to think the attacks on Natalie Bennett (leader of the Greens) have been excessive and have a whiff of sexism about them?

[lauralouise8]

I am not a Green party voter and never will be, so this is not a pro Greens rant, but I am increasingly cross that three weeks on from the 'brain fade' incident, it is still in the news cycle. I think Natalie Bennett has been unnecessarily attacked. So she had an off day: it happens to everyone. Maybe I am being paranoid, but I think had it been a male politician, the media would have moved on by now. It always seems that female politicians are fair game for personal attacks on intelligence and looks.

@Sallying
Eugh, yes i've just researched that. Whoops haha.

He has divorced mutually and civilly from his wife 'apparently'. Still, perhaps gender balance in politics across the world is fundamentally necessary.

Putin might be a complete pussycat in his private life. None of us really know, and it doesn't really matter, as when he is negotiating (or green-lighting military action) he is not in his domestic mode.

Angela Merkel negotiates with him; there's nothing to say a woman cannot do that. But I think there are strong reasons why someone who cannot present their own policies competently on launch date is not going to be able to handle top level talks. I wouldn't want to see Miliband attempting it either, because of his recent gaffe in 'forgetting' an important issue.

pandora
Putin is ex KGB. He does not have a milligramme of softness or compassion in his whole body.
He is corrupt to the core and is destabilising Russia and with it eastern Europe.
NONE of our politicians would last 30 seconds against him.

The only reason Frau Merkel stands up to him so well is that as an Ossie she speaks totally fluent Russian and grew up under the Stasi so knows how to read him.

Manifestos :
start here
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-29642613

It's no good projecting you beliefs in how people should behave according to your schematic I.e. They have a wife and kids so should be more compassionate etc. You have to deal with facts, not sentiment.

The Ukrainian situation is partly the result of both NATO and the EU expanding eastwards and sucking in former soviet states. The EU had made great overtures to U kraken as the EU accounts show they have pumped billions of euros into Ukraine to tempt them to seek EU membership. The Democratically elected Ukrainian PM was overthrown for failing to seek close ties with the EU.

So we, just as much as Putin, have been meddling. we would probably feel very aggrieved if Russia started bankrolling one of our close neighbours to woo it into a revived USSR.

Yesterday we saw the EU President Junckers call for a an EU army to fight Russia. An EU army is something that Clegg described as "a fantasy" during his debate withbFarage last year and here we are a year on and the EU is promoting a single EU army

All of which means we need someone who understand the geo-politics and can stand up to the EU and who would be prepared to act in accordance with Article 5 to defend the UK. The greens could not do that because they wish yo unilaterally disarm us of our nuclear deterrent and reduce the Army.

NONE of our politicians would last 30 seconds against him.

Indeed. The best we have in Europe is Merkel and I wish she was British.

YABU. She and the Greens are absolute clowns taking advantage of the fact that their party has an attractive name in order to fool people into voting for extremist Marxist style policies.

They deserve every ounce of opprobrium they get.

Actually scatter I don't think they are actively 'taking advantage' of anything. They aren't that clever.
They just happen to be in the position to receive support from people who are thoroughly pissed off with all the major parties.
Millions of people are looking for something, anything as an alternative.
In Scotland there is the SNP so they are trying that.
In England/Wales there are the Greens and UKIP, depending if you are naturally left-leaning or right-leaning.

scatteroflight
Among my bedtime reading is the Economist.
It really, really wanted the devolved, decentralising Libertarian aspects of the Green policies to stack up - because at the moment all the main parties are command and control centralisers

but found that the lack of economic literacy was too much
there must BE bright people in the Green supporters camp, but the party does not choose them as spokespeople

we can't even vote Monster Raving Loony any more

More people need to write: '
none of the above parties represents my interests' on their ballot paper.

None of them represent mine.

I had considered voting green. Not now.

I cant vote Labour as (aside from Miliband etc) they are going to jump in with the SNP and I've lived through an IndyRef here and it was very very divisive ('Yes' signs still up in my village and folk still not speaking to each other) so I wont vote for them.

I wont vote Conservative as, although economically they may be less reckless than Labour I cannot stomach what they are doing to the lives of the Disabled in this country.

LibDems sold themselves out ages ago.

I wont 'not vote' so all I can do is write my opinions on my 'spoiled' paper.
It is politics that is 'spoiled' in the UK - spoiled by corruption, lies and deceit.

@scatteroflight

Extremism of either the left or the right, manifesting itself in either revolutionary or reactionary forms, is formed from a hard core of the most excluded, the most down-trodden and marginalised layers of society. You can’t have a revolutionary or reactionary movement without people who are extremely oppressed becoming active in overthrowing that repression in either a progressive (left) or retroactive (right) way.

The Green party are the counter balance to UKIP in my eyes. It does cheer me up somewhat to know that their membership has surpassed UKIPs too.

@Talkinpeace - Thanks very much for the BBC link to preliminary policies, i'll give those a read and look forward to reading the fully costed manifesto's being submitted soon hopefully then we can all do the sums for ourselves.

In regards to Putin, he seems to be a law unto himself. He needs a serious lesson on freedom of liberty and as Wetaugust mentions the UK needs to stop meddling; Playing around with oil prices for political purpose or gain etc... sadly it always comes back to greed and pursuit of power and money, a very shortsighted view of how precious the earth, human life and experience is. I pity them really.

@dopeydawg

There are many people that feel the same way you do. Disilusioned by the lies and deceit. It reminds me of the film Brewsters Millions where he is standing as a "None of The Above" candidate....

Such a brilliant comedian :)

Pand0ra - thanks for that clip - YES, very clever comedy.

I think there is room for a MonsterRavingLoony Party atm (as all the 'real' ones really seem to be this, in actuality).

Re: 'I pity them really'.
Well, take Tony Blair for an example of a clever man who has done very very well on the back of his political career.
I may pity his 'soul' or conscience, call it what you will if you believe in such things - certainly if he has a portrait in the Attic it wont be pretty -
but I don't feel sorry for his bank balance as he tramples over human rights and truthtelling in the Commons.

You're welcome! it's been ages since I've seen that I must watch it again :)

I pity their lack of integrity and moral compass, they have very little substance or possess anything at all in my eyes. Amassing of massive wealth, properties and material possessions at others expense is shameful and disgraceful IMO.

For a country that is supposed to be one of the richest in the world - why is it that there is such a MASSIVE inequality divide between rich and poor, that the social and health problems we face are MUCH worse than the countries that have more equal income such as Nordics...

Here's another link for you that you might enjoy, it's a TED talk on how economic inequality harms societies
www.ted.com/talks/richard_wilkinson