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Theresa May Loses Overall Majority In UK Parliament (cnn.com)
Prime Minister Theresa May of Britain has lost her overall majority in Parliament on Thursday, plunging Britain into a period of renewed political chaos less than two weeks before it is scheduled to begin negotiations over withdrawing from the European Union. While May's Conservative party won the most seats, the party didn't win enough to govern without the support of minority parties. CNN reports: It was devastating result for May, who had called the election three years earlier than required by law, convinced by opinion polls that placed her far ahead of opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn. The result also plunges Britain into a period of renewed political chaos, with Brexit talks likely to be delayed and May's personal authority shredded. There was already talk in Conservative circles that she might have to resign, less than a year after taking over from David Cameron, who resigned following the Brexit referendum. The pound fell on currency markets in the wake of the results. After the result was declared in her constituency of Maidenhead, May gave a faltering speech. "At this time more than anything else, this country needs a period of stability," she said, suggesting she would attempt to form a government even if her party loses its majority. Corbyn said the early results showed May had lost her mandate and called for her to resign. Further reading: New York Times
Weak and wobbly.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
Maybe /. has more UK than US readers
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
SNP and Lib Dems have already said they're not going to form a coalition government which means the only option left is for Conservative to form a minority government which would effectively means the government loses its authority to pass laws without support from other parties which would be a disaster when managing Brexit given how divided the nation is on the topic.
Even 250 seats is too much for her, let alone 313.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
About as much as US politics has... Just because _you_ aren't in the UK, it doesn't mean that it doesn't matter to millions of other people.
Furthermore, the UK is one of the USA's closest allies, not that Agent Orange really gives two fucks about that.
I'm just wondering if much of electorate that placed these people in power have gazed into the abyss of populism and seen that darkness ahead. I certainly hope so because there is still time to set things right in the world.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
... be bothered to participate in the multi-party televised election debates. In the debate the Tories did turn up, she sent the Home Secretary, whose father had died days beforehand.
Weak leadership.
Theresa May wanted to have "back doors" in encryption schemes to allow government access and everyone with a clue laughed at her
she stood by the claims and this is what happens....
maybe next time a politician dreams of this we can remind them of how this turned out...
John Jones
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
Tories have played stupid games in the last two elections they called for. They've won stupid prizes as a result.
Didn't we just have an article where Theresa May vowed to "tear up" human rights to combat terrorism?
Hung government notwithstanding, getting rid of her is a good thing, right?
I really don't see much left that allows them to be united anymore. It would probably be best to allow the remnants of the formally great Empire to go their separate ways.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Oh crikey look at the whiny little snowflake.
The right wing nutjobs are convinced slashdot is dominated by evil commie leftist progressive SJW mangina race traitors or whatever.
The loony left think that slashdot is dominated by the gun totin' racist,sexist, transphobic denialist rightwing nutjobs.
Has it possibly occurred to you that slashdot actually has a better spread than most places which makes it less of an echo chamber and more of a yelling chamber?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
If Europe still mattered,
Only an American could think the largest trading bloc in the world somehow doesn't matter. Europe as a bloc is economically more powerful than your country.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Well I'd say it goes under the 'stuff that matters' part of the slogan. As a European one of the reasons I like political stories on Slashdot, especially political stories from outisde the US is that it's interesting to read american commentary on these matters. I mean, I often do not agree but it doesn't matter, it gives me a perspective on the matters that I feel I do not get from simply reading something like CNN or other american news sources.
In case there are others who feel the same and for what it's worth here's my take on this topic: The British right has effectively sunk their own ship. The Brexit campaign was never meant to succeed, but rather it was meant to be used as a PR-campaign for Farage and his ilk in preparation for the next eelctions. Pretty much everyone, on the right and the left, assumed people would vote remain. This lead to 2 things that started this cascade of clusterfucks:
1. The Brexit side felt they could make pretty much any claims they wanted. After all, they weren't actually going to win, so while they're at it might as well take it over the top for maximal visibility. Hence the absurd claims that by resigning they'd be able to pour hundreds of millions more into health care, or maintain complete control of their borders while still being free to trade with the Union like before, and so on.
2. The Remain side, equally convinced that they'd win easily - after all, who'd be stupid enough to fall for the extravagant hyperbole of the Brexit camp - did not do a solid campaign at all. Granted, I'm, not a Brit but I was left with the impression that they were totally unable to craft a message of their own, other than essentially trying to signal "leaving the Union would be bad for reasons X, Y and Z". This is when I knew they were screwed. You're essentially up against a populists wet dream: an popular vote where the other side gets to wrap themselves in a flag and talk about 'freedom'. That's really hard to counter, because the nuanced arguments about the benefits of a trade union are trumped by the idealistic talk.
