President Donald J. Trump

[albrecht]

And valid. Farage, Gove and Johnson had nothing to back up their message. Nothing. And now the vote is over, its looking more and more likely that the legislation and practical aspects will not be achieved with any degree of success that leaves the UK benefitting. The EU has said many times that unless there is freedom of movement (at the very least), the UK cannot enjoy trade benefits as it does now with the EU.

Trump isn't proven yet he is doing well other than making self wealth. He currently has 75 lawsuits against him; he had 7000 people sue him for his university scam, and they'll get back less than half what they paid. Oh, and he claimed climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese...This is your next POTUS.

In an odd way systems like the Chinese might be the 'final solution' to the 'warming' problem, it has proven before that real population decline is best done under your 'socialist' systems- whether nationalist type but even better on the so-called leftist types. Great central planning does a great job at population reduction by active, or passive, means. Imagine the 'carbon footprint' if we didn't ship grain to these countries, or even N.Korea now? But, really, unless the UN can get some injunction against the sun and get 'Mother Gaia' to agree to become a static system and never change we might need to deal with some 'warming'- which opens up great opportunities also- and not just for banker carbon trading scheme bubbles or taxation policy. Longer growing seasons, open Northwest Passage, easier/cheap availability to exploit energy and mineral resources in certain regions, etc. (Because there were never any changes before we evil white people invented things like internal combustion engines or steam power- there I blame the even more evil Germans and Scots. They are an especially evil form of evil whitey.) If it weren't for them there would've never been any changes on earth- no ice ages, no volcanic activity, no forest fires, no tectonic shifts, no weather, no changes in the water-cycle, no soil quality changes, and certainly no changes to the sun.

[SredniVashtar]

I don't know if you've noticed, but while the self-serving elites with their ''globalism'' agenda are moving us towards a one-world government run by them, the people you claim to champion are going in the opposite direction - breaking up into smaller entities.

It's been going on for a century now, the breakup of the massive empires in the aftermath of WWI and WWII, the breakup of the huge European colonial system, the breakups of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia.  The recent list includes Spain, Scotland, peoples like the Basques and Kurds, South Sudan and East Timor, the Brexit vote, the upcoming votes in Italy and France, and plenty more.

When these pigs tell us flooding our country with people who don't like us and aren't like us, shipping our jobs off, wrecking our healthcare insurance system without an adequate replacement, and all the rest of their destructive antics, is good for us, is it really a surprise that those affected don't just go along?

Which group controls government, media, academia, and Hollywood, and thus shapes opinions on all this?

These things aren't new. 1848 was known as the Year of Revolutions. Just because a large group of people want something to happen doesn't necessarily mean that it's a good idea. Globalisation is going to happen whether you want it to or not, you aren't going to change that at the ballot box. The people who voted for Brexit, for example, were infected by some kind of romantic notion about Britain as she was 200 years ago, not now. I don't hear much from them other than a sort of atavism and xenophobia. I do try to listen for alternative views, but I don't come across much coherence. When they get what they want they need to have an idea of what they are going to do when they get there. But they don't.

[Yorkshire pud]

You don't judge a woman's sexual attractiveness based on her looks?

I know you need things explaining to you, so I'll indulge you. On his TV show, dumbass.

[Jackstar]

I would want attractive people on my TV show. Who wouldn't?


Oh, right. Britain.

[ItsOver]

... there I blame the even more evil Germans and Scots. They are an especially evil form of evil whitey.)...

[ItsOver]

... Just because a large group of people want something to happen doesn't necessarily mean that it's a good idea...

Yep.

[Yorkshire pud]

I would want attractive people on my TV show. Who wouldn't?


Oh, right. Britain.

That explains your face for radio. Whereas I'm incredibly handsome. Win win.

[SredniVashtar]

That's just because continental Europe has always been a hotbed of extreme ideology on both the right and left and that attitude has slowly infected the UK over the last 40 years. We're simply the last place that still knows what a centrist actually is, though I have a sneaking suspicion that the same things that propelled Trump into power is about to take hold in Europe.

That's a bit of a head-scratcher. You talk about centrism, and then go on to mention Trump as though he's the patron saint of the middle ground. I don't know where the hell he stands, but then neither does he. Other than gaining power I don't see that he has much in the way of - certainly not ideology - but any real views at all that you can't scribble down on the back of an envelope. Europe has had all sorts of differing views ever since the Reformation, but that's what makes it so interesting.

I can really only speak for the American left, but to be honest, I can't tell what they believe. What you term as "vastly different shades of views" to me just seems like ideological schizophrenia. If people actually espoused Marxism, then I would refer to them as Marxists. But they don't -- Das Kapital isn't exactly on the NYT best seller list here. Instead they hold an amalgam of bizarre, cobbled together ideas designed specifically to create coalitions of voting blocs that can win elections.

