the modern world, the lucky or skilled individual can acheive super rich status in a fraction of a life time. Unfortunately this is mostly a zero sum gain, as the not so lucky majority must become relatively poorer as a result. If the effective of globalisation is to concentrate wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer individuals, at some point the process must break down most likely with violence. In some ways this resembles a thermodynamic problem. Wealth is being extracted from the difference between the rich and poor of the world. When everyone is equally poor, the trade stops, regrettably at that point most of the world's natural resources will have been used up. So what has the above got to do with tariff trade barriers you may ask, well as I have pointed out in earlier post, tariff barriers have their place in the tool box of controlling the negative effects of globalisation and re-establishing trade between self sufficient nation states. Your argument that tariffs on steel will result in the car industry relocating, fails to recognise that this knock on effect is limited by the consumers ability to pay. You can only sell cars into the US market if the consumers have the money to buy them and jobs to provide that money. The alternative is the nation must be willing to become increasingly indebted, a path the us seems to be following. For nations of different levels of wealth to protect themselves from globalisation, they will need a raft of tariffs, regulations, and internal standards. Your arguement is that globalisation is inevitable, I maintain that the global economic system must be re-engineered to make that not the case, because of the negative consequences that result.
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  4246. paranoidx9 I am not advocating communism or even a version of socialism, I am point out a weakness in the current fashionable trend for globalisation. It is responsible for the accelerated consumption of the planet's resources. It produces illogical anomalies, such as it is more profitable to ship products from the other side of the world than make them locally. The defence of globalisation is really based on the philosophy that greed is good. Excessive consumption is good and unlimited growth is a measure of success. It cannot be denied that the wealth gap between the rich and poor is growing. It cannot be denied that the planet's environment is in serous trouble. The need to be part of large trade blocks for trade defence cannot be used as an excuse to destroy nation states with the resulting loss of sovereignty and democracy. Internally the EU is a microcosm of the global economy. It's success, or lack of it, is measure by an aggregate of the performances of the member states. This ignores the fact that the success of Germany does not help citizens in other member states, for example Greece or Italy. The elite Eurocrats boast about the economic success of the union, failing to notice that this is very unevenly distributed. This fractal similarity extends down to the nation states, the regions and the towns, but the differences are greatest at the block level. The US, Russia and China have similar problems. By breaking up these big block the wealth differences become less extreme. Globalisation has allowed a super rich class of oligarchs to emerge, associated with this is the grossly unfair distribution of wealth. Those who criticise this wealth gap are labelled envious, but that is just the defence of the obscene greedy. Globalisation is taking us in the direction of the most dystopian future predicted by science fiction. An Orwellian world of undemocratic power blocks in a state of constant war, frighting over the planet's depleted resources and damaged environment, with a slave class population overseen by an unaccountable elite few who live a life of luxury. You may consider this exaggerated pessimism, the result of over extrapolation from our current position, however I contend that the markers are already clear to be seen. When multinationals, motivated by profit alone and exceed the power of the nation state, there is nothing to protect the planet from over exploitation. Democracy is the on!y defense against government corruption, short of violent revolution which is where the pursuit of globalisation is likely to end. The oligarchs may yet find themselves stood up against a wall facing a firing squad. There is historical precedence in imperial Russia or the end of the Romanian ceausescu regime. Thinking about it, one of the first examples of globalisation was the slave/ tobacco trade triangle. Was that a good thing?
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  4249. The US has exported its manufacturing offshore and abrogated its responsibility for the manufacture of the products it consumes. There are fundamental problems with the US economy, driven but the ability to print money and thus make money without producing anything. I have made my views on globalisation very clear in the above post, but Trump's attempt to rectify the problem are crude and piece meal, mainly driven by lobbing from donors. His the ridiculous attempt to revive the coal and oil industry and his sell off of mineral rights across the US to the detriment of the US environment will not solve the problem, just make a very few very rich. Trump is reluctant to deal with the real problems of the economy which require regulation to make industry to change direction. There is no fundamental reason why the US can not manufacture more of what it consumes. it is no different from other countries and it has many advantages in terms of natural resources and technology. It requires a holistic approach to fixing the economy, making it productive again. It must be recognised that not everyone is going to find employment designing the latest components in silicon valley or engineering the latest biotech. There must be jobs for everyone. There are major opportunities in the new green technology, but far from embarrassing this future Trump is attempting to revive 19th century industries. In this, I do not include steel and aluminium, as these are the building blocks for so many products. I maintain that to be successful as a country it is essential for it to be as self sufficient as possible, exporting the surplus it manufactures. This is the only way to stop the exportation of jobs, leaving a local unemployment problem. The US has more than its share of the super rich elite, who do not care where in the world they make their money. They may chose to live in the US but have no loyalty to it. Prior to globalisation, the vested interests of this group would have coincided with that of the majority of the US population, they would have made their money in the US. The trick is to engineer the economic regulations to return to this situation. The Greek GDP trend is currently flat at 0% growth, before EU membership it was more positive than the rest of the EU. What's your point. While the Greek economy is tied to the euro, the chances of recovery are not going to improve. I suspect it would have been a lot less painful to have defaulted on the EU debt and returned to a devalued drachma. A one stage during the crisis I thought the Greeks were going to earned money by giving the Russians access to their ports. Now that would have upset the EU.
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  4251. Jonathan Mosher globalisation is responsible for the growing gap between the super rich few and the rest,(the wealth gap). It is unlikely that Trump's intention is to reduce this gap. As a republican he represents the interests of the super rich few, however the us cannot continue to delegate the production of the goods it needs to other countries, as it risks becoming a nation of highly indebted consumers. It's trade deficit with the world, particularly China, is driving its debt way above its GDP ( not that GDP is a very good measure of productiveness) to levels where it can never repay that debt. The American super rich elite are insulated from the debt problem, at least for the moment, because they make their money from globalisation and the printing of money by the US central bank. These super rich may chose to live in America, but they owe it little allegiance, they are effectively citizens of the world free to migrate where they like. I doubt they pay much in US taxation. The problem for the US is that it is effectively bankrupt, and that risks social problems and the potential break up of the union, something even the reppublicans, with their new world order agenda, would not countenance, hence the drive to bring production back home. I maintain that for a stable world economy, that has limited ability to damage to the environment, all nation states should strive to be as self-sufficient as possible, selling only what is excess to their needs and buying only what climate and geology has denied them, restricting he export of capital. This would throw a spanner into the plans of the super rich few who profit from globalisation and the exploitation of the planet's resources. This would go a long way to reducing the wealth gap, as the super rich could only make money by increasing the local wealth of their fellow countrymen.
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  4262.  @bobbya8628  don't be silly, the EU is no more than an aggressive flock of sheep. The EU army will always be the poor relation. It is no match for Russia,China or the US. It can pretend and posture, but if threatened it will cave in. Do you really believe that French nuclear weapons will be used for anything other than defending France. Macron is painting a big nuclear target on France. The idea that the EU will be some forth super military power is just nonsense. In any conflict the member states will just be picked off one by one. For a start most are unwilling to spend the amount required to catch up with Russia and the US, both of which can deploy a complete range of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. Secondly, the EU model of warfare is out of date, they are still thinking in 20th century terms. If NATO is obsolete it is for the same reason. The real problem is that Macron is empire building, and he is not looking for defence, he wants to attack. He wants the EU to be able to project force. To intervene in conflicts around the world for the sake of prestige. The argument goes something like this: if you want to use conventional military weapons, it is necessary to have nuclear weapons so that you are not forced to back down when threatened with them. No one in their right mind is going to use them for anything other than the ultimate defence, since they rely on mutually assured destruction. The exception was the cold war confrontation of the US and Russia, where they contemplated a limited nuclear war waged in western Europe. This may have been why NATO was so successful in keeping the peace in Europe. An EU army will not make the EU safer, it will lead it into war.
