Metal Reviews

Ha, well, 40% is a possible landslide, don't forget. It'll be very interesting indeed to see the results of this election... massive, massive Labour losses, obviously, but I think the Tories will make up the balance and life will continue as before, ping-friggin'-pong. Brown'd have to start a war to get support now.

As for workers' rights, I agree as far as there being a demand for it, it's how that demand gets filtered through the political system that's so frustrating. There will always be a demand, but Labour in opposition will get a good percentage of those votes due to, well, being in opposition to the Tories, along with the natural leftward shift in policies to distinguish them from Cameron's lot.

40% is only a landslide in a stupid electoral system

Proportional representation plz

Ha, indeed, I meant to make a clearer point of this.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009 ... -reshuffle

Just before an election? There will be serious bloodshed tomorrow. All these pictures of Brown looking miserable are starting to make me feel sorry for him.

She was one of the Blairites who was really opposed to Brown was she not? What better way to stick the boot in that doing that right before an election.

Least she's gone though. For all intents and purposes she was fucking useless.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340 ... 04,00.html

What the fuck is wrong with these people? Obama's speech was very balanced indeed.

As for the UK election, I think Labour will be in such a sorry state that it won't matter if Brown stays or goes.

Of course they were going to complain. I'm just glad no one killed him.

WTF Labour seem to be 4th in Lincolnshire... even behind "Other". What an epic fail.

Considering that Hamas, Hezbullah etc replied with polite cynicism, it doesn't look very good that Yesha are ranting rather racistly about Barry's middle name and how Pharaoh didn't kill them etc. When you're looking less sane than known terrorist organisations, it's time for a rethink.

And yes, Labour fails, although it appears Brown may cling on to power for the moment. At the very best, he'll surely be a lame duck until the inevitable general election (which have to happen before next May, for the forrin) ?

Obama's speech was a thin spread of delicious rhetoric on the maggoty bread of actions which contradict it.

if you want to take a bite, go ahead, but just because you can't taste the maggots doesn't mean they're not squirming into your intestines.

Here we go. I suppose you'd prefer Bush's 'with us or against us' cock-waving, would you?

Considering he has a Tamil Tigers avatar, I'd think it'd be safe to say no.

Of course Obama is preferable but I agree with DM that people shouldn't be expecting some big happy change under him... he still has his own country's national interest at heart, like any other world leader, and as such there are going to be the same problems.

See the Tiananmen thread; politicians are rarely the solution to anybody's problems.

That said, an actual US president taking a line against Israeli settlers is a huge breakthrough, even if it is only rhetorical.

Fringers are really starting to annoy me. There's no way the two-man party will ever get into anything approaching power, so why not support the best thing going instead of sniping from the shadows? And yes, I think he would prefer Bush, because then his whining would have more factual basis than complaining because a speech made by a President has rhetoric in it. I mean, for fuck's sakes, Obama made it clear that Palestinians must renounce violence and Israeli settlements must stop. What more did he want, Obama revealing an Arafat tattoo and threatening to nuke Tel Aviv unless the Knesset delivered the head of Netanyahu by midday?

At least the people behind this and this are taking an actual political position, however stupid it is. DM's just being snarky.

And positive dialogue with Arab states and, like you said, a serious line against Israel isn't big happy change? Obama is centrist and always was, whining because he's not out-Trotskying the Communist Manifesto is stupid.

This is all out of whack. First off, you're implying that the alternative to supporting a mainstream party is "sniping from the shadows", which is not true at all. Very often the main parties dictate a very closed-off agenda which a great many people don't believe in. A great many positive things (most, by far?) are achieved in spite of them, not because. And the people that achieve it are those people you implicitly class as "fringers" who are "sniping from the sidelines". Clearly, there have been points when votes for women, desegregation, abolition of slavery, independent trade unionism, I could go on, were defined as entirely "fringe" issues and had no representation whatsoever amongst those in charge.

Second, it's a completely defeatist attitude... if you can't beat em, join em. Sure, defeatists may present themselves as just realists or pragmatists, but then they are often the reason that progress, when it does happen, has taken so long.

Thirdly, bending to the lesser of two evils means you swallow their agenda and lose the capacity for independent thought, in extreme cases. Discussion is defined entirely on the terms of an extremely small group. This is why so much political discourse is just based around stupid tribalistic buzzwords like "small government" or "war on terror" etc. etc.

In DM's case, he doesn't support a party, so is a real fringer and that's what I meant, but what the hell: you voted for a party that doesn't intend to take up any seats it wins. Precisely how is that going to help? In Britain's case, the best thing possible now would be for the left-wing to rally around the Lib Dems, since their policies (and yes, let's assume that the party will stick to that) are the most progressive of the mainstream three. I know that back in the prehistoric past votes for women slavery etc were fringe issues, but they were eventually decided by mainstream politicians.

Defeatist? Depends how you look at it, I suppose. Is splitting a vote and allowing the BNP to make gains helping progression, or hindering it? And yes, Britain needs electory reform, agreed. Yet if refusing to bend means that they slip behind parties like UKIP, what's the gain?

I was happy to vote Green in the MEP elections, as they have good policies and have done good things so far. Will wait and see before committing fully to a LibDem-supporting position, but if they were to become the mainstream centre-left opposition to a Cameron-fronted Tory government, well, what's wrong with that?

[quote="Legacy Of The Night"][quote="Goat"][quote="Dead Machine"]Obama's speech was a thin spread of delicious rhetoric on the maggoty bread of actions which contradict it.

if you want to take a bite, go ahead, but just because you can't taste the maggots doesn't mean they're not squirming into your intestines.[/quote]

Here we go. I suppose you'd prefer Bush's 'with us or against us' cock-waving, would you?[/quote]

Considering he has a Tamil Tigers avatar, I'd think it'd be safe to say no.[/quote]

that's not a Tamil Tigers avatar; this is a Tamil Eelam avatar. The flag of Tamil Eelam was differentiated from the Tamil Tiger flag (which has additional markings designating it as such, and in many cases does not have the red background) in the late 80s or 90s, I forget which, so that people could support for the idea of an independent Tamil homeland without openly support for the Tamil Tigers.

Also, I might remind everyone that GWB took a direct stand against Israeli settlers in the form of withdrawing financial support from them and stating that he took a direct stand against them in multiple speeches and negotiations; obama's empty rhetoric means about as much as GWB's did except it's much better said.

if you want me to cite reasons that I think obama's rhetoric is... well... empty, then I can do so, so say the words if you want 'em.

EDIT- why is that quote broken?
also, I would have supported the election of Brian Moore.

Yo Technogoat.

Nah, sorry, I have had it with voting for people I have no belief in whatsoever because they might be a balance to the tories. This is why Labour is the shell it is. The supporters that now despise them went along with Tony's project because they thought it was the best thing on offer.

Parliamentary democracy always has been and always will be a cesspit of careerists and pious "moderates". Mainstream politicians have destroyed more than they have created and saying that those things I listed were done "eventually" by them is meaningless. They would have never been on the agenda in the first place if it were left to those people. Somebody has to sign the actual legislation, I guess... but that's hardly a contribution.

The Lib Dems are a bunch of useless fencesitting bellends, that's really all I have to say about Clegg etc.

better than the discourse in America.

this election, choose between the centrist oligarchs and the lunatic right oligarchs! thrill as the nation drinks a shitload of kool-aid and elects a centrist oligarch who then starts leaning right faster than you can say 'preventive detention' while the right-wing oligarchs bleat about how he's a socialist marxist communist thug baby murdering eating faggot homosexual!