But at the same time, there is no actual ideology. There can't be one. It would prevent them from holding together a political party that caters to both virulently anti-homosexual people, such as Muslims in general and much of black America, and yet also caters to LGBT rights groups all while acting as though a large section of the party doesn't want them tossed off buildings to please Allah.

So what exactly do you label a group of people that have no core, consistent ideology? Democrats doesn't work because I hold a similar dim view of the Green Party. The only thing I can think of is Leftists. Or dingbats.

I feel much the same about the right, incidentally, and accept the label of "right-wing" readily as a result instead of trying to explain my centrist, moderately libertarian outlook.

The left is a pretty broad church. There are all sorts of problems right now getting it to align with all the differing views at the same time - Islam and women's rights for example. There is a great deal there with which I disagree, but at least the left, in general, tries to look at things with a critical eye with a view to improve them, even though they might be wrong. The right, so far as I can see, is very bad at articulating their own positions. They just want to sit back and let it all run its course, according to the dictates of the market. But, as we saw in 2008, that's terribly dangerous. Some people on the right would have been perfectly happy to risk economic collapse, with all that would entail. I just don't get that kind of thinking at all.

[Jackstar]

I don't know where the hell he stands, but then neither does he.

You're just making shit like this up. It's just your opinion. Presenting your opinion as your thesis is, you know, fine and all, but it doesn't jibe very well with your attempt to argue from authority.

[Jackstar]

Fucko.

[Jackstar]

Cussing does nothing to further the conversation and will actually cause some people not to continue reading.

What additional words may I sprinkle in, to get them to take some other people with them?

[SredniVashtar]

You're just making shit like this up. It's just your opinion. Presenting your opinion as your thesis is, you know, fine and all, but it doesn't jibe very well with your attempt to argue from authority.

I don't have to argue from authority. All I have to do is compare the things he said on the stump to the things he is proposing to do now. Yes, that makes him an ordinary politician, but that's exactly what the people voting for him didn't want. Bringing in all these bods from Goldman Sachs (drain the swamp, FFS), buttering up the leader of Pakistan (as if he's going to ban Muslims from entering the country). There isn't much that he isn't prepared to compromise to suit his own agenda.

[Jackstar]

I don't have to argue from authority.

Yes, every critical thinker around knows this. Nevertheless, you do it relentlessly. Far less often than I see you posting AMVs of Elton John's "Candle In The Wind."

[Juan]

The difference is that I'm British, so my opinion has more weight

Interesting.  Yorkie, though a northerner, also claims to be British.  Do you likewise hold his opinions so loftily?

[Jackstar]

Do you likewise hold his opinions so loftily?

It's a trick. Get an axe.

[K_Dubb]

Considering that you live in a country that gets its collective knickers in a twist every four years about electing itself a new god-emperor I call that rather rich. What do the people who elected Trump want if not someone who is going to come down from on high and fix all their problems? As much as I like Americans individually, collectively I wouldn't trust them to run a lemonade stand.

That horrid tub-thumping assaulting your delicate ears every four years from over here is the noise of revolution.  If you went back to 1789, I guarantee it wasn't all Voltaire and Montesquieu -- sky-high expectations and coarse rhetoric were more the thing.  We have been peacefully overthrowing our governments for a couple centuries now, and you presume to prate away to us about the cooperation you just discovered.

Your idea of cooperation depends on everyone buying into a sort of orthodoxy.  The very idea of orthodoxy is foreign to politics, which is (I invert) war by other means.  Your way leads to calcification and bureaucracy -- you guys will be Qing China at this rate, presided over by greasy mandarins shielding the center of power, teetering when somebody knocks on the door with a steamboat.  We manage to keep the lightning in a bottle.  Our cooperation isn't some placid jawing about shared values but rather the tacit agreement not to slaughter each other over every election.

For all the many problems with Europe (and I won't deny those) it's also about a spirit of cooperation that you simply don't understand, living where you are, insulated from all the forces that have buffeted the continent of Europe over centuries. When you look back at this country, which has seen itself at war with Spain, France, Holland, Germany, Austria, Italy etc over the course of only a few centuries, then it's no wonder that people want to come up with something that allows competition without the necessity for cracking people's skulls to get what they want.

Again you imagine that Europe has birthed a new species, this time one who's discovered how to live together peacefully -- and this within living memory.  You may be right (I hope you are), but the very history you trot out like a simpering A-student's report card suggests otherwise.  You are the naïf here, and I pat your head and give you a butterscotch before I go back to my books with a wry smile.

Anyway, you're the one who hasn't mastered the manly art of shaving yet, so if anyone's a pernicious weed, it's you! [pokes out tongue].

Honestly, I ought to just grow a great gray prophet's beard; your sophomoric optimism makes me feel positively ancient.