These two effects combined were enough to tilt the scales and now they're left in a situation that no-one really wanted. The Brexit camp has mostly ran to the hills and scattered, realizing well ahead of time that they've scored a massive pyrrhic victory and that by the time the effects of a brexit hit they don't want to be anywhere near responsibilities. This leaves the political establishment in a weird spot, where the resignation process has to be overseen by people who didn't really want to resign in the first place. May, herself a remainer, looked at all of this and probably figured that since she lost to raging populist she might as well do a full u-turn and attempt to go 'full populist' to solidify support for the conservatives. So she adopted a hardline stance on Brexit where they're trying to strongarm the Union into giving them everything they want even though from a purely realpolitik/game theory point of view the UK is at a massive disadvantage in these negotiations, so trying to play hardball is an insanely stupid move. She also called the elections in an attempt to gather support for her newly found stance of 'brexit means brexit' and 'no deal is better than a bad deal' -stance.
However by this time most of Brittain seems to have realized how much they were in fact duped by the Brexit campaign. That indeed, the majority of the claims made by the campaign about the benefits of resigning are outright lies. Many are feeling remorseful, and indeed it seems based on the polls if the vote was held today Remain would win
What can we learn from this? Well, the number one issue to be learned is that putting decisions of this scale to a binding popular vote with a simple majority is a suicidal move because people aren't really that well informed on complex matters like the role of the Union, which allows populists (from both sides) to essentially ma
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
Even 250 seats is too much for her, let alone 313.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
Theresa May is (was?) one of the leading figures in attempts to censor the internet in the UK, and this is entirely relevant to Your Rights Online.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Well, you suggest a better spread but this readership is like Marmite.
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
Maybe, but it typically just leads to smug and superior feelings IMHO because the people with more than half a clue are aware of their shortcomings - leaving an unrepresentive bunch of the politically naive spouting bullshit.
The relativism of thinking that everyone's opinion is equally informed has really soaked in there for some strange reason.
So what you're saying is that I've been reading slashdot for the past 20-odd years under the wrong impression that it has something to do with computers and things? Ok, sorry.
Even 250 seats is too much for her, let alone 313.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
About as much as US politics has... Just because _you_ aren't in the UK, it doesn't mean that it doesn't matter to millions of other people.
Furthermore, the UK is one of the USA's closest allies, not that Agent Orange really gives two fucks about that.
TW10 here mate...
A woman who states publicly that she is willing to shit on human rights for security loses votes
Good.
By working class Brexit voters. They simply didn't trust that she'd deliver what they voted for in the plebiscite. So those that voted for the Tories (many for the first time in their lives) in 2015 on the promise of the Referendum being held, returned to Labour.
Even 250 seats is too much for her, let alone 313.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
Theresa May is (was?) one of the leading figures in attempts to censor the internet in the UK, and this is entirely relevant to Your Rights Online.
Is she now? Tony did that 19 years ago actually...and did it quite good, so no point in repeating the exercise.
Democratic Unionist Party already gave sign they would work with conservative to form a majority - for a "price". So no it does not mean no law will be passed or the gov lose its authority. As for brexit, havign no clear majority means the parties will ahve to negociate. Much better for democracy than May which thought she had a mandate to ram UK citizen whatever she wanted.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
She's not that middle of the road. And really very authoritarian.
Slashdot really is not extreme leftist. Certainly there's a strong sense of liberalism and libertarianism, but politically, users are fairly centrist, at least by European standards.
Corbyn can not be described really really good since he did not even manage gordon brown level for labour seats... thats the reality
yes labour seats are up from before but if you start low then going up is easy,
your going to be dealing with the DUP being king/queen makers... good luck with that....
the point stands May made terrible mistakes and one of which was encryption
(n/c)
No, but Th. May had some impact on IT, mainly her will to add backdoors and decryption stuff (supposedly due to "terrorism")
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
Nah, the vast majority of Slashdotters are libertarian. Leave us alone and we well leave you alone.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
If the SNP would agree to form a coalition with the conservatives, on the single condition that they can leave the UK and stay in the EU, they can get their independence.
It will give the British and Welsh people what they voted for, and I think soon will regret.
And it will not be their problem anymore.
The Scots voted in 2014 only to stay in the UK, because leaving the UK would have meant leaving the EU.
And in 2016 they voted mainly to remain, as they did not want to leave the EU.
There are no stupid questions, Just a lot of inquisitive idiots. (from a good friend)
Anyone have a link explaining why most parliamentary system governments don't have a fixed election cycle?
oh but most have, usually like 4 years.
britain isnt strictly democratic parliamentary system though, with fixed seats and shit.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
May may in May but she can't now it's June?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
When a country like the UK is led by a bitch saying that she'll simply remove human rights and civil liberties like they mean nothing if they stand in her way to more terror legislation, I'd say that yes, this does affect us at some point.
Especially because one of her primary targets would be "teh intarnets". And as you know, such oppression, if unopposed, quickly spreads to other countries.
Let's face it, the internet is a threat to any politician that wants total control over his subjects. I.e. to every politician. The ones that think they can get away with it will censor it or even shut it down when it gets inconvenient. If you want to defend your liberties, forget your guns. Your first concern should be that you can still talk with each other and communicate your situation to the outside world.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Question is whether the DUP will support the Tories, formally or informally and what they will demand for their pound of flesh.
May is middle-of-the-road?
Holy fuck, that last earthquake really displaced a few things...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
So, from a US perspective, it's marxist-leninist-socialist-anarchist-... and then some.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"At this time more than anything else, this country needs a period of stability"
Then she probably shouldn't have called an election... Lol.
