Europe --- In or Out

[Rayvin 5176]

Just now, Renton said:

 

If JRM went against Corbyn in a GE, and won, would you accept Corbyn is fucking useless?

 

1 - Corbyn is a poor leader and were he to be judged against other leaders on the basis of leadership alone, I would agree that he is 'fucking useless'

 

2 - The point has never been about how good a leader he is. If the proper left of Labour can hold onto power inside of the party, it means that eventually, we will get change. On this basis, Corbyn is the most useful thing that has happened to the political landscape in the span of my serious political awareness (about 15 years - I know, not long).

[Renton 21286]

4 minutes ago, Rayvin said:

 

1 - Corbyn is a poor leader and were he to be judged against other leaders on the basis of leadership alone, I would agree that he is 'fucking useless'

 

2 - The point has never been about how good a leader he is. If the proper left of Labour can hold onto power inside of the party, it means that eventually, we will get change. On this basis, Corbyn is the most useful thing that has happened to the political landscape in the span of my serious political awareness (about 15 years - I know, not long).

 

But he is leader, and will probably be so next GE. My worry is always him and the inner shadow cabinet are unelectable. Forget about your socialist idealism if the likes of Johnson or Mogg become PM, the state will be dismantled before the next parliament. I don't think it's completely off the mark that the ERG are involved in a coup. Frankly I'm worried. 

[Rayvin 5176]

6 minutes ago, Renton said:

 

But he is leader, and will probably be so next GE. My worry is always him and the inner shadow cabinet are unelectable. Forget about your socialist idealism if the likes of Johnson or Mogg become PM, the state will be dismantled before the next parliament. I don't think it's completely off the mark that the ERG are involved in a coup. Frankly I'm worried. 

 

If they start dismantling the state it'll make Labour's job even easier. We were going through a slow but progressing dismantling anyway, across Blair as much as Cameron, and starting with Thatcher. Now Labour has something that will not just blithely go along with it, and it means, IMO, the Tories have to be careful. There is no parliamentary consensus for that path anymore. They can't overplay their hand - especially not given how close it was last time out. They're unlikely to forget that in a hurry.

 

But maybe you're right - to which I say again that a quick death is preferable to a slow and incompetent one.

[ewerk 30255]

59 minutes ago, Gemmill said:

ewerk, is it true that Arlene Foster is the best looking woman in NI? 

 

It’s hard to say definitively but she’s definitely in the top three fucks I’ve ever had.

One of the DUP’s MPs is pretty decent.

 

It helps that she probably hates me and everything I stand for but I’d sure like to try and fuck the prod out of her.

 

Though there is something psychologically wrong with me.

[Renton 21286]

2 hours ago, Rayvin said:

 

If they start dismantling the state it'll make Labour's job even easier. We were going through a slow but progressing dismantling anyway, across Blair as much as Cameron, and starting with Thatcher. Now Labour has something that will not just blithely go along with it, and it means, IMO, the Tories have to be careful. There is no parliamentary consensus for that path anymore. They can't overplay their hand - especially not given how close it was last time out. They're unlikely to forget that in a hurry.

 

But maybe you're right - to which I say again that a quick death is preferable to a slow and incompetent one.

 

Wrong. The damage will be done. Has Thatcherism ever been unravelled, even after 30 years? No, it hasn't. It changed the country, forever. 

Edited March 6, 2018 by Renton

[Rayvin 5176]

Has anyone tried?

[Renton 21286]

2 minutes ago, Rayvin said:

Has anyone tried?

 

Thatcher changed the mindset of the country. Maybe it will take an extreme turn of events (which we may be on the verge of) to change direction to socialist utopia, but I feel the whole world has changed and that ship has already sailed. Besides, I live in the here and now, not some hypothetical future Universe. 

 

Life was good for most people under New Labour. There, I said it. It's been the Tories and their implementation of austerity that has fucked everything up. Let's never forget that. We don't need a revolution, we just need some sanity. 

[Alex 34828]

Either way I'm not prepared to write-off another 10 years or so (as it would take at least that to begin rolling back the damage those cunts would do).

[Rayvin 5176]

Not disagreeing. I don't actually want a socialist utopia as I think I've said on here before. I would prefer a return to the centre - but a centre that hasn't been hijacked by a right wing economic philosophy.

 

Socialism, implemented to the fullest extent of the word, is not what this country needs. But we could honestly do with the country being dragged leftwards again, and with a general rethink about some of the things we just consider normal. Blairism can't give us that.

[ewerk 30255]

9 minutes ago, Rayvin said:

Socialism, implemented to the fullest extent of the word, is not what this country needs. But we could honestly do with the country being dragged leftwards again, and with a general rethink about some of the things we just consider normal. Blairism can't give us that.

 

What social elements would you like to see that Blairism didn't provide?

[Alex 34828]

Some renationalisation and an improvement in the social housing crisis would be a start

[Rayvin 5176]

15 minutes ago, ewerk said:

 

What social elements would you like to see that Blairism didn't provide?

 

I want to see Neoliberalism pulled off its pedestal and an alternative formed. I don't care exactly how this manifests, but this ideology is pervasive, and has been dragging us slowly to one single destination across multiple governments. We can go back to something that ostensibly looks like Blairism, would be fine by me - but it needs to have more focus on people as people, and not as consumers.

