DT Politics Thread

[RicoS321]

2 hours ago, CurlsLikeTattie said:

People need to take a test before a referendum with one simple question - explain in fewer than 500 words what we are voting for.

Fail that, you're not voting.

Actually, there should be a screen in the voting booth (for all elections and referendums etc.) where you either

- match the policy to the candidate, and if you get less than 80% you don't get taken to the voting screen, or

- select the policies that resonate with you, and it matches your answers to the relevant candidate.

I might need to give these options some real thought before airing them any more.

With a by-election coming up, I feel they should save the rejoin the EU talk for a little while. Gives Reform all the fuel they need to take Makerfield.

How about explaining in more than 500 words what you don't get to vote on? That'd be far more meaningful.

[Ajja]

We should move heaven and earth to get back into the EU. We will go back with a significantly poorer deal than we had but that’s the price paid for stupidity. The only realistic way we get out of this Reform spiral and the misery of where the UK is headed is by driving economic growth and bringing some much needed wealth back into both the public purse and into the pockets of those at the poorer end of society. The EU is our biggest market opportunity, we’ve lost tens of billions by leaving it. 
 

On top of that, the rise of Trump has changed the landscape immeasurably in Europe and the need to form stronger ties with them has never been greater in recent times. 

Edited May 18 by Ajja

[blinlemon]

1 hour ago, Ajja said:

…the rise of Trump has changed the landscape immeasurably in Europe and the need to form stronger ties with them has never been greater in recent times. 

I’ve been saying this since 11/9 and the US using it as an opportunity to get its mitts on the States’ fossil fuels which had somehow found their way under Mesopotamia. 

[Ajja]

12 hours ago, Mason89 said:

There’s a lack of honesty with politicians when it comes to Brexit. Somebody should just come out and say it. If you still believe in Brexit you’re a dildo 

Labour definitely want it but they are in the jaws of the vice on this one and the media in this country are just waiting to turn the screw. They are terrified of how Farage would weaponise a reversal of Brexit and the right wing media would blow the wind directly into his sails. They would go full bore on the boats and images of thousands upon thousands of immigrants landing here for free. Even though Brexit has been the most damaging thing for immigration as the French can now just say fuck it, your problem now. 
 

it’s exactly the same with Isreal, Labour are so terrified of the antisemitism tag that they won’t speak out about it despite how they really feel. Again, the media and certain factions within politics are poised and ready to go to town on them if they do. 
 

The media in this country are absolute cretins and they make it almost impossible for a left or even central party to succeed for any length of time. 

[RicoS321]

11 hours ago, Ajja said:

The only realistic way we get out of this Reform spiral and the misery of where the UK is headed is by driving economic growth and bringing some much needed wealth back into both the public purse and into the pockets of those at the poorer end of society

Does anyone really believe this shite? Economic growth is the biggest disaster that this planet has ever seen. It's a make believe, anti-science, game. If the intention of GDP was to help poor people, which it isn't, then we could simply do that. Equality is not, and will never be, predicated on growth. Just change the rules of the make believe game. It's okay (it isn't, really) for a loser politician to talk about growth like it's a real thing, but for the public to parrot is significantly worse than climate change denial. Economic growth decimates every single planetary boundary identified, without exception. The only realistic way that we get out of the misery of where the UK is headed is for the addicts to admit the problem, and do the exact opposite of what you suggest. That means less global trade, and more local focus, especially on food production. Less stuff and less travel. 

Anyway, the cognitive dissonance of the economic growthers will come to a shattering halt when they realise it's entirely powered by diesel, and the easy to reach stuff is now done (and has been for some time, but the fictional growth of money printing has kept the illusion going for a bit). Hopefully they'll not only admit the problem, but begin to act on it. 

Obviously, this isn't a direct go at you @Ajja. Just the narrative. Normally when I make a comment about growth being the worst thing, people who espouse the narrative (the adults, apparently) tell me that they know all this, but we've got to work with what we've got or some shite (in other words, don't admit to, or attempt to tackle the problem). That once we just get back in the EU/become more sustainable/get to net zero/reduce inequality, then we can deal with the biggest issue that underpins every problem we have as a species (and the biggest problem for every other species). It's an extreme form of gaslighting, surrounded by the fictional economic edifice. Hopefully the best thing to come out of Hormuz will be that people will be forced to engage with the problem and stop engaging with the fictional terms of the system, which everyone knows cannot be sustained. The best thing that can happen is that the stand off continues, and gives just enough of a shock that people come to their senses. COVID clearly wasn't the awakening, hopefully the permanent loss of 15% of oil production will be. And, no, the answer isn't renewables. 

[Mason89]

When should we start stockpiling tinned foods & arse paper? 
 

