"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
Thats a quite pathetic comment. Grotesquely bigoted.
But not quite as bigoted as the "men" wot actually carried out the sexual assaults?
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
ffs, I've just stuck my neck out saying there's no Germanophobia on here and you post that.
Bollocks!
That's not Germanophobia but the truth.
If you want to deny it then its you who has a problem.
lol
So you can't argue your point.
lol
The fact is Germany en mass did meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness and patted themselves on the back for so doing.
Germanophobia? Whatever next, after two world wars we played a World Cup final less than 20 years later, in great spirit, I've never heard anybody speak of the Germans in less than respectful manner. It's because of that we're so outraged about Cologne and other places.
All these phobias, homo, xeno, Islam etc are just lazy stereotypes, people are people and should be treated accordingly, the perpetrators in Germany should be dealt with in the same way a gang of young English would be, for example. Our football hooligans over the years have been quite rightly dealt with severely with little sympathy from us at home. I've quite often cheered as foreign police have baton charged our drunken morons.
For anyone considering hiring the writing talents of Mr Herdson, which I would heartily recommend, I would point out this piece has even managed to keep people generally on topic; a rare event indeed and worthy of note.
I recall a prevalent suggestion on here that people shouldn't rush to judgment of Trump specifically or the US right wing in general since non-Americans couldn't really understand the nuances and political culture.
I'm sure none of the folk that made that point are now enthusiastically joining in the Angela kicking.
Even if they were, that doesn't mean they are 'rushing' to judgement, there may still be sounds reasons for whatever view is taken, even with less knowledge of the German political scene.
Yeah, I'm getting an overwhelming sense of considered analysis completely free of hysteria, hyperbole or (I'll play nice) 'Islamoscepticism'.
How many 100s of millions more migrants/immigrants/refugees do you expect to try and enter Europe?
Do you think mad, lunatic, idiotic, bonkers, bullshitter or feeble minded best describes Merkel?
Do you agree that a willingness to obey orders and an inherent sense of superiority is part of the modern German character?
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
Thats a quite pathetic comment. Grotesquely bigoted.
You'll be screaming waycissstt next.
What a pathetic bleater you are.
Go stuff yourself. Your as ignorant as the Muslims you despise. What a shambles this topic has descended into.
My gods, some people in the BBC are Tories!? Will the madness never cease? It should only be Labour supporting former Guardinistas, and even then only the 'sensible ones'.
In all seriousness I enjoy when some on the left start down this route, as it makes a change from the more prominent complaints from the right.
As things st and in France the latest poll has Le Pen first and Hollande edging out Sarkozy to get to the final round
My tentative thought is that Hollande's unpopularity will reassert itself in time and that we'll see a Marine/Sarko run-off, and Sarkozy winning ofc.
Post the shootings Hollande has looked more statesmanlike, while Le Pen will come top in round one I could well see him knocking out Sarkozy now, especially as Juppe and Fillon may also run splitting his vote
Mr. Eek, that's a flawed comparison, because we don't know how well, or badly, the others are integrating. There have been many reports on Twitter [which could, therefore, be utter tosh, or completely right] of covered up sexual assaults which were often against charity workers assisting, or trying to, the migrants.
The fact the media ignored what happened on such a large scale event, which was bound to come out simply due to the sheer number of victims and witnesses, and then some in the political class downplayed over a hundred alleged groping instances and two alleged rapes, does not engender confidence that we have a clear picture of the situation.
Rotherham was covered up for years, and other comparable disgraces have happened elsewhere. Downthread there's a reference to a German show, sounds like the equivalent of Crimewatch, not showing a crime because the suspect had dark skin and they didn't want to inflame tensions.
It is also worth noting that there have been reports for some time of sexual attacks within migrant camps against the relatively few women refugees. That should have been a warning and a clue. It was ignored.
@NickPalmer knows Germany better than me and he may be right that Germany has had a good experience of immigration. But that is in part because it has not had that much immigration by comparison with other countries. And there have been issues with the Turkish guest workers - in part in how they were treated by the Germans.
But that is rather a naive view. Within a few months of a massive amount of immigration, we are already getting reports of serious problems and German politicians are beginning to talk about reversing their previous policy. That does not seem to me to be evidence of sober policy-making. It smells of panic and a realisation that they may have bitten off more than they can chew.
As I was saying last night, I think women are entitled to expect the authorities to act vigorously to protect them and not let this become something they just have to deal with.
However I think the actual German response will be quite cautious. I could be wrong, of course.
Agreed. The initial and default reaction has, sadly but not surprising to me, been just that: women should learn to live with it. If the people who thought that had to endure sexual assault - as I and far too many of the women I know have - they'd very rapidly change their mind.
Excuse me but where have you seen that initial reaction? Everybody I've spoken to has said the polar opposite. Should this happen here I dread to think of the consequences.
