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keep punching joe posted:The Labour party appears to be eating itself tonight. Now Tony Blair is calling Miliband out for being unelectable. Says the warmonger. Love him or loathe him but Miliband is a far better person than Blair could ever hope to be.
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Oct 24, 2014 22:31
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goddamnedtwisto posted:I'm sure I remember reading a thing about some sex workers paying their income tax and VAT as "personal service providers" or some similarly-bland term, because they're less likely to attract adverse attention that way, but I guess that'd be at the top end of the market and given it's cash-in-hand I've no idea actually how honest they are about it. That's a general constant of the sex industry, mind you. The most popular sex toy is still marketed as a back massager, after all.
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Oct 24, 2014 22:38
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TinTower posted:That's a general constant of the sex industry, mind you. The most popular sex toy is still marketed as a back massager, after all. I meant paying the tax at all deflects unwanted attention rather than the name but you've just reminded me of one of my favourite Onion News network bits (which doesn't seem to be on Youtube for some reason about a company angrily recalling their back massagers when they discovered what they were being used for.
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Oct 24, 2014 22:45
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Andre Le Fuckface posted:That's because they've probably asked for euros and not sterling every news outlet can do the conversion. i'm sure he could too.
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Oct 24, 2014 22:58
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goddamnedtwisto posted:Although of course legalisation would increase both supply and demand so that might be enough to offset that. i wouldn't be so quick to assume that. in various occasions legalisation / decriminalisation / lessening of enforcement have coincided with fall in use. there isn't really at any time a great untapped demand from people who would indulge, but respect the law / are too scared / just don't know anyone.
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Oct 24, 2014 23:02
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Cerv posted:i wouldn't be so quick to assume that. Portuguese decrim most notably has the fall in use of everything except cannabis. There really, really is. People will try it, people will like it.
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Oct 24, 2014 23:04
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Cerv posted:every news outlet can do the conversion. i'm sure he could too. Are you saying this man isn't being entirely straight and sincere with everyone 
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Oct 24, 2014 23:06
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I don't want to have a legalise cannabis debate, there are other threads for it, but can any of you honestly say you either a) haven't tried at least once or b) don't know people who have. I don't take cannabis anymore, did allot when I was young. It really is just silly that's its illegal isn't it? Could be making some sweet tax money off of some homegrown here and it technically criminalises 50% of the population. Is it just the endless momentum of 'rarr drugs!!!' that's stopping things?
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Oct 24, 2014 23:16
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Seaside Loafer posted:Is it just the endless momentum of 'rarr drugs!!!' that's stopping things? yes.
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Oct 24, 2014 23:20
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re: Tony Blair. Quite aside from being a lying, warmongering spineless poo poo, he corresponds with my boss very occasionally. He signs his letters "Tony, in Jerusalem". Complete tosser. e: should specify I haven't seen a letter from him in like 2 years, so not sure if he still has a pad out there or what.
