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Author Topic: Let's Get Political!  (Read 1995805 times)
janaage
People's Front of Alba

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« Reply #765 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:02:53 »

maybe not. But they've voted for a party that are.

Not in every case, there are plenty of people who didn't vote for the tories as such, but just couldn't take the risk of letting Tweedledum and Tweedledee control the UK's purse strings.

And voting Tory was the only real way of voting against Labour and there awful anti recovery fckn policies.
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Berniman
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« Reply #766 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:24:29 »

There seems to be an awful lot of preaching on here. And plenty predicting immediate Armageddon.
Just because someone votes tory doesn't automatically mean they are a fox hunt loving, banker bonus encouraging, europe hating, immigrant bashing, welfare cutting, nhs dismantling, young child hating (saw this on twitter), nazi.
It just that in some peoples eyes, when looking at the alternatives, happens to be the best choice this time around.

Agreed.  Those that are saying that those voting tory have dropped the country in the shit and will regret the vote maybe right, but perhaps they should take a look at what the alternatives were before chucking rocks.  I would guess the majority of the "bellends" that voted this lot in voted for them because of the lack of decent alternatives rather than they fully supported their entire manifesto.

The best of a bad bunch has won IMO.  Too much of a risk to stick Labour in charge of our coffers for another 5 years.  Come back with a solid plan, and a leader we can get behind and I have no doubts that the "don't feel there is a better choice" voter will swing back to Labour..  Labour haven't done that this time around...
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“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” ― Marcus Aurelius

When somebody shouts STOP! I never know if it's in the name of love, if it's HAMMER TIME, or if I should collaborate and listen...
Samdy Gray
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« Reply #767 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:33:03 »

I'm satisfied with the result. Although, I did not expect a Tory majority and probably would've preferred another coalition.

Whilst my views generally sit somewhere to the left of centre, the thought of Labour undoing years of austerity by increasing spending frankly scared me. Economically it was the best outcome.
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jonny72

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« Reply #768 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:38:53 »

Think a lot of people were primarily worried about the SNP being in government, Miliband and Balls to a lesser degree.

The biggest issue we've got now is Scotland, more so than the economy. Appears the chances of some form of federal system being implemented are growing, Boris and other senior Tories talking about it. Depends on whether Cameron is up for it, the majority and support the Tories got gives him the mandate to do something radical. Plus all the other parties are in tatters.

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Nemo
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« Reply #769 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:45:37 »

I'm satisfied with the result. Although, I did not expect a Tory majority and probably would've preferred another coalition.

Whilst my views generally sit somewhere to the left of centre, the thought of Labour undoing years of austerity by increasing spending frankly scared me. Economically it was the best outcome.

Was it though? Even if you accept that the Tories are more economically literate in running the domestic economy, the EU referendum is going to cause huge uncertainty and if we do vote to leave, that's going to cause huge economic turmoil. And with a small majority, Cameron's backbenchers are not going to let him not hold that, and probably not even campaign in favour.
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Ardiles

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« Reply #770 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:47:00 »

Any federal arrangement would need to involve fiscal autonomy for the Scots to go for it.  The stand out message of this election is that Scotland wishes to follow a different path fiscally to England.  As you say, much of this hinges on Cameron, Johnson and Osborne.  They may decide to fight for a federal arrangement in which some ties with Scotland are retained...or they may decide that an amicable separation is in everyone's best interest.  If they come to the latter conclusion, I think things could move quite quickly.
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jonny72

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« Reply #771 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:54:13 »

Was it though? Even if you accept that the Tories are more economically literate in running the domestic economy, the EU referendum is going to cause huge uncertainty and if we do vote to leave, that's going to cause huge economic turmoil. And with a small majority, Cameron's backbenchers are not going to let him not hold that, and probably not even campaign in favour.

We're not going to be leaving the EU. Cameron will get some concessions - Juncker has said there is some wiggle room and the rest of the EU don't want us to leave. Plus the economy will have recovered a lot more by the time of the vote, which will lessen the negativity towards the EU even more.

We do need the discussion and the vote though, if only to put it to bed for a while.

They may decide to fight for a federal arrangement in which some ties with Scotland are retained...or they may decide that an amicable separation is in everyone's best interest.  If they come to the latter conclusion, I think things could move quite quickly.

