Is this political? I don’t know - POLL ADDED
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MattR
Well-Known Member
In the UK, election spending is very tightly controlled and all donations are scrutinised. A party that exceeds the allocated spend can be fined. All politicians have to declare any donations they get and any interest they have in a subject as a result of lobbying. They usually have to recluse themselves from subject.
And why wouldn’t you want to see politics as a career? If you’ve spent your formative years studying politics at Uni, walking miles knocking on doors canvassing for votes as a minor council official to then work your way up to becoming a successful MP don’t you deserve that in the same way any other career person does? In fact, don’t you deserve it more than someone who has done absolutely nothing to contribute to society but concentrates purely on building wealth for himself?
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MattR
Well-Known Member
Shame you can’t talk about it without getting angry. We need to take angry out of politics. Facebook and Twitter are products of an unregulated free market economy. It was bound to go wrong because big business has no scruples. Same with the sub prime bank crash in 2008. It was obviously going to happen but they were allowed to continue anyway. Regulation is essential if you want to stop big business riding rough shod over society.
Conservatism is based on the idea that if you support the wealth creators some of that wealth will trickle down to the workers. But that doesn’t work any more. Modern conservatives have become masters at keeping all the wealth for themselves and reducing their contributions to society at all levels. That’s why the gap between the rich and the poor has grown so wide. The poor now pay a much greater proportion of their wages in tax.
Socialism works by sharing the wealth with those that produce the wealth in the first place. The workers. Somehow, the ultra rich in the UK and the US have convinced working class people that this is a bad thing.
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MattR
Well-Known Member
Then it’s our fault. I see it in the UK and it is most apparent in areas that are less educated and have been persuaded by short, simple sound bites to vote for things that will harm them. Case in point: Scottish fisherman who voted for Brexit only to find that they can’t sell their catches to the EU any more due to the delays in customs checks. These guys have just parked up 20 trucks full of rotting shell fish outside Parliament in protest.
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Well, this working class peon thinks that socialism is a bad thing because
Tenman
Well-Known Member
'And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.
...So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue". That doesn't sound like "break in the capital and beat up congress". It sounds like my high school football coach jacking us up for a game away from home. We knew what he meant.
...So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue". That doesn't sound like "break in the capital and beat up congress". It sounds like my high school football coach jacking us up for a game away from home. We knew what he meant.
PhilPhilippines
Well-Known Member
Yes, we did...
In fact, I knew it from the comments leading up to that fateful day. I thought it would get violent, but I did not see them storming the Capitol. That was a PPPPP moment. Was it a legitimate oversight? Was the late deployment of backup a deliberate act? Let us see what is uncovered. I know what I think...
PhilPhilippines
Well-Known Member
I am proud of Christy, a good friend of mine. She was named the ''PPI (Payment Protection Insurance) Queen'', after her investigations as acting director of retail at the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) culminated in GBP12 billion fine for the major UK banks. High street financial institutions that knowingly mis-sold PPI to their customers. Her dedicated actions led to many/most/all(?) customers to be compensated.
This piece is very interesting. It follows the money...
The real Goldfinger: the London banker who broke the world
The true story of how the City of London invented offshore banking – and set the rich free
www.theguardian.com
MattR
Well-Known Member
Do you know what % of benefits claimants are lazy asses? I bet it’s really small. In the UK it’s 0.2%. But many claimants have to claim because they don’t get paid enough to live off by their employers. These people are working hard doing jobs you wouldn’t want to do but don’t get paid enough to live on. So the tax payer pays the difference to make their wages up to the living wage. Meanwhile the greedy selfish business owners pay them selves dividends whilst we subsidise their wage Bill. These are the people we should go after
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MattR
Well-Known Member
As a working class chap, would you vote for a free healthcare system (like our NHS)? Free to everyone at the point of service (of course it’s not free, we pay National insurance) This system disproportionately benefits the working class but many have been persuaded by the elites that we should swap to an American style insurance system.
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Dirt_Dad
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That pretty much sums up the disconnect between those who had a problem with the last president, and those who did not.
One group saw him as a relentlessly optimistic, patriotic guy with a sense of humor. They didn't take his words seriously, they did take his policy actions very seriously.
