Brexit thread 2 Electric Boogaloo

[CCTV]

Thorn in the Side Ltd, of which Farage is the sole director, had assets of £548,573 for the year to May 2018 – a substantial jump from assets of just over £157,000 recorded for the previous year.

The disclosure comes as Farage was chided on Wednesday by the European parliament’s Brexit coordinator, Guy Verhofstadt, while the parliament debated the current Brexit turmoil.

Verhofstadt claimed Farage wanted an extension to article 50 in order to keep Britain in the EU, so he can continue to have his MEP’s salary and transfer it into an offshore company.

The irony

Not here to defend politicians they're a scummy lot certainly a disgrace to the shoulders they stand on today imo.

Tony Blair is a multimillionaire with an extensive property portfolio, key note speaker for corporations commanding a hefty fee, all while considering the working class and dropping freedom bombs on Iraq after the evidence was concluded to he a fabrication for all intensive purposes.

Contributions to the Clinton foundation charity dropped instantaneously as soon as she was out the doors of power. They're going to trump now.

[CCTV]

The European union's purpose is to promote:

peace, establish a unified economic and monetary system, promote inclusion and combat discrimination, break down barriers to trade and borders, encourage technological and scientific developments, champion environmental protection, and, among others, promote goals like a competitive global market and social progress.

Sounds like a good idea in principle.

If you put 10,000 grand in my back account I will reimburse you with a million pound after I become prince of yousuckerstan

Sounds great in principle also.

[Balinkay]

To be fair CCTV, I think for a large portion of its young people the EU has achieved a number of those things.

There's not been a war between EU countries since its inception, France and Germany are basically married now instead of each other's throats and the union has made it a lot easier to live, study and travel abroad. I've also heard it's pretty good for science.

[dicko1969]

A lot of governments are trying to uncover tax dodging.

So many live in Monaco for example.
Why should they pay in countries that badly manage resources.

I believe in Denmark they pay one of the highest amount of taxes. +50%.
Why? because the see the benefits of their taxes. Services, schools, and so on.

Talking globally we are near 8 billion people on the planet. 1960 we were 3 billion.
The future predict between 3 billion and 24 billion by 2100.

Iraq war. Sure not a great thing. I think President of France Jacques Chirac was one of few western leaders to oppose this. Of which the Americans resorted to "French bashing". Even French fries were renamed.

Back on topic. Even Mrs Thatcher Saud it's better to be in Europe. Because at least you have a place at the table to debate, and make a difference to our local partners.

[dicko1969]

Countries such as your Ireland have got richer. 6th in the world.

Czech republic has improved vastly.
Due to Europe.

[CCTV]

Awesome CC! This is exactly what I was looking for. I really want to see what went on how to understand this weird situation.

Alright. That video by Heidt is ver entertaining - I've been lucky enough to have been exposed to these ideas of the possible absurdity of moral self righteousness when it comes to politics and history, but I've seldom seen someone put it as well as Heidt has here. I've not seen much of him, but what I have seen has been good. The idea that you should listen to your political adversaries and seek the common ground rather than the differences is painfully lost. Have had a few discussions with fellow students (I'm obviously quite young, probably even in comparison to you) on such matters. I also get the same feeling that the economic issues of the referendum didn't play much of a role in anyone's mind when voting, though that remains to be proven. As outside observers, I'm sure we could both benefit from the views of someone who actually voted for it. *AHEM* YOU ENGLISH SLOUCHES.

I don't quite understand your next point about Fry - Maybe what he meant was that those in homogenous areas had no reason to fear immigration since it had not come to them in the forty years the UK's been in the EU?

In general I'd like to hear a bit more about your views on financial inequality. I don't think financial inequality in and of itself is an issue - poverty is. I think you're kind of mixing up the two things with your family of doctors example - surely the issue isn't that there's someone 1 000 000 times richer than them but that they can't afford a decent life while (as I'm sure we'll all agree) both doing more than enough to earn it? Could you also tell me a little more about what "little England / Britain" means? I've heard the term many times, but never quite understood it. I'd also be interested to hear what you mean by "traditional liberalism". In particular I can't really understand what you mean by this paragraph:



Should even wealth distribution be a liberal goal? And why is it good?

This might provide an interesting avenue of discussion as well:



Are they? Also define "liberal". I think my understanding of the term might be polluted by the US's monopoly on my media intake.

Next you talk about the growing wealth inequality (which as stated, I don't view as morally reprehensible in and of it self) around the world and the state mandated policies which are designed to keep international inequality on the rise. Could you elaborate? Isn't this just every country looking out for its national interest and trying to make its own situation as good as possible?