''That poll was Fox, it is has already had 3 or 4 polls showing Trump beating Hillary and has Cruz beating her too, it is the only national pollster to do so''
According to the article, a December Fox poll had Hillary up by eleven.
The three polls before that from Fox all had Trump beating Hillary, Fox leans GOP. Even Rasmussen last week had Hillary narrowly beating Trump
A more general thought perhaps worth a separate article: are we seeing the gradual death throes of distinctive national culture? The combination of global market, easy travel, the internet and a lingua franca (English) is making sometimes uncomfortably rapid influx of people from other cultures the norm in nearly every developed country. It changes the culture of both the recipient society and the immigrants. In 50 years, will it be difficult to talk about a distinctive German or British or American society, rather than a constantly-evolving melting pot? I'm not saying it's good or bad, but maybe it's going to happen whether we like it or not, and we need to steer the flow rather than trying Canute-like bureaucratic ways (the "Englishness test" is a classic example) to stem it. (I don't have a brilliant solution either.)
I think you are half right here; I think we are on the verge of the world being split into 2; a Muslim world and a non-Muslim world. Immigration has been successful in the UK for non-Muslim Asians, Eastern Europeans, Afro-Carribeans and Antipodeans. No one has an issue with this immigration aside from the teething issues around public services; this is an issue of successful immigration where the immigrants want to integrate.
Muslim immigration is different. It is based on a religion which teaches bigotry and is anti-integration, where homosexuals, women and non-Muslims are seen as scum and death comes with a trip to paradise and 72 virgins. When the immigrants chose not to integrate and believe they can foist their sick practices (FGM and child marriage) onto the hosts then that is where the problem lies. The only solution is to prevent Muslim immigration whilst allowing non-Muslim immigration.
I recall a prevalent suggestion on here that people shouldn't rush to judgment of Trump specifically or the US right wing in general since non-Americans couldn't really understand the nuances and political culture.
I'm sure none of the folk that made that point are now enthusiastically joining in the Angela kicking.
Even if they were, that doesn't mean they are 'rushing' to judgement, there may still be sounds reasons for whatever view is taken, even with less knowledge of the German political scene.
Yeah, I'm getting an overwhelming sense of considered analysis completely free of hysteria, hyperbole or (I'll play nice) 'Islamoscepticism'.
How many 100s of millions more migrants/immigrants/refugees do you expect to try and enter Europe?
Do you think mad, lunatic, idiotic, bonkers, bullshitter or feeble minded best describes Merkel?
Do you agree that a willingness to obey orders and an inherent sense of superiority is part of the modern German character?
I never said everyone was not rushing to judgement. I omitted the word 'necessarily' between 'are' and 'rushing'. There have been plenty of measured contributions which I think reflect the general character more than the 'mad mad mad mad mad' stuff.
I'm enjoying the honeymoon with Southam and Flightpath today. :-) One of the charms of PB is that we sometimes find unlikely common ground.
I think Southam is right that both of us mainly see middle-class well-educated Germans. That said, they dominate German affairs to an extent not yet seen in Britain. The Western states in particular are an overwhelmingly middle class society in skills and attitudes - even the skilled working class with their extensive apprenticeships feel middle class and are keen on cautious politics, judicious thinking, etc. It's not an accident that there is only one successful tabloid in the whole country (Bild-Zeitung) - imagine a British media with 20 variants of the Times, Telegraph and Guardian plus one Sun.
kle4's assessment looks right too. In a prosperous society, Merkel's tactical and pragmatic approach looks better than it does in Britain, but I agree that people are getting a bit tired of it. There is a shortage of serious challengers at the moment, but I'd guess her political sunset is now in sight, perhaps 5 years from now.
A more general thought perhaps worth a separate article: are we seeing the gradual death throes of distinctive national culture? The combination of global market, easy travel, the internet and a lingua franca (English) is making sometimes uncomfortably rapid influx of people from other cultures the norm in nearly every developed country. It changes the culture of both the recipient society and the immigrants. In 50 years, will it be difficult to talk about a distinctive German or British or American society, rather than a constantly-evolving melting pot? I'm not saying it's good or bad, but maybe it's going to happen whether we like it or not, and we need to steer the flow rather than trying Canute-like bureaucratic ways (the "Englishness test" is a classic example) to stem it. (I don't have a brilliant solution either.)
I've also get the impression (from visiting, not living there) that Germany is an overwhelmingly bourgeois society. I think that's becoming true of Britain too though.
Concerning your last paragraph I think the key is language. While European nations retain separate languages their cultures will remain somewhat distinct. However I've read that linguists are predicting a lot of European languages to die out within a century, far more than everyday sense would suggest.
The original NS article is utterly brutal with respect to Corbyn -
"He might once have fitted the role of a deputy manager of a northern friendly society — kind, polite and compassionate yet unable to help his client — but he is intellectually unsuited to be a minister of any kind, let alone the Prime Minister. Either he goes, or the party itself is a goner."