The other group took every word he said seriously, could never detect a humorous intent in anything he ever said. This perspective overrode any serious evaluation of his policy actions.
Boris
Well-Known Member
All my successes are my own doing. All my failings are somebody else’s fault. Inspirational quote from our opposition party 
PhilPhilippines
Well-Known Member
You probably did not bring molotov cocktails, pipe bombs, handcuffs, pepper spray, mace, tasers, and guns to your high school football game. There was one person who could have stopped the invasion of the capitol and he was watching it on TV.
Boris
Well-Known Member
Year 19-20 that resulted in £4.6billion in over payments or 2.4%, money that could of gone to people that are truly in need. That relates to benefit fraud or error, that’s just what’s known. I have no doubt that the real figures are much higher.
I can agree with your comments on the freeloaders who are taking advantage of the taxpayers. Did you know that when Social Security, Medicare, unemployment, Welfare, FHA and even VA loans, were introduced they were viewed as socialistic programs? Are these bad things? Sure, there are a lot of fraudulent claims in these programs that need to be addressed, but I'm sure almost every US citizen has or will use one of these programs at some time.
I just put a couple quotes I'm familiar with and am sure that is that is the position Trump's defense will take and it would probably be fine for a normal crowd.
BUT
It is out of context because this was not a normal crowd. Trump had strongly and repeatedly encouraged participation by the right wing and far-right extreme groups and there was a lot on our DC news about who to expect for several days before. He did it successfully a year before when a much smaller crowd was here and the stakes weren't so high with the Electoral count going on. But on January 6 this time, the extremist colors and banners were extremely visible throughout the MUCH bigger crowd and almost every photo shows Proud Boys in orange hats, QAnon, Oath Keepers, Three Percenter flags, the green Kekistan flags, etc. The Proud Boys leader being arrested the day before at the airport was ALL over the news.
In other words, this was not a normal crowd, it was gasoline waiting for a match.
Giuliani started it with his remarks like "This is trial by combat" then Junior came on saying "we are going to kick some ass" before Trump's final hour long pump-up and telling the crowd he would personally walk with them (a lie) to the Capitol and said in several ways they were going to see members of Congress. Tump may have not thought it would end up like it did and this was all unintentional but the way it played out absolutely fits the definition of sedition.
PhilPhilippines
Well-Known Member
Amanda Gorman - "The Hill We Climb"
When day comes, we ask ourselves where can we find light in this never-ending shade?
The loss we carry, a sea we must wade.
We’ve braved the belly of the beast.
We’ve learned that quiet isn’t always peace,
and the norms and notions of what “just” is isn’t always justice.
And yet, the dawn is ours before we knew it.
Somehow we do it.
Somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken,
but simply unfinished.
We, the successors of a country and a time where a skinny Black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president, only to find herself reciting for one.
And yes, we are far from polished, far from pristine,
but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect.
We are striving to forge our union with purpose.
To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters, and conditions of man.
And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us, but what stands before us.
We close the divide because we know, to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside.
We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another.
We seek harm to none and harmony for all.
Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true:
That even as we grieved, we grew.
That even as we hurt, we hoped.
That even as we tired, we tried.
That we’ll forever be tied together, victorious.
Not because we will never again know defeat, but because we will never again sow division.
Scripture tells us to envision that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree and no one shall make them afraid.
If we’re to live up to our own time, then victory won’t lie in the blade, but in all the bridges we’ve made.
That is the promise to glade, the hill we climb, if only we dare.
It’s because being American is more than a pride we inherit.
It’s the past we step into and how we repair it.
We’ve seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it.
Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy.
This effort very nearly succeeded.
But while democracy can be periodically delayed,
it can never be permanently defeated.
In this truth, in this faith, we trust,
for while we have our eyes on the future, history has its eyes on us.
This is the era of just redemption.
We feared it at its inception.
We did not feel prepared to be the heirs of such a terrifying hour,
but within it, we found the power to author a new chapter, to offer hope and laughter to ourselves.
So while once we asked, ‘How could we possibly prevail over catastrophe?’ now we assert, ‘How could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?’
