The Political Thread

[JayzusB.Christ]

Is it a political version of the Mid Life crisis?  Feeling trapped in a marriage that is in all reality perfectly functional and overall beneficial, but wanting to be free to walk around in our underpants all day, spend money on that car you always wanted but spent the cash on the wedding and chase after unobtainable women?

Best analogy I've heard yet. I'm currently in Wetherspoons having some fish and chips, and am disappointed to find that once again their magazine's editorial is devoted to gloating over the Brexit result.
Yet another spiel about the non-democratic nature of the EU but not a single mention of any of these laws they're supposedly always making without our consent.

The UK has made its bed and now must lie in it, for better or for worse  (and let's face it, it's looking very like the latter) but for fuck's sake, Wetherspoons, just sell beer keep your toxic, divisive and financially suicidal isolationism to yourself.  Long may the EU last, and long may Ireland be a part of it.  Even if Brexit is going to put our borders back to the awful state they were in when I was a kid, I sincerely hope that we will continue to progress while others regress.

[CrazyFoxMachine]

but for fuck's sake, Wetherspoons, just sell beer keep your toxic, divisive and financially suicidal isolationism to yourself. 

Yeah, just HOW would a pub chain profit from pushing toxic, divisive and financially suicidal isolationism........

[The Legendary Shark]

Whatever happened to the old - and wise - tradition of never discussing politics or religion in pubs?

[Tjm86]

Just wondering if it wouldn't be a bad idea to extend that idea to this forum?   

[The Legendary Shark]

Is Trump trying to use a hastily arranged manned NASA flight around the Moon to bolster his popularity and make it look like he's getting things done?

[Mikey]

Of course I'm back.

If you believe that, Mikey, I have a magic rock here that keeps tigers away. Want to buy it?

Fuck's sake.

You can shove that up your hole for starters.

I have no idea what your argument is

Exactly.

The essential core, for the hard of comprehension, is that you contributed absolutely nothing to any discussion about terrorism and all your arguments come down to 'gubmints are bad, m' kay' or 'we need a jury to look at cases of littering because a court is a ship under contract law' or 'money's a bit mental, innit?' no matter what the topic. All delivered with and air of patronage followed with some cod martyrdom when someone reckons you're being a nob. Or even when they clearly demonstrate flaws in your reasoning or grasp.

Or to put it another way, it's always themuns and you poor unenlightened people *sigh* just can't accept it. You sound like a religious zealot and I'm fed up hearing it irl and online.

[The Legendary Shark]

Bluster.

[Mikey]

Precisely.

[IndigoPrime]

Having popped back in after a slew of moderation requests (a reminder: be civil. This thread is clinging on by its fingernails), I flick through a few pages anyway and see:

I'm not having a go at you, I don't understand. I don't understand what benefits you think we'll be getting that outweigh the risk any of the things I've mentioned, never mind all of them.

That's it for me. I just don't understand Brexit. We're at the point where we're without doubt going to be massively poorer, place the country in a state where it will take decades to recover to the point we're at now (if ever), that will almost certainly lead to the end of universal healthcare, that will begin a bonfire of rights, and that will make us hugely reliant on an unstable USA. Meanwhile, we piss off all our closest allies, in terms of politics and geography.

There's no extra money for the NHS. There will be little or no impact on immigration. The government's own white paper admitted that sovereignty was never an issue.

So it seems we're going to blow up our economy, risk peace in Ireland, lose the UK, end up paying through the nose for health insurance, possibly tear apart hundreds of thousands of families, and more, for – what – a vague feeling that we weren't always in control when we in fact were? That is absolutely mental. Like Jim, I don't get it. This is the political equivalent to having a health minister decree that no cancer patients are to receive chemotherapy because of a 'feeling' it doesn't work right (against all the evidence) and they'll now instead get some homeopathy sugar pills.

[Steven Denton]

Having popped back in after a slew of moderation requests (a reminder: be civil. This thread is clinging on by its fingernails), I flick through a few pages anyway and see:

I'm not having a go at you, I don't understand. I don't understand what benefits you think we'll be getting that outweigh the risk any of the things I've mentioned, never mind all of them.

That's it for me. I just don't understand Brexit. We're at the point where we're without doubt going to be massively poorer, place the country in a state where it will take decades to recover to the point we're at now (if ever), that will almost certainly lead to the end of universal healthcare, that will begin a bonfire of rights, and that will make us hugely reliant on an unstable USA. Meanwhile, we piss off all our closest allies, in terms of politics and geography.

There's no extra money for the NHS. There will be little or no impact on immigration. The government's own white paper admitted that sovereignty was never an issue.

So it seems we're going to blow up our economy, risk peace in Ireland, lose the UK, end up paying through the nose for health insurance, possibly tear apart hundreds of thousands of families, and more, for – what – a vague feeling that we weren't always in control when we in fact were? That is absolutely mental. Like Jim, I don't get it. This is the political equivalent to having a health minister decree that no cancer patients are to receive chemotherapy because of a 'feeling' it doesn't work right (against all the evidence) and they'll now instead get some homeopathy sugar pills.

The politics of the demagogue involve convincing people that what they believe is more important than what can be proved. Unfortunately large groups of human are easily lead and do not actually require coherent arguments. Without a coherent argument there is very little hope of a coherent answer. 

[IndigoPrime]

Yeah. And this has been planned. You get people like Gove laying the seeds for this way in advance, saying we should just believe in ourselves rather than experts. But this is also a worrying area of politics, because it becomes about rousing the mob with bullshit, and being able to say whatever the hell you like with no comeback.

With Brexit, all rationality has gone. There are no concrete benefits. And yet people still support it. Do they hate being wrong? Do they see something I don't? Or do they genuinely put a vague feeling about something that the government itself said wasn't an actual fact above all else?

[The Legendary Shark]

To bastardise Eric Hoffer, "The game of Brexit is usually played by the best and the worst over the heads of the majority in the middle."

Also:

The politics of the demagogue involve convincing people that what they believe is more important than what can be proved. Unfortunately large groups of human are easily lead and do not actually require coherent arguments. Without a coherent argument there is very little hope of a coherent answer. 

Yes, well said.

[Old Tankie]

Just because you don't understand something it doesn't mean it is wrong.

[Jim_Campbell]

Just because you don't understand something it doesn't mean it is wrong.

Then why can't you explain it?

[Old Tankie]

I have, you don't agree with me,that's fine.