[Taaroa]

That's just because continental Europe has always been a hotbed of extreme ideology on both the right and left and that attitude has slowly infected the UK over the last 40 years. We're simply the last place that still knows what a centrist actually is, though I have a sneaking suspicion that the same things that propelled Trump into power is about to take hold in Europe.

I think probably one of the best examples of centrism in world politics is Australia, where the two main parties are only slightly left or right of center and differ very little. With that said, even there the anti globalist and anti immigration parties are gaining rapid support.

[Yorkshire pud]

Interesting.  Yorkie, though a northerner, also claims to be British.  Do you likewise hold his opinions so loftily?

'Though a northerner'? You should be horsewhipped. I'm a Yorkshireman first and foremost. That Yorkshire is in England and therefore Britain, is happenstance.

Of course he holds my opinions with equal merit to his; except when he differs, in which case we have a chat and decide I was correct.*

*With thanks to Brian Clough.

[albrecht]

We have perverts and deviants here also (heck, it seems these days they are even praised especially if they are in Hollywood) but what the heck is going on in the UK? I just got a message that Chelsea is added to all the others and is "cooperating" and "wants to be open" (although apparently there was a payment involved) over another pedo scandal. From Muzzies, certain churches, pop stars, tv presenters, schools, MPs, orphanges- all the way to football coaches it would seem that the whole of society is involved in this stuff over there. And much of it "known about" for decades but swept under the rugs for ratings, "cultural reasons" lest we offend, perceived liability, and politics.

[21st Century Man]

We have perverts and deviants here also (heck, it seems these days they are even praised especially if they are in Hollywood) but what the heck is going on in the UK? I just got a message that Chelsea is added to all the others and is "cooperating" and "wants to be open" (although apparently there was a payment involved) over another pedo scandal. From Muzzies, certain churches, pop stars, tv presenters, schools, MPs, orphanges- all the way to football coaches it would seem that the whole of society is involved in this stuff over there. And much of it "known about" for decades but swept under the rugs for ratings, "cultural reasons" lest we offend, perceived liability, and politics.

[Yorkshire pud]

We have perverts and deviants here also (heck, it seems these days they are even praised especially if they are in Hollywood) but what the heck is going on in the UK? I just got a message that Chelsea is added to all the others and is "cooperating" and "wants to be open" (although apparently there was a payment involved) over another pedo scandal. From Muzzies, certain churches, pop stars, tv presenters, schools, MPs, orphanges- all the way to football coaches it would seem that the whole of society is involved in this stuff over there. And much of it "known about" for decades but swept under the rugs for ratings, "cultural reasons" lest we offend, perceived liability, and politics.

'The whole of society'? Out of a population of nearly 70 million? What?

'The whole of the USA' go around shooting people, when they're not trying to persecute women who have abortions. Not forgetting that all Americans believe the Earth was made in 6 days and sacrifice those who don't believe it.

Yeah...?

[albrecht]

'The whole of society'? Out of a population of nearly 70 million? What?

'The whole of the USA' go around shooting people, when they're not trying to persecute women who have abortions. Not forgetting that all Americans believe the Earth was made in 6 days and sacrifice those who don't believe it.

Yeah...?

As like your comparison with our shootings, I'm going with your logic here about all your pedo stuff. Clearly everyone in the UK is involved at some level.

Like you, hopefully, with regard to your pedo stuff. I don't know a single person, or mass of people, thankfully, who has been shot (in any regard- by police, by a mass shooter, by a Muslim, by accident, by an illegal, by a gangmember, etc) and I know a lots of people with guns- who hunt, who shoot, who have CCL, etc- and right now living in Texas, of all places, where the holiday sales flyer in the mail is for AR-15s and shotgun specials.

[pyewacket]

Still at it? Time for some holiday cheer!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl2ryKu2UVA

[PB the Deplorable]

What happened after WW2? To save you googling it, I'll tell you. The voted out Churchill and brought in a Socialist government, much to your scorn and contempt no doubt, but there you go.

So 70 years later we're all supposed to go along with the Globalists?  Still not seeing the connection

[PB the Deplorable]

And which elected candidate to POTUS, used that media and TV to get product placement of his brand? Trump rode a wave of publicity that the media were only too happy to provide, because Trump (then) was a novelty candidate, a TV personality who shouted and fired and judged women on their looks. Trump isn't entirely stupid, but he isn't capable of going outside his bubble of needing to be liked, and he cannot stand the idea he may not be and still remain professional.

Well, my point was perhaps these pro-Globalist views we're seeing here and elsewhere are generated in part by Big Media's ability to influence.

And here you've actually demonstrated the power of media influence quite well yourself.  Thanks.

[PB the Deplorable]

And valid. Farage, Gove and Johnson had nothing to back up their message. Nothing. And now the vote is over, its looking more and more likely that the legislation and practical aspects will not be achieved with any degree of success that leaves the UK benefitting. The EU has said many times that unless there is freedom of movement (at the very least), the UK cannot enjoy trade benefits as it does now with the EU.

