Sony UK distribution centre burned to the ground

[bakubo]

Greg, that is exactly what a huge group of people all over the U.S. who call themselves the Tea Party believe and are trying to fix. I am undecided about them, but they are vilified with such venom and hysterical rants by many of the entrenched politicians, government employee unions, and the media that it makes me, rather than have more doubts about the Tea Party, it makes me wonder if maybe they are on to something. Is there anything similar in Australia and the UK?

[Atgets_Apprentice]

I don't know about Australia, but in the UK, the equivelant of the Tea[s] Baggers[/s] Party are in Government, and the very people who haven't got a clue what went wrong or how to fix it, and make a different announcement every day, some of which seem to contradict the previous ones.

[Dusty]

Agorbasta, we still produce a lot here in America, and yes, we do get most of it ripped from our hands to pay for everything under the sun! It is coming unglued, and the Tea Party is trying to do something about it. For decades we've been electing politicians that tell us that the govt. can give us everything we want for free, but our dumbed-down education system hasn't let most people understand that the government has no money that it doesn't take from someone.

We are broke, but so is much of the Western world. Too much giving everything away for free to those who won't work. Once you reach that tipping point where you have more voters getting funds/services that they don't contribute to or contribute very little to, they'll vote themselves into bankruptcy. Only an onslaught of insight and moral courage can save them from the catastrophe that will follow.

Free food, housing, education, health care, retirement, just vote for me! Sooner or later the bills come due. Once we go broke, and the current pols can no longer get elected because everyone knows their promises are no good, I'd like to see the Congressional Retribution Act passed. Basically, we confiscate every dime from every former member of Congress that got us into this mess, going back to 1900 and following their descendents down to the present. Then forever change Congress to ensure that their pay, retirement and health care as the same as everyone else who works, outlaw political contributions from anyone who isn't allowed to vote for that person, and instill strict term limits.

Of course, it may be too lat for that. Our Chinese masters may not let us rule ourselves, and may take all of our natural resources and labor to pay them back.

MAYBE we'll wake up first!

Dusty

[Greg Beetham]

Henry I’m not totally sure if there is currently an equivalent to the tea party in Australia, with multiculturalism and a Hodge podge of noisy idealists and greens all with there various agendas and axes to grind it’s hard to tell where we are headed too exactly. On balance it doesn’t look good for the battlers, I think, what really irritates me is that after a lifetime of struggling and paying taxes there are people living in poverty while huge amounts of revenue are diverted to provide welfare, medical assistance and extra rights and privileges to an ever growing population of non contributing antisocial free breeding morons, but are not available to those who actually helped pay for it, and the segregating factor appears to be based on racial grounds despite there being anti-racial legislation in place.
There was one glimmer of hope on the horizon in recent times, a female politician who went in to bat for average Joe, but she was vilified and shouted down by the various socialist academic media organizations and political groups (who felt threatened, justifiably) as some kind of racist, but I thought she spoke a great deal of common sense. Funny thing though, some aspects she spoke of were adopted quietly (slightly modified) by one of the main political parties.
But we have other social problems I think, with the decline of manufacturing in Australia there seems to be a choice of becoming a bulldozer driver or an entrepreneur and not a lot in between, I’ve always looked with envy at the way America promotes and encourages research and development, that too my mind is one of the most critical deciding factors whether a culture is going to ‘make it’ or not. Too make R&D cost effective though you need economies of scale, Australia probably doesn’t have enough population to justify large investment in the same way the US does, but then it has also amazed me that in the past there have been significant discoveries here in research with labs operating on a shoestring budget.
I still believe in America and it’s ideals, but I think some of the aspects of adopting the ‘high moral ground’ might have to be modified somewhat if America is too survive long term, (as Dusty said, the so called ‘marginalised’ need to be made to understand there is no such thing as a free lunch), I don’t understand why people are paid to do nothing (same thing here), why not have social work programs for them helping out in nursing homes, aged care, fixing and repairing infrastructure etc. where they can at least do something useful?
Greg

[bfitzgerald]

Can't say the tea party appeals...
Folks it's something like this swing left/right you pretty much get all the same thing in a different suit but playing the same old tune.
Take a good look at Libya as well most of the National Transitional Council top bods are merely ex Gaddafi cronies..so they suddenly decided to be "nice people" but were pretty happy to go along with Gaddafi for years. Happy to watch their country people exploited...and then they change the tune?

Vested interest power grab or genuine peace? You decide..
And whilst we're at it nobody is crying about Gaddafi easy to see what he was about, but hey let's be honest Nato went far beyond their mandate they supported a rebellion..ok fine but where to next as we're on a mission to rid the world of dictators lots of countries left Ooops I forgot Libya has oil..hmm starting to see a pattern here. Seems lots of western leaders were happy to hug Gaddafi as well lots of handshakes and visits. I suppose they were ok about what was going on all these years.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/3566545.stm

I'll be waiting to see when Nato scrambles jets to defend civilians in the West Bank and Gaza strip I suspect we will be waiting for a very very long time. Those people are not part of the favoured club.

I'd like to try to make a non comedy/non cryptic post but we've so much information around us that tells us the "real story" is it's almost hilarious to find many people who still don't seem to get what is going on. There is the odd rare politician who might be genuine and not looking out to line their own pockets. In a way at least with the Gaddafi's/Saddam Hussein's of this world they don't pretend to be anything other than what they are selfish greedy dictators who want money and power. I don't see a lot of difference between that and a lot of the politicians we are surrounded by. They don't put troops and tanks on the street to repress people..they just blind them with propaganda to distract them. I'm really not sure which one is worse!

Think I'm wrong? Well here you go again America is broke..but of course it's a good time to have a big spend up! Enjoy... you're paying for it


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... tions.html

[bakubo]

I'll be waiting to see when Nato scrambles jets to defend civilians in the West Bank and Gaza strip I suspect we will be waiting for a very very long time. Those people are not part of the favoured club.

Here you go:

Israeli-Arab Crisis Approaching

http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20110822 ... 1240afaa14

[Dusty]

Henry, would the idiot who wrote this statement in the article:

Whatever the Palestinians once were, they are clearly a nation in the simplest and most important sense — namely, they think of themselves as a nation.

Say the same thing about the Confederates?

If "thinking of yourself as a nation" makes you one, I know of a whole bunch of micro nation-states (make that nation-cities) that the UN will have to recognize as well!

Dusty

[bossel]

Could an admin please lock this post? I'd like to respond to several posts but this is not a political forum so I just keep reading lots of stuff

[bfitzgerald]

Well it is off topic so I guess anything goes.

[bakubo]

Henry, would the idiot who wrote this statement in the article:

Whatever the Palestinians once were, they are clearly a nation in the simplest and most important sense — namely, they think of themselves as a nation.

Say the same thing about the Confederates?

If "thinking of yourself as a nation" makes you one, I know of a whole bunch of micro nation-states (make that nation-cities) that the UN will have to recognize as well!

I get the distinct impression you read the first few lines and didn't bother with the rest, right?

I have been reading stuff by Friedman since he started Stratfor about 1995/96. He is far from an idiot. Stratfor is a non-partisan, non-ideological intelligence analysis outfit and write some good, insightful stuff. It used to be all free, but now a lot of the stuff is available only by subscription. I am still on their email list and get the occasional free article that they send to me. This was one.

http://www.stratfor.com/about_stratfor

[pakodominguez]

Could an admin please lock this post? I'd like to respond to several posts but this is not a political forum so I just keep reading lots of stuff

Well, we are on the Off Topic forum, so we are allow to talk politics (and behave)