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Oct 24, 2014 23:20
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LemonDrizzle posted:On this particular point, Maggie was absolutely right and perfectly entitled to tell the French to go gently caress themselves. Without the rebate, the UK would be by far the biggest net contributor to the EU budget - we'd be paying a lot more than Germany, even though it's similarly wealthy per capita but has a substantially bigger population and economy. There is no plausible justification for us to pay a €5b annual subsidy to France just because they have a lot of farmers who will riot if they don't get their welfare handouts. You might think it's right, but that doesn't change the fact that internationally it still breeds a lot of resentment. Especially when the default UK line is "we are the highest net payers", which is far from true. If anything, this actually is an excellent opportunity to spin it positively, both for the EU as a whole and for the UK government to look like it's accomplishing things. A while ago the EU started a pushback against the agricultural lobby, and everyone (with the possible exception of France) agrees that the farm payments are far too high. That's a perfect time to renegotiate things. If instead of throwing tantrums all the time, the UK proposed trading in the rebate for a reduction in farm spending, they would gain a lot of goodwill from everyone, AND the PM could look like he is trying to do real reform. goddamnedtwisto posted:Because GDP is a terrible, terrible economic indicator, that's why. We could boost our GDP massively if we paid unemployed people to go round and smash every window in the country (something something UKIP kristalnacht), because more money would be being spent on goods and services than had been the year before. Serious economists don't really take GDP to mean a lot, for precisely those reasons. At least in my studies we were very strictly cautioned against putting too much stock in GDP. It's very useful as a shorthand, and as part of a wider set of indicators, but not alone. The problem is that the public usually is not interested in carefully examining tens of interconnected indicators. I'd argue that economists only look at increasing the GDP as the main goal when they're told to by the government, because GDP looks good in newspapers. No self respecting economist would be so narrow minded. Well, if they're any good, at least, which is not necessarily a prerequisite for a government position. That said, it is not a worthless indicator. It's a nice shorthand, and it has its place. I apologise if I tend to respond to things that were happening on the previous page, the thread can move quick. I try to comment on things I actually know something about, and pure UK internal politics are not one of those. I hope my different perspective is welcome, even if not totally relevant. I really am greatly enjoying the thread (well, except when it turns into a shitfest temporarily  ) and want to contribute.
Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 23:38 on Oct 24, 2014 |
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Oct 24, 2014 23:21
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Zeppelin Insanity posted:AND the PM could look like he is trying to do real reform. Yeah but the only thing more improbable than Cameron looking non-evil is him looking competent
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Oct 24, 2014 23:43
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Zeppelin Insanity posted:You might think it's right, but that doesn't change the fact that internationally it still breeds a lot of resentment. Especially when the default UK line is "we are the highest net payers", which is far from true. The UK line isn't "we are the highest net payers" (which is trivially provable to be untrue), it's "we would be the highest net payers if the rebate were abolished". This is a direct consequence of the way the CAP works - the UK is a large and rich country with relatively little farmland, so it pays a lot into the European kitty but gets comparatively little back in the way of CAP subsidies. The rebate exists to address that imbalance. The UK government has previously offered to trade the rebate for CAP reform, but it's never gone anywhere because France has made it abundantly clear that it will veto any measure that reduces the subsidization of its farms, so you have a deadlock; France won't countenance any measure that exposes its agricultural sector to genuine competition and the UK is not willing to pay for French protectionism.
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Oct 25, 2014 00:57
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LemonDrizzle posted:the swan who was attacking rowers on the cam got evicted and had his wings clipped to prevent him from returning, so his son took up the mantle instead and has resumed the terrorisation of the boaties Unbelievably a story in the papers was inaccurate, and this didn't actually happen (as far as I know, I don't live in Cambridge any more)
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Oct 25, 2014 01:36
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Lugaloco posted:Should come as a surprise to no one: Johann Lamont will stand down as leader of Scottish Labour. A huge blow for the SNP.
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Oct 25, 2014 01:59
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Seaside Loafer posted:I don't want to have a legalise cannabis debate, there are other threads for it, but can any of you honestly say you either a) haven't tried at least once or b) don't know people who have. Yeah it's stupid on like five different levels. 1) It's not that harmful compared to other options if you aren't a child. 2) You make other options seem relatively safer when you conflate something many, many people have tried with Serious poo poo™. 3) It's fairly easy to grow pretty much anywhere so it's like giving shady people who want money fast a blank cheque. 4) Having the police deal with it and the associated issues of non-regulation detracts from real crime that actually hurts other people. 5) You immediately discount any tax revenues which could be raised from regulation and taxation. 6) You make it more likely that people will be harmed by the drug as you force them to get it from somewhat shady characters. There's no logic involved, it's just paranoia, ironically.
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Oct 25, 2014 04:22
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but but but but. Druuuugs, toughoncrime,toughonthecousesofcrime, wot do you mean alcohol is an addictive substance? erm? et cetera, Anyone elected thinks it would be political suicide to decriminalise it. The best question to ask is: "Why are politicians pandering to misinformed idiots"?