 

[CurlsLikeTattie]

52 minutes ago, Mason89 said:

When should we start stockpiling tinned foods & arse paper? 
 

 

Don't you already? Can't move in my house for heinz beans and andrex (no supermarket own for us come the apocolypse)

[RicoS321]

38 minutes ago, Mason89 said:

When should we start stockpiling tinned foods & arse paper? 
 

 

According to government advice, you should already have a stockpile of essentials. All a bit individualist if you ask me, people should just starve with dignity.

Honestly though, this type of response is expected, rather than engage with the point. That's exactly how climate change deniers work: "when's the disaster coming? They said we'd be wearing bikinis in February by now!!!".

I have no idea when the fruits of the system will become ripe, but the evidence suggests that it will. Perpetual growth cannot happen, oil (the good stuff, that actually powers the material world) is declining, renewables are not renewable, 7 of the 9 planetary boundaries have been exceeded (unabated). I do think we are past the upward peak of the bell curve, which was entirely built on fossil fuels, and as we descend there will be some big jolts on the way, with the current middle east crisis potentially being one. However, it could resolve itself within a few years and business will return to relative normal but with oil sitting higher and demand having permanently reduced without most of the middle class being completely unaware as resentment continues to boil over amongst the working classes (who will continue to be scoffed at for their form of ignorance/racism/bigotry whilst ignoring the actual issues further). This is the part that people who talk about EU, or Labour leaders fail to engage with. 

[RicoS321]

59 minutes ago, CurlsLikeTattie said:

Don't you already? Can't move in my house for heinz beans and andrex (no supermarket own for us come the apocolypse)

You forgot the important part: never reveal your stockpiling online. They'll come for you first. 

[Mason89]

31 minutes ago, RicoS321 said:

According to government advice, you should already have a stockpile of essentials. All a bit individualist if you ask me, people should just starve with dignity.

Honestly though, this type of response is expected, rather than engage with the point. That's exactly how climate change deniers work: "when's the disaster coming? They said we'd be wearing bikinis in February by now!!!".

I have no idea when the fruits of the system will become ripe, but the evidence suggests that it will. Perpetual growth cannot happen, oil (the good stuff, that actually powers the material world) is declining, renewables are not renewable, 7 of the 9 planetary boundaries have been exceeded (unabated). I do think we are past the upward peak of the bell curve, which was entirely built on fossil fuels, and as we descend there will be some big jolts on the way, with the current middle east crisis potentially being one. However, it could resolve itself within a few years and business will return to relative normal but with oil sitting higher and demand having permanently reduced without most of the middle class being completely unaware as resentment continues to boil over amongst the working classes (who will continue to be scoffed at for their form of ignorance/racism/bigotry whilst ignoring the actual issues further). This is the part that people who talk about EU, or Labour leaders fail to engage with. 

The future might be a bit bumpy but we already have the answers, just not the will. That’ll come. 
 

Ignorance/racism/bigotry in this day and age is a choice and has nothing to do with class. 

[CurlsLikeTattie]

1 hour ago, RicoS321 said:

You forgot the important part: never reveal your stockpiling online. They'll come for you first. 

I have a house full of used dog shit bags and rangers tops. Nothing you want here. Move along please. Thanks.

[Mason89]

3 minutes ago, CurlsLikeTattie said:

I have a house full of used dog shit bags and rangers tops. Nothing you want here. Move along please. Thanks.

How do you tell them apart? 

[RicoS321]

1 hour ago, Mason89 said:

The future might be a bit bumpy but we already have the answers, just not the will. That’ll come. 
 

Ignorance/racism/bigotry in this day and age is a choice and has nothing to do with class. 

The answers don't exist within our political system, they weren't an option in any vote in living memory and they have nothing to do with being in the EU or not (or stopping boats). 

Ignorance, racism and bigotry are no more choices than being tricked into buying a can of monster, or an ultra processed vegan meal.

Edit: I'm not saying that every bigot does so without free will. Just as not every person able to cook will choose to do so. 

Edited May 19 by RicoS321

[Mason89]

2 minutes ago, RicoS321 said:

The answers don't exist within our political system, they weren't an option in any vote in living memory and they have nothing to do with being in the EU or not (or stopping boats). 

Ignorance, racism and bigotry are no more choices than being tricked into buying a can of monster, or an ultra processed vegan meal.

The panic is in the future though? 
 

They are absolutely choices. I choose not to drink monster, eat ultra processed vegan meals or hate minority groups. That has nothing to do with class (although I simply ooze the stuff) 

[Don Julio]

47 minutes ago, Mason89 said:

How do you tell them apart? 

The dog shit bags look and smell better.

[RicoS321]

51 minutes ago, Mason89 said:

The panic is in the future though? 
 