For anyone considering hiring the writing talents of Mr Herdson, which I would heartily recommend, I would point out this piece has even managed to keep people generally on topic; a rare event indeed and worthy of note.
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
ffs, I've just stuck my neck out saying there's no Germanophobia on here and you post that.
Bollocks!
That's not Germanophobia but the truth.
If you want to deny it then its you who has a problem.
lol
So you can't argue your point.
lol
The fact is Germany en mass did meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness and patted themselves on the back for so doing.
I recall a prevalent suggestion on here that people shouldn't rush to judgment of Trump specifically or the US right wing in general since non-Americans couldn't really understand the nuances and political culture.
I'm sure none of the folk that made that point are now enthusiastically joining in the Angela kicking.
Even if they were, that doesn't mean they are 'rushing' to judgement, there may still be sounds reasons for whatever view is taken, even with less knowledge of the German political scene.
Yeah, I'm getting an overwhelming sense of considered analysis completely free of hysteria, hyperbole or (I'll play nice) 'Islamoscepticism'.
How many 100s of millions more migrants/immigrants/refugees do you expect to try and enter Europe?
Do you think mad, lunatic, idiotic, bonkers, bullshitter or feeble minded best describes Merkel?
Do you agree that a willingness to obey orders and an inherent sense of superiority is part of the modern German character?
Of course PB discussions on matters Scottish are known for their cool, calm, rational, factual, good humoured dialogues.
Mr. 86, don't watch it often, but sometimes Dateline London epitomises the chattering classes. The accents differ, the opinions often do not.
That's a very astute point, Mr. Dancer.
They always have the one on for balance whose views differ slightly, but by differ I mean you can just about squeeze a fag packet between them. IMO it is one of the worst programme on BBC News, it is just the chattering classes talking among themselves.
Very good, insightful piece. I'd argue, though, that on top of the weight of history there was a level of pragmatism about Merkel's decision - Germany has an ageing population that will need to be supported by a younger one. Birth rates are relatively low. Merkel not only saw a moral imperative, but a practical opportunity. She clearly did not think it through. But the fact that even now it has had little effect on her standing or the position of the parties surely indicates a lot of Germans, however reluctantly, essentially went along with the call she made. Maybe the recent events will change that, we shall see.
But David is right, Germany is different. Every country is. A narrative of rich, liberal elites imposing their views on everyone else may be satisfying, but it does not come close to telling the full story.
At the start there certainly was backing for Merkels stance but you can't argue that it was due to economic practicalities about an ageing workforce. After all, the typical leftie supporter clapping Merkel, usually shows no interest in govt finances, govt debt etc.
Secondly, not all the muslim invaders are engineers and doctors, very few are. Most, apparently have an IQ of about 85. They will find it extremely difficult to find work in an advanced industrial economy as well educated as Germany is.
What I find really interesting is how the elite can no longer control the narrative. The media only started talking about Cologne etc after it was all over the net. The same is happening with Trump in america.
I fear this is not going to end well.
The whole point is that in Germany it was not a left/right issue. Merkel is not a leftie.
Wrong again, Merkels lefty supporters were not concerned over questions of failing birthrate etc.
Instead , they are like Gregor Gysi who thinks that most indigenous Germans are closet nazi's who have to be outbreed by importing loads of potential rapists who are more likely to vote Die Linke.
You know, just like the labour party did in this country.
My gods, some people in the BBC are Tories!? Will the madness never cease? It should only be Labour supporting former Guardinistas, and even then only the 'sensible ones'.
In all seriousness I enjoy when some on the left start down this route, as it makes a change from the more prominent complaints from the right.
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
ffs, I've just stuck my neck out saying there's no Germanophobia on here and you post that.
Bollocks!
That's not Germanophobia but the truth.
If you want to deny it then its you who has a problem.
lol
So you can't argue your point.
lol
The fact is Germany en mass did meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness and patted themselves on the back for so doing.
Are you denying that ?
I don't think you're worth arguing with
So you accept I was right but find the truth 'inconvenient' and so don't want people to discuss it.
The very same mentality that the authorities in Cologne have.
I suppose Mr Pride has dug deeply to show the backgrounds of the rest of the BBC Politics, News and Current affairs editors. Twitter.com/ThomasPride/status/685786489632993280?lang=en
Back to smearing the messenger again for Corbyn's followers. Remember in their eyes anyone to the right of Corbyn is a Tory, ergo the BBC is full of Tories!
Is it too much to ask that the Corbynistas might support a reduction in the licence fee?
The wonders of jetlag notwithstanding, having recently returned from the US (a country not without its own immigration issues), I've not heard a lot about what happened in Cologne and it wasn't widely covered on the US news media (at least in the immediate post-New Year period).
Thanks as always for the article, David. As usual, plenty in it with which I don't entirely agree. The primary motivations for Merkel's decision were economic and humanitarian (possibly in that order, possibly not). The provision of a pool of potentially very cheap labour would in theory safeguard future German economic growth - one can argue the Gastarbeiter from Turkey and Yugoslavia were a big part of West Germany's own economic revolution especially in the 60s and 70s.