This. Stay out of my business, I'll keep my nose out of yours, limited to where your business is to meddle with the business of someone else who doesn't want you to.
That's probably not the entire legal code, but a good start.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
...we start arming foxes with machine guns and RPGs and teach them how to set up IEDs?
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
The strategic value of the UK to the US is twofold. First, it's pretty much the only country in Europe that isn't on the verge of giving the US the finger as soon as they can possibly get away with it, maybe with the exception of Poland. And second, if push comes to shove, it's fairly hard to invade England. Hasn't been done successfully for over a millennium now, and counting. It's fairly easy to defend an island.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You mean thick?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The problem is the troll moderation on Slashdot. Obviously as one of the loony left I have no idea if other loonies are doing it to conservatives, but I'm certain that left leaning posts attract a lot of bad moderation designed to silence dissenting views.
I'll say it again - if the system was changed so that -1 mods counted for less when there also +1 mods, it would really help.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
[quote]decisions of this scale to a binding popular vote with a simple majority is a suicidal move [/quote]
It's not legally binding though. They could have decided, based on the near split to put a stop to it there and then. Basically the Conservatives have been shitting themselves over UKIP for so long they lost perspective.
the number one issue to be learned is that putting decisions of this scale to a binding popular vote with a simple majority is a suicidal move
The brexit poll wasn't even binding. Which makes the current situation even more absurd.
Some on the remain side took it seriously, like Corbyn. The problem was that his own party were too busy trying to sabotage him and so the press largely just ignored him and in fact the whole party.
The Leave side was made up of people with a vested interest in leaving (mostly those in business who wanted a bonfire of rights and regulations that affected their profits), and those who were just in it for themselves (Boris, Gove) and those who just wanted to watch the world burn for ideological reasons (Farage). The referendum just happened to come along at the right time to go full post-truth fake news. Remember the money birds?
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Typical leftist, wanting to give out prizes for participating. And who will pay for these +mods? The taxpayer, that's who.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I'm aware it wasn't legally binding, but that's in essence irrelevant. The poll was hyped up to such a height, and 'the will of the people' brought up so many times that the vote was de facto binding. That is, the conservatives themselves had made it clear prior to the election that the result would be followed, so a failure to do so would have (in their minds) destroyed the party.
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
Even 250 seats is too much for her, let alone 313.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
Theresa May is (was?) one of the leading figures in attempts to censor the internet in the UK, and this is entirely relevant to Your Rights Online.
Is she now? Tony did that 19 years ago actually...and did it quite good, so no point in repeating the exercise.
Did what?
Did he pass legislation allowing 40 agencies unfettered access to all citizens' browsing history? No, that was Tresemmé.
Not to defend Tony, hateful lying little prick, but what are you actually talking about?
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
Mod point are a human right.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
The referendum wasn't binding. As I understand it they can't be - parliament is sovereign.
United Ireland? Not very likely. Here's the maths:
650 MPs. 7 Shit Fails never turn up so that makes 643.
Thus a working majority is 322, rounding up. Tories have 318. The DUP's 10 can keep Maggie II on the throne for a couple of years, assuming typical attrition rates.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
No, the UK really isn't the reason why the EU didn't work well (except actually, I think it does work quite well). The Greece crisis , for example, was caused by putting idealism ahead of practicality. The Greeks were allowed to lie about their fiscal position because France wanted the "mother of democracy" in the Euro.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
As a British citizen, I have to agree with much of what you say, but let me offer a slightly different perspective, perhaps.
I think one of the main problems in British politics over the last several decades has been the way Labour deserted its natural core voters: the working class, in a wider sense - not just the traditional factory workers, but everybody in a simillar position in society; all us that are destined to be employees, basically, rather than business owners. Blair tried to widen the scope, but lost sight of the working class and became enamoured with what one can call 'neo-capitalism' (well, I'm trying to be kind - not sure if he really deserves it); that is not to say that it is impossible for Labour to appeal to those who don't traditionally feel they are 'working class' - I think it is very possible, but you have to persuade people to rethink their position in society and realise that it isn't somehow embarrassing to be working class. Corbyn's jaw-dropping, explosive rise shows us that a lot of people felt that so-called New Labour was a mistake, and that they do in fact want them to remember the old values and bring them in to the modern reality; I think Corbyn at least has the intellectual span to envision this, and if the party can unite behind him, they could pull it off.
The Tories gambled and lost; they misread the situation, but I am not convinced that this is Theresa May's fault - she is in many ways one of the few good Conservatives, and I like her, but she is surrounded by the old-style 'nasty tories', as she once called them; the kind satirised in 'The New Statesman' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Statesman). The Tories, under David Cameron tried to re-invent themselves as 'nice, and in favour of social justice, but I think it never rang true, and you kept seeing the jeering, private-school raised bully through the varnish on a regular basis. They will form the next government, I'm sure, and they deserve it; if anybody deserves struggling with the mess of Brexit and the inevitable failures that will come off it, it is the Tories.