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  4270. This is political opportunism by the opposition parties. They are attempting to manipulate people's grief at the losses they suffered during the covid pandemic to remove the PM. Technically he broke the covid restriction laws, but there is a difference between an impromptu birthday party, with a cake, in a government office, with colleagues, and visiting a seriously infected loved one on hospital. The increased risk of spreading the infection in the former case is negligible, while that in the latter case is significant. This is cruel, but true, and it is obvious. The real mistake is in the way the rules were framed in the first place. They were not designed to take into account the risk of an activity spreading the infection, presumably to keep the rules simple. The PM broke the law and was fined, but the law he broke was not fraud in high office, or any of the other criminal offences which would justify his immediate removal from his job. He did not lie to parliament, if he truly believed that that colleagues, with whom he worked, wishing him a happy birthday did not break the rules. The media and opposition parties want the PM replaced, something they have been unable to do through the ballot box, so they are trying to conjure up a lynch mob from those hurt by covid. Looking at the potential replacements, I would prefer if the PM was given the benefit of the doubt, until a more substantial charge can be made against him. Something more important than eating birthday cake.
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  4285.  @sergioraya4388  you are making two errors, first you assume that every one will want to join at some stage. Second you are assuming that all this can happen in some distant future. Neither is true. There is no reason to expect those who do not want to join to conform to the rules of those that do i.e the rules of the super state. The EU has already adopted a common currency without the financial discipline that comes from federal government control of other parts of the economy, such as taxation. Without such control the euro is unstable and at risk of failure from the tidal economic forces that develops between states that do not have common fiscal control. This is already becoming increasingly evident. Even with such control, there is strong evidence from other federal systems of government that stability is not guaranteed. The USA is just one example, where wealth is being concentrated amount a few due to financial mismanagement. Even under a completely different system of government control, as examples by the former USSR, the federal system is seen to fail, in this case the result of micro management of the economy. It could be argued that large monolithic block of society are doomed to fail by virtue of their own weight. China is an example of a society being held together by a ridged system of oppressive government, however even here there is evidence of differential financial and cultural pressures building. These are only controlled by government oppression, ruthlessly weeding out any dissent. This maybe the fate of all such large economic blocks, with ever increasing oppression being required for the government to remain in control. The use of every more sophisticated electronic monitoring may allow the block to stay together longer, but then this reflects the dystopian future predicted by George Orwell and others.
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  4360.  @josedourado3747  the EU like to claim the credit for keeping the peace in Europe, but in fact it has been NATO that kept the peace. The US being the major contributor. It should be said that the US had its own very selfish motives, that the current adminstration seem to have forgotten. During the cold war, the US regarded Europe as its nuclear battle field, prepared to fight a limited nuclear conflict in Europe rather than a full global nuclear war. It is questionable if this doctrine would have worked in practice, but both the Soviets and the US seemed to be willing to play this game. The idea that an EU army can match the power of NATO in the near future without US support is clearly nonsense. The problem for NATO is that the world is far more complected now with more than one potential enemy. Europe finds it difficult to sit under the us nuclear umbrella, simply because the US and EU do not necessarily share a common set of enemies. The US made a big mistake by believing the adage, mentioned above, that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. It actively supported the taleban against the Russians. It armed, and continues to arm, Al-Qaeda against the Assad regime. It is friends with Saudi Arabia, despite ample evidence that the Saudis are financing militant Islamic terrorists. This at the same time as being friends with, and dominated by, Israel. The US actively trades with China despite the fact that China will soon replace the US as the world's largest super power. Given the totalitarian and environmental destructive nature of the Chinese regime, it is a prospect that should terrify the rest of the world. The world has become far more complicated and the wishy washy European liberal elite, who just want to be friends with everyone do not know where to turn. The EU behaves like a herd of sheep surrounded by a pack of wolves. They bleat loudly and inflate their egos in the hope of scaring off the predators.
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  4362.  @josedourado3747  there is no doubt that NATO is a us tool, but for 70 years Europe is been using it. Saving billions on paying for its own defence. They is one of the reasons that the member states have such weak military. Maybe the only exception is the French, but they are compensating for their humiliation during WWII. Even then the French military is no match for the US. The US military some is huge and has been for a very long time, even allowing for the incredible waste associated with it, it still has 70 years of advanced R&D. If the EU dies squire its own military, it will be decades before it can match the sophistication of hat of the US. It can say goodbye to a large part of its wealth, which will need to go into weapons. Once it has a credible military force, it will be required to use it to justify the expense and to gain battle experience. At the moment the EU is not really regarded as a threat by any of the super powers, it lacks the teeth to do any real damage and lacks the nuclear weapons to act as an effective deterrent. The French nuclear arsenal will only be used to defend french, not the whole of the EU. Why would the French make their cities a target to defend other EU states? Strategically the French will only get involved if they are the lead and it is specifically in the interests of France. In the case of the us in Europe it was a case of fighting its war on European soil rather than that of the US. NATO cannot do that if the threat is coming from some other direction than Russia. If Iran launched a nuclear attack on Europe, would the US respond. A while ago this was a certainty, now need Trump, I am not so sure. It is possible that the US would reduce Iran to ash, simply because they would be concerned about being next. The only reason Iran would attack Europe and the EU in particular is because the EU had armed itself. At the moment the EU is harmless. If it forms a military, it will be mostly harmless for a long time.
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  4401.  @gloin10  oh I get the picture, the EU is on the scene of all the crimes, but did nothing wrong. The idea that the EU is a golf club is simply ludacris, it operates more like the Mafia, using blackmail and extortion. The idea it did not know that the Greek government cooked the books is beyond belief. If it did not know it is criminal incompetent, but in practice it was a case of don't ask don't tell. Because it wanted to expand the euro zone for political reasons. Most of the Greek bailout money, was returned to German banks, to stop them going bust for incompetent leading. Nice to see your opinion of the french, I am sure they will like that. In practice the French government is eroding workers rights to meet EU austerity targets. So much for the EU protecting workers rights. The UK fishing industry was destroyed by unfair fishing quotas, which kept UK boats in port while EU factory boats emptied UK waters of fish, throwing many dead fish back into the water because they did not meet the quota requirements. No plans for a federal government!!! You cannot be serious, it has always been the intention of the EU to have a European Central government, and many of the small changes it introduces are to further this agenda. Why else does it need its own military or embassies, they are all the trappings of statehood, usurping the roles of the member states. It is a creeping process, but the movement is inexorably towards the formation of a EU federal super state. It can be argued that it is necessary as it is the only way to stabilise the euro. The Germans have resisted the formation of a banking union or a central EU fund. They expected to control Europe not pay for it. They do not want to fund feckless member states, that is one of the reasons the Italians have not been allowed to budget on improving their neglected infrastructure. On could go on, but you get the picture.
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  4410.  @tjmarx  at least one who has"resigned" says she has done so as a matter of principle, but I suspect this is a face saving exercise. I can't imagine that the pm spent much of his time organising parties at No 10. Iris obvious that such arrangements must have been made by people lower down the food chain, though the PM may have been aware of such arrangements and not objected. If those attending such parties were working closely together anyway,then mixing at a party is not going to increase their covid risk, which is really the point of the regulations. There is certainly an element of hypocrisy, but what many of the general public resent is that they were suffering and lossing loved ones while those in government were apparently enjoying themselves. Of all the reasons to hold government to account, the parties at No 10 are trivial and should be at the bottom of the list. Those calling for the pm to go may well be more involved in more important scandals, such as the purchase of PPE and its subsequent waste. The closure of the UK gas storage facilities, that made the UK vulnerable to the gas price spike. The failure to react sufficiently fast to prevent the very high deaths from the pandemic. The failure to equip our military with state of the art weapons, and the procurement waste associated with this failure. The failure to use brexit to make the UK better. There is a litany of government failures and scandals which have resulted in suffering and loss of life that are more significant than local parties at No 10. These are the things for which the whole of government should be held accountable. Sacking Boris will effectively let those responsible off the hook, and the cronyism, corruption and incompetence will continue. For decades the UK has had a succession of governments which have been the greatest threat to UK prosperity, its time we had a government that worked for the UK and not for a select elite. Don't fire them, make them do the job for which they are paid.
