UK Politics Thread

title is self-explanatory

Big News: Government cuts EMA subsidy

This didn’t get nearly as much controversy as tuition fees; even though I’d argue this is much more neccessary. I know a ton of people who only did 6th form college because of EMA providing fees for transport/books. And a lot of people used it to save for uni in addition to working at weekends.

Any thoughts on how this affects the Coalition, especially Lib Dems and Clegg?

If I put Tea Part/Obama/Fox news in this thread will anyone reply??

Anyway Alan Johnson’s resigned as Shadow Chancellor. Ed Balls has taken over. Does anyone get a whiff of the Blair/Brown relationship and what does this mean for Labour?

[quote]Bambi wrote:
If I put Tea Part/Obama/Fox news in this thread will anyone reply??

Anyway Alan Johnson’s resigned as Shadow Chancellor. Ed Balls has taken over. Does anyone get a whiff of the Blair/Brown relationship and what does this mean for Labour?[/quote]

Ha, man I would love to debate/talk about this, but unlike some of the people on here, I try not to speak about things I know nothing or little about. I do feel that the whole world is going to shit, not sure if that helps or not!

[quote]Bambi wrote:

This didn’t get nearly as much controversy as tuition fees; even though I’d argue this is much more neccessary. I know a ton of people who only did 6th form college because of EMA providing fees for transport/books. And a lot of people used it to save for uni in addition to working at weekends.

Any thoughts on how this affects the Coalition, especially Lib Dems and Clegg?[/quote]

Well, they’re not going to get many votes from under-21s at the next election anyhow, so the cynical answer is to say fuck the lot of them, and save some money along the way. The Lib Dems have been arguing for more coalition governments for years and years - now they know what it’s like in practice. I’m very happy for them to be taught a lesson.

Doc - I dunno. If you look at the Oldham by-election a lot of Tory votes propped up the Lib Dem Support. Labour might run on an anti-coalition ticket but all Cameron has to do is to point to Ed Balls, one of the architects that has caused this economic misery and say Labour haven’t changed. Cameron is very ruthless and if Vince Cable and Simon Hughes say, broke off from the Lib Dems in power things might get interesting

I am a university student at the moment and i dont think EMA is as important as the hike in university fees, i would have much rather preferred no EMA and the fees sticking to around £3000, the Lib Dems lied and got my vote, never again!!

All this is happening while the foreign aid budget which primarily buys new Mercedes for dictators is not only ring fenced but increased. The cost of college and university is going up to keep the cost to foreign students from rising. The job market is being flooded with large numbers of foreign college graduates, undermining the wage market for British graduates who now have to pay higher fees.

Britain had to scrap it’s plans for two new aircraft carriers for the Royal Navy but it has given several billion to the Indians who have used some of the money to buy a nuclear submarine. From the Russians. Fund their space program. Expand their nuclear weapons program. They give money to the Pakistani’s so they can build more nukes as well.

I could go on but it is kind of pointless. The British keep voting for the three parties that fuck them over the most. It is pathetic what the British have become. It is difficult to have any respect for them at this point because they are so spineless and clueless.

[quote]Bambi wrote:
If I put Tea Part/Obama/Fox news in this thread will anyone reply??

Anyway Alan Johnson’s resigned as Shadow Chancellor. Ed Balls has taken over. Does anyone get a whiff of the Blair/Brown relationship and what does this mean for Labour?[/quote]

You’re speaking French.

Don’t worry about the UK you can print your own money (QE2,3,4,etc). The Euro is going to explode, wait till Sinn Fein win the election in Ireland. The Chinese are buying european bonds. When Spain collapses (40% youth unemployemnt) and huge property repossesions then its SHTF time. Ireland printed 51 billion Euro notes with no back up just paper. Just watched a program on TV about Weimar a loaf of bread went from 10 pf (cents) to 340 Billion Reichsmarks in one year.

We all now know what happend after 1933 and as “history repeats itself” looks like here we go again. The demos in Tunisa are just the start. It’s going to be a year of civil unrest. Head for the hills and take some tinned food with you!

Not sure it’s that desperate but am as thankful as fuck we never went into the Euro. That’s a giant messup right there

Bambi the only good thing Mr. G. Brown did, although it was really to spite Tony B!

This is frightening. I more-or-less agree with Sifu. Aaaagh.

[quote]Sifu wrote:
All this is happening while the foreign aid budget which primarily buys new Mercedes for dictators is not only ring fenced but increased.
[/quote]

The principle of foreign aid is sound. But yes, the implementation is woeful, awful - evil, even - crap. Next to none of it appears to go anywhere near the world’s poorest.