So here we are - fatefully moving towards Brexit, as if it was just unavoidable now; a very British kind of fatalism, I think. The truth is, of course, that we can halt this process at any time; we may have to eat humble pie and come back hat in hand, but of course we can. Just turn the idea around: if the remain side had won by such a slim majority, we would immediately have had the leavers shouting about how unfair it all was, and they would have been campaigning on and on now; so why should we just accept what is increasingly looking like a very bad idea with a heavy sigh? That simply does not make sense.
I have little doubt that we will come back - but next time, I hope the EU is a more ambitious union, not just a glorified market place with a few extra curls, but a full political union - a federal state or something like that.
May's gone, it's June now.. Awww yeaaaa!
Brexit isn't a foregone conclusion. It's also two years of negotiations. There should also be negotiations to stay. At the end of the negotiations there should be another referendum or maybe even two or three until there is a significant majority.
Chief among issues is immigration. Call it racist all you want but a country does not feel like a country if it can't control it's own borders. Furthermore the richer nations really do need to contribute more for the border protection in the eastern nations.
There is also opportunity to change the current way the EU does business (high handed) specifically in it's regulations and how nations might choose to opt out. The way I see it "most" regulations should take 10 or more years or say three elections so that opposition can be organized to reverse course.
Furthermore banking needs to change. Stop the bailouts that make certain people rich. Just declare bankruptcy already and get good people into Greece and Italy to rebuild something sane. Bankruptcy should always be on the table and almost automatic to insure that the people investing money are doing so on sound business principles rather than just a promise from the EU to guarantee their money.
Interesting analysis, but mostly wrong. I agree with this bit:
However, support for Brexit really hasn't softened that much. If it was the reason why people voted against the Tories, the Lib Dems who campaigned on a platform of stopping Brexit would have done much better.
Going into this election, the Conservatives had a 25 point lead in the opinion polls. It vanished entirely because Theresa May ran such a terrible campaign. She didn't turn up to the leadership debate. She advocated lifting the ban on fox hunting. She campaigned for "strong and stable" but was caught off guard when people pointed out that, as Home Secretary, she presided over a reduction in police numbers. Basically, in this campaign, she came across as a horrible person who doesn't care about ordinary British people.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
This is politics not tech.
While I agree about politics on /. (I too like to read the /. community opinion on politics), a news about the UK conservative loosing the majority?
UK isn't that big of a country.
Losing the majority isn't that big of an event.
I'm sure one of you will quickly remind me about the importance of both, but I'm taking a Worldwide perspective here. If we're to have a news on this, then to be fair with the rest of the world we should also have a news about every major political event in the G20.
And, just to be clear, I do love politics on /. and I do like the discussion about this news. But it fell a little unfair as we haven't discussed about other more important political event in other more important countries.
Elok
A solid leader would calm down the shit, and not do the Fox News scaremongering as excuse to push their own agenda. Instead she did a full on 'tech companies to blame/ Human Rights legislation to blame/ there's no human right she wouldn't undermine or security she wouldn't backdoor to use this even for political gain'.
Tories should eject her.
No in terms of authoritarianism she's perfect for the Tories. They are traditionally a party of 'christian' values and the associated shame about sex, porn, children out of wedlock, and the like.
Grabbing power as a response to 'terror' is standard pretty much everywhere nowadays. Nobody cares, they've been successfully cowed.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
Slahsdot is a hotbed of extreme leftists, and the defeat of a middle-of-the-road conservative makes them want to gloat in a venue they know will be kept as a blissful monoculture by moderation.
lol. Much triggered.
The dark hand of 'extreme leftism' at work here, folks.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
I think an issue is that we now have something like 5 levels of society in the sense of, social conditions, life conditions, environments, and they each have their own sense of judgement and values. The Labour Party should actually be something like three different parties. The Tories should be at least two parties. And so for a while we flirted with these other versions, like Lib Dems, and Greens, and UKIP, and so on, but now we've sprung back to two main parties.
The five levels or social conditions, with their own values, judgements, politics and aspirations, are just a consequence of the increasingly complex globalised world we live in. Maybe someone in their heart wants to be socialist, or socially conscious, but there's three versions of that, and Corbyn most naturally fits one of those, whist Blair fitted another version, and the traditional base was the third version.
The fact is, these five levels or forms of society, are realities, not ideologies, as they are just how the world has come to be and function. They are all present for a reason. And most of our systems are intermixed and linked. For example, the NHS is a state thing, but it still buys MRI machines from private companies. Another example, people in poor rural areas have different sets of needs to people in urban areas, even though they may both vote "socially".
But we have a first past the post system, and nobody much appreciates these distinct societal stages/worlds, which can lead to these sort of bizarre results where people try to fit square pegs into round holes.
Seconded. I can always be guaranteed a good debate on Slashdot compared to most other media. It is the very fact that people with completely opposing views battle it out here that makes it worth the visit.
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
The fascinating thing is that apparently "terrorism" originally means a government that keeps its population in fear. I guess May wants back to that.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
The irony is epic here...