 

Problem is that we're just one of many battlegrounds, and without the EU we'll have to make compromises with countries who don't share these values. So we may be fucked either way now, thanks to Brexit.

[ewerk 30255]

12 minutes ago, Alex said:

Some renationalisation and an improvement in the social housing crisis would be a start

Social housing, yup. I see that Sajid Javid has returned nearly £300m in the last two years that his department has been 'unable' to spend on housing.

What would you like to see renationalised?

[ewerk 30255]

2 minutes ago, Rayvin said:

 

I want to see Neoliberalism pulled off its pedestal and an alternative formed. I don't care exactly how this manifests, but this ideology is pervasive, and has been dragging us slowly to one single destination across multiple governments. We can go back to something that ostensibly looks like Blairism, would be fine by me - but it needs to have more focus on people as people, and not as consumers.

 

Problem is that we're just one of many battlegrounds, and without the EU we'll have to make compromises with countries who don't share these values. So we may be fucked either way now, thanks to Brexit.

Okay. But behind the rhetoric. What would you like to see. Specifics.

[Alex 34828]

Just now, ewerk said:

Social housing, yup. I see that Sajid Javid has returned nearly £300m in the last two years that his department has been 'unable' to spend on housing.

What would you like to see renationalised?

I think railways, public transport generally and some utilities ideally. Although perhaps the cost of reimbursement would be too great

 

[ewerk 30255]

What's your beef with public transport? Cost? Service?

And would renationalising utilities improve anything or decrease costs to the end user greatly?

[Alex 34828]

1 minute ago, ewerk said:

What's your beef with public transport? Cost? Service?

And would renationalising utilities improve anything or decrease costs to the end user greatly?

I think public transport doesn't serve rural communities well in particular. I also think of the example of something like the Tyne and Wear Metro which seems quite expensive, not least for kids. And compare it to somewhere like London, where iirc, kids under 16 travel free on the Tube (accompanied by an adult) and also the buses might be along the same lines (I last visited London summer before last so the memory is a tad sketchy. Re: utilities, they are obviously profitable businesses. Why couldn't the profits be used by the Treasury for public services instead? You could argue they are less efficient in public hands but perhaps we need to think differently. Incentivised pay for efficiency etc. would mean everyone was a winner (except the current shareholders but that's part of a broken system anyway imo). I confess to not having given it a great deal of thought.

[ewerk 30255]

I think that around 3% of every train ticket bought is 'profit'. So there isn't a great saving to the user if it were to be nationalised. There is also the obvious problem that governments tend not to be great at running these sort of services. Cheaper travel for youths and better provision of rural services could be achieved under the existing system by public subsidies.

British Gas made a profit of about £50 per gas customer and lost money on electricity users so there's reasonably small margins. They've cut thousands of jobs recently, something that governments tend to be reluctant to do.

So basically I'm not convinced that these are areas that would be better run by the government, as much as I wish they could be.

[ewerk 30255]

No suprise.

 

[Alex 34828]

There's two people at work who voted leave who are always complaining about how expensive holidaying in Europe is now.

[Howmanheyman 32718]

31 minutes ago, Alex said:

There's two people at work who voted leave who are always complaining about how expensive holidaying in Europe is now.

 

[Renton 21286]

Well, the shit is about to hit the fan now. Oh and CT, the EU confirmed today that there will be no trade negotiations until the UK legally signs up to its commitments in phase one. 

 

The options now, unless May removes pretty much all her red lines, are an FTA like Canada one, or crash out on WTO. Although neither will work for Ireland. Cracking deal. 

[Alex 34828]

I don't know what you're expecting in the way of a reply. It's not like he even believes half the stuff he writes. He'd have to understand it for a start.

[Renton 21286]

2 minutes ago, Alex said:

I don't know what you're expecting in the way of a reply. It's not like he even believes half the stuff he writes. He'd have to understand it for a start.

 

Aye, I know. But actually he's quite useful, as he got me to some research on the topic to clarify matters. 

 

The EU response to May's speech is quite brutal, I have to say. They're being completely consistent though while we piss in the wind. I can scarcely believe the idiocy of Brexit. But like most brexiters, CT will never admit he's wrong so on we go, like the charge of the light brigade. 

[Alex 34828]

2 minutes ago, Renton said:

 

Aye, I know. But actually he's quite useful, as he got me to some research on the topic to clarify matters. 

 

The EU response to May's speech is quite brutal, I have to say. They're being completely consistent though while we piss in the wind. I can scarcely believe the idiocy of Brexit. But like most brexiters, CT will never admit he's wrong so on we go, like the charge of the light brigade. 

That Andrew Pierce from the Mail who's always on TV 'jousting' with Kevin MacGuire basically sums them up. After May's recent speech he was claiming it was full of detail but when asked for examples it was basically "there's loads of detail in it". It was fucking laughable how much he was full of shit but I get the feeling his readership just accept it as fact. I struggle to get my head round how fucking dopey most people are, ranging from rule Britannia, it'll be mint, the EU can't bully us to the will of the people. And the lies keep coming. There's not a single one of the Leave campaign who have been able to come up with a remotely workable and beneficial outcome even though they should've have something in pretty minute detail planned before the vote. And here we are, nearly two years later and they're still bluffing. It's a fucking disgrace but the knackers who continue to lap it up are also beyond contempt. You could point this out to them, invite them to prove you were wrong, they'd secretly suspect you had a very good point (at the very least) and they'd still vote Leave again given the chance.