We have the same here - the street cleaner, the office cleaner and the building site labourers are now Romanian and Bulgarian where they would once have been Indian or Pakistani but that's allowed others to move onwards and upwards just as those who came off the land to work in the factories eventually made enough money to move from the slums to the suburbs.
As others have said, there are millions of unemployed elsewhere in the EU but they aren't or wouldn't be as cheap a labour source as sub-Saharan Africans.
I suspect Merkel's actions also derive from her own heritage - she's a Pomeranian by birth I believe and the experience of the displaced Germans from eastern Europe (notably East Prussia) both during the winter of 1944-45 and after the war isn't widely known in the West but was a humanitarian disaster in which thousands perished.
This becomes the problem - we are who we are and we are the sum of our experiences and that is as much true of political leaders as anyone else and David alludes to the "shame" of the Germans. Well, perhaps but had Merkel slammed the German door closed in the autumn, what would have happened ? Possibly one major disaster but instead Merkel has initiated a series of cumulative minor disasters which may have more serious political and economic consequences down the line.
Ultimately it's about management and the semblance of control - Merkel perhaps believed she and the German "system" could assimilate and control the incoming migrants and use economic prosperity as a mechanism for maintaining order (when people are making money they are less likely to make trouble). The problem is that's a skin-deep facade (as it is here) and, as others have argued, cultural and traditional attitudes and differences are much harder to assimilate than economic ones.
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
ffs, I've just stuck my neck out saying there's no Germanophobia on here and you post that.
Bollocks!
That's not Germanophobia but the truth.
If you want to deny it then its you who has a problem.
lol
So you can't argue your point.
lol
The fact is Germany en mass did meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness and patted themselves on the back for so doing.
Are you denying that ?
Its lazy stereotyping which has very little if any basis in truth. The Germans did not meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness. The vast majority appear to have agreed pretty wholeheartedly with it whilst a smaller number were opposed and made that clear. I believe the reasons for this are exactly as set out by David in his thread header.
I have never met a German who thought he was superior. Indeed for Germany it appears that there is exactly the opposite problem. And the willingness to obey orders however mad was roundly crushed 70 years ago.
I would suggest you know very little about either Germany or the Germans and so are still resorting to stereotypes that are more than a lifetime out of date.
I recall a prevalent suggestion on here that people shouldn't rush to judgment of Trump specifically or the US right wing in general since non-Americans couldn't really understand the nuances and political culture.
I'm sure none of the folk that made that point are now enthusiastically joining in the Angela kicking.
Even if they were, that doesn't mean they are 'rushing' to judgement, there may still be sounds reasons for whatever view is taken, even with less knowledge of the German political scene.
Yeah, I'm getting an overwhelming sense of considered analysis completely free of hysteria, hyperbole or (I'll play nice) 'Islamoscepticism'.
How many 100s of millions more migrants/immigrants/refugees do you expect to try and enter Europe?
Do you think mad, lunatic, idiotic, bonkers, bullshitter or feeble minded best describes Merkel?
Do you agree that a willingness to obey orders and an inherent sense of superiority is part of the modern German character?
Of course PB discussions on matters Scottish are known for their cool, calm, rational, factual, good humoured dialogues.
In response to the query about the SPD, I missed David's post on this, but essentially I can't see the SPD playing a very effective role any time soon. They are divided between the membership, who on the whole dislike being junior partner to the CDU and want to be more left-wing, and the leadership, who see it as a necessary compromise to have any power. Their position is depressingly like the LibDems in Britain and if there was a spread bet on their seat count I'd be betting on "fewer" next time. What is keeping them afloat is that the only challengers to the left are the Left Party, which is seen as still too close to the GDR for comfort by floating voters and the Greens, who are light on serious profile and not as clearly left-wing as in Britain.
It was just a throwaway comment of David's I think. I don't want to tie him to it. But essentially that Die Linke and the Greens could cannibalise the SPD vote as the SPD don't seem to be doing anything except prop up Merkel.
As I understand it Die Linke provokes very strong negative reactions for the reason you mention. Maybe the Greens are a more serious threat to the SPD.
I do wonder, though if the instinct for stability we have been talking about will save the SPD. I mean, we are talking about the German Social Democrats, one of the most storied of European political parties. They are not going to just disappear.... are they?
Where does Frau Merkel think she can deport these people to? If they come from places like Syria it is a non-starter (and lots will be claiming Syria even if they don't come from there) and even those from North Africa are claiming asylum, I presume with tales of persecution, threat of harm if they return and that normally means the courts across Europe won't send them back.