I think you mean the DUP! They have 10 seats and are more aligned with the Conservatives. Sinn Fein could only just conceivably form an alliance together with Labour, Lib Dems, SNP and Plaid Cymru if conservatives could not form an alliance
Possibly, but once we're out (and that does seem to be the way things are headed, for whatever form of "out" we end up with - fatalism or not), we're not going to be coming back in any time soon because of the required concessions, at least some of which will probably be needed with the "cap in hand, abort Article 50" approach too for that matter. When the UK joined the EU, we got a whole bunch of concessions because our economy was fucked and we needed them, although the EU also wanted us because they thought the likely UK recovery would ultimately benefit the EU and saying "no" to anyone would scupper the "One Federal Europe" vision they were starting to aim for.
Since then membership requirements have changed - things like adoption of the Euro, Schengen, and other things we are currently exempt from have been mandatory for many of the countries of the current EU, and there's no way ALL of those countries - and membership requires it to be "all" - are going to let the UK back in without the same commitments. Not to mention anything else they might add once they UK's repeated vetoing of anything that moves them closer to a Federal State gets cut loose. 48% might have voted Remain in the referendum, but that was on the assumption of maintaining the status quo; I can't see anything like that percentage of the current population agreeing to adopting the Euro and Schengen to get back in, no matter how screwed the economy/Sterling might be and how secure the EU might become from Islamic fundamentalism, which obviously isn't happening soon. We're currently just too sentimental about Sterling (even as we march towards a cashless economy and it becomes mostly moot), and too fearful over the relatively miniscule risk of being a victim of terrorism for that to happen.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
Or maybe the voting public has now decided to bring to the ballot booth their online attitude of frivolity above all. Maybe voters who in the past simply stayed away, convinced that Candidate X is gong to be the runaway winner, now voted for somebody other than Candidate X?
Deja vu: In the 80s we had a 70ish actor as POTUS, a woman PM in the UK, and a bald leader of that other nuke superpower
You're correct that the left these days in Europe (and I say this as a Finnish leftist myself) is more worried about populism because right wing populism is on the rise. However, you're wrong if you think this means I - or the left in general - think disagreement or in fact populism itself should be disallowed. There's nothing wrong with being a populist. I mean, the point of a politician after all is to try and enact the will of the people who elected him, so populism in a sense is central to western politics.
The problem with populism is that the more complicated a topic, the easier it is for populists to oversimplify the issue and paint an entirely skewed picture to the voters. And this is not a partisan issue, the same faults and problems are entirely possible on the left itself, it's just that right now the right has embraced this kind of populism more.
No. I'm saying that if you're having a vote on an important and complex issue there should be impartial information handed out to the voters about the outcomes. In Switzerland (arguably the nation curently furthest in implementing direct democracy) whenever they have these votes on matters of policy, they get beforehand an information package that contains the pros and cons of both sides. Look at the amount of information and material that the Swiss get before they head to the polls on any issue:
So yes, they get marketing material in retsricted amounts by the parties, but they also get booklets constructed by the government about the pros and cons of the issue. This way, the parties cannot easly make wild assertions in their marketing of the issue because the opposing side can easily say: "check the numbers from the booklet, their claim is false." and you will lose the vote.
If the information about the vote is left for the campaigns of both sides and no facts whatsoever are established in the mind of the populace, then certainly the people cannot be trusted to vote correctly because they might
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
Can we please stop with the false reporting?
The conservative party won a MAJORITY in parliament. What they did not win was a PLURALITY.
Please understand the difference.
I suggest you look up the meaning of overall majority
Funnily enough (not really), that was a major selling point for some of my colleagues. To paraphrase one - "we need to get rid of the stupid human rights so we can lock up these terrorists". You know those rights that I don't think I've never needed, nobody else should have them either...
Interestingly enough, one of those people filed for bankruptcy (as well as having a large amount of debt written of by my employer) - I wonder how he'd feel about a return to Debtor's Prison too?
You can't halt the Brexit, afaik.
Once article 50 is invoked there is no way back. Brexit will happen, two years after the invocation. Deal or no deal. And any deal will have to be approved by all EU member states, so it's quite possible it'll be no deal.
The UK could negotiate about an immediate re-entry, but the conditions required for that by the EU are not going to be pretty...
WTF are you on about? Cashless doesn't mean unitless. Do you know anything about economics?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Nah, the vast majority of Slashdotters are libertarian. Leave us alone and we well leave you alone.
Why do libertartians who are not anarchists imagine that the political system they create won't wind up just the same as the typical pattern we have now? Why do libertarians who are anarchists imagine that a power vacuum won't lead to another power structure?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Or how about the good old tradition of paying your debt off with your last possession: Yourself.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You have that exactly backwards. A plurality is the largest party. A majority is a party with over 50% of the vote. The Tories have a plurality but no single party has a majority now.
My sincere congratulations to the Labour party for working out how to bribe the younger generation in such a way as to get them to turn out for you. Let's be clear what Corbyn was proposing; raising taxes on the few to ensure that the relatively gifted will get a large benefit. Not the NHS. Not schools. But people who are doing well, are going to university, are looking forward to being the relatively well off, were bribed by Labour.