The important thing is that a long term solution is found and then implemented in a controlled manner so everyone knows what they're getting in advance. Would have been chaos if they'd voted yes in the referendum. Don't think it really makes that much difference to the rest of the UK and especially England in the long run (I reckon we'd be better off) but we need to make sure it's done right.
« Last Edit: Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:56:31 by jonny72 » Logged
Samdy Gray
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« Reply #772 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 12:02:50 »

Was it though? Even if you accept that the Tories are more economically literate in running the domestic economy, the EU referendum is going to cause huge uncertainty and if we do vote to leave, that's going to cause huge economic turmoil. And with a small majority, Cameron's backbenchers are not going to let him not hold that, and probably not even campaign in favour.

In the grandest scheme of things, yes. I know it's not what you're really saying, but electing an economically illiterate government on the basis that they would've saved us from a Yes/No vote on the EU would've been bonkers.

I'm quite open to the EU referendum, because I don't think we'd vote to leave. Yes there will be some uncertainty in the markets but the fact we don't have a pegged currency will soften things somewhat.
« Last Edit: Friday, May 8, 2015, 12:25:26 by Samdy Gray » Logged
Nemo
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« Reply #773 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 12:17:25 »

So, we all know FPTP is a flawed system, but what chance electoral reform now?

Some stats from today, number of votes per seat for each party:

UKIP 3.8m (one seat)
Green 1.2m (one seat)
Lib Dems 300k (eight seats)
Plaid 60,000 (three seats)
Labour 40,000 (229)
Conservatives 34,000 (325)
SNP 26,700 (56)

It's a funny old form of democracy, isn't it? Not suggesting that full PR would be a great idea, but there are things between the two...

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StfcRusty

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« Reply #774 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 12:54:23 »

Whilst my views generally sit somewhere to the left of centre, the thought of Labour undoing years of austerity by increasing spending frankly scared me. Economically it was the best outcome.

I think a lot of people share your view on that. What I don't understand is that despite all the austerity, the deficit is higher than it was in 2010 and so is the national debt.
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Simon Pieman
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« Reply #775 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 13:11:03 »

I think a lot of people share your view on that. What I don't understand is that despite all the austerity, the deficit is higher than it was in 2010 and so is the national debt.

The state of the economy is to blame. Less tax revenues.
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jayohaitchenn
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« Reply #776 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 13:16:59 »

Bored of the austerity debate now - it just doesn't work. What did Attlee do after WW2 when the country had a national debt of over 250% of GDP? He started the biggest public spend in years including the NHS, privatising the railways and investing in infrastructure.

Austerity is not the answer.

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2013-04-03/austerity-delusion

http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/17593/austerity_doesnt_work

http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/its-official-austerity-economics-doesnt-work
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horlock07

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« Reply #777 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 13:41:26 »

So, we all know FPTP is a flawed system, but what chance electoral reform now?

Some stats from today, number of votes per seat for each party:

UKIP 3.8m (one seat)
Green 1.2m (one seat)
Lib Dems 300k (eight seats)
Plaid 60,000 (three seats)
Labour 40,000 (229)
Conservatives 34,000 (325)
SNP 26,700 (56)

It's a funny old form of democracy, isn't it? Not suggesting that full PR would be a great idea, but there are things between the two...



It is a flawed system now, however it has always been a flawed system and there seemed to be less complaint about how bad it was for democracy when Labour were winning elections?
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Nemo
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« Reply #778 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 13:43:37 »

It is a flawed system now, however it has always been a flawed system and there seemed to be less complaint about how bad it was for democracy when Labour were winning elections?

Can't speak for others but I've never been a fan. Rise of smaller parties is clearly a huge issue with it though, it's fine for a two party system but not when you have 5-6 parties potentially in contention.
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Samdy Gray
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« Reply #779 on: Friday, May 8, 2015, 13:46:12 »

Bored of the austerity debate now - it just doesn't work. What did Attlee do after WW2 when the country had a national debt of over 250% of GDP? He started the biggest public spend in years including the NHS, privatising the railways and investing in infrastructure.

Austerity is not the answer.

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2013-04-03/austerity-delusion

http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/17593/austerity_doesnt_work

http://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/its-official-austerity-economics-doesnt-work

But after WW2 the private sector wasn't mortgaged up to the eyeballs, rolling in credit card debt. 2009 was a balance sheet recession and had much more to do with private sector debt levels than the business cycle.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balance_sheet_recession

Sure, we could've tried spending our way out of it to encourage growth so that the private sector could carry on feeling comfortable about the level of debt they were shouldering. But the next crash would've been inevitable and even deeper.

It would've taken longer to recover too. Part of my dislike of Labour's economic plan was that they wanted to reduce the deficit reduction rate to 1/5th of what the Tories plan. Cuts aren't nice for anybody, but I'd much rather a decade of cuts than multiple decades of stagnant growth (see: Japan).
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