Politics is Stupid

Time to look into Gary Johnson I suppose.

I dunno.

A quick spell of socialist anarchy would do the world a lot of good right now.

Anarchy in the US has generally ended up with neighborhoods on fire and the people who need the most help dying or losing their business or livelihood. It usually barely even hits the middle class.

I wouldn’t say the USA has ever experienced anarchy, merely civil disobedience. Anarchy would require the disassembly of all local, state and federal government; socialist anarchy would remove state and federal government.

Y’know, like how the USA started out all those years ago :stuck_out_tongue: townships with no external pressures, beholden only to themselves.

Watts was anarchy, LA after Rodney King was anarchy, Ferguson was anarchy. Civil disobedience in either case would have attacked the forms of oppression, not their neighbors and friends. Civil disobedience implies disobeying unjust laws or official sanctions. Burning down the CVS on the corner, or breaking into the Korean pawn shop down the street does nothing.

Circling the police station, mass appearances to court dates, hell, even attacking the police (Stupid idea and I don’t approve) would be civil disobedience, refusing to disperse, resisting the government, not attacking your fellow sufferers.

The government doesn’t suffer when CVS burns down, hell that’s job creation in their book. Plus new construction fees and permits and all that fresh money coming in.

That was also a country that had a lot more in common than most of us do now. Though I’d be more than happy to restrict the Fed to the powers of let’s say 1850? For a loose conglomeration of states we’re all toeing the same lines here.

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Kiiiiiiinda. It’s possible we’ve both fallen into a colloquial hole.

Riots ≠ anarchy in the same way that cars ≠ trains. In a riot things may become anarchic since the riot has no definitive leader structure, but that does not make anarchism since the overall powers that be were not destroyed. In fact the very point in Ferguson was that the police force survived as a government structure means that there was no anarchy installed, there was simply an uncontrolled riot.

Had the riot sacked the governing forces (local senate, city hall, police, army, et al) then the riot would have caused anarchy; since it didn’t then there wasn’t. The Los Angeles riots came close to causing local government collapse, but not national. And I’d have to look up Watts, since I’m not familiar at all with that incident.

Looking at how the computer’s American English dictionary defines things, and assuming American schools teach from it as a rule as we do from the OED here in the UK, it’s easy to conflate anarchy1 (a state of disorder) and anarchy2 (an absence of government). I was talking solely from the anarchy2 definition, so I’m sorry if I caused confusion :smile:

Fair enough. Anarchy as an absence of government is just a transitional phase on the way to totalitarianism though. Not exactly what people normally want.

I would say that the US needs some disorder, but directed at the cause of the problem. In Fergy that being the city council that continues to add fee after fee and fine after fine to a population that can’t afford to pay taxes or buy food. Possibly to the people enforcing it, but mostly to the people they put in power that are continuing to screw them.

Of course, I’ll bet big money that the majority of those people were reelected, or were planned switches by the members.

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The suggest has been made that he should co-op Sander’s slogan and start running ads with the tagline, ā€œFeel the Johnson.ā€

Or perhaps that’s not a good idea.

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Why is it so difficult to explain to people that having union representatives on both sides of a public union/government negotiation table is a bad thing?

Do you want a school board that is all education first spend more money negotiating with the teacher’s union? Even if you think education needs more funds, do you want every extra dime going to teachers and administrators? Does the school really need a new football field, or are half the people on the county board football team alumni and married to teachers?

This crap is important.

Does it make sense for half of a public safety committee to be retired policemen? Or should there be an appointed member that is one but can’t vote?

Do you bar former teacher’s union trustees from running for local or state office? Is it a conflict of interest if a woman married to a fireman pushes for annexing the local fire department as a city council member?

We worry about this sort of influence between congress and Dow Chemical, or Wall Street, but I’d bet billions more are lost this way in the churn. Money goes where people aren’t controlling it.

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Lots of truths there. I’d agree that the smaller the governmental body, or the smaller the area of influence, the greater chance of shenanigans slipping through unopposed.

Fuck. FUCK. FUCK. FUCK.

So last night we all voted to leave the EU.

I say we all, I mean most of the places where nazis poll high.

I woke up this morning to find my house has effectively lost £15,000 in value, and I think my car warranty might now be invalid. Well fuck. Fuck the lot of those small-minded xenophobic twat-faces who voted leave with a pneumatic drill with razorwire welded to the chisel.

Any of you guys live in Canada and can suggest a nice place to live as a British ex-pat fleeing the nazi hordes?

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I hear Calais is a nice place to be right now.

This was a victory for xenophobia and bigotry.
I vaguely recall it didn’t go so well last time that happened in Europe.

All the jobs are in Ontario and Quebec, but if you’re just looking for a cheaper place to live, try New Brunswick.

In fact, New Brunswick is part of our retirement plan. It’s where I’m from, and where we plan to go. Right now, we live in Ontario and I should have my mortgage paid off in another 10 years if things go to plan. Sell that and get a much bigger, much cheaper place there and live like kings (or, a king and queen in our case).

Example:
Our house is valued at just under $400,000. It’s a one story bungalow on a largish lot (75’x100’) that could use a bit of improvement.
My sister lives in NB and her house is a split level ranch that easily has double the space of ours, a lot twice as big, and is in excellent shape. One very similar sold behind her for $165,000. You have to not mind snow, though. Like, LOTS of snow.

I’ll just leave this here for you.
http://www.cic.gc.ca/englIsh/immigrate/index.asp

I’d been wondering how that would go, hoping for a different result.
Keep us updated, please. I really am interested in how this works out.

Must go and check on my money.

Congratulations!

From what I understand, based on economic analysis after Greece shat on itself a while back, leaving should be good for your economy in the long run.

So seriously, no non-racist non-evil reasons someone might not want to be part of the European Union?

Sovereignty - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SovereigntyWikipedia

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If we had a left-wing government that cared about the people then I would have voted leave. I don’t agree with a lot of European politics, protectionism, and general ham-fistedness when it comes to the general populace.

As it is we have one of the harshest right-wing governments in recent decades, and suddenly they’re not going to be bound by the European Court of Human Rights anymore. This is going to be disastrous for living conditions for anyone earning anything between minimum wage (Ā£14,000pa full time) up to about Ā£20,000, even more disastrous for those who owe student debt to organisations or governments outside the UK.

From the outside looking in, I’d rather be bound by a harsh national government that I can vote out than a Belgian commission I have no input on. And since there’s going to be a new government now, it could change substantially and imminently.

In the short term, this is going to be pretty disruptive. But it will take years to sort out. I’m seeing a lot of commentary citing day one financial market results to mean this was a horrible idea from which the UK will never recover. I can’t understand that argument to be anything other than fear-mongering.

But demonizing the other side (and I’m naturally inclined to local rule) is easier than examining arguments. Maybe I am misreading it.