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  4412.  @tjmarx  I am surprised that the NZ government is so poorly rated. From news reports, I would have thought it was doing a good job. Regarding the royal family, I do not see them as a particular problem. I do however regard the undemocratic, selfserving, anachronistic, house of lords as a problem. Any changes must be carefully done, as democracy is inherently unstable and can easily tipped into a dictatorship, like that in Russia or China, both of which serve the needs of the elite and the state. The problem is that globalisation has allowed the super rich elite to shed their allegiances to their country of origin. There was a time when the acquisition of wealth by the elite class,automatically benefited their country of origin, even if it did not make the population of that country much richer. It is now the case that the elite can prosper by making their country poorer. It is the way the rich and powerful have managed to modify the rules of the global financial system in their favour. Iris a fact that the super rich do not pay as, or at least not much. If this were not the case, the wealth gap would not continue to grow. The problem is that anyone who enters politics with the best intentions has the system stacked against them, meaning that even the most democratic countries, are not truly democratic. Certainly the system in the UK is biased towards preserving the status quo, the best that can be said for it is that it maintains a level of stability, but fails to correct the slow decline of the country. This is evident by the decisions of government that clearly serve the vested interests of a minority. In most cases this is legalised corruption. The process of inefficiently moving public money into private pockets, creating huge amounts of waste in the process. I suspect that is what happened with PPE procurement during the pandemic. It is what happens with a lot of UK construction projects. This illness is not unique to the UK, it is also rampant in the US, which why the US is in rapid decline. What is baffling is the popular right wing support that is give to the obviously corrupt political elite.
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  4415.  @gloin10  both Scotland take more from the UK exchecker than they contribute. If Scotland leaves the UK, not only will it lose the money it receives from the UK exchecker, but you also expect it to make contributions to the EU budget. In the case of NI the cost of it to the UK is far greater than the UK EU membership fee. In both cases you are expecting that both will suddenly become profitable in their own right and make contributions to the EU budget. In the case of Scotland, it will lose access to its main trading partner ( England ) and replace it with a very poor second the EU. Anything that affects the EU budget will impact on the RoI. So while NI will have a direct impact, Scotland not being a net contributed to the EU budget will also impact on the RoI. So much for your understanding of economics, never mind geography. You may be correct about the changing demographic of NI, a fact I have already admitted, but you will most likely exchange republican terrorism for that of loyalists, only this time it will be directed at the RoI and the EU. I think you are being very disingenuous if you think that hundreds of years of sectarianism can be washed away in a few years, just because the demographic ratio has changed. The EU has never admitted in public that NI is a liability but neither varadkar or the EU seem keen to make reunification happen, in the recent interview Mr Varadkar eluded time the political problem of reunification and admitted it was likely to be rejected by a NI referendum. It is open to interpretation if his reference to the political problems of reunification were related simply to the administration problems or a recognition of the risk of loyalists terrorism. You may cynically assume that the loyalists will offer support to anyone who pays them sufficient, but as you have recognised it only takes a few diehards to form a terrorist force. Something which has been demonstrated by the provisional IRA. Then there is your optimism that all will be financial and political sweetness and light in the reunited Ireland, given that it will be in the EU that seems very unlikely or have you not been paying attention to the EU's problems. I suppose you have been too preoccupied with the UK's problems to notice.
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  4493.  @edwardbrady5843  are you completely stupid. The way the eu keeps itself together is by setting up codependency. That is why supp.y lines stretch across Europe. It's why fruit from the far side of the eu is cheaper in the supermarkets than the same fruit grown in the local area. It is why the UK was forced buy eu rules to buy steel from other member states. The UK government dutifully obeyed the eu rules and directives, destroying UK industry. The UK has forty years of this destruction, now you wonder why the UK is struggling to compete. If the UK was the poor man of Europe when it joined, why did it end up paying one of the highest membership fees. Before you point the economic boom, associated with eu membership, you should know that this was funded by the sale of uk assets and by every increasing debt. The whole of the UK economy, during that period was based on smoke and mirrors, and creative accounting. The health of the UK economy was judged by how many houses it could, (using imported raw materials), and how well we could sell expensive imports to each other. It was the service and banking industry that boomed, neither of which are productive, neither of which actually increased the wealth of the country. Did you really think that the UK could recover for a forty plus year long parasitic infection so quickly. It was always going to be painful, even without the cost of the covid pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We have had decades of lazy ineffective government, that was happy to live off the profits from the sale of tax payer assets, gas, electric generation and distribution, rail, airports, ports. The list is long. Is it a surprise to you that the UK is struggling to make a profit, when so much of value in the UK is now foreign owned, and the profits are exported offshore, never to return to the UK economy. Successive UK government's have failed to understand that foreign investment is bad for the economy. By definition, a foreign investor expects to take out more than they put in. UK industries than are not foreign owned have been destroyed. The UK imports most of its electronics, computers, telecommunication equipment. Industrial machinery. How do you think these things are paid for, where does the money come from? EU rules have destroyed output farming industry. The government did not object, because rich land owners, many sitting in the house of lords, got a nice income from the eu farming subsidy. What we are suffering now, is the effect of decades of government mismanagement, assisted by EU membership. Rejoining the eu will not fix this, it will only make it worse. The EU will not allow the troublesome, poor, UK to rejoin. It wants the UK as a vassal state. Something it can further exploit. Those in government wanting to rejoin, are looking for someone else to bail them out. They will be disappointed, as the eu has allowed the UK to be sucked dry. Do you really think they will allow the UK to join, when it is likely to be a net beneficiary from the eu funds? Not a chance.
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  4507. Earlier adopters of robot technology may make money, but the robot revolution is self limiting, as robots do not consume or pay taxes, so an economy that is based on extensive use of robots will stagnate and decline. There will be no market for the products and services that the robots produce. Essentially an unemployed human work force will not have the money to keep the economy running. It is also a fallacy that robot automation will replace many low skilled jobs. Robotics is expensive to buy, and it makes no sense replacing a low paid worker with a very expensive machine. The depreciation in the capital value of the asset, most likely will exceed the pay of the casually employed worker. It is artificial intelligence that will be taking over the role of the highly paid management and skilled workers, where the return on the investment is likely to be much higher in replacing wages and pensions. That said, there are jobs that machines will replace. Those where it is difficult to find the Labour willing to do the work, and where one machine can cost effectively do the work of many low skilled employees, for examp,e in the harvesting of agricultural crops. This should not come as any surprise, since the combine harvester has for decades replaced the work that was once done by a army of farm workers equipped with sickles and string. The newer technologies have the ability to identify and pick, produce that once required the sight and dexterity of a human. Produce such as fruit and soft vegetables. There are other jobs that will be taken by robots, simply because they are too dangerous, unpleasant or repetitive to attract human workers to the task. It is very likely that the use of robots will create additional jobs, with humans acting as supervisors. Complex machines are already used to carry out routine testing in many technical fields, such as biochemistry and engineering. What is clear is that business cannot afford to remove humans from the workforce, as they need human economic consumer power. It is the hidden driving force behind innovation. The only other model would be a system that paid people not to work. This is a utopian model, that does not stand any analysis, as it is quickly revealed to be dystopian in practice. The trick will be finding work for all the human skill levels, not everyone is caperable of being a computer programmer, engineer or scientist. It is questionable if even the best AI will be able to match the skills of some of the creative professions, such as journalist, or fiction writer. It maybe a long time before an AI truly thinks, and generates an original idea. So far robotic music compositions have been extremely poor quality, lack that spark of genius that we have yet to understand and copy in hardware. Today's robots are extremely impressive, some claiming to be as intelligent as a dog, but they really cannot match the size and behavioural performance of even the humble house fly.
