Europe and the Tories Wagging the Dog

[Beef Oven]

So are you really going along with the dodgy verse of "All things bright and beautiful" ?
Blimey you kippers really are stuck in the fantasy past

is it a "hot chip" ?

and you know what mr Lydon said about anger

Well at last, we agree

[Beef Oven]

Can your own view be expressed perhaps more persuasively in something longer than a brief one-liner? I imagine you didn't appreciate the opinion of UKIP?

The only point in gurnemanz' post that I am doubtful of, is whether the UK can retain its cultural identity, the threat being from the US, of course, not the EU.

I don't give a monkey's what people think about UKIP. It's a free country and people can think what they want. But dismissing legitimate political views as neurotic and obsessive is not in order. The post got a response from me that was comensurate.

[Flosshilde]

But dismissing legitimate political views as neurotic and obsessive is not in order.

"retrograde attitudes, boorish behaviour and crude populist propagandising" seems to sum up UKIP's policies rather neatly, I thought. I don't see where they're called neurotic & obsessive.

[MrGongGong]

I don't give a monkey's what people think about UKIP. It's a free country and people can think what they want. .

But not, it would seem, this man

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ukip-youth-leader-olly-neville-sacked-for-supporting-gay-marriage-8444330.html

and nice to know that you agree about the fantasy past

[Beef Oven]

But not, it would seem, this man

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ukip-youth-leader-olly-neville-sacked-for-supporting-gay-marriage-8444330.html

and nice to know that you agree about the fantasy past

It's all about the future MrGG - keep pace, please

[MrGongGong]

It's all about the future MrGG - keep pace, please

You know what John said about the future ........

[Beef Oven]

You know what John said about the future ........

You probably didn't mean to, but your two Lydon references have made my day!!!

Edit: Crickey! Did I walk onto that last one or what!!!!?

[french frank]

I don't give a monkey's what people think about UKIP. It's a free country and people can think what they want. But dismissing legitimate political views as neurotic and obsessive is not in order. The post got a response from me that was comensurate.

I'm not complaining about your post, merely trying to understand which bit of gurnemanz' you thought 'went downhill'. I could only think you disagreed with the description of UKIP, but it seems you didn't give a monkey's about that

[Beef Oven]

I'm not complaining about your post, merely trying to understand which bit of gurnemanz' you thought 'went downhill'. I could only think you disagreed with the description of UKIP, but it seems you didn't give a monkey's about that

I misunderstood - sorry ff.

[Flosshilde]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...e-8444330.html

Interesting to compare that with their initial actions over this (nut)case -

"The UK Independence party has suspended one of its election candidates who suggested that mothers carrying foetuses with Downs syndrome or spina bifida should be forced to have abortions to avoid the child being "a burden on the state as well as on the family".

Ukip had initially backed Geoffrey Clark, saying that members held "a range of views and opinions" that were not party policy and adding that while it disagreed with his comments, they were contained in a "personal manifesto".

But following a backlash, the party performed a u-turn " (http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2...downs-syndrome)

[aeolium]

In the case of Greece, although I have no first-hand knowledge of conditions there, it's clear that the mandarins of the EU, and German politicians are seen as behind the fiscal, economic and political crisis. People turn to Golden Dawn, the police become more and more powerful, and immigrants are reviled. Most of the same happened in Germany in the 1930s, with consequences that are well known. There and then the scapegoats were the Jews, hellishly tarnished by Nazi politicians with all manner of manipulative sins and economic malice. I don't know to what extent the Greeks can see their own laissez-faire economic habits - huge state bureaucracy, tax evasion and corruption - as also to blame. I know Italy rather better and I have witnessed how all that has simply been widely accepted with a shrug and a self-satisfied smile.

Thanks for your considered response, kernelbogey.

What surprises me is that we know from history in what circumstances nationalism, and extremist parties, flourish, yet repeat the policy mistakes. We know that a combination of economic crisis, a sense of abandonment by the authorities, externally imposed conditions intensifying the suffering all make for a dangerously inflammatory political atmosphere in which extremist parties flourish. All these were present in the last years of the Weimar republic where we had the externally imposed reparations, the Great Depression followed by policies of economic austerity not greatly dissimilar to those now being imposed on Greece. The result was that the Nazi party went from less than 3% in 1928 to over 18% in 1930 and over 37% in 1932. The meteoric rise of the Syriza and Golden Dawn parties in Greece in recent years as the Greek economy has imploded was entirely foreseeable by the EU/IMF policy-makers and especially Germany who had seen something like it in its own history. And how could Angela Merkel not have foreseen that the largely German-dictated terms of the austerity regime in Greece would have been seen by many there as a kind of second German occupation? Do no politicians or economists read history?