They are absolutely choices. I choose not to drink monster, eat ultra processed vegan meals or hate minority groups. That has nothing to do with class (although I simply ooze the stuff) 

The panic should be now, given the scale of the problem. We certainly shouldn't be discussing EU versus no EU, or Burnham versus Starmer. We absolutely shouldn't be frittering away our remaining fossil fuels on consumer culture or pretending that switching to electric cars is sustainable, or that net zero is sustainable. That is truly destructive. To be honest, I'm surprised that you don't know this given that you know what the answers are? If you know what sustainable actually means, and you have an outline of what it entails, then you set course for that target now surely? Otherwise you are just wasting vital resources on something that might stretch another couple of iterations, leaving future generations with significantly less resources to make the switch, resulting in more death and destruction (and war, of course). I'm sure you can give a rough outline of what sustainable looks like to clarify.

You choose not to do those things because they're not targeted at you, and your an individual. The billions spent on marketing is to ensure that the average individual drinks monster and dislikes foreigners. There are many who can choose not to partake, and still do, of course.

[Mason89]

3 minutes ago, RicoS321 said:

The panic should be now, given the scale of the problem. We certainly shouldn't be discussing EU versus no EU, or Burnham versus Starmer. We absolutely shouldn't be frittering away our remaining fossil fuels on consumer culture or pretending that switching to electric cars is sustainable, or that net zero is sustainable. That is truly destructive. To be honest, I'm surprised that you don't know this given that you know what the answers are? If you know what sustainable actually means, and you have an outline of what it entails, then you set course for that target now surely? Otherwise you are just wasting vital resources on something that might stretch another couple of iterations, leaving future generations with significantly less resources to make the switch, resulting in more death and destruction (and war, of course). I'm sure you can give a rough outline of what sustainable looks like to clarify.

You choose not to do those things because they're not targeted at you, and your an individual. The billions spent on marketing is to ensure that the average individual drinks monster and dislikes foreigners. There are many who can choose not to partake, and still do, of course.

That’s not how it works. Individuals are targeted. Many of the parasites made fortunes selling your data. In fact, it’s all most of them seem really interested in. I’m more than happy to call out racism because it’s a choice and people choose it regardless of their class. The richest man in the world is a honking racist. 
 

For the rest of it, I’m sure I’m missing something. What does sustainability mean to you? How are renewables not renewable? Why does it have to end in doom and gloom? Let’s polish this turd together 

[RicoS321]

2 minutes ago, Mason89 said:

That’s not how it works. Individuals are targeted. Many of the parasites made fortunes selling your data. In fact, it’s all most of them seem really interested in. I’m more than happy to call out racism because it’s a choice and people choose it regardless of their class. The richest man in the world is a honking racist. 
 

For the rest of it, I’m sure I’m missing something. What does sustainability mean to you? How are renewables not renewable? Why does it have to end in doom and gloom? Let’s polish this turd together 

Is the richest man in the world a racist? Or does racism suit his agenda of enriching himself? Some folk use racism, some folk are racists and some people are drawn in by the lure of the first two. I don't think we're at the stage of individuals being targeted, it's still blanket marketing or propaganda with the hope of getting to 10% or whatever. A bit like gambling companies existing because they can get the ten percent addicted that keep coming back. Or weight watchers. Anyway, I don't have any real conviction on the subject, I'm happy to be wrong (or unhappy in this case!).

Okay. Sustainability is something that you can define up front. You can argue about the exact parameters, but you have to have something. You could say that sustainability is returning us to a background extinction rate; using only materials that are circular or compostable (i.e not plastic), carbon based; ecologically sound and in harmony with the rest of life on earth, staying within planetary boundaries. Importantly, it's not acceptable to say that we have met these things on a generational basis, whatever you design must fit within the boundaries for generations and millennia if extrapolated out as best as possible. Anyway, once you've defined what sustainability is, then you assess your existing plans on whether or not they meet sustainability, and any new technology must meet these guidelines or we simply don't pursue it. 

That is a fairly reduced, but straightforward way to define sustainability and then work towards it. It is not how we currently approach sustainability. There are no goals (other than net zero, which only deliberately treats carbon emissions as a stand alone item) and nothing sustainable to work towards, only something unsustainable to work away from. It's a key difference. It means that we can couch everything in sleekit language such as "more sustainable". Electric cars are "more sustainable" than ICE vehicles. They don't meet any criteria of sustainability whatsoever, but they're more sustainable than the existing technology. More sustainable, in this context, is the same as being more pregnant. It's nonsense. The word for "more sustainable" is simply "unsustainable". Electric cars are unsustainable. Unfortunately, when held to appropriate standards, every single city in the world is currently unsustainable, and there isn't a single blueprint available that describes one that could be or how to get one there. But because our politics doesn't require us to define what sustainable is, we can just simply keep measuring different versions of unsustainability against one another and saying that my unpregnant wife is more pregnant than your unpregnant wife because we've had sex this year. 