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  4540. Regrettably this is a David and Goliath battle where Goliath will win, at least in the short term. The patience of the Chinese government is running out, sooner or later they will impose martial law in Hong Kong. There are two reasons why this has not happened yet, the risk of condemnation by the western world and the risk of the protests contaminating mainland China. No doubt the Chinese government would like to avoid a repeat of the Tiananmen Square massacre, but it will not tolerate it's authority being abused much longer. So far it is Hong Kong's visibility to the west and it's isolation from mainland China that has saved it from military intervention. That will not last. We can expect the Chinese government to manipulate the unrest to give it an excuse to intervene. One way of doing this would be to introduce agents to incite more street violence. The military will then respond, while imposing a news blackout in Hong kong. With all news beginning managed by Beijing. Ironically the protestors will have engineered the very thing to which they are protesting. Any military clamp down will require the protest ring leaders to be subject to trial and punishment on the mainland, away from the more open media view in Hong Kong. The error the protesters have made is turning to violence, had they continued in a path of non violent civil disobedience that might have stood a chance, as it is it is only a matter of time before the Chinese government responds with force. They just need a major violent event as an excuse.
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  4579.  @guleiro  I am aware of the make up for the UK parliament. It is time the house of lords to be abolished. The English will decide the nature of the next UK government. As far as I am concerned Ireland is a liability and I would be happy to see it reunified with the rest of Ireland, but the NI people ,who control this issue, do not want to be part of the RoI. The RoI and the EU no not want it. So that part of the UK is not going anywhere. The SNP like to think they would thrive as an independent nation in the EU and would somehow have a say in deciding its operation. In practice their economy is in a worse shape than the UK and would quickly turn into the next Greek style crises as they no not generate the money to support their people. Without the UK their position would be worse having lost their biggest trading partner and the grant they receive from the rUK. Many of the devolved powers they currently enjoy will be returned to Brussels. They would be forced to return their coastal waters to EU control, and there influence in the EU would be about the same as one of the smallest members of the EU, virtually zero. The same applies to Wales, but more so. So while the English hating SNP might want separation they would be destroyed if they get it. As to the UK leaving without a deal. This is the most likely outcome at the moment. It remains to be seen if the UK holds a second referendum and if the EU will allow the UK to unilaterally withdraw article 50. The politicians are not sure if they could get a remain vote, May's deal is most likely dead. If there is a second referendum remaining in he EU is a better option than May's deal. A second referendum that vote for remain will set a precedent for a third at a later date, when the UK is better prepared for brexit. Remaining will put 17.4 million people back in the EU who hate it and would like to see its destruction. A remain vote would also see a very Eurosceptic government replacing the current one. Given all the problems the EU is facing, it is questionable if a third referendum will be necessary, as there may not be an EU to leave. The only problems are how the UK can afford to pay for continuing membership, and if we will be dragged into the conflict if the EU break up turns violent. The longer the EU exists the more likely its demise will be by war or violent revolution. What is certain, the closer it moves to becoming a federal super state, the more unstable it becomes.
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  4632.  @bca-biciclindcuaxel7527  I do not have any solutions, only questions and suggestions. I think I support the cull of the stupid and greedy in government. Those who are responsible for many of the problems you have identified. The difficulty with population control is than it has been shown that it does not work. It leads to an aging population, with too few young people to support and look after the old. There are already suggestions that governments will be required to pay everyone a living wage even if they are not working in order to keep the economic system working. Certainly the stigma associated with not having a job will need to be removed if the robots are going to displace humans from gainful employment. There will also a need to change the attitude to life long learning. Currently learning ends between 21 and 27 years of age. With paid learning ending at 18 years old. The adult unemployed simply cannot afford to go back into unpaid education, and even less into education that has a fee attached. So government will be required to pay to we educate and reskill those who through no fault of their own are displaced from employment. This is not a charity but a necessity to maximise the efficiency of the work force. No government can afford to have a substantial number of its working age population unemployed, or in the terms of the vernacular economically inactive. The implication of you post is for some form of eugenics to ensure that the population has a sufficiently high IQ that they can function in a highly technological world. Given that genetics plays a major part in defining the IQ of the next generation, the means to achieve your professed goal look distinctly dystopian, maybe involving aborting the foetus shown to be of low IQ or forbidding these of lower intelligence from breeding. Of course the latter does not take account of spontanous gene mutations that might result in an new Einstein from an unlikely coupling. There is also the possibility that a naive selection for intelligence may result in unintended consequences, such as genetic diseases or loss of resistance against external pathogens. It is a truism that goid science fiction plays a major part in shaping the future. This maybe why so much good science fiction is so prescient. Sime if those who read science fiction in childhood go on to make it a fact in adult life. There is a wealth of what if examples to be found in science fiction literature, so maybe this is the place to start looking for answers.
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  4644.  @alexsalemo9137  you are wrong if you think Russia will never invade Europe, they have already shown a willingness to do so in the Ukraine and are likely to invade Belarus if their puppet dictator is removed. You could argue that these countries are not Europe, but it was Ukraine's intention to join the EU that triggered the invasion. Russia will continue to chip away at the edges of Europe, just as the EU tries to expand to the east, inflaming Russian concerns about security. The only reason the cold war never turned hot was because Russian leaders were never sure if America would fight a war over Europe. The Russians were aware that the US wanted to limit any nuclear exchange to European territory, and that made the possibility of nuclear war very real. The French stupidly think that the EU can defend itself, but this is equivalent to holding a gun to its own head. If Russia made a determined effort to invade Europe, the French would reserve its nuclear weapons for the last ditch defence of France, and the rest of the EU would be left to defend its self. This is the every man for himself strategy that would rapidly develop if faced with such a direct threat. Russia does not really want control of the whole of the eu, it will be happy to pick off bits from the periphery, what it wants is a cowed and subservient Europe that is too frightened to do anything other than meet any demands Putin wishes to make. The EU politicians will be forced to argue to their domestic audience that Russian demands are very reasonable and in their interest. NATO controlled Russian ambitions, because of the US willingness to fight to protect Europe, as part of its own vested interest. This was accepted by the Russians, since it had been demonstrated in two world wars, but as the memory of these conflicts fade into the past, the US commitment to too provide the big stick for Europe's defence becomes more questioned. As I said the EU is like a flock of sheep, huddled together for mutual comfort, against the circling wolves packs of Russia and China. No doubt with the hope that the US sheepdog will come to their rescue, should their false bravado failed to keep the Wolves at Bay.
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  4689.  @virginiatyree6705  the Ukrainian war may see an end to the evils of globalisation, as countries see their future in much greater self sufficiency. The ultra rich make their money from the process of globalisation, they exploit the wealth differences that exist across the globe, to manufacture where it cost the least, where environmental protection does not exist, and sell to the rich regions where it is now to expensive to manufacture. They also asset strip the world for raw materials. It is globalisation that has allowed the super rich to divest themselves of any national loyalties. Some have wealth that exceeds the GDP of many small countries, and have the power to define the laws to benefit themselves. That is why their moral crimes are not prosecuted, they have defined them as not being illigal. A case in point is the corruption of the US political system, that has made political bribery legal. The US politicians no longer attempt to hide the corporate bribes they receive. Pay enough, and you can get anything made legal, toxic dumping, tax evasion, worker exploitation, fraud, destruction of the environment, all legal activities if you pay the right politician. It is alleged, but obvious, that the former administration made a business of it. The world is full of kleptocracy and vested self interest groups. The common factor is they have accumulated sufficient wealth to be a law unto themselves. That is why the super/ultra rich continue to accumulate wealth, but it is not a zero sum gain, for them to get richer, the majority of the world must get poorer. High inflation does not affect the super rich, it is a consequence of their actions. They need the wealth differentials across the world to exist, the thing is they don't care which region is rich and which is poor, the profit is made through global trade.
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  4691.  @virginiatyree6705  the rich have always fostered a fear of socialism among the masses as a means of justifying their wealth gains. A common statistical trick is to use percentages to hide the absolute value increase in their wealth. 3% of billions is a lot greater than 3% increase in the minimum wage. Then there is the argument that you must pay the going rate for the jobs, usually used to justify obscenely large increases in the CEO manual bonus. There is always the " it could be you" argument used by national lotteries and millionaires who justify their tax avoidance strategy, by saying that you would do the same in their position. I find it interesting that the relatively poor oppose taxation on the super rich, because they are deluded into believing they will one day they will be sufficiently rich to pay the same level of taxes. (Opposing higher taxes for the rich, in the vain hope of future prosperity). There is always the trickle down argument, that the rich must be allowed to keep their money, because they will spend it in ways that male every body richer. This is clearly not true, or the wealth gap would not be growing. The real problem with government taxation is that it fall on the well off and not the super of ultra rich. The poor are too poor to be worth taxing and the super rich have sufficient money to buy the best legal and financial advice, thus avoiding paying any tax. In any case their wealth is sufficiently mobile to move to a safe haven. You certainly don't pay tax if you are richer than many small countries.