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Oct 25, 2014 06:12
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keep punching joe posted:The Labour party appears to be eating itself tonight. Now Tony Blair is calling Miliband out for being unelectable. Excellent timing there Blair. Just as the Tories are facing meltdown over this latest EU row. Could have just blundered to victory at this point.
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Oct 25, 2014 06:23
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Lugaloco posted:Should come as a surprise to no one: Johann Lamont will stand down as leader of Scottish Labour. The referendum was a pyrrhic victory. e: This kind of thing isn't helping. Labour needs to move left to challenge the SNP, it also needs to realise that hatred for the SNP isn't a substitute for talent or vision. Alertrelic fucked around with this message at 09:30 on Oct 25, 2014 |
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Oct 25, 2014 09:20
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staberind posted:but but but but. Druuuugs, toughoncrime,toughonthecousesofcrime, wot do you mean alcohol is an addictive substance? erm? et cetera, Do you want a more nuanced answer than "because they vote?" It also doesn't help that unless you do independent research about drugs, the media narrative is pretty terrible when it comes to drugs. It'd be a complete uphill struggle to even just have an open discussion about it as a politician.
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Oct 25, 2014 09:29
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Regarde Aduck posted:Excellent timing there Blair. Just as the Tories are facing meltdown over this latest EU row. Could have just blundered to victory at this point. "Tony Blair PM" = "I'm Tory Plan B"
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Oct 25, 2014 09:45
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Leggsy posted:A huge blow for the SNP. Depends on whether or not Labour are stupid enough to try appoint Jim Murphy as Lamonts replacement. I'm not sure if I have sympathy or not. They just don't have a clue at all and haven't for 10 years. They went through two internal inquiries and both of them apparently didn't go "hey, maybe we should split from Labour down south?" Lamont must have ruffled alot of feathers. She was the only person in Labour to say that she'd work with the SNP if independence came about and would form a Labour opposition in independent Scotland. But then again, her policies were terrible or non existent, she was very patronising and negative and her views on women and politics were terrible (It was her that argued that Scottish women have no time or interest in politics). No wins but Labour continues to be in downfall.
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Oct 25, 2014 10:12
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Shelf Adventure posted:Do you want a more nuanced answer than "because they vote?" Especially when politicians fire scientists for challenging that narrative.
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Oct 25, 2014 10:13
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Alertrelic posted:e: This kind of thing isn't helping. Labour needs to move left to challenge the SNP, it also needs to realise that hatred for the SNP isn't a substitute for talent or vision. If Labour really wanted to change then they'd bury John McTernan alive and record it. There probably isn't someone currently active in the party who has done more to poison it's grassroots support. Like Douglas Alexander they hold him up as some kind of election conquering party elder without any evidence since 1997 (  Australian election 2013).
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Oct 25, 2014 10:20
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Alertrelic posted:The referendum was a pyrrhic victory. Thanks for the link, I got a real laugh at him describing renationalising the Royal Mail as an "extreme left" policy.
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Oct 25, 2014 10:22
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LemonDrizzle posted:The UK line isn't "we are the highest net payers" (which is trivially provable to be untrue), it's "we would be the highest net payers if the rebate were abolished". This is a direct consequence of the way the CAP works - the UK is a large and rich country with relatively little farmland, so it pays a lot into the European kitty but gets comparatively little back in the way of CAP subsidies. The rebate exists to address that imbalance. The UK government has previously offered to trade the rebate for CAP reform, but it's never gone anywhere because France has made it abundantly clear that it will veto any measure that reduces the subsidization of its farms, so you have a deadlock; France won't countenance any measure that exposes its agricultural sector to genuine competition and the UK is not willing to pay for French protectionism. I misspoke. The UK narrative is "we are the highest net payers". I've heard that plenty from British people. Anecdotal, of course. But they're people who really should know better. When I pointed out that there's clearly statistics that refute that, it was basically countered with "Sure, because the EU is unbiased!". Though it's quite possible that's an anomaly and not what lots of people actually think. Good point with the UK offering to trade the rebate before. I was not aware of that, since I only started following things in the last few years. However, I still think it's different now. In the past, everyone was crazy about putting even more emphasis on farming. The pushback started relatively recently. If the UK were to propose it now, even if France vetoes it, the UK will still get a lot of countries nodding in approval. That's valuable when you're trying to build your position for future negotiation. It would have to be a new government, though, and definitively not Cameron. At this point Cameron is such a vortex of hate in the EU that if he suggested saving kittens from trees it would be booed.
