Off Topic Thread 3.0

Deleted User wrote: »

...see absolutely no way to even meet them in the middle...

This is the problem over and above everything else. Nobody at all can see any way to compromise. It's all so polarised that it simply can't be fixed in the short term.

molloyjh wrote: »

This is the problem over and above everything else. Nobody at all can see any way to compromise. It's all so polarised that it simply can't be fixed in the short term.

I think it's important to point out that this polarisation is driven almost entirely by one side.

Obama tried to compromise, he brought Republicans on board for healthcare which was his tent pole legislation. Clinton had Republicans in his cabinet.

Deleted User wrote: »

I think it's important to point out that this polarisation is driven almost entirely by one side.

Obama tried to compromise, he brought Republicans on board for healthcare which was his tent pole legislation. Clinton had Republicans in his cabinet.

Maybe in the political sphere. In the real world for everyday Americans people on both sides are claiming the definitive moral high ground and only driving each other further and further apart.

The TV show Braindead nailed it tbh.

Deals are my art form. I like making deals, preferably big deals.

Buer

It's somewhat aside but I think a unique issue is the demographic of public representatives in the United States. I would wager that the US Senate has one of the highest average ages of any upper house in the developed world. Of 100 sentators, 64 of them are over 60 years of age. These people remember Eisenhower in the White House. The House of Representatives is similar. Of the 400+ representatives there are only about 80 who are under the age of 50...there are about the same number who are over the age of 70.

These are the people driving policy and resisting a lot of the change in society. They impact on people's lives and, as their public representatives, speak on their behalf. It appears that in America there's an element of people taking their lead from what their representative says as opposed to their representative taking their lead from the people they've been elected to represent.

It surely cannot help a society move forward when the most influential among it are from a completely different era which held different values and had different experiences from the vast majority dealing with day to day issues today.

Neil3030

Quite recently I've been to both San Marino and to Monte Carlo - the former had a border looking thing, but no controls, while the latter didn't even have any visible border that I could see. So these two non-EU, non-EEA microstates nonetheless have a "soft border" with their EU neighbours. They are both, however, in the Customs Union, through various agreements.

So would I be right to say that such a solution would not work for the UK, given the hard Brexiteers wishes to be free to negotiate independently with China, USA etc., and membership of even the Customs Union would preclude that?

Stheno

Neil3030 wrote: »

Quite recently I've been to both San Marino and to Monte Carlo - the former had a border looking thing, but no controls, while the latter didn't even have any visible border that I could see. So these two non-EU, non-EEA microstates nonetheless have a "soft border" with their EU neighbours. They are both, however, in the Customs Union, through various agreements.

So would I be right to say that such a solution would not work for the UK, given the hard Brexiteers wishes to be free to negotiate independently with China, USA etc., and membership of even the Customs Union would preclude that?

Yes

Christmas tree up tonight, starting to feel festive!

Neil3030 wrote: »

Quite recently I've been to both San Marino and to Monte Carlo - the former had a border looking thing, but no controls, while the latter didn't even have any visible border that I could see. So these two non-EU, non-EEA microstates nonetheless have a "soft border" with their EU neighbours. They are both, however, in the Customs Union, through various agreements.

So would I be right to say that such a solution would not work for the UK, given the hard Brexiteers wishes to be free to negotiate independently with China, USA etc., and membership of even the Customs Union would preclude that?

Yes completely correct. A soft border would be a very sticky issue in attempting to negotiate trade deals with 3rd parties for both the UK and EU as well.

awec wrote: »

Christmas tree up tonight, starting to feel festive!

It's November?

pickarooney

Monte Carlo is not a state or principality.
Where do you people learn your geography?

Stheno

[Deleted User] wrote: »

It's November?

I advocate a months ban for anyone doing Xmas stuff prior to December

Dave_The_Sheep

Buer wrote: »

It's somewhat aside but I think a unique issue is the demographic of public representatives in the United States. I would wager that the US Senate has one of the highest average ages of any upper house in the developed world. Of 100 sentators, 64 of them are over 60 years of age. These people remember Eisenhower in the White House. The House of Representatives is similar. Of the 400+ representatives there are only about 80 who are under the age of 50...there are about the same number who are over the age of 70.