There's a reason why political philosophers oppose democracy from first principles; because it can allow a group in society that happens to be a numerical majority to mug the rest of the community. The Tories were doing with pensioners, but got too honest this time in abandoning the 'triple lock'. Now Labour has mobilised the young... I don't think this will end well!
When she announced that the conservatives would take the value of peoples homes into account when assessing funding for home care she lost a big chunk of their core supporters. The majority of Conservative voters are middle aged, middle class homeowners. They feel that by buying their home they have been responsible and had to cut back on spending for discretionary items to pay for it. They feel it grossly unfair that people who have lived the high life and spent all their money on holidays and recreation get free care where as they get their home taken from them. She gambled that she could push this through because people would still vote conservative because they had no confidence in the labour opposition. But that gamble didn't pay off, people turned to the opposition.
I just want to know who was the weirdo in the yellow and black 'clown suit' standing behind Corbyn during one of his news conferences.
Labour got less seats under Corbyn than when gordon brown campaigned was my point. Which stands.
The westminster system works like that... ask the SNP or UKIP to tell you all about it...
one of those points again I made previously was about encryption, if any of the leaders came out and actually stated they wont be trying to break into communications. Via techniques such as escrow keys or force Certificate Authorities (CA) to issue a root to "security services" then I would be impressed otherwise jog on...
The right wing nutjobs are convinced slashdot is dominated by evil commie leftist progressive SJW mangina race traitors ...
... who have no girlfriend, live in their parent's basement with a robotic dog and a PC running Linux. Next to the PC there sits a mountain of used tissues and a bottle of lube while a video clip of a porn actress that bears a striking resemblance to Natalie Portman covering herself in hot grits is running full screen on the 42" UltraHD monitor. ... aaaand I think that pretty much covers the stereotype of the Slashdot reading leftist.
I kind of disagree. I get accused of being a part of the loony left more often than I get accused of being a right-wing nutjob, but I have been accused of both. I've also been accused of being a Mac fanboy, a Microsoft shill, and an open source militant. My general Slashdot experience is, some percentage of any viewpoint gets modded down. It doesn't really matter what position you take, there's going to be someone who doesn't like it, and if that person has mod points, you're going to get modded down.
However, at least in my experience, if your post is reasonable, getting modded down won't be the norm. You might have one post modded down to 0 or -1 for every 10 posts that get modded +5. Meanwhile, you'll have 100 posts that are practically ignored by the mods. I actually think the mod system works pretty well, and it's not too entirely biased one way or another.
I mean, I just looked at some of the scores for your recent post history, and it seems to match a similar pattern. Mostly 2's, a couple 3's, a couple 4's, and a couple 5's, and then one thing modded down to 1. It doesn't seem like the mods are preventing your voice from being heard.
Tory back benchers have a lot to answer for.
If the Tories had anyone who could provide decent, nevermind strong and stable, leadership this would not have been an issue. Instead, they have had Cameron who just went with the flow wherever it led and May who stubbornly refuses to bend a millimetre. A real leader knows when to bend and when not to.
However after a result like this I'm not sure how long the government will last. If the DUP force the Tories into looking at a soft Brexit to preserve the open border with Ireland the rabid right-wing, Eurosceptic side of the party could well end up bringing the government down if they felt they might do better in an election.
Actually, since 2010-ish, the UK does have a fixed, 5-year election cycle, designed to stop PMs calling snap elections at their party's convenience whenever they like what they're hearing in the opinion polls.
However, the legislation was drafted by politicians and thus has an "unless you really want to" clause, which is why we've just had a snap election called by the PM at her party's convenience because she liked what she was hearing in the opinion polls.
On the other hand, maybe the resulting debacle will make future leaders learn from history and think twice,,, wait, no what am I saying?
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Mark my words, Brexit will eventually be walked back...EU will be OK with that.
The Guardian compiled a list of interesting facts from books written by parties insiders.
You're right that the Brexit campaign was never meant to succeed, however your deductions are IMHO incorrect :
About May, she was a remainer in name only: from past behaviour, it's obvious that she prioritize (lack of) immigration to trade, as she was personally responsible for stalling talks on an EU free trade deal with India.
(1) They didn't lie. You misunderstood. Probably dishonest media pretended they promised what they didn't (come on, it was obvious hyperbole!), or failing media are pretending they broke promises that they didn't (better, alternative facts show differently). Anyway, on that topic, they have Better Lies (r) now.
(2) While regular politicians just figure out they were too optimistic: now that they've been elected, they find out it costs too much, it is more complicated than they expected, it would require a majority that they don't have, and they're really sorry about it (3). And who would vote for a boring, down-to-earth administrator anyway?
(3) The amount of genuine sincerity in that statement is not guaranteed.
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of killer sig, which this margin is too narrow to contain.
Sure it wasn't a blowout, but her party still won the most seats by a fair margin. This indicated strong but not overwhelming support for her hardline policies.
Tony did that 19 years ago actually...and did it quite good, so no point in repeating the exercise.
It's like saying you got a spanking one day so there's really no difference to someone breaking your arm now.
What Blair did that 19 years ago was pale in comparison to the psychotic approach May is trying to take and repeated exercises should be resisted at every opportunity.