Trump isn't proven yet he is doing well other than making self wealth. He currently has 75 lawsuits against him; he had 7000 people sue him for his university scam, and they'll get back less than half what they paid. Oh, and he claimed climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese...This is your next POTUS.

We'll take Trump, and you can have all the Syrian refugees, Afghans, Somalians, Pakistanis and all the other brain-dead 7th Century barbarians you want - deal?

[Dr. MD MD]

You take Nigel Farage seriously over there. The prosecution rests.

They are just protest votes, that's all. They aren't about anything except giving the people in charge the finger. That's not necessarily a bad thing, until you start to ponder what will arrive in its place. Brexit is a total bugger's muddle, for instance, because nobody ever stopped to wonder what happens next. The actual practicalities of disengaging from everything are going to be terrifyingly complex, but that's nothing compared to voting a used-car salesman leader of the free world.

I guess you shouldn't have called for that referendum if you didn't trust the proletariat to make the right choice then. 

BTW, most used car salesmen aren't worth 4 billion dollars. 

[SciFiAuthor]

That's a bit of a head-scratcher. You talk about centrism, and then go on to mention Trump as though he's the patron saint of the middle ground. I don't know where the hell he stands, but then neither does he. Other than gaining power I don't see that he has much in the way of - certainly not ideology - but any real views at all that you can't scribble down on the back of an envelope. Europe has had all sorts of differing views ever since the Reformation, but that's what makes it so interesting.

I agree that Trump has no ideology. He took notes from the American left's playbook and did what they've been doing: use a bunch of slogans and cobble together a coalition big enough to win an election. It's really that simple nowadays due an educational system and pop culture specifically designed to dumb people down. It's a nightmare. Elements of the left don't want to teach history before the renaissance as though Aristotle and Plato never existed and elements of the right want to teach bullshit like creationism.

But, in the end, I'll take a president that will pick up a phone and call a company and try to persuade them not to move or automate over a president that doesn't really do anything except sit around while agitators burn down cities.

The left is a pretty broad church. There are all sorts of problems right now getting it to align with all the differing views at the same time - Islam and women's rights for example.

That's because it can't ever be aligned. The left should be for relegating sexist, inherently misogynistic Islam to the trash heap of human history. It's a religion that needs to be shamed out of existence. Instead they court it as though it's somehow rational or acceptable. It's not, thus it must go. And so must go any collective delusion that can't successfully incorporate itself into modern society. Because of things like Islam's incompatibility with reason, the left reveals itself to not be honest with itself across the board, and that's why I just toss it all under one category for purposes of keeping it simple.

There is a great deal there with which I disagree, but at least the left, in general, tries to look at things with a critical eye with a view to improve them, even though they might be wrong. The right, so far as I can see, is very bad at articulating their own positions. They just want to sit back and let it all run its course, according to the dictates of the market. But, as we saw in 2008, that's terribly dangerous. Some people on the right would have been perfectly happy to risk economic collapse, with all that would entail. I just don't get that kind of thinking at all.

As a centrist, I agree with you. I don't think we're all that far apart in outlook. My problem is that in this country we've let the left run things for 8 years and they haven't accomplished anything other than introducing fake racial divisions that resulted in several cities, including my own, burning down. That's extremism and was not helpful to a stable, prosperous society. Especially St. Louis, since it was a Democrat-run shithole long before it burnt down.

The ideas of Barack Obama failed. So did the neoconservative ideas of George W. Bush. The Joe Sixpack of the American Midwest has already experienced economic collapse. That's what no one noticed from their ivory towers on the coasts of this country. Trump in his tower did notice. And it won him the election. Whether he turns out to be a nightmare, a failure, or the greatest president ever will be determined by his actions. But the point is, the last two presidencies were full of nightmares and failures. We've got nothing to lose. 

[PB the Deplorable]

... Brexit is a total bugger's muddle, for instance, because nobody ever stopped to wonder what happens next...

Isn't that why there is a period between the vote and the announcement they are leaving - to figure out some of the logistics, and then a 2 year period of negotiation to iron out the details? 

Why wasn't it enough for people to know they didn't want to be subject to the dictates of Brussels, and that the above would get done on it's own schedule afterward?

[Dr. MD MD]

And which elected candidate to POTUS, used that media and TV to get product placement of his brand? Trump rode a wave of publicity that the media were only too happy to provide, because Trump (then) was a novelty candidate, a TV personality who shouted and fired and judged women on their looks. Trump isn't entirely stupid, but he isn't capable of going outside his bubble of needing to be liked, and he cannot stand the idea he may not be and still remain professional.

Heehee! It's just killing you that he's already turning things around here and hasn't even been sworn in yet.