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  4754.  @slavadonbass1188  to a certain extent I agree, as NATO is used as an extension of US policy. However, it is difficult to defend the rights of dictatorships that gas and murder their own people. Serbia, which has so recently been found guilty of war crimes, is not really in a position to take the moral high ground. I really don't care if you throw in your lot with Russia, it will be interesting to see how it treats you. Those states that escaped russian influence when the USSR collapsed do not seem to be keen to go back. They are even willing to buy into the corrupt EU emerging super state. This gives some indication of the treatment they received as part of the USSR. Today's Russia is not the same as the old USSR, it is run along the lines of a well organised criminal organisation, which seems to mirror the Mafia. With Putin as the don. It has been suggested that Putin is really the richest man in the world as a result of the money he has extracted from the country. I have no way of knowing if this is true, but the world seem full of despotic leaders at the moment. Those who have no ideals or commitment to service, but run their countries to fill their pockets and those of a few elite friends. The death of communism is evident by the number of oligarchs that have been created. China is in a similar position, but for some reason still clings on to a communist delusion, presumably to control the NOT rich majority. With the death of communism we have seen the growth of corrupt capitalist plutocracy, which really do mirror organised crime syndicates, Russia is just one of a number.
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  4770.  @roberttwardowski9711  isn't it obvious, the eu is empire building. Its intention is to form a federal super state, with strong similarities to the old soviet union, or maybe even the old Roman empire. The actions of president Macron, show that he sees France as the natural leader of this new empire, acting as the central military control and weapons supplier. The EU is organised as a ponzi scheme, so must constantly expand by recruiting new members. In some respects it acts like a parasite that subsumes member states, binding them into the whole, by creating unnecessary codependency, making it ever more difficult for member states to ever regain their independence or freedom. Internally, It is a plutocracy, run for the benefit of a super rich and political elite. There are echo's of New World Order, with the eu hoping to become the basis of a world government. This will no doubt be the source of future conflicts with the other big power blocks which have similar ambitions, for themselves. The EU operates as a microcosm of globalisation, making money from wealth differentials between regions. To assist in the free movement of labour, a requirement of big business, cultural differences between member states must be suppressed, creating a homogenous mix, hence the emphasis on supremacy of EU Law. The loyalty of the citizens must be transfered from their country of origin to the eu super state, hence the need for the trappings of state, such as a flag, an anthem, embassies, and a military. Maybe school children will be required to pledge allegiance to the EU flag, in a similar fashion to that of the US. In practice the eu is a bully, mimicking the behaviour of the Mafia, using blackmail and intimidation on those it sees as weaker, but really it owes its existence to the herding mentality, with member state huddling together for safety, like a flock of frightened sheep, against the circling wolves, such as Russia and China. In this respect it is self delusional, with a misguided idea of its own power and self importance. A delusion that will be its undoing, should it ever believe its own publicity, and seek a conflict with any of the surrounding wolves. The EU believes it has strength in numbers, but by suppressing diversity it becomes one, and loses the resilience that numbers should provide.
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  4774.  @HypermarketCommodity  Mrs May is playing a stupid game. Her deal will never be ratified by parliament while it has the back stop in it. She is currently attempting to blackmail UKMPs into accepting it or risk a no deal brexit. What she does not appear to understand is that her bad deal appears to be worse than a no deal brexit. It is possible that she is being very duplicitous, in that she will reluctantly agreed to a last minute referendum, believing that it will reverse the brexit result, which is what she, and the EU, wanted all along. In that case she could not be called stupid, just treasonous. As someone who voted leave, her deal still looks the worst option. If the UK is forced to remain, I would prefer that we withdraw our article 50 application and remained in the EU with full voting powers. This has a number of advantages: 1) it will put 17.4 million people back in the EU who would like to see it destroy. 2) it damages EU democratic credentials, as the brexit question will have been asked twice and the answer is only accepted when it is a vote for remain. 3) a second referendum sets the precedence for a third brexit referendum. 4) it puts a spanner in French and German plans for further unification and the formation of an EU army. 5) it make it likely that the uk will elect a Eurosceptic government and send Eurosceptic MEPs to the European parliament. 6) the brexit negotiations have shown the UK people the true nature of the EU in all its blackmailing duplicity. 7) it shows that the UK must rebalance it's economy to be more self sufficient, ready for the next brexit referendum. Second referendum bring it on, the leavers win not matter which way the vote goes.
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  4792. Joseph Bloggs California has always had wild fires, but not as the same time as the rest of the world. The predictions for climate change is a 4 to 5 degree rise in the next forty years. It is easy to find reports that confirm global warming and ridicule Trump's position on the subject. This is not just ignorance on his part but willful denial of the scientific evidence so as not to inconvenience his billionaire donors who have huge vested interests in fossil fuels. The predictions of climate change are for increasingly unstable weather, oscillating between abnormal cold winters and record breaking hot summers, with a consistent increasing global temperature trend. Anyone who has worked with non-linear feed back systems will recognise the oscillations that occur when the system feedback phase and gain margins move from the system from negative to positive feedback. The idea that this is some Chinese plot to make us industry less competitive is just Ludacris, particularly as the Chinese are making great efforts to produce the green energy the world needs, having almost poisoning themselves with fossil fuelled power stations. If anything Trump's policy is going to leave the US with 19th century technology that the rest of the world will not buy. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/10/climate/climate-change-trump.html https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/may/29/trump-administration-refuses-to-consider-that-97-of-climate-scientists-could-be-right
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  4799. Joseph Bloggs where did the UN get mentioned? Yes people like jobs, but they also like to be alive. If there jobs are killing them or the planet they should be seeking new employment. If these heat waves become regular events, then the food supply is going to literally dry up. The tax cuts do not benefit most people because they are paying for them in other ways. What is the point of more money in your pay packet if everything you buy is more expensive and you cannot afford health care. Only the super rich make money because as a percentage they pay much less tax, this far out weights the cost of their out goings, even if they are buying yachts or expensive cars. The problem is that most people do not look far beyond the headlines. They get a tax cut and think they are doing well, not correlating the cut with a much greater increase in their cost of living. Trump is allowing the corporation's to do as they like, ok unless it is your home that is poisoned by toxic waste or your water supply is polluted with organic poisons or heavy metals. Those nations that continue to use fossil fuels might see a very short term gain, but risk much greater long term losses. China is killing its own people with air pollution. The only reason they can do this is because the sick and dying much look after themselves, thus costing the government and industry nothing. This is where Trump is taking the US, if you are poisoned and are dying it is your problem. I agree that the democrats are not much better, but they are not the ones who are destroying the US environment, allowing drilling in national parks. If your politicians are corrupt it is your problem. The lobbying system in the US is a disgrace, it is nothing more than legalised bribery. US politicians do not work in the interests of the people they work for the corporation's that pay them the most. Need a toxic drug approved, pay to have it approved and get the health risks suppressed.