Unleash the Wild Hunt!
The Royal Corgis are set loose in Parliament and No May Shall Pass!
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
This false argument was used in BC up in Canada when the Liberal party (a right wing party) lost to the NDP and Green parties.
It didn't work there.
It won't work in the UK.
Parliamentary Democracies don't work the way our failed Democracy in the US does.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
This is one of the most astute summaries of the shitshow we've been in over the last year I've seen.
I've not heard the term plurality in the UK. An absolute majority is where a party gets more than half the total number of seats in the House of Commons and can thus govern by itself. This is what Theresa May had, gave up and has failed to regain. The total share of the vote is not relevant.
Letting people keep their own money is hardly a bribe.
US Out of North America!
I blame the lack of User Friendly cartoons and insufficient Beowulf Cluster memes.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Your link doesn't prove your point. For a stalker, you're pretty fucking shitty.
Go back to your cognitive therapy sessions. You really need the help/
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
However, the legislation was drafted by politicians and thus has an "unless you really want to" clause, which is why we've just had a snap election called by the PM at her party's convenience because she liked what she was hearing in the opinion polls.
As I understood it, the key difference is that the PM has get it approved, and the opposition party duly did so. If they had said 'no', it wouldn't have happened.
If there are other important international events, you are free to post a story yourself.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Are you sure it is defined like that in the UK(aka British English)?
Because if you translate that word by word into German it makes no sense at all.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
ha, ha, ha, ha!!!
http://www.acetonestudio.com
I looked up binding in the dictionary. It didn't say "adj - bloody inconvenient & embarrassing for us if we don't do it".
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The Tories already had a healthy majority in Parliament, and with May (A Tory) they could do pretty much what they wanted.
Oh, but May wanted an even bigger majority, and called for early elections. The Tories lost a bunch of seats, so now they don't have a majority at all. Compromises will have to be made, and it will be messy.
Oops!
No amimojo, the problem is that unlike your favorite mutual ego masturbation groups, here you actually have to deal with alternate views of things, and soon learn that the world does not often agree with the highly biased black and white world view of the extremist.
As was correctly said above, most extremists claim the other side is in control of moderation, because extremists breed in groups who support their unusual worldviews.
Sorry that the normal world doesn't want to bow to your personal biases. Deal with it.
As I understood it, the key difference is that the PM has get it approved, and the opposition party duly did so. If they had said 'no', it wouldn't have happened.
...and yet approved it even though the prediction at the time was that the Labour party were going to be decimated and the PM returned with a stonking majority - which begs the question "under what circumstances would parliament not approve a snap election"?
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Who's interested in invading any powerful country nowadays?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Well I'd say it goes under the 'stuff that matters' part of the slogan. As a European one of the reasons I like political stories on Slashdot, especially political stories from outisde the US is that it's interesting to read american commentary on these matters.
Agreed.
People read /. for the Comments section, where a diverse array of people, with various perspectives, or specific knowledge, will chime in if they have something worth saying.
Even 250 seats is too much for her, let alone 313.
But what has UK politics got to do with slashdot, did I miss something?
Theresa May is (was?) one of the leading figures in attempts to censor the internet in the UK, and this is entirely relevant to Your Rights Online.
Yeah. It was really bizarre to hear May's response to the most recent terror incident, which was basically, "The internet is to blame. They are using the internet to communicate, and we need to spy on everyone in order to prevent attacks like this." ... Some other bits were mixed in.
Hearing her make that connection was a real eye-popper – especially since it was an attempt to score political points while some of the victims were still in the ICU. Totally insensitive on top of being relevant to Your Rights Online.
There's a lot more libertarians on Slashdot than in real life, which at least gives us greater diversity of opinion. They aren't the vast majority.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
So mr know it all...
Perhaps you would like to point out when the super majority to join the EU was given?
Of course you know that there was not even a majority, because there was no vote..
And no, the common market is very very different from the EU, and I am also sure you know.
None of which matters. The brexit vote was a vote of no confidence in politicians and there continual destruction of the middle class in favor of their own wealth and power, in the same way the Trump vote was.
Trying to gloss over that is simply hiding from the reality. What people want is actual change, because the current systems are being actively used to damage the majority or the population.
The problem is there are no viable alternatives given, of course, however even with that people with their eyes open have reached the point of desperation where they must vote for non viable alternatives.
I know that the Brits like to push that commentary about standing all alone but they did have lots of help. I certainly don't mean to take away from their courageous stand. But the Commonwealth countries were there helping the UK throughout that time. Many Canadians lost their lives on convoy duty to keep critical supplies moving over from North America. Many of the pilots were from Canada, Australia, and New Zealand and trained in Canada before fighting in the Battle of Britain. Soldiers came from all over the Commonwealth long before the US got bloodied.
Now it must have been terrible and a completely different experience for the citizens of the UK (and the rest of Europe, parts of Africa, and parts of Asia) than in North America and the rest of the world. I can certainly see how it would have seemed like being all alone. They were very lucky to have the right person come into leadership. I hate to imagine what someone like May would have done.
Europe as a bloc is economically more powerful than your country.