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
A more general thought perhaps worth a separate article: are we seeing the gradual death throes of distinctive national culture? The combination of global market, easy travel, the internet and a lingua franca (English) is making sometimes uncomfortably rapid influx of people from other cultures the norm in nearly every developed country. It changes the culture of both the recipient society and the immigrants. In 50 years, will it be difficult to talk about a distinctive German or British or American society, rather than a constantly-evolving melting pot? I'm not saying it's good or bad, but maybe it's going to happen whether we like it or not, and we need to steer the flow rather than trying Canute-like bureaucratic ways (the "Englishness test" is a classic example) to stem it. (I don't have a brilliant solution either.)
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
Where does Frau Merkel think she can deport these people to? If they come from places like Syria it is a non-starter (and lots will be claiming Syria even if they don't come from there) and even those from North Africa are claiming asylum, I presume with tales of persecution, threat of harm if they return and that normally means the courts across Europe won't send them back.
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
If there is to be any hope for integration of refugees then there has to be a system for weeding out the undesirables. As a minimum that has to mean that those who commit crime can expect to be sent back home.
If they don't want to be dumped at the airport in Damascus, then maybe the international community can build a prison camp somewhere in the region to lock them all up. But it absolutely has to be the case that they forfeit any right to live in the EU after they have shown such contempt for their hosts.
Where does Frau Merkel think she can deport these people to? If they come from places like Syria it is a non-starter (and lots will be claiming Syria even if they don't come from there) and even those from North Africa are claiming asylum, I presume with tales of persecution, threat of harm if they return and that normally means the courts across Europe won't send them back.
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
I was thinking that as well. However if it encourages a more robust attitude to refusing asylum then so much the better.
Where does Frau Merkel think she can deport these people to? If they come from places like Syria it is a non-starter (and lots will be claiming Syria even if they don't come from there) and even those from North Africa are claiming asylum, I presume with tales of persecution, threat of harm if they return and that normally means the courts across Europe won't send them back.
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
If there is to be any hope for integration of refugees then there has to be a system for weeding out the undesirables. As a minimum that has to mean that those who commit crime can expect to be sent back home.
If they don't want to be dumped at the airport in Damascus, then maybe the international community can build a prison camp somewhere in the region to lock them all up. But it absolutely has to be the case that they forfeit any right to live in the EU after they have shown such contempt for their hosts.
That is all well and good, but it won't happen will it. At best it will all get bogged down in German and then EU court, and as I say the German's aren't going to take the French / Italian approach where they have dumped some trouble makers in their home country.
Given Guantanamo, world leaders are definitely not going to agree prison camps.
Where does Frau Merkel think she can deport these people to? If they come from places like Syria it is a non-starter (and lots will be claiming Syria even if they don't come from there) and even those from North Africa are claiming asylum, I presume with tales of persecution, threat of harm if they return and that normally means the courts across Europe won't send them back.
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
If there is to be any hope for integration of refugees then there has to be a system for weeding out the undesirables. As a minimum that has to mean that those who commit crime can expect to be sent back home.
If they don't want to be dumped at the airport in Damascus, then maybe the international community can build a prison camp somewhere in the region to lock them all up. But it absolutely has to be the case that they forfeit any right to live in the EU after they have shown such contempt for their hosts.
I not sure deportation should be the centrepiece of a strategy because it may be impractical.
I think the host country's legal system has to deal with criminals, as it usually would, if necessary with significant custodial sentences. Of course, that costs money.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
ffs, I've just stuck my neck out saying there's no Germanophobia on here and you post that.
Bollocks!
That's not Germanophobia but the truth.
If you want to deny it then its you who has a problem.
lol
So you can't argue your point.
lol
The fact is Germany en mass did meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness and patted themselves on the back for so doing.
Are you denying that ?
Its lazy stereotyping which has very little if any basis in truth. The Germans did not meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness. The vast majority appear to have agreed pretty wholeheartedly with it whilst a smaller number were opposed and made that clear. I believe the reasons for this are exactly as set out by David in his thread header.
I have never met a German who thought he was superior. Indeed for Germany it appears that there is exactly the opposite problem. And the willingness to obey orders however mad was roundly crushed 70 years ago.
I would suggest you know very little about either Germany or the Germans and so are still resorting to stereotypes that are more than a lifetime out of date.
I know a few Germans and have lived in Germany for a short while and found both the people and country admirable.
Nevertheless the Germans did meekly acquiesce to Merkel - as has been said its impossible to imagine another European country having such little political criticism of such a decision.
Likewise the patting themselves on the back did occur - the banners in the football grounds being the most visual illustration.
Still my thanks for being willing to discuss the issue rather than trying to stop any discussion as some here have done.
It will also be interesting to discover if the 'Syrian refugees' involved in the attacks actually are Syrian and not from elsewhere in the Middle East but who claimed to be Syrian to get entry into Germany.
Put aside the terrible crimes. Germany have taken on an absolutely huge task and with that a cost. They have to feed, house, educate and find work for over a million people. Their economy is based upon efficient modern high tech economy and the vast majority of people they have taken neither speak the language nor have the skills.
