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No it wouldn't. It in no way resembled a coup, attempted or otherwise. Parliament was at no stage denied the time and freedom to act if it wished

Meanwhile: https://twitter.com/BBCMarkSimpson/stat ... 55456?s=19

For context, Ian Paisley said this during the foot and mouth crisis, when British beef exports were banned. So it sound like the suggestion is to keep the North Irish people but not their goods, so NI would remain in the common market indefinitely?

The suggestion is purely agricultural as things stand, not that there's much flesh on the bones of it at all as far as I know. In all honesty I think it was said simply to give the impression that ideas were being pursued, but that's just speculation on my part.

Can we just take a moment to appreciate that Floppy Johnson Fails To Get Election is the best tabloid headline since Bezos Exposes Pecker.

Well it looks like the unanimous verdict from the Judges in the UK Supreme Court is very clear, Naughty Boris has been dishonest to Queen Elizabeth 2nd & that's a definite problem for him... Off to the Tower of London with the blighter, then off with his head & stick it on a pike ???

Possibly. The clarity of the result has caught people somewhat by surprise. For something to get to the Supreme Court in the first place it is seldom clear cut by nature, and there's a sense of "what just happened?" going around.

Looking a bit closer at the comments of Lady Hale of the spider, the underlying reason for the level of clarity is that the government side didn't just simply fail to provide convincing reasons for proroguing Parliament, but they didn't actually provide any reasons or witness statements whatsoever. It is impossible to take into account the weight of evidence that isn't presented, and so inevitably the judgment came down heavily on one side.

Which begs the question of why no reasons were presented. There is no guarantee that the government would have won if they presented a robust defence, but they may have, and the judgement would almost certainly resembled the traditional fudge you come to expect. This looks more like a deliberate attempt to lose.

Octavious wrote: ↑

Sun Sep 01, 2019 3:52 pm

MPC wrote: ↑

Sun Sep 01, 2019 3:00 pm

See how China is humiliating the UK in general and regarding HK in particular

How is China humiliating the UK? The entire point of the Hong Kong handover was that it would cease to be a problem for us (in the sense that keeping it British would cause a permanent argument with a military that would outnumber anything we could deliver locally by 100 to 1) and start being a problem for China (in the sense that a city full of millions of independent thinking freedom loving Chinese would be unleashed amongst those who know nothing but Communism). It seems to be working beautifully.

China isn't communist.

Agreed, China is no longer a Communist nation, certainly not a form of Communism that Marx and Engel proposed or would recognise. There's an irony in that, the "People's Party" is now the oppressor of the ordinary citizen. The other irony is that the capitalist "Western nations" particularly the USA and it's powerful Capitalist robber barons wanted China to engage in Capitalism and now many of those same people particularly in the USA are now whining because the Chinese are such damn good capitalists.

State capitalism can be quite powerful in a nation state geopolitical sense. Not that I agree with any form of capitalism.

But yeah it's quite ironic how the western countries keep crying communism about a country that is actually just doing capitalism better than them

Well there's that old saying, be careful what you ask for...

The performance of state run Capitalism in the Chinese example is also a snack in the face for all those acolytes of the notion that Governments cannot be effective business operators, the radical free market philosophers.

Oops, smack in the face.. damn typos

Kingdroid wrote: ↑

Tue Sep 24, 2019 6:01 pm

China isn't communist.

In some respects it's arguably not, but it's very much definitely not a free and liberal democracy. Hong Kong, by way of contrast, sees itself in that light, and it is that set of ideas that have been unleashed on the communist traditions of state control and public obedience that China imposes on the mainland.

Octavious wrote: ↑

Wed Sep 25, 2019 10:19 am

Kingdroid wrote: ↑

Tue Sep 24, 2019 6:01 pm

China isn't communist.

In some respects it's arguably not, but it's very much definitely not a free and liberal democracy. Hong Kong, by way of contrast, sees itself in that light, and it is that set of ideas that have been unleashed on the communist traditions of state control and public obedience that China imposes on the mainland.

I've said it before, China is a one party democracy. They still elect people to positions within the party... But it is problematic. Much like the US where the broken two party system means most people's votes don't count for much... And the two parties are pro-corporate interests who buy election campaigns...

Yes... I recall you using the phrase "one party democracy" before... The passage of time hasn't made it any more convincing, I have to say.

... Not being a free and liberal democracy (most countries in the world, even the ones that you probably think are, are not) doesn't make it communist, or even socialist. It's a capitalist one party state, but it's definitely capitalist. Capitalism isn't inherently (or even particularly) democratic. And, neither is communism, though it can be.

Yes Octavious our Oracle, the description "one party democracy" is I think a polite euphemism for totalitarian dictatorship.
I think wonderful Orathaic is innacurate in equating voting within the Chinese Communist Party to voting in a genuine democracy, if that is what he is doing. Only members of the Chinese Communist Party are eligible to vote in Party "elections" .. it's nowhere near a democratic vote by all adult citizens.
That's a feature of the USA as well, the inequities in enfranchisement. The USA imho is not a genuine democracy, it's a Republic with corrupted elements of democracy. Perhaps a way to reform the political system in the USA would be to start with effective reforms to laws governing political donations & funding and introducing compulsory voting and getting rid of the inequities in enfranchisement.
It's a seductive dream, the USA & a multitude of other nations having corruption free electoral processes with equitable, universal enfranchisements. As I have frequently remarked, our collective path to enlightenment is long and arduous. (& not often helped by the God botherers)

Octavious wrote: ↑

Wed Sep 25, 2019 10:01 pm

Yes... I recall you using the phrase "one party democracy" before... The passage of time hasn't made it any more convincing, I have to say.

I continue to not claim this is a good thing. Just that painting them as 'evil' lacks nuance and plays only into the propoganda of their rivals.

Just as painting the US as 'the lands of the free', as some kind of democratic paradise beyond all corruption, oppression or problems would be naive

The USA is a powerful force for evil.