And here are the real pitfalls of greater European integration. If it is to work, it will need economic levelling out between the rich North and the poor South, which will require extensive transfers between regions. In return, the rich North will demand central oversight of budgets. Almost inevitably, Germany, as the richest and most powerful country in Europe, will be the dominant player (however reluctantly) in this process of integration. How will this be viewed, not only within Germany, but also in peripheral countries a number of which experienced German occupation (or its threat) within the memory of the oldest generation still living?

Those who praise what the EU has achieved cannot turn their eyes away from what is going on in the poorer states. Here is Ambrose Evans-Pritchard writing in the Telegraph today:

"The horror before our eyes right now is social ruin. Europe’s crisis strategy is to the break the back of labour resistance to pay cuts by driving unemployment through the roof. That is what `internal devaluations’ are. It stinks. And the ECB is adding to the cruelty by keeping money too tight."

[LHC]

But not, it would seem, this man

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ukip-youth-leader-olly-neville-sacked-for-supporting-gay-marriage-8444330.html

and nice to know that you agree about the fantasy past

Although Mr Neville's claims that he has been removed because of his views on gay marriage have been used by the press as a timely reminder of some of the more unsavoury views of some UKIP members, it appears there is more to his removal than this.

Apparently he has in recent weeks published an article in support of Nick Griffin and also expressed his support for the legalisation of bestiality and necrophilia. It is doubtful that any political party would allow one of its officer to continually espouse views that were completely at odds with the party's main policies in this way.

Of course, reporting his views on gay marriage in isolation makes UKIP look intolerant, whereas reporting all of the reasons for his removal makes him seem more like a loose cannon and makes his removal more understandable.

I should add that I am not a supporter of UKIP (far from it), but it is always interesting to look behind the news and consider what angle the press are trying to promote in their reporting of any political issues.

[MrGongGong]

Although Mr Neville's claims that he has been removed because of his views on gay marriage have been used by the press as a timely reminder of some of the more unsavoury views of some UKIP members, it appears there is more to his removal than this.

That's very interesting, where did you read that ?
Maybe one should be careful of the company that one keeps ?

[kernelbogey]

Thanks for your considered response, kernelbogey.

And my compliments on yours, aeolium.

What occurred in Nazi Germany was the projection of what Jung called the Shadow onto the Jews, Slavs, communists as well as other minorities. That which is unpleasant and undesired is foisted upon one or more groups, usually a minority, and then they are persecuted. The contemporary vilification of 'immigrants' - as though they were all the same, and scroungers to boot - is similar, and though we haven't descended to Nazi oppression in this country, we see something very similar in Greece ('the cradle of democracy' etc). For some time after 9/11, there was a kind of vilification of arabs in just the way the jews were vilified in the forties by fascist states: that seems to have declined somewhat, though I recall it every time I hear one of those 'If you see anything suspicious...' announcements on the train.

[teamsaint]

[QUOTE=kernelbogey;248625]And my compliments on yours, aeolium.

What occurred in Nazi Germany was the projection of what Jung called the Shadow onto the Jews, Slavs, communists as well as other minorities. That which is unpleasant and undesired is foisted upon one or more groups, usually a minority, and then they are persecuted. The contemporary vilification of 'immigrants' - as though they were all the same, and scroungers to boot - is similar, and though we haven't descended to Nazi oppression in this country, we see something very similar in Greece ('the cradle of democracy' etc). For some time after 9/11, there was a kind of vilification of arabs in just the way the jews were vilified in the forties by fascist states: that seems to have declined somewhat, though I recall it every time I hear one of those 'If you see anything suspicious...' announcements on the train.[/QUOTE]

Which is usually inside 2 minutes of arriving at the station.
Fear is a very powerful tool. Politicians now only promise to make things less bad than the other side.