UK General Election 2015

[topmo3]

Id vote farage tbh seem like a nice fella. we actually have a really similar type of party in finland and our nigel looks like this

[mason666]

If people looked at the manifesto's side by side without any previous bias i think a lot of people from across the political spectrum would choose ukips.

doesn't seem to be the case... https://data.voteforpolicies.org.uk/cou ... es/england

of course this is based on almost 400k surveys, rather than one ukip supporter's hunch, so believe what you want

lol and what kind of person do you think would do that survey?

[mason666]

and what a good approach to have djoe, 'i am going to ignore the people i have different opinions from'

[DJoe]

nah the people who arent being serious

[mason666]

Even better!

'the people i disagree with must be joking, there is no way anyone could have a different opinion to mine'

[hubb]

I thought it slightly cheeky

[ehbes]

Ukip has yet to put forward a policy that doesn't revolve around them hating brown people

[mason666]

nice one m8

[hubb]

theres no escaping that is there?

[mason666]

Well seeing as the majority of 'hate' is towards the EU and 'brown people' likely make up the minority of EU citizens there is quite a lot of escaping it.

In fact if we were to leave the EU then we would increase skilled immigration from non-eu countries like india, brazil and africa leading to an increase of 'brown people' as you so nicely put it.

Also if you read my post about the manifesto points only one point could even be vaguely considered to be aimed at 'brown people'.

One more thing, 76 of UKIP parliamentary candidates are of an ethnic minority so arguing that UKIP as a party is racist is quite rediculous.

[Phigure]

76 of UKIP parliamentary candidates are of an ethnic minority so arguing that UKIP as a party is racist is quite rediculous

this means literally nothing, it's the same as arguing "I can't be racist! I have a black friend"

[mason666]

ok

[Phigure]

im unconvinced about budgets in general. ill admit i dont understand most economics, but. whats the point in having a strong economy if the money doesnt get spent on the people.
if we can keep borrowing and everyone has a better quality of life. why not just do that?

you ever heard of "modern monetary theory"? the central point is basically what you're talking about, ie, that we should realize that with FIAT currency, etc the budgets of nations are actually no longer financially constrained in any meaningful way. people don't like to think about how money is printed out of thin air and that you can actually do so with little ill effects thanks to modern reserve banking and monetary policy to counteract inflation/deflation/etc.

essentially they can pay for anything if they really want to, and they do (the US had no problem pulling 3+ trillion out of its ass to fight two wars in the middle east). government debt really isnt intended or necessary to be paid off, it's just a buffer where you get the funds for spending (the US hasn't paid off its debt since about 200 years).

they're perfectly capable of ending unemployment, poverty, etc in countries like the US or UK. they just don't care to

[Muncey]

im unconvinced about budgets in general. ill admit i dont understand most economics, but. whats the point in having a strong economy if the money doesnt get spent on the people.
if we can keep borrowing and everyone has a better quality of life. why not just do that?
like i never get why politicians go on about gdp as if it affects normal people. its all very well having a reduced deficit (whatever that means) or a greater GDP but if normal people are poorer have less public services and a million people use foodbanks, whats the point?

literally couldnt care less about the financial responsibilities of the different parties as long as it contributes to raising everyone's standards of living. (unless you can already own/comfortably rent a house have a car, go on holiday, then youve got good enough standards of living)


now can someone who understands economics explain why Im wrong

You're right about GDP and theres many claiming its not good enough and we should look at other things, I think the green party (or green economists at least) suggested adding something to the GDP measure which accounts for global warming contribution or something.. can't really remember. If anybody is that interested I'm sure I could dig up the details. It is something all political parties love to do, bang on about GDP if its up.. because its a cop out and you don't really have to address any particular issues. Unemployment is a good one too, you can easily get around the figures of unemployment because of the way unemployment is defined. The whole zero hour contract and policies like that are just a way of getting people off the unemployment rate figure, its easy then to say 'look unemployment is down' when in reality its not. Its an economic sleight of hand.

Also the thing about "borrowing money" is a myth, or at least a huge misunderstanding of what Government debt is. The mainstream picture is to paint the Government as a business or household and treat deficits as household or business debt, which has to be paid back and its a huge misrepresentation of reality because Government is nothing like those two. They make it sound like we are in debt to some big organisation/another country. Other countries can buy our debts (which are basically like IOUs) just like they can buy gold or oil.. its just a security. The two main difference is that our Governments debt is in Pound Sterling, the currency they legally have the right to print, and we are under no obligation to ever pay off all our debt. We have never and will never be forced into paying all our debt off, we can always reissue new debt to pay off old debt or simply print money. Printing money will cause inflation though.. the German Government tried to free themselves from their debt after WW2 by printing money and causing hyperinflation.. making their currency worthless and making themselves debt free in the mean time. Didn't work that way but you get the picture, a sovereign nation can only go bankrupt if they choose to. So yeah most politicians have the wrong view of deficits imo and they use that to justify strict austerity measures to balance the budget and lower the standards of living. In their eyes its what needs to be done.

Also you'll find the vast majority of economics in Government is based around 19th century economists ideas. They've died off at times, Obama put in a big Keynesian style stimulus plan, but then quickly retreated and went back to austerity measures. Europe is dominated by the same ideas, we are probably the worst for it though.

Its scary because its mostly based on whats known as a barter economy, one void of money let alone a huge financial sector and banking systems.. all internationally connected.

[mason666]

they're perfectly capable of ending unemployment, poverty, etc in countries like the US or UK. they just don't care to

lol, another good contender for stupidest thing i have read on the forum

[ehbes]

One more thing, 76 of UKIP parliamentary candidates are of an ethnic minority so arguing that UKIP as a party is racist is quite rediculous.

You know how most Republicans in America who hate the gay turn out to be closet gays themselves?

[mason666]

ukip supporters are closet ethnic minoritys?

[ehbes]

Self loathing

[Phigure]

they're perfectly capable of ending unemployment, poverty, etc in countries like the US or UK. they just don't care to

lol, another good contender for stupidest thing i have read on the forum

you could end the worst cases of poverty and inequality with a few trillion easily, and as we've seen in the past they've had no problem coming up with that type of money when they want to "liberate" some foreign countries

[hubb]

+ it's political levity too keep a bunch of poors around that will blame other poors