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Oct 25, 2014 10:44
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Honestly, of the special privileges we got, the rebate was nice but control of our currency is considerably more potent. Ask Greece.
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Oct 25, 2014 10:50
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Myrddin_Emrys posted:Says the warmonger. Love him or loathe him but Miliband is a far better person than Blair could ever hope to be. I'm no fan of David Miliband but he took going from heir apparent to being beaten by his brother far better and has behaved far better than Tony Blair. Blair is so loving petulant.
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Oct 25, 2014 10:55
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Henry McLeish and James Naughtie were absolutely ramming the boot into Scottish Labour on the Today Show  http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04n6q9r (from 50:00) It's quite lovely.
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Oct 25, 2014 11:11
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Shelf Adventure posted:Do you want a more nuanced answer than "because they vote?" Well, the nuanced answer also includes, As Twisto pointed out, the fact that they themselves created that narrative, they have willfully misinformed the general public, Personally, while I have taken it upon myself to dabble in recreational chemicals, both organically or artificially derived, its something that I would not recommend to anyone, aside from cannabis and cannabinoids, due to the massive amount of therapeutic value they hold. If they can be tinctured for use legally in vaping or something, it would be a cultural revolution.
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Oct 25, 2014 11:17
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WMain00 posted:Lamont must have ruffled alot of feathers. She was the only person in Labour to say that she'd work with the SNP if independence came about and would form a Labour opposition in independent Scotland. What else would they expect her to plan to do? Book a bus to take every Scottish Labour member down to London, after a brief hour or so vandalising their offices in Holyrood and stealing the computers?
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Oct 25, 2014 11:25
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Zeppelin Insanity posted:At this point Cameron is such a vortex of hate in the EU that if he suggested saving kittens from trees it would be booed.
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Oct 25, 2014 12:02
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LemonDrizzle posted:He's certainly been bumbling around and pissing people off, but it's far from clear that he's exhausted everybody's patience or run out of influence just yet. For example, he was able to talk Juncker into giving him the financial services Commission portfolio he was looking for even after tacitly endorsing a media smear campaign against Juncker's presidency. He's also useful to Germany and their allies as a sort of austerity attack dog and a generally pro-competition voice in the Council. Merkel has repeatedly said that some concessions will be made (as long as they stop short of treaty reform) to keep the UK in, so it's clearly not the case that everyone's ready to wash their hands of the whole business and just say "exit and be damned". True. Every country has its own views, and I am obviously biased by my own. Perhaps I overestimate how widespread it is. But it's still true that the general attitude of the EU has shifted radically from appeasement towards "deal with it". I don't think anything radical is likely within the next 5, maybe 10 years, but unless a subsequent UK government has a very different tune I think that shift is going to steadily continue. I also don't think anyone wants a UK exit. I just think sooner or later if things don't change the bluff will be called. CoolCab posted:Honestly, of the special privileges we got, the rebate was nice but control of our currency is considerably more potent. Ask Greece. Again, very true from an economics standpoint. But from what I've seen people don't really take much issue with the currency thing - Denmark got the exception too, and no one really cares. Sweden does not have the exemption but is still using its own currency with no plans to switch anytime soon. The rebate is a very visible and obvious thing. I don't think most of the people who are really annoyed at it now would mind all that much either if the UK was not consistently building an anti-EU narrative. It's like the perception of Germany in the EU - everyone thinks they've got an unfairly good position, and people grumble a bit, but at least Germany is, for lack of a better word (and it's not a good one), gracious about it. They achieved their position through shrewd politics, and at least among the people who have a political education (hugely skews things, obviously) there's far more grudging respect than outright resentment as is the case of the UK. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 12:26 on Oct 25, 2014 |
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Oct 25, 2014 12:16
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That's the key thing. The UK is too big for anyone in the EU to actively want to kick out but they're not going to give the whiny rich teenager anything extra even if they do threaten to leave. Cameron is in a great position to get some really good deals but he seems utterly unable to engage in any diplomacy with other Member States for fear of his backbenchers. He also seems to view other Member States saying they're willing to do a deal with the UK as "we'll capitulate to you utterly" and consequently embarrassing himself.