That is not even close to be true. The sum of the GDP of Germany, UK, France and Italy is less than half that of the USA; California alone has a bigger GDP than the UK. As for "Europe as a bloc", I assume you're talking about the EU, and the EU has a lower GDP than the USA.
Dude, Mexico has a bigger GDP than Sweden and the Netherlands combined. Get real.
lucm, indeed.
Invade the UK? For what purpose? Get cheap ugly extras to play zombies in the Walking Dead? What else could anyone possibly want to get from the UK?
lucm, indeed.
Typical British usage (according to my sources, at least) is "absolute majority" (>50% vote) versus "relative majority" (largest vote), with "majority" typically but not always referring to "absolute majority" when unspecified.
However, it was the original anonymous poster who chose to use the American terms "plurality" versus "majority". A check of the Oxford dictionary shows they do not have a different definition for "plurality", therefore GGP was either a Brit confused by unfamiliar American terminology, or an American unaware of UK terminology and precisely wrong about American definitions.
She called it in order to enjoy five years as Empress of Britain.
She called it when she did because she's an opportunist.
That just about sums up her whole political ideology in fact.
No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
That is not even close to be true. The sum of the GDP of Germany, UK, France and Italy is less than half that of the USA; California alone has a bigger GDP than the UK. As for "Europe as a bloc", I assume you're talking about the EU, and the EU has a lower GDP than the USA.
I see you're a believe in "alternative facts". Seems I was mistaken about the EU being larger than the US, but "not even close to true" is wronger than I was. It's possibly slightly smaller but within the margin of error.
So let's see: The germany/france/UK statement is not even wrong. It's technically correct, but meaningless and you're drawing the wrong conclusions from it. The EU consists of 27 countries. It's as meaningless to cherry pick a few from the bloc as it is to cherrypick a few states from the US. If you add up the top 3 US states by GDP, you actually get a somewhat smaller number than the top 3 of the EU-27.
California alone has a bigger GDP than the UK.
You really don't get the concept of a bloc do you? And you're also mistaken. They're similar sizes with the UK usually coming out a few percent larger in most estimates.
Dude, Mexico has a bigger GDP than Sweden and the Netherlands combined. Get real.
And Belgium has a bigger GDP than Arkansas.
But basically you really REALLLY don't understand what a bloc is.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Whoopsie, almost a millennium. I'm ahead of my time, it seems. :)
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The 1st and 2nd Amendments you speak of.
"There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and
The Tories gambled and lost; they misread the situation, but I am not convinced that this is Theresa May's fault - she is in many ways one of the few good Conservatives, and I like her, but she is surrounded by the old-style 'nasty tories', as she once called them; the kind satirised in 'The New Statesman' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Statesman).
I agree with you about May but that was the May before she became PM. After that she became one of the nasty 'old style Tories'. The same thing happened to Malcolm Turnbull in Australia, he was a forward thinking "progressive" conservative until he gained power. Ultimately the party powerbrokers who were old school conservative broke him and he became a shadow of his former self. The same thing is happening to T-May, after the fall of Cameron the nasty old-style Tories saw an opportunity to take back the Conservative party, succeeded and set to work destroying any type of progressive attitude. If T-May cant take the Tory party in hand by the next election, Corbyn may very well be the next PM.
Also, supporting fox hunting during an election is just plain stupid. Sure it's the kind of stupidity you can get away with when an election is 2 years away, but not when you've just called a snap election to try to increase your majority.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Don't eat that humble pie. You guys need to exit. You lost your rights as a country, you're being ruled from Brussels. That's why you have entire sections of London being take over by Muslims that have absolutely no desire to become a Britain, they have every desire to take your country over and kill you. It's in the Koran if you read it. Killing Infidels is ok, they teach that to their kids from the age of 3. It's not too late, your country could get rid of the invasion force. That's what they are by the way, invaders, not refugees. Refugees cannot return to their country or they'll be killed. We know muslims go back all the time. Here the left is bringing in invaders under the guise of refugees illegally - https://www.youtube.com/watch?... . They end up in GB too.
Abolishing war by becoming a unified state was a good idea, didn't work out though. Leftists got in the way, just as they are getting in the way in the US.
It's funny how many people consider the second their defense against an oppressive regime, but the first is far more powerful. The second allows you to have a gun. The first enables you to raise an army.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
But basically you really REALLLY don't understand what a bloc is.
Oh I understand it clearly. The "bloc" is why you hypocrites stand behind all those agreements to fight greenhouse gas emissions; it's because you bundle your shit together, and spread the pollution numbers of your industrialized countries over all the EU weak links that barely have indoor plumbing.
I don't understand how you can be so proud to be part of such a chicken shit union, especially since your people can't even fight their own wars, but if you feel more secure in your "bloc", enjoy it; nobody will ever try to take it from you because nobody else cares about it.
lucm, indeed.
weak links that barely have indoor plumbing.
We're talking about the EU, mate, not the deep south.
I don't understand how you can be so proud to be part of such a chicken shit union, especially since your people can't even fight their own wars,
You, er, don't know much European history, do you?
SJW n. One who posts facts.