Let's Get Political!

[Legends-Lounge]

Getting more and more difficult to speak your mind these days for fear of branded a ‘phobic’ of some description.

Free speech is under threat, no doubt. I remember a little while ago a woman getting arrested because she was silently praying outside an abortion clinic.

Add racist, far right, misogynist and many, many more. Except far left, that’s ok, apparently.

[RobertT]

We can’t go on repeating the same old policies - whether from the Tories or Labour. They’ve all been proven to be useless.

Both parties need a complete overhaul when it comes to policy.

Social media and the rise of 24hr news entertainment, has ked us to a path where the only thing that can break through the noise is Populism, right sided or left sided.  Neither are much kop.

In reality, if we all just step away from the depressed step, we've never really had it better.   Technology has changed our lives, we live longer than ever before and, despite the wealth gap, we've never been "richer", in the sense we no longer live in shitty cold houses and piss out the back (unless it's a late one on a Saturday night).

Alongside the drop in political discourse, we've also got older, reaching ages where we just get grumpier.

I am not suggesting we should just be happy with everything, but I do think we slide into the extremes far too easily these days.

[Audrey]

‘Things’ aren’t better at all - unless you mean material things. Every other aspect of life in general is worse and getting more so.

[Cookie]

Public services in the toilet, productivity stalled, average wage declining, wealth gap increasing, likely to see more unemployment from AI adoption and the world is heating up which will lead to massive migration. Not to mention wars on the horizon. The direction of travel is one way. I appreciate the optimism though Rob.

[Nemo]

‘Things’ aren’t better at all - unless you mean material things. Every other aspect of life in general is worse and getting more so.

Tell me you're getting old without telling me you're getting old

Folk have thought things are going to hell in a handcart for as long as humans have been able to write. They've not been right yet (well, not globally anyway, the Afghan version of Audrey has pretty much always been spot on).

Life is complicated. There's lots of shit stuff, there's lots of good stuff, basically every generation in human history has had a better time than the previous one. Is there an argument that things 'peaked' 20 years ago in the UK? Probably, but even if it did, now is still better than 99.99% of human history.

[Tails]

There are no circumstances where Farage should be considered electable compared to almost any other party. Anyone who thinks thats a step forward, or even a worthwhile finger to the main parties needs to give their head a proper wobble.

People said the same about Trump.

[horlock07]

we live longer than ever before and, despite the wealth gap, we've never been "richer", in the sense we no longer live in shitty cold houses and piss out the back (unless it's a late one on a Saturday night).

Alongside the drop in political discourse, we've also got older, reaching ages where we just get grumpier.

Sadly for the UK at least that's a massive part of the problem, a rapidly aging population and a similarly rapidly dropping birth rate, add into the equation the fact that a rapidly aging population also increases pressure on the NHS and we end up with a massive shortfall between public spending/social welfare requirements just to stand still vs tax revenues.

Once again it just illustrates why the whole house of cards will collapse at some stage without immigration to provide additional working age tax payers.

The usual parts of the media like to make a massive thing about the strain on benefits etc being the feckless unemployed with their hundreds of fatherless kids and asylum seekers, but the figures just don't support that. This is a pretty interesting analysis of the figures and how the media dishonestly report them. https://monkdebunks.substack.com/p/benefits-taxes-and-misleading-headlines it also illustrates how much the pension bill dwarfs things like UC/PIP etc for instance.

On the issue of 'shitty cold houses', come up to some of the more deprived parts of the north west and you would be surprised. I worked in Workington for the Council 20+ years back and had to go back up there a few weeks ago for a Client, and it really is no better than it was when I worked up there, the towns a mess, the housing is grim, society seems to be on the brink of collapse and unemployment is rife.

The public need to stop believing what snake oil salesmen tell them and actually stop for a minute and take an interest in what is really happening and putting pressure on the country societally and economically, think about what realistically can/needs to be done and decide who is actually at least remotely interested in helping them.

[RedRag]

Sadly for the UK at least that's a massive part of the problem, a rapidly aging population and a similarly rapidly dropping birth rate, add into the equation the fact that a rapidly aging population also increases pressure on the NHS and we end up with a massive shortfall between public spending/social welfare requirements just to stand still vs tax revenues.

Once again it just illustrates why the whole house of cards will collapse at some stage without immigration to provide additional working age tax payers.

The usual parts of the media like to make a massive thing about the strain on benefits etc being the feckless unemployed with their hundreds of fatherless kids and asylum seekers, but the figures just don't support that. This is a pretty interesting analysis of the figures and how the media dishonestly report them. https://monkdebunks.substack.com/p/benefits-taxes-and-misleading-headlines it also illustrates how much the pension bill dwarfs things like UC/PIP etc for instance.

On the issue of 'shitty cold houses', come up to some of the more deprived parts of the north west and you would be surprised. I worked in Workington for the Council 20+ years back and had to go back up there a few weeks ago for a Client, and it really is no better than it was when I worked up there, the towns a mess, the housing is grim, society seems to be on the brink of collapse and unemployment is rife.