We will not march back to what was, but move to what shall be:
A country that is bruised but whole, benevolent but bold, fierce and free.
We will not be turned around or interrupted by intimidation because we know our inaction and inertia will be the inheritance of the next generation.
Our blunders become their burdens.
But one thing is certain:
If we merge mercy with might, and might with right, then love becomes our legacy and change, our children’s birthright.
So let us leave behind a country better than the one we were left.
With every breath from my bronze-pounded chest, we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one.
We will rise from the golden hills of the west.
We will rise from the wind-swept north-east where our forefathers first realized revolution.
We will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the midwestern states.
We will rise from the sun-baked south.
We will rebuild, reconcile, and recover.
In every known nook of our nation, in every corner called our country,
our people, diverse and beautiful, will emerge, battered and beautiful.
When day comes, we step out of the shade, aflame and unafraid.
The new dawn blooms as we free it.
For there is always light,
if only we’re brave enough to see it.
If only we’re brave enough to be it.
www.yahoo.com
When day comes, we ask ourselves where can we find light in this never-ending shade?
The loss we carry, a sea we must wade.
We’ve braved the belly of the beast.
We’ve learned that quiet isn’t always peace,
and the norms and notions of what “just” is isn’t always justice.
And yet, the dawn is ours before we knew it.
Somehow we do it.
Somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed a nation that isn’t broken,
but simply unfinished.
We, the successors of a country and a time where a skinny Black girl descended from slaves and raised by a single mother can dream of becoming president, only to find herself reciting for one.
And yes, we are far from polished, far from pristine,
but that doesn’t mean we are striving to form a union that is perfect.
We are striving to forge our union with purpose.
To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters, and conditions of man.
And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us, but what stands before us.
We close the divide because we know, to put our future first, we must first put our differences aside.
We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another.
We seek harm to none and harmony for all.
Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true:
That even as we grieved, we grew.
That even as we hurt, we hoped.
That even as we tired, we tried.
That we’ll forever be tied together, victorious.
Not because we will never again know defeat, but because we will never again sow division.
Scripture tells us to envision that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree and no one shall make them afraid.
If we’re to live up to our own time, then victory won’t lie in the blade, but in all the bridges we’ve made.
That is the promise to glade, the hill we climb, if only we dare.
It’s because being American is more than a pride we inherit.
It’s the past we step into and how we repair it.
We’ve seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it.
Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy.
This effort very nearly succeeded.
But while democracy can be periodically delayed,
it can never be permanently defeated.
In this truth, in this faith, we trust,
for while we have our eyes on the future, history has its eyes on us.
This is the era of just redemption.
We feared it at its inception.
We did not feel prepared to be the heirs of such a terrifying hour,
but within it, we found the power to author a new chapter, to offer hope and laughter to ourselves.
So while once we asked, ‘How could we possibly prevail over catastrophe?’ now we assert, ‘How could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?’
We will not march back to what was, but move to what shall be:
A country that is bruised but whole, benevolent but bold, fierce and free.
We will not be turned around or interrupted by intimidation because we know our inaction and inertia will be the inheritance of the next generation.
Our blunders become their burdens.
But one thing is certain:
If we merge mercy with might, and might with right, then love becomes our legacy and change, our children’s birthright.
So let us leave behind a country better than the one we were left.
With every breath from my bronze-pounded chest, we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one.
We will rise from the golden hills of the west.
We will rise from the wind-swept north-east where our forefathers first realized revolution.
We will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the midwestern states.
We will rise from the sun-baked south.
We will rebuild, reconcile, and recover.
In every known nook of our nation, in every corner called our country,
our people, diverse and beautiful, will emerge, battered and beautiful.
When day comes, we step out of the shade, aflame and unafraid.
The new dawn blooms as we free it.
For there is always light,
if only we’re brave enough to see it.
If only we’re brave enough to be it.
Poet Amanda Gorman reads 'The Hill We Climb'
The nation's first Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman recites "The Hill We Climb."
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You put your finger on the heart of our US election problem - Money
We don't have anywhere near the restrictions that the UK does. You guys even black out the news on the day of the elections.
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