I would really love for someone to come back with a sustainable city design, even in rough form. 

[Mason89]

38 minutes ago, RicoS321 said:

Is the richest man in the world a racist? Or does racism suit his agenda of enriching himself? Some folk use racism, some folk are racists and some people are drawn in by the lure of the first two. I don't think we're at the stage of individuals being targeted, it's still blanket marketing or propaganda with the hope of getting to 10% or whatever. A bit like gambling companies existing because they can get the ten percent addicted that keep coming back. Or weight watchers. Anyway, I don't have any real conviction on the subject, I'm happy to be wrong (or unhappy in this case!).

Okay. Sustainability is something that you can define up front. You can argue about the exact parameters, but you have to have something. You could say that sustainability is returning us to a background extinction rate; using only materials that are circular or compostable (i.e not plastic), carbon based; ecologically sound and in harmony with the rest of life on earth, staying within planetary boundaries. Importantly, it's not acceptable to say that we have met these things on a generational basis, whatever you design must fit within the boundaries for generations and millennia if extrapolated out as best as possible. Anyway, once you've defined what sustainability is, then you assess your existing plans on whether or not they meet sustainability, and any new technology must meet these guidelines or we simply don't pursue it. 

That is a fairly reduced, but straightforward way to define sustainability and then work towards it. It is not how we currently approach sustainability. There are no goals (other than net zero, which only deliberately treats carbon emissions as a stand alone item) and nothing sustainable to work towards, only something unsustainable to work away from. It's a key difference. It means that we can couch everything in sleekit language such as "more sustainable". Electric cars are "more sustainable" than ICE vehicles. They don't meet any criteria of sustainability whatsoever, but they're more sustainable than the existing technology. More sustainable, in this context, is the same as being more pregnant. It's nonsense. The word for "more sustainable" is simply "unsustainable". Electric cars are unsustainable. Unfortunately, when held to appropriate standards, every single city in the world is currently unsustainable, and there isn't a single blueprint available that describes one that could be or how to get one there. But because our politics doesn't require us to define what sustainable is, we can just simply keep measuring different versions of unsustainability against one another and saying that my unpregnant wife is more pregnant than your unpregnant wife because we've had sex this year. 

I would really love for someone to come back with a sustainable city design, even in rough form. 

Show off 

[TheDonbytheDee]

Some nice light afternoon reading on here today.

[Ajja]

Yikes. Not been able to access today so missed all this. No personal offence taken my end Rico, I’m too long in the tooth for that, all opinions and debate are valid in my head. I gave up thinking I’m always right when I met my wife 30 years ago but I also gave up thinking other people are too so anything is up in the air .

I would love to come back and challenge your points but I actually can’t really decipher what they are other than a fairly apocalyptic view of the direction of travel that appears to negate any short term thinking that doesn’t change the direction of that particular course. 
 

 

[mondo_notion]

34 minutes ago, TheDonbytheDee said:

Some nice light afternoon reading on here today.

Here's some lighter reading for you....

HS2 has been delayed, will have trains run at a reduced speed and will cost more than NASA's Artemis moon mission.

I did read somewhere that it equates to about £100 billion per mile but shirley that can't be right?

[swaddon]

10 minutes ago, mondo_notion said:

Here's some lighter reading for you....

HS2 has been delayed, will have trains run at a reduced speed and will cost more than NASA's Artemis moon mission.

I did read somewhere that it equates to about £100 billion per mile but shirley that can't be right?

It's over 100 billion for the whole thing.

Which will probably double before a train even hits the tracks.

[RicoS321]

26 minutes ago, Ajja said:

I would love to come back and challenge your points but I actually can’t really decipher what they are other than a fairly apocalyptic view of the direction of travel that appears to negate any short term thinking that doesn’t change the direction of that particular course.

Sounds like you've deciphered them quite succinctly! The only slight addendum I'd suggest is that it's not just that it negates the short term, it's that short term not only actively ignores the long term, it dresses itself up as solving it. In reality, the long term is not discussed, ever. It's like discussing the new skis you're getting for a snowy holiday your going on in a few years. You've bought all your snowsuits, gloves, hats, ski boots etc. Next year, you're due to have your legs amputated. It's denialism. Very costly denialism. The EU/Burnham shite is discussing the intricate parts of the game without actually discussing what and why the game exists and what its outcomes are.

[Mason89]

34 minutes ago, swaddon said:

It's over 100 billion for the whole thing.

Which will probably double before a train even hits the tracks.

What about those FeRrieZ though!?!?