The USA

[ohmymimi]

Ted Cruz for President? Is the GOP now lost to any resemblance of sanity? Why is 'progressive' a dirty word? How can the land of the free and the home of the brave have 1 in 5 of it's citizens on food stamps? Why do people watch Fox News? Is Glen Beck for real or just a big hoaxer ( or a chalk fetishist). BHO is an African Muslim? Why would anyone take Sarah Palin seriously? Are the Founding Fathers spinning in their graves? Thoughts please, if anyone is interested.

[ohmymimi]

Claig, please tell me where I can move to where my vote will count. Big Tory majority here and the Dave 'n Gideon show isn't for me. I always vote on the least worse principle, I'm not draft enough to be party political.

[claig]

'My view is the world will be a better place when humans become extinct, we're nowhere near as clever as we think.'

Please don't think that. That is what they want us to think. That is part of their whole climate change scam philosophy.

[ohmymimi]

Secret, 'calls', not 'cells' .

[claig]

You are right, our voting system is a joke and is not representative.

I have faith that one day it will change, but it may be after we are all dead.
The vested interests will not change it while they still stand to gain from the current system. There will be change when people become so disaffected that they no longer bother voting. Then the system will have to change.

[ohmymimi]

I'm not under some sort of mind control! I actually thought it up all by myself, sitting in my garden, reflecting on something deep Jeff Goldblum said in 'Jurrasic Park', so there.

[ohmymimi]

Last post referred to human extinction, by the way.

[SecretWitch]

Ohmymini, I think the "birthers" have gone away since Obama's second term. Only angry white men would call for the verification of a birth certificate from a black president.

[claig]

What did he say?
Don't forget that that is the message that they are constantly trying to sell us in movies and news and elsewhere. We can't help being influenced by what we are constantly told.

[ohmymimi]

Now I've missed 'Newsnight'. Interesting interaction, thanks, but I'm off to bed.

[claig]

They think we are so stupid that we will believe what pop stars and actors and soap stars and footballer and celebs say. That is the progressives of course and their charity fundraisers and celebs and all the rest. Fox gets some credibility because it mocks them just as the people mock them.


“The world can decide in a fit of madness to kill itself,” announced Bob Geldof at the launch of the One Young World summit in Johannesburg. “Sometimes progress may not be possible.

“We're in a very fraught time,” he added. “There will be a mass extinction event. That could happen on your watch.

“The signs are that it will happen and soon.”


www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/globalwarming/10353206/Were-facing-a-mass-extinction-event-claims-Bob-Geldof.html

[claig]

Good night, ohmymini

[ohmymimi]

Secret, I think some angry white women were involved as well. I think they may have been distracted by fear of personal weapon removal so they couldn't form an orderly militia.

'Night.

[ohmymimi]

Look, Geldof is no Goldblum, I'd never be influenced by someone with a daughter called Fifi Trixie Belle. Goldblum was much more convincing playing a fictional character in a film about dinosaurs.

Goodnight.

[MrJudgeyPants]

With regards to overhauling our democracy and making it more suited to our needs, I think the parties need to take some of the blame for this problem. Politics is becoming an ever more elitist pursuit where the criteria for entry is, ever increasingly, a private school education, an Oxbridge PPE degree and an internship / non-job with the political party of your choice. We end up where we have a cadre of (multi) millionaires, across both parties, telling the rest of us that they understand our worries and that "we're all in it together". If only.

There is one glimmer of hope out there though. The prominent Tory backbencher, Douglas Carswell (privately educated, didn't do PPE at Oxbridge AFAIK), has some interesting ideas about the future of democracy. Amongst these ideas is that with the internet etc, direct democracy could be brought in. In essence, the current house of parliament devolves the voting on parliamentary bills back to the people through micro-referenda. This means the current HoP is reduced to setting the referenda question and rubber stamping our decision.

[MrJudgeyPants]

Of course, this doesn't address some of the biggest issues that our political masters have conspired to smother debate on over the years and there is no guarantee that, even with direct democracy, many topics would ever be tabled. Think how much democratic choice, or even parliamentary debate, we've had on the following issues; Climate Change, Europe, Immigration, the Blair Wars, university tuition fees or the size and purpose of the state. It's lamentable really and I can't see that changing any time soon.

[claig]

There is a major danger in internet and computer voting. It is that they can fix the results. We have had postal vote possible problems too. Nothing beats the old-fashioned ballot box where opponents can check that the counting is accurate. But as fewer people turn out to vote, the system loses its mandate and so they want voting to become easier with postal voting or electronic voting.

Yes, we need a more representative Swiss-style referenda based system. But of course, they will never grant us that, because then we would vote them out.

The reason that UKIP are rising and the reason that the Tea Party rose is because they are not stuffed full of Oxbridge and Ivy School elites, they may contain some fruitcakes, but they are essentially ordinary people with ordinary concerns. They are the type of people who don't think it is a "bad day for britain" if Parliament votes for no action against Syria.

www.express.co.uk/news/uk/425658/Syria-vote-a-victory-for-Farage-AND-Assad-blasts-furious-Paddy-Ashdown

But of course, the Tea Party are also controlled and are used by the elite.

[claig]

Anything that gives the people more say and a greater voice is a step in the right direction.

Zac Goldsmith campaigns for a recall system for MPs, where citizens in a constituency can dismiss an MP if they have lost faith in them and if they win a vote after enough of them sign a petition

[MrJudgeyPants]

Agreed!

[niceguy2]

'Why do people watch Fox News?'
For a closer representation of the truth than is available in the progressive media.

That's the funniest thing I've read for a while. Claig, have you watched this piece of 'truth'?

News - Religion 0

[niceguy2]

oops...dunno what went wrong there

News on Religion 0

[niceguy2]

argh...never mind

[claig]

Haven't seen it before, but am watching it now

[claig]

OK, I have watched it. Of course it is Fox propaganda. We all know that.

Everybody knows that what you see on the news or read in the papers is based on a political agenda and is often dictated by powerful political and financial interests behind the scenes.

Everybody knows that Fox wants to promote the elite's "clash of civilizations" philosophy and depict Muslims in a negative light, and everybody knows that the BBC wants to promote the elite's population plans by promoting global warming and pictures of the polar bear.

Everybody knows that you will only find out about some of the actors on the stage by reading newspapers (including the great Daily Mail) but that you can't find out the real truth from those sources. Everybody knows that for the truth, only the conspiracy theorists can be of some use.

The anchor in that clip was not an experienced spinner, she presumably had been given a brief to promote the elite's "clash of civilizations" but she was not up to it.

Fox viewers aren't stupid. They know that Muslims revere Jesus as a prophet. They can see through the spin and they know what Fox's spin is, just as they know what the BBC's spin is.

But Fox spent 10 minutes discussing that book and it is an interesting subject and may have interested some viewers to buy the book and think.
It is better than a BBC 10 minute report on the polar bear or a 10 minute report on what Beckham has been up to lately.

[claig]

Here is why I and millions of others prefer to watch Sky News over the elite's broadcasting corporation's, BBC News 24.

This is Sky which is a tamer version of Fox, but both Sky and Fox are less politically correct and less politically controlled by the elite and therefore are allowed to go where the BBC and the others fear to tread. That means that they give more glimpses of the real truth. But of course you cannot expect the whole truth from them, for that you need to go to some of the conspiracy theorists.

Here Sky devotes 7 minutes to a debate which the BBC would not even broadcast.