Oh, the foreign student fees remain a small percentage of university turnover. UK universities are effectively the last great socialist enterprise: national fee-scales (effectively), national pay scales (effectively), rewards for all the wrong, non-productive activities. The central planning - voluntarily perpetuated - consigns the whole venture to greyness of ever-increasing cost. Skilled jobs do indeed seem to go largely to those from overseas.

The radical right, the libertarian perspective, the notion of small government, have all lost the argument. Totally. It’s quite depressing.

[quote]oldtimer3 wrote:
Don’t worry about the UK you can print your own money (QE2,3,4,etc). The Euro is going to explode, wait till Sinn Fein win the election in Ireland. The Chinese are buying european bonds. When Spain collapses (40% youth unemployemnt) and huge property repossesions then its SHTF time. Ireland printed 51 billion Euro notes with no back up just paper. Just watched a program on TV about Weimar a loaf of bread went from 10 pf (cents) to 340 Billion Reichsmarks in one year.

We all now know what happend after 1933 and as “history repeats itself” looks like here we go again. The demos in Tunisa are just the start. It’s going to be a year of civil unrest. Head for the hills and take some tinned food with you![/quote]

Reluctantly, I have to agree with you. I don’t know if you have the time-scale right, but I do fear a very bloody outcome from the present policy direction. And Europe imagines it cannot happen.

[quote]doc_man_101 wrote:
This is frightening. I more-or-less agree with Sifu. Aaaagh.

[quote]Sifu wrote:
All this is happening while the foreign aid budget which primarily buys new Mercedes for dictators is not only ring fenced but increased.
[/quote]

The principle of foreign aid is sound. But yes, the implementation is woeful, awful - evil, even - crap. Next to none of it appears to go anywhere near the world’s poorest.

Oh, the foreign student fees remain a small percentage of university turnover. UK universities are effectively the last great socialist enterprise: national fee-scales (effectively), national pay scales (effectively), rewards for all the wrong, non-productive activities. The central planning - voluntarily perpetuated - consigns the whole venture to greyness of ever-increasing cost. Skilled jobs do indeed seem to go largely to those from overseas.

The radical right, the libertarian perspective, the notion of small government, have all lost the argument. Totally. It’s quite depressing. [/quote]

The budgetary deficit is greater than the foreign aid budget. So virtually all of the money for the foreign aid budget is borrowed money. Because of the increasingly third world make up of the British electorate it really is just a British version of what Americans call pork barrel spending. It is ridiculous that they can spend 12 billion a year on foreign aid but they can’t come up with 5 billion one time to properly fund the aircraft carriers that are necessary to protect the Falklands.

David Cameron stated that fees for British students were being raised to keep fee for foreign students from going up. The British government do enough for everyone but it’s own people. There is no other government like it in the world.

The labor market for educated and skilled workers has been flooded with cheap foreign labor. That is not a formula for maintaining the standard of living for working people.

I wouldn’t say they have lost the argument so much as people have become tolerant of really bad behavior through out the society. There is no sense of holding people accountable.

this is strange. I am agreeing with Sifu too. Interesting times.

We have had a generation of shit politicians. The only politician in power I had the inkling of respect for was Alastair Darling who said it like it is (we’re f*cked basically) and Gordon Brown who seemed a decent man totally disconnected from his party, and in the latter stages, from himself.

UK economy contracted by 0.5% in the run up to Christmas. Double dip recession?

[quote]Sifu wrote:
David Cameron stated that fees for British students were being raised to keep fee for foreign students from going up. The British government do enough for everyone but it’s own people. There is no other government like it in the world.
[/quote]

Yes, but he was talking crap to the Chinese at the time. The numbers don’t work. But your general point holds good; the British political classes seem to have a deep-seated self-loathing which recoils from helping those who elect them. And their electors let them get away with it.

[quote]
I wouldn’t say they have lost the argument so much as people have become tolerant of really bad behavior through out the society. There is no sense of holding people accountable. [/quote]

Britain is full of people who believe that we will cease to be a civilized country if private companies have a hand in delivering NHS services (conveniently overlooking the fact that they already do). Full of people who actually believe that making a profit should form no part of the provision of health, water, or railways - but that it’s ok for purveyors of food. Full of people who think that a broad range of public services should be placed into the hands of unelected commissions because elected politicians are too untrustworthy. Full of people who will suggest that any politician espousing popular policies is a popularist, as if that is a bad thing. And so on. That sounds like having lost the argument to me.