These are the people driving policy and resisting a lot of the change in society. They impact on people's lives and, as their public representatives, speak on their behalf. It appears that in America there's an element of people taking their lead from what their representative says as opposed to their representative taking their lead from the people they've been elected to represent.

It surely cannot help a society move forward when the most influential among it are from a completely different era which held different values and had different experiences from the vast majority dealing with day to day issues today.

I don't disagree with your post at all, and agree with pretty much it all, but what it doesn't mention is that those who are most influential in society are, by and large, bought and paid for by insane lobbying spends by those who want to pretty much write the law themselves. The whole FCC debacle at the moment, gun control, regulatory capture, etc. could be avoided if Congress and the Senate in the US weren't more or less mouthpieces over all. Sure, there are individuals out there who give a ****, but most don't appear to do so, unless you're donating. That's not healthy.

Deleted User wrote: »

It's November?

For about 2 more hours.

I've my tree up, so I declare the season to have started.

Zzippy

awec wrote: »

For about 2 more hours.

I've my tree up, so I declare the season to have started.

Pics or GTFO

Zzippy wrote: »

Pics or GTFO

Zzippy wrote: »

Pics or GTFO

Not a Nucifora in sight.

Bazzo

awec wrote: »

Not a Nucifora in sight.

He's out of shot perched on top of the tree?

awec wrote: »

Not a Nucifora in sight.

Those curtains are suspiciously brown.

Deleted User wrote: »

Those curtains are suspiciously brown.

They are actually a dark cream colour but I've a red light on in the room. Just to set the mood and all.

awec wrote: »

They are actually a dark cream colour but I've a red light on in the room. Just to set the mood and all.

CatFromHue

Buer wrote: »

It's not even serious accusations....his own party have called for him to resign from the race and it was completely ignored.

It did cross my mind when I saw the opinion polls...the diversity of the United States is something that is generally celebrated but there does reach a point where their differences, cultures and values are so out of sync that people have to ask themselves if they really do want to remain part of the same nation. I would imagine that people in NY or Seattle or Chicago have far more in common with Canadians than they do with those from Alabama or Tennessee etc.

The whole Moore situation is somewhat dumbfounding though even for US politics. The guy has active accusations against him of sexual misconduct and a host of quotes from locals who have corroborated the claims including former law enforcement officers stating that Moore was banned from local shopping malls for inappropriate behaviour. If he gets in, it will just confirm that it doesn't matter what someone does up to and including sexual assault of minors...people will support you based purely on the fact that you're not from the other side.

America is starting to look like it's going towards a very bad place and it isn't purely the temporary situation I thought it was.

it reminds me of michael lowry

Lowry is a former Chairman of the Fine Gael party and was Minister for Transport, Energy and Communications between 1994 and 1996. He resigned from his ministry in some controversy. Fine Gael barred him from standing for the party again. Thereafter he ran as an Independent candidate and has maintained his seat in the Dáil ever since. The Moriarty Tribunal concluded "beyond doubt" that Lowry was a tax evader and had assisted businessman Denis O'Brien's Esat Digiphone consortium in acquiring a lucrative mobile phone licence in the mid-1990s, during Lowry's time as Communications Minister. O'Brien went on to become one of the richest men in Ireland.[2]

Lowry initiated a defamation lawsuit against an Irish Independent journalist, Sam Smyth, over an article that Smyth had written regarding the Moriarty Tribunal as well as comments that Smyth made on a TV3 show. The lawsuit was thrown out of several courts and Lowry was ordered to pay Smyth's legal costs. More recently his relationship with Kevin Phelan has come under scrutiny, with the emergence of a recorded conversation in which Lowry claims to have made an undeclared payment of €250,000.

Despite being the subject of a criminal investigation resulting from several scandals pursuing him from his time in office, he continues to be very popular in his constituency.[3]

by very popular they mean the last time he didn't top the poll in his constituency was 1992

Buer

CatFromHue wrote:

it reminds me of michael lowry

I don't think that even Lowry could survive multiple allegations of sexual misconduct against minors.