The final paragraphs I frankly don't know too much about. What I will say is that if you're looking for a government that has no dirty secrets you will find none. Even the most righteous historic figures often end up having done some reprehensible things - look at the like of mother Theresa. Isn't there even a bit of a debate about Churchill's legacy going on in the UK nowadays? I'm not sure what you mean that the war has been exported out of the region?

Furthermore, even if power is being consolidated in Germany, I wouldn't call that the worst thing in the world (without discussing the situation more concretely of course), but I am a self-confessed germanophile after all. What can I say, I like it here!

And yes, the EU is not on stable footing. Interesting times we live in. Would be inconvenient for me if it falls apart, but hey-ho, shite happens.

Ok, quickly answering...

Little Britain is a comedy , the idea in terms of Brexit is the British want to go back to some golden age that is deemed a dream or fantasy by remainers, the little englanders same type of term. This era has a golden era in terms of wealth distribution, which returning to seems fanciful and undeliverable by their opponents, yet you will not find a remainer really who opposes this principle. Fry as an example acknowledges this need, the problem is it only came to the fore really after Brexit. A bit late for them to have cake.
The global trends all point toward increasing inequality.
Mark Blythe has some good pieces on this issue globally

Haidt is good there are a few more challenging dogmatic/unfounded teaching with no basis in reality or science. Pinker writes about how people blame the idea of culture or environment when in fact they undermine the real genetic components involved also.
As per haidts intentions I believe what he is trying to instill in society and its present in his other pieces is that the left/liberals like to call the right/conservatives racist, ignorant and stupid. This is because they have a different basis on the moral authorities or value sets. This is criminal to conflate difference with negative connotations. Its practically like shaming a gay cause they are wired differently and saying why cant you just be straight.

For example if you want to minimise migration, which is driven by inequality, you are racist.
Truth is liberals do not share the values of conservatives and conflate what appeals to them with racism. Say you oppose the projected demographics of Britain and the point where typically English or native people become a minority against others. You want to keep Britain british it does not follow you are racist. It's a very difficult concept for remainers. It doesnt mean you hate people, it's a preference for maintaining a traditional order.

On fry his expected results was that where there is more diversity thered be more problems with it. And vice versa. This was not found which shows he had a poor understanding as his prediction was very wrong. Using a personality as lived model (in my head but fits with literature) you would expect people who wouldn't like to live in more diverse regions to not live in them. They voted Brexit because they like the idea of retaining/protecting quaintly British regions.
It wasnt a problem with foreigners as he presumed, it was a problem of retaining traditionally British regions within Britain. Migration of course can be a challenge, see demographic projections, on this front but it is not due to a problem with foreigners or hatred.

Abject poverty is most definitely an area where we have improved. But what you are not getting is the role of inequality in the health of a society. If you look at abject poverty on a global scale the west doesnt have abject poverty by and large. There are few Brits living on a dollar a day or less.
The thing about inequality is that it is very much a factor within a society and between the worlds as defined 1st 2nd & 3rd.

To put it this way. The world most certainly has never seen this amount of material wealth. About 200-300 years ago the entire world practically speaking was in abject poverty by today's standards. These strides cannot be discounted as progress.
For most of englands domination of Ireland say, the average brit lived in poverty and the spoils went to the rich. The Brits had it better than most but the idea your average brit partied off imperialism is a bit redundant. Jaysus H Christ I'm sliding off topic here.

What is financial inequality. It is the measure of difference between the top and bottom in society. In the developed world USA wins this contest and Britain is pretty close. You could have no abject poverty in the UK. But with large inequality countries you can see the differences with low inequality countries whereby theres a wealth of health, child, crime, societal like trust, statistics that correlate well with the thesis.

The more unequal a society is financially the more negative consequences for it's people, even the rich. This is where the morality of the most basic basic commonly shared authority demands actions.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ7LzE3u7Bw
A brief introduction again Tedtalk.

Liberals tend to vote labour/Democrat
Conservatives tend to vote Republican.
You'll have to look into this one yourself as it is a bit beyond me to surmise in any meaningful way bar the above. Theres a bit of philosophy but the 2 terms in most cases are practically interchangeable ie liberal/labour conservative/tory

It doesnt matter where you are tbh. The problem is a global political-economic one so everyone's in it.
Here in Ireland for example having looked at research before by people who I'd say are honest there really would be no difference to us within or outside of Europe.
However the public perception would be miles away from this reality. The idea here would be we are proud Europeans - having been shafted by the euro and German banks.
The fear of people would be based on our somewhat terrible dependency on washing corporate money through our economy. We reduced our corporate tax rate to 12.5%, now America and the UK are proposing a 15% rate- we started this rst race. We attracted many left-leaning tech giants who hate paying taxes and sit on hundreds of billions of idle cash. Think 1 in every 6 euro we generate here is from corporate tax which isn't anywhere near the 12.5% rate but its significant in terms of its contribution to our exchequer. They've a way of filtering money through Ireland for money that is not really generated here and our government kind of turns a blind eye.