In comparison, we have had about million Poles, the vast majority who turned up speaking English and educated / skilled with things the UK needed (in fact many did jobs well below their skill set), and even then there are huge pressures on services.
I can't help think about the "suburbs" around major cities in France like Paris to envision how it is more likely to go in Germany.
Where does Frau Merkel think she can deport these people to? If they come from places like Syria it is a non-starter (and lots will be claiming Syria even if they don't come from there) and even those from North Africa are claiming asylum, I presume with tales of persecution, threat of harm if they return and that normally means the courts across Europe won't send them back.
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
If there is to be any hope for integration of refugees then there has to be a system for weeding out the undesirables. As a minimum that has to mean that those who commit crime can expect to be sent back home.
If they don't want to be dumped at the airport in Damascus, then maybe the international community can build a prison camp somewhere in the region to lock them all up. But it absolutely has to be the case that they forfeit any right to live in the EU after they have shown such contempt for their hosts.
That is all well and good, but it won't happen will it. At best it will all get bogged down in German and then EU court, and as I say the German's aren't going to take the French / Italian approach where they have dumped some trouble makers in their home country.
Given Guantanamo, world leaders are definitely not going to agree prison camps.
Of course it won't happen, you are right. Like in the UK, where there is plenty of sentiment about deporting undesirables, the feeling is that the French and Italians just ignore the laws they don't like, while the British and Germans follow them to the letter.
But it *needs* to happen. Civil society will quickly be replaced by vigilante mobs, even in somewhere as law abiding as Germany, if the general population of women feel they can't leave the house without some random stranger feeling them up in the street.
No, the translation is distorted, presumably with malign intent, to make it looks as though she's generalised about immigrants. The correct translation is "...but we must accept that the number of offences committed by youthful immigrants is particularly high." It's a 7-second clip of half a sentence, and obviously taken out of context, which I suspect will be something like "It is a mistake to say that immigrants represent a significant threat to Germany, but ...insert the quote... We must therefore redouble our efforts to ensure that youthful immigrants understand and follow the law."
kle4's assessment looks right too. In a prosperous society, Merkel's tactical and pragmatic approach looks better than it does in Britain, but I agree that people are getting a bit tired of it. There is a shortage of serious challengers at the moment, but I'd guess her political sunset is now in sight, perhaps 5 years from now. )
It is easy for prosperous societies to become decadent and throw money at any problem that turns up.
But what happens when the money runs out.
Lefties like you, because of your leftyness, believe in a magic money tree etc.
Suppose we start to have a recession, govt's can't sell debt and put up tax which simply takes out money from the productive part of the economy, people are starting to lose trust in the cultural part of govt and then lose trust in the economic part of govt. Money hoarding starts which leads to a mass depression.
People start to get very angry.
Europeans tend to be very nice, sometimes insufferably nice until they are not.
Then, they don't just get a little peeved or somewhat pissed off, they become very nasty.
Take the UK in the last war for instance, appease, appease, appease, fight alone for two years and then fire bomb Dresden just because we can. Angry Germans tend to send in the panzers and make that well known British invention of the concentration camp much more efficient.
Immigrants may simply be forced out of Europe.
A lot of innocent people will suffer.
And their suffering will be directly attributable to the lefty policies YOU advocate.
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
It's not really "globalisation", it's capitalism. It's the same as when agricultural workers moved from the country to the towns to work in the factories. It was a fundamental cultural, social, political and economic change for them and I suspect they didn't all adapt smoothly.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
It was just a throwaway comment of David's I think. I don't want to tie him to it. But essentially that Die Linke and the Greens could cannibalise the SPD vote as the SPD don't seem to be doing anything except prop up Merkel.
As I understand it Die Linke provokes very strong negative reactions for the reason you mention. Maybe the Greens are a more serious threat to the SPD.
I do wonder, though if the instinct for stability we have been talking about will save the SPD. I mean, we are talking about the German Social Democrats, one of the most storied of European political parties. They are not going to just disappear.... are they?
I think you're right, and it's the reason why their poll rating is only slightly down. The Greens have been around for quite a while without making much further progress. But the SPD trend is unpromising unless they seriously rethink their role, and it's hard to see how they can, with the CDU firmly in the centre and two existing left-wing rivals.
This is anecdotal and proves absolutely nothing, but it's an intriguing read of what can happen if a family makes a serious effort at hosting and integration of a refugee, with its ups and downs:
No, the translation is distorted, presumably with malign intent, to make it looks as though she's generalised about immigrants. The correct translation is "...but we must accept that the number of offences committed by youthful immigrants is particularly high." It's a 7-second clip of half a sentence, and obviously taken out of context, which I suspect will be something like "It is a mistake to say that immigrants represent a significant threat to Germany, but ...insert the quote... We must therefore redouble our efforts to ensure that youthful immigrants understand and follow the law."
Thanks Nick, your translation makes much more sense.
With the rise in user-posted content, things like mistranslation - either accidentally or deliberately - become a serious problem if not checked. This sort of thing could quickly go around the English speaking Tw@ttershere without anyone checking that was was written is what she actually said.