Although given what happened at a trial in Kerry several years ago when people queued to shake hands with a convicted sex offender, I could be way off.

There's police talking about how when they were working at local school sports events that they were being told to keep an eye on the guy to keep him away from the cheerleaders. He is absolute scum. It's totally, totally insane that this man is going to become an elected official.

I feel for decent Americans. They're welcome here anyway if they want out of that mess. Unfortunately a lot of them feel a duty to stay and try to fix it, but I fear for the future of the place. Europe would be smart to take every step possible to decouple themselves from that disaster.

I'm just going to leave this here. Saw it a couple of days ago and had to laugh. A self described researcher and fact checker gets caught out making up a false allegation by research and fact checking while trying to show that "left-wing liberal media" don't do the proper research and fact checking. It couldn't get more American than this! Especially when one of the reasons she was caught out was because she' set up a GoFundMe page to help her move up to New York to do exactly what she was caught doing. You couldn't make this stuff up.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/a-woman-approached-the-post-with-dramatic--and-false--tale-about-roy-moore-sje-appears-to-be-part-of-undercover-sting-operation/2017/11/27/0c2e335a-cfb6-11e7-9d3a-bcbe2af58c3a_story.html?utm_term=.f673490993fc

That guy James O'Keefe is very dangerous. I watched his "undercover reporting" into the Washington Post the other day. He sent two younger people to meet and talk to employees of the newspaper. They were in bars after work and they were posing as recent graduates who had questions about the industry. What the Washington Post employees said was entirely fine, not even remotely surprising or all that controversial. But O'Keefe frames it as this big sting operation and cuts everything up to make it look as controversial as possible and his fans lap it up. I feel awful for the WaPo employees who were just trying to help younger people by telling them the lay of the land. I won't link it, but his organisation is called Project Veritas.

O'Keefe himself is on the payroll of exactly the type of companies you'd expect and he goes around talking about how there should be limitations put on who should be able to become a journalist. A very dangerous type of individual who has a very worryingly large and receptive audience.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

That guy James O'Keefe is very dangerous. I watched his "undercover reporting" into the Washington Post the other day. He sent two younger people to meet and talk to employees of the newspaper. They were in bars after work and they were posing as recent graduates who had questions about the industry. What the Washington Post employees said was entirely fine, not even remotely surprising or all that controversial. But O'Keefe frames it as this big sting operation and cuts everything up to make it look as controversial as possible and his fans lap it up. I feel awful for the WaPo employees who were just trying to help younger people by telling them the lay of the land. I won't link it, but his organisation is called Project Veritas.

O'Keefe himself is on the payroll of exactly the type of companies you'd expect and he goes around talking about how there should be limitations put on who should be able to become a journalist. A very dangerous type of individual who has a very worryingly large and receptive audience.

O'Keefe, Hannity, Bannon, Jones and countless others. Total bull**** merchants but skilled at making everything sound like an attack on conservative ideals.

If something sparks the tinder these guys have packed into the southern strategy states things will get ugly. I wonder will they ever be held accountable.

https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/936352215551406080

irishbucsfan wrote: »

That guy James O'Keefe is very dangerous. I watched his "undercover reporting" into the Washington Post the other day. He sent two younger people to meet and talk to employees of the newspaper. They were in bars after work and they were posing as recent graduates who had questions about the industry. What the Washington Post employees said was entirely fine, not even remotely surprising or all that controversial. But O'Keefe frames it as this big sting operation and cuts everything up to make it look as controversial as possible and his fans lap it up. I feel awful for the WaPo employees who were just trying to help younger people by telling them the lay of the land. I won't link it, but his organisation is called Project Veritas.

O'Keefe himself is on the payroll of exactly the type of companies you'd expect and he goes around talking about how there should be limitations put on who should be able to become a journalist. A very dangerous type of individual who has a very worryingly large and receptive audience.

Yeah, I wasn't aware of Project Veritas before reading that article, but I'm not at all surprised tbh. The US is messed up in so many ways politically. TV and the Internet in particular have allowed a lot of that BS to thrive by creating huge echo chambers for this stuff. In an age where we should be expanding our minds and becoming more objective there's a frightening number of people doing the very opposite.

b.gud