UK General Election thread

[Hauldren Collider]

So you're saying that the Conservatives are the best party to vote for?

I guess? I don't live in the UK. I don't know. Probably?

[Hauldren Collider]

Marine Le Pen weirds me out. Her french nationalist party seems to be best described as one that is very nationalist, yet also very socialist.

[C0ckney]

yeah, it's a somewhat updated fascist party. there's a good 10%-15% of the electorate in most european countries that can be reached with such a programme. the crisis and the EU's terrible handling of it has made the ground more fertile for the far-right; changes within the far-right itself have allowed it to take advantage of that fertile ground.

[Hauldren Collider]

The thing I find amusing is that it is in fact very nationalist, and it is also in fact very socialist (I think? I'm not super informed on french politics, these are superficial impressions), while the nazis were really just nationalist and not really very socialist.

I don't believe Marine Le Pen's party is nearly worthy of comparing to Nazis, by the way. It's just kind of creepy and definitely the wrong kind of conservative.

[C0ckney]

i don't mean that the FN are like the nazis, but rather that they offer a french version of a european far-right programme. they have gone through some radical changes in the last 20 years. they used to be a neo-liberal free market party but started to change in the 1990s and are now a protectionist, anti-EU, dirigist party. they're big on law and order and tough on immigration, very anti-muslim and pro-jewish - they see them as allies against radical islam. this is a big change from the past and is matched by similar changes across the european far-right.

ideologically the far-right across europe are in a state of flux. many have changed their message, toned down racist rhetoric, and tried to reach out to new voters. this has hastened since the crisis, as the prospect of electoral gains has focused minds. many now have a strange combination of free market and welfarist policies, though this confusion hasn't done them any harm at the polls (if i were being unkind i might say that the average far-right voter lacks the intelligence to recognise the contradictions). basically your typical far-right outfit is anti-EU, anti-immigrant, tough on crime, anti-muslim (though with varying degrees of honesty), with populist economics. UKIP will probably try to emulate this, with the necessary adjustments to fit a UK context.

[Bereta_Eder]

Marine Le Pen weirds me out. Her french nationalist party seems to be best described as one that is very nationalist, yet also very socialist.

Cheeky bas...rd


But, yes, any party that opposes current EU financial policy is bound to be "nationalist".

This translates to each country's automatic "go to" responce (defined by its core characteristics).
In england it's lessaiz faire economics while in france (and pretty much anywhere else) it's state control (one of the things that makes england's model marginally appealing actually)

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

This translates to each country's automatic "go to" responce (defined by its core characteristics).
In england it's lessaiz faire economics

Hardly.

[Bereta_Eder]

Well what is it according to you? (assuming you believe it has one)

[Dauphin]

You moved recently?

I've been working in Paris and Geneva on long term projects for the last few years. I still 'live' in the UK, even though I am only there a few days a month.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Well what is it according to you? (assuming you believe it has one)

If you look at Britain's economic history since 1945, "laissez-faire" it certainly isn't. It might have flirted with that direction in Thatcherism, but that's hardly representative.

[Hauldren Collider]

It is more so than the rest of Europe, but not nearly as much as the United States and Canada.

[Dauphin]

Blair makes a speech, and everyone says "If only he was leader of Labour. A man who can unite the country! A man we can all hate!".

[C0ckney]

if people voted in line with their policy views the greens would win the election.

If people just voted on policies, the Greens would be the party of government in the run-up to the 2015 General Election.

That’s according to a survey that polled voters from across the United Kingdom, based solely on policies rather than party affiliation, seat incumbents or leaders’ personalities.

The Liberal Democrats are faring well in the same survey, which has collated more than half a million responses so far, out-scoring their coalition counterparts the Conservatives – 17% to 14%.

[I AM MOBIUS]

I don't like that website as it's results are too black and white.

For example, there were a number of policies from different parties that are virtually identical, but if you choose a particular one, that party is given 100% of the credit for the answer, instead of all parties with a similar policy being given a similar weighting.

Hence the Lib Dems flagship tax allowance policy, which was their idea and their biggest achievement in this government, has been hijacked by UKIP, for example, and I accidentally picked the UKIP version.

But yes, this is a timely reminder that human beings are instinctively social creatures at heart, and not selfish greedy planet rapists.

[C0ckney]

i don't think you can blame the test for most of the parties having the same policies.

but yes, it's one of the curious things that often seems to come out of tests like this: people prefer left of centre policies yet vote for right-wing parties.