America still feels like a very foreign country to me. And I am there a hell of a lot. In Texas and other states you can walk around freely openly carrying firearms. It's insane. But, generally, the whole outlook there is just different. I can't see that changing. Europe, though, is definitely homogenising. When I lived in Spain it was palpably very different to the UK in a huge number of ways. Now, there are still differences, of course, but far fewer. It's down to language, the internet and social media, cheap air travel, free movement, the decline of the Church's influence, the Champions League (seriously) etc. None of these things are going away. I suspect we'll cling ever closer to the things that still make us different, but Europeans are inevitably going to become ever more alike.
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
Thats a quite pathetic comment. Grotesquely bigoted.
But not quite as bigoted as the "men" wot actually carried out the sexual assaults?
Put aside the terrible crimes. Germany have taken on an absolutely huge task and with that a cost. They have to feed, house, educate and find work for over a million people. Their economy is based upon efficient modern high tech economy and the vast majority of people they have taken neither speak the language nor have the skills.
In comparison, we have had about million Poles, the vast majority who turned up speaking English and educated / skilled with things the UK needed (in fact many did jobs well below their skill set), and even then there are huge pressures on services.
I can't help think about the "suburbs" around major cities in France like Paris to envision how it is more likely to go in Germany.
Yep - I have had a couple of experiences in France which actually were rather unnerving.
Having the car stoned because we drove somewhere where the local youth didn't want us was one of those.
Put aside the terrible crimes. Germany have taken on an absolutely huge task and with that a cost. They have to feed, house, educate and find work for over a million people. Their economy is based upon efficient modern high tech economy and the vast majority of people they have taken neither speak the language nor have the skills.
In comparison, we have had about million Poles, the vast majority who turned up speaking English and educated / skilled with things the UK needed (in fact many did jobs well below their skill set), and even then there are huge pressures on services.
I can't help think about the "suburbs" around major cities in France like Paris to envision how it is more likely to go in Germany.
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
It's not really "globalisation", it's capitalism. It's the same as when agricultural workers moved from the country to the towns to work in the factories. It was a fundamental cultural, social, political and economic change for them and I suspect they didn't all adapt smoothly.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
A good deal of research has been externalised. I'd rephrase your point as "why bother developing a robot when Google will do it for me?".
Many companies are, like ordinary people, consumers of technology rather than originators. I imagine that's largely due to to the shift to a services-based economy.
I disagree with the idea that it's simply capitalism. Technology has enabled populations to be both more mobile and more able to see what life is like in other countries. This provides both the motive and the opportunity to move.
I don't think this is necessarily the beginning of the end times, but we have to accept (in the words of William Gibson: "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed". We're importing people from the past; not an easy thing to deal with.
"That impulse is the only rational explanation for Angela Merkel’s mad decision to invite a million unscreened asylum seekers and migrants into the country last year (mostly in the last six months)."
Well, it might be German birth rates. It might be concern about the possibility of utter humanitarian catastrophe in the Middle East. Either way, there are plenty of alternatives beyond "bloody Muslims, the woman must be mad". I'd rather hear about those first than shutting the analysis down if you're going to be doing this professionally.
There are millions of unemployed across the southern EU; there are millions more in (or from) the east of it who may or may not have jobs but could find better paid ones within Germany. All could be pitched to move to and settle in Germany to address the demographic problem. Why roll the dice on the migrants?
In any case, it's not just Merkel - it's the whole German political / ruling class. Were she so out of step, she'd have been opposed in her policy. It's only now, after serious consequences are starting to be felt, that voices are being raised against it - and even there, mayors, interior ministers and police chiefs are still trotting out the same old lines: it's the public rather than politicians who are leading the opposition.
The German willingness to obey orders, however mad, is frightening.
As is the German need to feel superior - which is what lay behind Merkel's madness.
Thats a quite pathetic comment. Grotesquely bigoted.
But not quite as bigoted as the "men" wot actually carried out the sexual assaults?
Why the scare quotes? Are you suggesting they were women in disguise?
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
It's not really "globalisation", it's capitalism. It's the same as when agricultural workers moved from the country to the towns to work in the factories. It was a fundamental cultural, social, political and economic change for them and I suspect they didn't all adapt smoothly.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
Agreed.
There's certainly a difference between economic growth dependent upon extra (and so cheaper) labour to growth dependent upon capital investment and higher productivity.
In the first the gains are concentrated among the ownership class with many of the original workers disadvantaged. Whereas the second sees the gains spread throughout the workforce.
In the UK we had economic growth based on the capital investment for a century or so up to 2000 and consequently increased general prosperity and equality. The return of cheap labour - either internally from migration or externally from China etc - has seen the benefits concentrated within 'the rich'.