The public need to stop believing what snake oil salesmen tell them and actually stop for a minute and take an interest in what is really happening and putting pressure on the country societally and economically, think about what realistically can/needs to be done and decide who is actually at least remotely interested in helping them.

I had long been right with you on the above point, i.e. the economic downside of the growing dis-equilibrium between our working age and post working age population.  The sums don't add up without immigration if we also want our sick and elderly cared for in the public and private sectors, if we want some hope of increasing prosperity and tax receipts through astute economic growth.

For that reason, the EU or EEA membership, with its emphasis on vacancy-orientated immigration (and emigration) as opposed to longterm family-lifestyle betterment is the soundest first option for the UK Labour market.  

And it remains so.

Because vacancy-orientated also works for economies which may be predicted to be providing fewer employment opportunities (and especially reasonably remunerated jobs) with the increasing integration of AI into the workplace.  Fewer vacancies would mean fewer EU/EEA migrants.

In other words, there is not a ONE-WAY disequilibrium to consider.  We need to manage changes in labour demand. Up and also down.  In terms of a labour market, the operation of the EU/EEA Single Market absolutely smokes Brexit's bureaucratic and often dogmatic approaches to immigration control.

[RobertT]

Public services in the toilet, productivity stalled, average wage declining, wealth gap increasing, likely to see more unemployment from AI adoption and the world is heating up which will lead to massive migration. Not to mention wars on the horizon. The direction of travel is one way. I appreciate the optimism though Rob.

Public services as we know them didn't even exist 100 years ago - medical advancements have been massive (and costly).  The people working the looms were going to kill employment.

Now, there are more of us than ever before, and we clearly don't share well.  As Horlock mentioned though, the system we have created requires a constant throughput of people in each generation, if we are not going just let everyone die at 65.  Add to that your point about one of the reasons why everyone is moving around the world, and I just don't see how we can't accept we have to allow people to move and plan better for it.

[Batch]

They got the (suspected) shooter then.

Shopped by his own father, and Trump wants the death penalty. Awful thing to have to do.

[horlock07]

They got the (suspected) shooter then.

Shopped by his own father, and Trump wants the death penalty. Awful thing to have to do.

I suspect it won't get to trial, the cynic in me is amazed it didn't follow the normal line of these things in recent times of the suspect handily being shot dead while being apprehended.

From the stuff leaking out so far he doesn't seem to particularly fit the profile of trans, Muslim, immigrant leftist which was being lined up by the usual SM mouthpieces as the narrative....

[Jimmy Quinn]

He must have been a trained sniper to hit his target from that distance.

[Audrey]

I suspect it won't get to trial, the cynic in me is amazed it didn't follow the normal line of these things in recent times of the suspect handily being shot dead while being apprehended.

From the stuff leaking out so far he doesn't seem to particularly fit the profile of trans, Muslim, immigrant leftist which was being lined up by the usual SM mouthpieces as the narrative....

There was some waffle about trans stuff scratched on 3 bullet cases left behind.

I was amazed at the number of trans people responsible for school shootings.

[Nemo]

They got the (suspected) shooter then.

Shopped by his own father, and Trump wants the death penalty. Awful thing to have to do.

I imagine his lawyer is going to complicate jury selection with the literal president declaring him guilty and needing to be executed on live TV... I realise the guy simply can't be 'professional' in the usual sense but sweet Jesus.

Aud, you'll be shocked to hear you've swallowed some misinformation whole again. Please stop believing everything you read on the internet.

[Audrey]

And you know this how? Only 5. That’s OK then.


Since 2018, only a small number of mass shootings (including school shootings) have involved transgender or non-binary perpetrators.

- **Nashville, TN (2023)**: Audrey Hale, identified as transgender, killed six people at The Covenant School.[](https://www.mdpi.com/2075-471X/12/6/88)
- **Denver, CO (2019)**: Alec McKinney, a transgender teenager, was involved in a school shooting that killed one and injured eight.[](https://www.reuters.com/article/fact-check/majority-of-us-mass-shooters-are-cis-men-not-transgender-or-non-binary-people-idUSL1N363273/)
- **Aberdeen, MD (2018)**: Snochia Moseley, reportedly transgender, killed three at a Rite Aid facility (not a school).[](https://www.newsweek.com/mass-shootings-transgender-perpetrators-1790854)
- **Colorado Springs, CO (2022)**: Anderson Lee Aldrich, who killed five at an LGBTQ nightclub (not a school), was claimed to be non-binary by their lawyers, though this is disputed.[](https://www.reuters.com/article/fact-check/majority-of-us-mass-shooters-are-cis-men-not-transgender-or-non-binary-people-idUSL1N363273/)
- **Minneapolis, MN (2025)**: Robin Westman, identified as transgender, killed two children and injured 17 at Annunciation Catholic School.[](https://www.newsweek.com/robin-westman-latest-transgender-mass-shooter-spark-national-debate-2120683)