[quote]Bambi wrote:
Gordon Brown who seemed a decent man totally disconnected from his party, and in the latter stages, from himself.
[/quote]

I think he is a decent man who wants to do what’s right and good. But he proved to be woefully unable to run the country, or even the economy.

[quote]doc_man_101 wrote:

[quote]Sifu wrote:
David Cameron stated that fees for British students were being raised to keep fee for foreign students from going up. The British government do enough for everyone but it’s own people. There is no other government like it in the world.
[/quote]

Yes, but he was talking crap to the Chinese at the time. The numbers don’t work. But your general point holds good; the British political classes seem to have a deep-seated self-loathing which recoils from helping those who elect them. And their electors let them get away with it.

[quote]
I wouldn’t say they have lost the argument so much as people have become tolerant of really bad behavior through out the society. There is no sense of holding people accountable. [/quote]

Britain is full of people who believe that we will cease to be a civilized country if private companies have a hand in delivering NHS services (conveniently overlooking the fact that they already do). Full of people who actually believe that making a profit should form no part of the provision of health, water, or railways - but that it’s ok for purveyors of food. Full of people who think that a broad range of public services should be placed into the hands of unelected commissions because elected politicians are too untrustworthy. Full of people who will suggest that any politician espousing popular policies is a popularist, as if that is a bad thing. And so on. That sounds like having lost the argument to me.[/quote]

The self loathing is the worst aspect of British politics. What happened to my grandparents sense of self worth? It is very dangerous to allow people with that much self loathing into positions of power.

Okay I concede the second point. WTF happened to the British? They will get all worked up over the wrong shit, going out on their silly marches with placard in hand ready to wrestle with the police. But when it comes to something important like the transfer of sovereignty to the EU, they will roll over and play dead.

Unfortunately it is too late. Junk food + Tv is the same as Bread and Circuses and look what happened to the Roman empire. A century ago most of the world map was coloured pink i.e. the one time British Empire. I am old enough to remember it. Two world wars left Britain bankrupt and in debt and it has never recovered properly. There is a saying “In the old days the British went out to the empire now the empire comes to Britain.”

Since the end of the second world war politicians of all colours have ruined the country it is now ruled from Brussels. I worked with the European Commission before retirement so I know what I am talking about. The EU have not had their accounts audited for the last 15 years! Graft and corruption are rife. There are a few good and honest people but they are few in number. As always throughout history there comes a time when the people have had enough e.g. Romania and the other East European countries. It is happening now in North Africa and that is going to have a spill over effect throughout the middle east (not just my opinion read what some experts have to say). As I said before social unrest will occur when the weather turns warmer this year.
Head for the hills and take enough tinned food with you.

[quote]oldtimer3 wrote:
Unfortunately it is too late. Junk food + Tv is the same as Bread and Circuses and look what happened to the Roman empire. A century ago most of the world map was coloured pink i.e. the one time British Empire. I am old enough to remember it. Two world wars left Britain bankrupt and in debt and it has never recovered properly. There is a saying “In the old days the British went out to the empire now the empire comes to Britain.”

Since the end of the second world war politicians of all colours have ruined the country it is now ruled from Brussels. I worked with the European Commission before retirement so I know what I am talking about. The EU have not had their accounts audited for the last 15 years! Graft and corruption are rife. There are a few good and honest people but they are few in number. As always throughout history there comes a time when the people have had enough e.g. Romania and the other East European countries. It is happening now in North Africa and that is going to have a spill over effect throughout the middle east (not just my opinion read what some experts have to say). As I said before social unrest will occur when the weather turns warmer this year.
Head for the hills and take enough tinned food with you.
[/quote]

What I wonder about is just how much of Britain’s woes are due to governmental mismanagement and incompetance. ie The Tories are continuining bad policies of Labour that they campaigned against. It appears to me that what is happening is not incompetence but a deliberate design, that has been carefully orchestrated and continued from one government to the next.

If you watch Glenn Beck he talks a lot about the ideology of Cloward and Piven. Which is based upon the idea that if you can overwhelm the welfare rolls with more dependents than can be supported you will crash the system and foment unrest so the government has an excuse to impose a new system. It occurs to me that with the economy in recession, millions of unemployed people on the dole, the only reason why they would continue with the policy of adding to the welfare rolls with mass immigration is to collapse the system.