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  4803. Joseph Bloggs maybe you can explain who benefits from the claim that global warming is man made? It is not as if the green energy industry already existed, unlike the fossil fuel Industries who are defending their billion dollar positions. So what is the purpose of the global warming conspiracy, other than saving the world from a disaster of biblical proportions, a mass extinction event? I did not responded to your comments about unusual cold weather events, such as snow in the Sahara. Extreme and unusual cold events are also consistent with the predictions of global warming. As I pointed out earlier. A nonlinear system with feedback tends to experience a period of extreme oscillation as the stability margins are eroded as negative feed back becomes positive. The oscillation swings become increasingly extreme as the system switches to a new stable state. More frequent and violet hurricanes and tornadoes are to be expected as energy is added to the system, as are ice storms. The extreme weather events are a small portent of what is to come. As energy is being trapped in the system, it is more likely to settle in a hot state than a cold. The other planets in the solar system show how bad it could get. Venus has a runaway green house effect, with surface temperatures of 400C. Give that solar output has been steadily increasing since the earth was formed, it is the complex feed back loops that have been regulating the planet's temperature. Some believe that life itself has played a part in regulating the temperature in a range suitable to sustain life, and if it had not evolved on earth when it did the earth's temperature would already be too high for liquid water to exist. It follows that if sufficient number of plants and lower animals are killed in an extinction event, the planet's temperature will reach that of the inorganic environment lacking the biological feedback components, from where there is no way back to an earth that sustains life. Hopefully the earth will stabilise at only a few degrees increase in temperature, but even that may be because the source of the pollution has been removed from the system, I will let you guess what that might be.
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  4804. Joseph Bloggs you really don't have a feel for the physics. Venus is much smaller than the earth, closer to the sun. It is highly volcanic giving a dense CO2 and sulphuric acid atmosphere. It never had a chance for life to develope, so biological feed back never developed. It is questionable if life could ever have existed on Venus. The point is that the CO2 atmosphere shows how solar energy can be trapped in the atmosphere to produce extremely high temperatures. On the earth, early in its history before the solar output had reached today's levels, oxygen breathing life evolved and started to remove CO2 from the atmosphere, stabilising the global temperature. One of the major feedback loops that regulate the temperature is the amount of oxygen breathing life on the planet. When it is too cold, life dies back and CO2 levels rise, warming it to the point where organisms can thrive again removing the CO2. Add to much CO2 and other green house gasses and the biological feedback loop cannot cope and starts to die. The decaying bodies release further trapped gas heating the environment further. One of the big risks of global warming is that the oceans organisms will die allowing sea temperatures to rise and release huge deposits of trapped methane from the sea floor currently held as very cold solid methane hydrate. Methane being a much more efficient green house gas than CO2 would completely destabilise the system and killing all life on the planet. With the much higher solar output of today, oxygen breathing life would be unlikely to evolve again. It is quantitatively very difficult to model these complex systems, but it is relatively easy to visualise how they evolved and work. The earth's temperature regulation system is constantly being stress by natural forces such as variations in the solar output, geological action and the Milankovitch Cycles. A combination of physical/chemical and biological feed back has developed that tends to keep the planets temperature in a range where liquid water exists on its surface. This is critical to the existence of life, so the biological feedback has evolved to make it so. The system has been stressed further by the addition of man made green house gasses. Such stress will not initially produce any significant change in temperature as the system feed back allows it to adapt. But the reserves being used to stabilise the temperature are finite and are being used up. Over stress the system and threshold points are reached on the individual feed back loops and they stop working, or worse switch to positive feedback further increasing the temperature rise. This explains the step changes and purses in the temperature record. Anyone who has worked with electronic feed back systems will recognise the oscillations that accompany the onset of switching to overall positive feedback. That explains the cold events that interleave with the ever more frequent and intense hot events. All are signs of a system under stress that is about to switch state are obvious. Just because the world has not changed state yet, does not mean it will not do so in the near future. All the warning signs are there to be read. It just requires a basic understanding of nonlinear system dynamics and feed back to see what is going to happen unless we destressing the system. Positive feedback is applied to control systems to make them react rapidly. The changes to the earth's temperature may happen very rapidly when they start. We should all be very concerned by heat wave like the one we are experiencing at the moment. It may be just a one off random event or the start of a big lethal switch in global temperature state.
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  4806. Joseph Bloggs I have taken a quick look at Al Gore's predictions. As far as I can tell the only problem is the time scale, he may yet be proved right. The models he was using at the time are not as complete as they are now. The basic physics is sound. It is not surprising that the climate changes in steps, with each increment opposed by some new feed back system that attempts to keep the temperature constant. It is a very complex system with many interactions. That does not mean we can stress it with impunity. At some point the system will run out of resilience and change will be dramatic. The argument that man's input is relatively small ignores the butterfly effect, where a small change is amplified by positive feedback in a system. I keep going on about feed back, but this is key to understanding the problem. Imagine running a home with air conditioning. A feed back loop in the air con is designed to keep the house temperature constant and cool. Now suppose the home owner switches on the cooker and takes a hot shower. The aircon response by stepping up its motor output to maintain a constant cool temperature. If the home owner continues to add heat sources, the air con continues to up its output to compensate. Sooner or later the air con motor is adding yet more heat and reaches its limit as to the cooling it can provide. At this point the temperature in the home starts to rise. The air con motor starts to over heat and fails. Without cooling the true effect of all those heat sources is felt and the house temperature rises dramatically, only limited buy the heat that can escape through the walls. In the scenario, the house temperature remained constant up to the point where the air con reached its limit and then it became part of the problem. It shows in a very simplistic fashion that we may be living on borrowed time and not know it. Before the point of failure the aircon might have switch on and off repeatedly as a result of a thermal overload switch, this would have resulted in the house temperature oscillating between cool periods and hot. Technically these are called limit cycles, as linear regulation has been replaced by nonlinear switching. This is equivalent of positive feedback where the gain of the system has become infinity. Again a very simplistic analogue to heat waves and cold events.
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  4824.  @saabsa  your own question tells the story. If the EU is nothing really than a market place then those who are members do not really believe in its documented ideals. The weakness of the EU is that it is a market in which to sell, not to buy. As it gets bigger, it grows weaker, as those inside have less incentive to sell outside its border. Those outside are not bound by EU rules, and at least some of them will under cut the EU producers. I have often likened the EU to a herd of aggressive sheep, huddled together for protection from the pack of wolves that surrounds them. Someone in the US administration said that having a large market of common standards outweighed all the disadvantages that tariff barriers might produce. It is for this reason the EU is so keen to hobble the UK's ability to freely compete with the EU. Without the bias of the so called level playing field, the EU fears the UK will be able to out perform it. As for Germany, it is increasingly finding that its former advantages are rapidly disappearing and it is being hampered by the need to finance those who do not contribute to the EU budget. Worse still, within the EU market it is being forced by the solidarity fund to finance it's competitors. If any UK industry is lost through Brexit, it will not go to Germany, it will go to lose prosperous regions of the EU, or not likely outside the EU altogether. The EU is already suffering from the same globalisation illness that afflicts the US. It imports much of its technology from China, its software comes from America. I do hope it true to steal the financial services from the UK, as this will be the final nail in its coffin. Germany will move its focus onto the parasitic service industries. The EU its self is already suffering from insolvent banks, negative interest rates and money printing in the form of QE.
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  4865. Truss has established a government philosophy of "Greed is Good". She has adopted the discredited policy of trickle down economics. It seems that the conservatives have abandoned any pretence of fiscal prudence, and are happy to do as much damage as possible before they are voted out of power for a generation. They are doing their best to fill the pockets of the undeserving rich, before the country faces an economic meltdown. It seems likely that the UK will face a winter of discontent, maybe a general strike, before the current government is voted out of office. Truss claims her policies will lead to economic growth, but the only thing likely to grow is the wealth gap between the super rich few and the rest of the population. The government is already seeking to stave off industrial action by introducing legal controls on the ability of the unions to call a strike. At a time when most UK households are seeing a drop in real income, this government has decided to remove the cap on bankers bonuses, and give big tax cuts to the rich. The bonuse cap that was introduced after the last financial crisis was intendec to discourage the bankers from taking unacceptable risks. The pound has responded by falling to record low levels, while the cost of government borrowing is rising, as the UK is increasingly seen as a bad risk. The falling pound will make imports more expensive at a time when the government is relaxing planning regulations to encourage house building, which is dependent on imports. This government appears to have learned nothing from its past failures, attempting again to base the economy on the construction and finance sector. This government has approved further oil and gas exploration in the north sea, and FRACKING on land. This policy change will do nothing to improve UK energy security, as the fossil fuels recovered are to be sold on the global market, rather than kept for UK exclusive use. The only beneficiaries are going to be the oil and gas companies.