The good little Europeans that we are, we never take on Europe. Our politicians through wikileaks cables releases showed they had no intentions of fulfilling election pledges. So despite campaigning on not paying these bank debts they cowered under duress as they had intended while lying.
But when Europe said we had to collect 13billion from apple I taxes due, we rose against Europe and appealed this decision. Shows where interest are today.
Lump bank debt on the tax bill, ok they made us.
Collect 13 billion from apple, no way.

The idea here is we really are a Basket case and couldn't upset the applecart. But realistically such dependency ideation is rather unjustified.

The problem of tax avoidance isn't confined to Ireland. The UK and Dutch are far bigger problems within the eu.

I might have to rejig bits later if not clear

[CCTV]

I'll have to check the abject poverty in the USA and UK later. They might not be living on a dollar a day but I think there are a good few who do live on its equivalency when you balance for exchange rates and costs of goods.
No doubt there are people living in the misery of poverty in the UK and USA.

Even if they were not in poverty, if the ratio/gaps to the richest are bigger than in other countries then the principle effect would still come through.
Poverty is about materials.
Inequality is about justice/fairness.

Ideally you want to eliminate poverty, maintaining a healthy level of inequality.
People tend to be on with doctors say getting a wage reflective of their duties.
Our problem is we have increased the inequality to an unacceptable level.

[CCTV]

Devil's advocate here, but isn't that normal in politics? If you own house is on fire you don't really care that your neighbour's got some serious issues.

Into today's politics. Money has taken over the political sphere, before it was not this way.

[Balinkay]

Without going into too much depth, I still don't understand the inequality thing. Why is it bad if you have it okay but your neighbour has it a million times better? And what constitutes a "fair" distribution of money? What objective practically applicable function can be used to justify that?

[Balinkay]

Into today's politics. Money has taken over the political sphere, before it was not this way.

Meh, politics has always been a dirty business. If it wasn't money it was power. The nature of the profession. It's a necessary evil.

[CCTV]

I've heard the net stories about China too. Gruesome stuff.

I think the left leaning tag comes from their policies on content - for example of 22 examined major bans on twitter in a roughly two year period somewhere in the middle of this decade 21 were right leaning. Don't quote me on those stats but I heard them on the web so they must be true.

Also most of their employees are left leaning, just the ones who deal with money and actually make the company function financially probably aren't. When things are going well for you, you don't tend to ask too many questions as you might have to face the fact you're a bit of a cunt for not paying taxes through a shitty legal loophole.

Look up James Damore if you are not familiar with his case. Vilified for his presentation of facts which no credible scientist would dispute. It doesnt fit with the ideology or desires and he got sacked.

I think they are called left leaning because they support abortion, lgbtq rights, oppose religion and faith. They are what I'd term socially left but have very extreme right wing views on supporting services.

If you look up Amazon? Jeff Bezos he gets the state to subsidise his workers. So they're alright with taking from the state services.

[CCTV]

Without going into too much depth, I still don't understand the inequality thing. Why is it bad if you have it okay but your neighbour has it a million times better? And what constitutes a "fair" distribution of money? What objective practically applicable function can be used to justify that?

16 minutes of YouTube will point you towards the answers you are looking for.
I think after watching it you might understand the principle better.

There are no clear objective answers. Only looking at what exists today and what consequences are associated with it.

A rough explanation.
Denmark is pretty good on it.
The uk/Ireland/France twice as bad.
USA twice as bad as these 3.

Association on mental and physical health conditions.

Denmark has a score across all health conditions.
Uk/Ireland/France say average twice as many conditions
USA 4 times as much

Reducing inequality reduces a whole host of negative outcomes in a society.

On a global scale it drives the incentive to migrate up as there countries while richer now than before are relatively poorer.

[dicko1969]

Bezzos is 50% less wealthy these days after his own personal divorce.

[dicko1969]

Currently, the richest 1% hold about 38% of all privately held wealth in the United States.

while the bottom 90% held 73.2% of all debt

[dicko1969]

There are two billion fellow human beings who live on less than two dollars a day. And the richest people over there -- there's one billion people -- and they live above what I call the "air line," because they spend more than $80 a day on their consumption.