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Oct 25, 2014 12:44
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tdrules posted:Presumably if they didn't buff up growth figures with drugs and prostitution this bill wouldn't be as big. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/0f8df0c2-5b64-11e4-b68a-00144feab7de.html?siteedition=intl#ixzz3H9yBZXbP LemonDrizzle posted:On this particular point, Maggie was absolutely right and perfectly entitled to tell the French to go gently caress themselves. Without the rebate, the UK would be by far the biggest net contributor to the EU budget - we'd be paying a lot more than Germany, even though it's similarly wealthy per capita but has a substantially bigger population and economy. There is no plausible justification for us to pay a €5b annual subsidy to France just because they have a lot of farmers who will riot if they don't get their welfare handouts.  So, gently caress you, you cheap UK bums. We should kick you stingy bastards out.
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Oct 25, 2014 14:49
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CSM posted:It's not even about that. This surcharge is a consequence of changes under the old 1995 accounting standard (still not accounting for stuff like the black market), it's mostly the charitable sector and investments that has made the UK underreport their GDP in the 2002-2013. The ESA10 changes (accounting for prostitution and such) that will be implemented in 2016 in might require additional back payments. While Germany and France, who're way down at the bottom with us, are getting rebates. In other words, the point you're trying to make, it's not being made. tooterfish fucked around with this message at 14:55 on Oct 25, 2014 |
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Oct 25, 2014 14:53
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CSM posted:So, gently caress you, you cheap UK bums. We should kick you stingy bastards out.
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Oct 25, 2014 14:55
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LemonDrizzle posted:Before you do that, you should probably look up the terms 'gross' and 'net', and see which one of those is being plotted in that chart. You might think it's unfair that the UK gets little in return. But that still doesn't change anything about its small contribution.
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Oct 25, 2014 14:58
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CSM posted:That absolutely changes nothing to the fact that the UK makes the smallest contribution in terms of its GNI. So in your world, it's better to contribute £100 to the communal pot and then withdraw £10,000 than it is to contribute £90 and then withdraw £10? Must be an interesting place, that world. e: this analogy doesn't really work because in absolute terms, the UK's contributions are currently bigger than those of pretty much every country bar Germany and sometimes France, but whatever. also, here's your chart in net per capita terms: 
LemonDrizzle fucked around with this message at 15:11 on Oct 25, 2014 |
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Oct 25, 2014 15:04
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The BBC has a brief article about how to avoid inheritance tax: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29756520 And one bit in particular puzzled me: quote:Bob Dyson has found himself being dragged into the net. In 1987 he bought a house in north London for £115,000. It is now valued at £800,000. I can totally understand why one would want to pass on as much wealth as possible to one's children but to be furious that his daughter may have to pay considerable inheritance tax on a very valuable asset, that has gained a huge value from luck rather than any kind of skill seems absurd to me. I suppose it is just another case of just world fallacy mixed with wilful misunderstanding of tax rates but still, to have an asset so valuable that 40% of it, after £325k is deducted, is still >£100k seems like an awfully good problem.
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Oct 25, 2014 15:17
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