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  4913. Putin's next move will be to reduce the supply of gas to Europe, to put pressure on the EU, and particularly Germany. Putin will not cut off the supply because he needs the money and he hasn't established an alternative customer. If Putin survives this crisis, he will try again, but only after he has new customers for his gas and a means of delivery. With luck, China will drive a hard bargain for Russian gas, now that Russia is desperate. China also has a problem, if it's customers in Europe suffer financial hardship, as China will also lose trade revenue from Europe. The West will be reevaluating the wisdom of being dependent both on Russia and China. The EU has certainly woken up to the need to be self sufficient in electronics. Long term this is really going to hurt China. There must be significant admiration for the bravery of the Ukraine people, who if news reports are to believed, are putting up stiff resistance to Putin's huge oppressive military forces. The whole of Europe owes them a debt of gratitude, as their fight is protecting the rest of Europe. They should be provided with as much support as we can give, without triggering WWIII. If Russia occupies Ukraine, then the ukrainian resistance need all the materials and intelligence necessary yo fight a guerrilla War against Russia. It is not Ukrainian soldiers who should thrown down their weapons, it is the Russian soldiers who are fighting Putin's illegal war. With sufficient economic pressure, maybe Putin's own elite will turn on him, and remove him from power.
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  4929. The fundamental weakness in the EU system is that the member states are not really united as one. It is questionable if this is even possible or desirable. Even members of the euro zone are in fact competitors, there success does not contribute to the common good. It is one of the myths of the EU, that what is good for one member state is good for all. This has been the justification for the membership fee. In practice the one rule fits all has benefited some disproportionately to others. Germany and the Netherlands have done very well out of EU membership, while must others have done less well to varying degrees. The problem is highlighted when EU funds are used to set up industries in the poorer member states at the expense of closing other operations in the richer states. Sure this is wealth redistributed, in fact it is forced wealth redistribution, but how does it help the tax payers of the richer states to know that their taxes are actively being used to fund a competitor in another member state? This is really a zero sum gain. Someone must lose for another to gain. The only real winners are the multinationals who stand apart from the EU and make their money from manufacturing in the poorer parts of the union and selling to the richer, and still managing to pay less than their fair share of the tax bill. The drive for federalism is one solution, since it puts a super state in control of all the member states and acts as a central collection point for the taxes collected from the member states. The argument is that citizens are less bothered about the success of one region if that region contributes to their welfare through collective taxes. This is a macrocosm of the relationship between local councils and national governments. The problem is the system breaks down as the scale increases, what just about works for a national government is unlikely to work for a huge federal super state, the stresses between the rich and poor become just too great amplified by the distances involved. The problem is worse for the EU where there are significant cultural differences between member states. Reading the comments on this report highlights the problem, with talk of resentment about providing aid to feckless and financial irresponsible states, in this case Spain. One solution is to concentrate even more power at the federal level, with government controlled directly from the center. It is then impossible to call any member state feckless as all decisions are taken by central government. But this seems far too similar to the old Soviet or Chinese model of central government, and central planning, and no one want the EU to emulate these failed systems. The alternative federal system is to follow the example of the US. This does not solve the inequity between member states, it just stops complaints about it from having effect, and of course the system is just as open to corruption and financial failure, as is evident today with the current US adminstration. Ironically, the EU was closer to a solution in its early days, when it was the common market, a loose collection of independent states working for the common good. As it stands, the existential threats the EU faces, of which Covid-19 is just one, will ensure its destruction.
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  4931. leeroy leeroy i did not say they were right or blameless. What I said is that Iran is providing them with easy political ammunition without any real gain. This is just playing the game very poorly. Iran is playing to the stereotype that the west has created. Is the imprisonment of one individual worth the damage that results. I would have thought Iran would understand the creation of marta, and how the individual maybe used. If this is about the return of iranian money paid to the UK for armaments. The Iranian government clearly have misjudged the attitude of the UK government to such blackmail. It will not bother them in the slightest, in fact it has handed the UK government and the US and Israeli goverments a propaganda tool, which will be used by the EU as a face saving measure when they are forced to follow the US sanction lead. The EU simply does not have the money to protect its companies from US sanctions. Short of a change in the US administration, it is likely the EU will be forced to fall in line with the US within a year. The EU will cite political prisoners held in Iran as a reason for the change of policy. Before that we can expect the importance of these prisoners to be increased, maybe at the UN, certainly n the media. By that time Iran will have lost the initiative and pardoning the prisoners at that time will appear as an admission of guilt. It will be interesting to see if my analysis proves right. Of course Iran could take the moral high ground, and pardon the political prisoners in advance, leaving the EU and others to search for another excuse. This will be tricky, as the plight of political prisoners always plays best with the western public. Much more believable than the secret manufacturer of wmd.
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  4969.  @coochiecoocrook  here is no real comparison, you are not paying to preserve the stolen artifacts. The items would have been safer left in the ground. In the case of Egypt, tomb robbers stole most of the artifacts that had conventional value, gold, precious stones and jewellery. Items of scientific value as part of the historic record were destroyed, or displaced to make them valueless. Isis and the Taleban demonstrated what can happen to historical artifacts if left in unstable countries. The items were either sold to fund their perverted religion or were destroyed, mostly to rewrite history to fit their narrative. In Africa, historical items have been sold by corrupt governments and government officials, with the proceeds put into Swiss bank accounts or to fund luxury lifestyles. In these cases the artifacts and their significance have been lost to history. The western museums have effectively preserved the history and culture of other less stable nations by keeping the artifacts safe. There is not always a guarantee that the items returned will not suffer a destructive fate in the future, governments change, and it only takes one with a perverted ideology to wipe a nation's history by destroying the relics from it's past. Greece want the Elgin Marbles back, but had they not been removed in the first place, it is likely they would have been destroyed long ago, by the polluted atmosphere that once was common in Greece. There may now be a good case for their return, based on the promise to build a Museum with an environment to protect them. The past is another country, and owner ship of items produced by ancient civilisations is questionable. Do the current occupants of the land really hold title to artifacts from such a distant past, or does the scientific value of these items belong to the whole human race, in that it records part of its history. If the latter, then the objects are better left where there is a greater chance of their continued existance and study.
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  5007. @Frankly Frank first size was the reason for the demise of the dinosaurs. I don't think the UK was ever dependent on Germany. The Germans have never really rejected their culture of Aryan superiority. The origins of the EU can be traced to the need to appease German belligerence. The idea being to make the states of Europe so co-dependent they could not wage war against each other with damage to their own self interest. Even now any suggestion that the EU might disband is met with claims that this would lead to war in Europe. The subtext is that if Germany is not given what it wants, it will return to its war mongering ways. In practice it appears to be the French who have military imperial ambitions for the EU. The Germans think they are doing nicely as it is and have no wish or reason to rock the boat. Unfortunately for the Germans current prosperity is not a guide to future wealth. There storm clouds on the horizon, not least from an resurgent post brexit Britain. The UK paid a very heavy price for standing up to the Nazi regime, for a period alone. It was only relatively reciently that the UK paid off its war debts to the US. Germany maybe big, but it is also very clumsy, its technology is expensive and over engineered. As it grew, post unification it expected to rule the EU, it did not expect to pay for it. For a long time it benefited from not having to provide for its own defence and not being allowed and very reluctant to be seen involved in any military adventures, the same advantage that Japan enjoyed. In political time scales, the current state is relatively new and it is already looking unstable.
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  5013. When asked, the MPs who are protesting at the suspension of parliament have said they want more time to force the PM to ask for a further extension of article 50. Beyond that they have no idea as to what to do next. The existing Brexit deal stands no chance of being ratified by parliament. They do not have the necessary referendum mandate to cancel the article 50 application. There indignation would be more convincing had they decided to give part of the very long holiday they have just had or applied to postpone the three week party conference period which normally results in the suspension of parliament every year. Allowing for the time that parliament is normally suspended before the queen's speech, the government is not extending the suspension of parliament by more than a few days. It is also reasonable to ask what decision they are likely to make in the few days before the 31st of October deadline, that they could not have made in the last three years. The only reason for anything to change in the next few weeks will be because the EU have decided to remove the Irish backstop for the withdrawal agreement, and this is only likely because Boris Johnson has given the EU a firm deadline for when the UK is leaving the EU, with or without a deal. The latter ensuring that there will not be an Irish backstop in any case. All the that the obstructive UK MPs are doing is delaying the inevitable outcome for a few more months. Given they have no real plan beyond a further extension of article 50, it is difficult to see why the EU would be willing o grant any further extension. At this stage, it is doubtful that the EU would welcome the UK revoking it's article 50 application and returning as a full member. There is no doubt that the returning UK would be even more Eurosceptic than before and that would be reflected in its disruptive behaviour. This would be compounded by the Brexit party MEPs who would continue to represent the UK in the EU parliament.
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  5030.  @toyotaprius79  i am concentrating on the causes of wealth inequality. I make no mention of the Jews as I am not racist. Globalisation is most definitely evil. It functions by exploiting the wealth differentials that exist across he world and the natural environment that is is quickly destroying. It is based on manufacturing in poor countries with poor environmental protection laws and sell what they make in rich decadent Western countries. The bulk of the profit is kept by the super rich who facilitate the trade, which they justify by the small profit the exploited country makes, though they fail to mention the huge environmental damage done in the process and that associated with the transport of the goods across the world. In addition to this destruction to the natural world, considerable social damage is done to the middle and lower classes of the western countries involved. This see the destruction of their industrial and manufacturing base, with the associated loss of employment. This creates a debt spiral from which many western countries are now suffering, as their workers cannot compete with products made in low wage economies that do not protect their environments. The winners and the international super rich, who have no national loyalty and the bankers who make money from the debt created. The proof is all around us. In the growing wealth gap between the super rich very few and the rest of society, and in the massive damage being done to the planet in the name of increased growth. The social damage is also clear, with fewer well paid jobs in western economies, particularly in manufacturing. The misguided quest for growth and profit is reflected in the slow erosion of the value of money. Where the banks create it out of thin air (QE) and then lend it to make a profit on he interest, with the tax payers picking up the tab when the debt goes wrong. What is shown in the thumbnail of this report is the collection of self interested thieves and rogues who allow this corrupt iniquity that passed for the world economy to continue. It is a system that is built on sand, exhausting the world's limited natural resources. Sooner or later the system must collapse.
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  5032. A week ago the UK government was being castigated for not publishing a strategy for leaving lockdown, now they are being criticised for providing a plan. The UK media was commenting that the reason the government refused to publish its plan for leaving lockdown was because it feared that the plan would dilute the lockdown message and result in confusion. The UK press criticised Boris johnson for treating the UK people as children, who could not be trusted to distinguish between a strategy for leaving lockdown and the message to stay at home. Well all the evidence is that the press at least, willfully misinterpreted the message and did behave like children. It is important to understand that the stay at home message is simple to understand. Its is an order to everyone, backed up by new laws to enforce it. Even then, some idiots failed to understand the logic of the lockdown in stopping the spread of the virus and decided that the instructions did not apply to them. There actions in part are why the lockdown has not eliminated the virus. The new message of "stay alert" is far more complicated, as it is attempting to convey the complexity of how each individual should leave lockdown taking into account all the myriad of individual personal circumstances that that entails. The government has backed up this new message with a host of documents that deals with the conditions for different industries and occupations. If every there was a case for the UK public to behaviour as adults it is now, yet the media seems to think that it is the governments job to provide instructions to every individual as to how and when they should return to work. That about 29 million individual documents, tailored to the Citizens personal circumstances. This is clearly a nonsense, the best that can be expected is what the government is attempting to provide, which is instruction that cover sections of work and industry. What is clear, is that the government is attempting to establish a new normal way for work, that keeps the people safe and the virus under control, until a vaccine is developed. Since it takes up to 15 days for the infected to show symptoms, any return to work must be slow and managed, monitoring the virus for any spread that indicates a return to an epidemic. The PM has made it clear that lockdown will be reimposed if there are any signs of the virus spreading again. Those who are being asked to return to work, are in employment that has an inherent or engineered minimum risk of infection. HOW IS THIS COMPLICATED TO UNDERSTAND???
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  5067.  @jandoedens1171  I have recently reached the conclusion the EU empire building extends to dominating the whole of the continent, including Russia. At one point, I think Putin was part of this conspiracy, thinking like other leaders who share the goal, that they will be the leader of leaders. I think the intention is to form a power block to rival China and the US etc. It is questionable if the UK splitting from the EU is an advantage to Russia. It is well documented that there is a lot of Russia money is flowing through London. I suspect that uk membership of the EU made it less likely it would confront Russia. Trump has ensured NATO is no longer a threat to Russia. It was US military technology, and their willingness to use it in Europe, that gave NATO its bite. Maybe it is the case that Putin considers those who are not with him are against him. It is reported that the cold ended, and the USSR fell because, because at the time it could not match western (US) military technology, in particular, high performance solid rocket fuel and microprocessor technology. The UK press has suggested that Russia now makes up for these deficiencies by using cyber warfare to spread discord and chaos around the world . But this seems unlikely, as such a random strategy will have as many negative consequences as positive for Russia. I suspect that Putin's original aim was simply to regain control of the satellite states that the USSR lost following during its break up, but geo politics is a complicated chess game with more than two players, so achieving even a simple goal involves complex machinations in all regions of the globe.
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  5081.  @ronitmahawar1193  you are assuming that big countries have a choice. In fact, no one has a choice, the feedback mechnisim will force net zero, like it or not. If the world does not go net zero soon, the economies of the world will be so badly damaged by climate related disasters that it will cease to function, and thus will not be able burn fossil fuels. This is not the way anyone wants to get to carbon zero, as it will involve the breakdown of global civilisation. What most fail to understand is the effect of exponential change In the climate, as negative feedback becomes positive. The effects of global warming has the potential of being far worse than any war. So far nature has been nudging us to make the necessary changes, this incentive to change will become more intense, the more we ignore it. It is tempting to anthropomorphize this system response, as in the Gaia philosophy, but it is purely automatic. You might ask how climate change is going to force a reduction in fossil fuel use. There are many scenarios, but a common feature is a cascade failure effect. Mid latitude heat waves, resulting in crop failures producing famine, droughts. Floods resulting from sea level rise and redistribution of rainfall patterns. Wild fires and massive storm damage to infrastructure even at more polar latitudes. Mass migration, resulting in a loss of industrial workers. Disruption to sanitation, resulting in epidemic diseases, and finally the collapse of human population size. This is the road we are rolling on, and it is increasingly downhill from now on.
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  5101.  @mamamalamut9478  you might have a point if they all came from the Liberia, but they don't. In any case it really makes no difference, the UK has spent so much fighting other people's wars it does not have the money to re-home anybody. It is also worth looking why such wars were fought. Are you really going to argue that Gaddafi and Saddam Hussein were not evil dictators. In the case of Gaddafi, he actively supported terrorists bombing in the uk, so his removal was justified on the ground of self defence. The middle East is full of tinpot dictators and militant religious zealots who run theocracies as if it were the 13th century and not the twenty first. The latter reject western decadent technology, apart from where it provides weapons of war. It seem the people in these countries are incapable of electing leaders that govern in their interest. Given the volitile and irrational temperament of the people of these countries, it could be argued they get the leader they deserve. Or rather they get the leaders who can manage them. The prerequisite seems to be a selfish, sadistic, megalomaniac dictator that will enforce his will by imposing a police state based on torture and murder. Or a religious zelot madman, who will also impose a police state, etc, etc . They have in common a do as I say , not as I do mentality that allows them to live a hedonistic life style in palaces while their people are poor. Why is it that countries that do not have sufficient food or medicine, always have a surfeit of guns, bullets and RPGs? What is annoying, is those who come to the UK supposedly seeking escape from such regimes, spend a lot of their time trying to recreate them here. Demanding the local population change their ways to fit in with the culture of the migrants. A culture that produced the conditions from which the migrants are supposedly trying to escape. It must be true that, some who come from broken countries, had a hand in breaking them.
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