I suppose Mr Pride has dug deeply to show the backgrounds of the rest of the BBC Politics, News and Current affairs editors. Twitter.com/ThomasPride/status/685786489632993280?lang=en
Back to smearing the messenger again for Corbyn's followers. Remember in their eyes anyone to the right of Corbyn is a Tory, ergo the BBC is full of Tories!
Is it too much to ask that the Corbynistas might support a reduction in the licence fee?
In their eyes about 85% of the population must be tories then.
Shows exactly how worried they are about actually winning an election at this stage.
Mr. Observer, under Trajan and Hadrian, one imagines it was inevitable the Empire would go from strength to strength.
When the EU collapses, the economic tensions and social strife will probably lead to a resurgence of nationalism and cultural identity, with differences being exalted rather than abandoned.
Of course, some similarities are related to new technology.
The other side of the story for Labour. of course, is that if the party recommits to Trident Corbyn and the hard left are finished. Trident may well be the proxy battle for Labour's heart and soul.
Labour did fight the 1964 election on a platform opposed to Polaris at the peak of the Cold War. Despite the Tories making it a major campaign issue Labour still gained office.
Any country that takes in too many foreigners with alien values risks problems. Powell spoke eloquently about this in 1968, and Trump rather ineloquently a few weeks ago.
Any alien group that oversteps its welcome as guests risks a backlash. One historical example was the attempted Judeo-Bolshevist revolution in Munich immediately after WW1, which led to the rise of the NSDAP.
One way of discouraging excessive settlement of people with alien values is to have legislation in place which is in line with the values of the host country but uncomfortable for the alien group in question. An example would be the alcohol prohibitions in certain Islamic states. European states could similarly ban practices contrary to indigenous Christian values, even if they are mandated by Sharia law.
If people with different values wish to live in peace in another country with different values, they need to keep a low profile, not demand "rights" and recognise that they will forever be guests in that country, whether or not they gain citizenship. If they do this they are more likely to be tolerated by the host community. The German word gastarbeiter is apt, particularly as there citizenship is generally determined by blood, not residency.
kle4's assessment looks right too. In a prosperous society, Merkel's tactical and pragmatic approach looks better than it does in Britain, but I agree that people are getting a bit tired of it. There is a shortage of serious challengers at the moment, but I'd guess her political sunset is now in sight, perhaps 5 years from now. )
It is easy for prosperous societies to become decadent and throw money at any problem that turns up.
But what happens when the money runs out.
Lefties like you, because of your leftyness, believe in a magic money tree etc.
Suppose we start to have a recession, govt's can't sell debt and put up tax which simply takes out money from the productive part of the economy, people are starting to lose trust in the cultural part of govt and then lose trust in the economic part of govt. Money hoarding starts which leads to a mass depression.
People start to get very angry.
Europeans tend to be very nice, sometimes insufferably nice until they are not.
Then, they don't just get a little peeved or somewhat pissed off, they become very nasty.
Take the UK in the last war for instance, appease, appease, appease, fight alone for two years and then fire bomb Dresden just because we can. Angry Germans tend to send in the panzers and make that well known British invention of the concentration camp much more efficient.
Immigrants may simply be forced out of Europe.
A lot of innocent people will suffer.
And their suffering will be directly attributable to the lefty policies YOU advocate.
Shame on you.
Whatever the personal qualities are of Nick Palmer, I doubt that the downfall of Western civilization can be wholly attributable to him
But, and it’s a huge “but” – in fact a series of “buts” – things could happen to upset this “all else being equal” scenario. Here are four “known unknowns”: things that might happen to push the middle third of British voters towards the “out” camp.
A fresh refugee crisis might erupt in the final weeks of campaigning – a fresh influx of arrivals from Syria, say, or a significant number of people in camps near Calais getting into Britain via the Channel Tunnel.
A new Eurozone crisis – maybe Greece again, or Spain, or Portugal, or Italy – provoking voters to think that the EU’s economy is in a mess and we are better off increasing our distance from it.
Another Paris-style terrorist attack that voters think, rightly or wrongly, puts EU countries at greater risk than countries outside the EU
Boris Johnson, who steps down as the Mayor of London next May, joining the “out” camp. He is by far the most charismatic Conservative politician, and could go some way to neutralise David Cameron’s near-certain advocacy of an “in” vote. (By the same token, if Johnson recommends staying in the EU, this would be a big boost to the “in” camp.)
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
It's not really "globalisation", it's capitalism. It's the same as when agricultural workers moved from the country to the towns to work in the factories. It was a fundamental cultural, social, political and economic change for them and I suspect they didn't all adapt smoothly.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
Agreed.
There's certainly a difference between economic growth dependent upon extra (and so cheaper) labour to growth dependent upon capital investment and higher productivity.
In the first the gains are concentrated among the ownership class with many of the original workers disadvantaged. Whereas the second sees the gains spread throughout the workforce.
In the UK we had economic growth based on the capital investment for a century or so up to 2000 and consequently increased general prosperity and equality. The return of cheap labour - either internally from migration or externally from China etc - has seen the benefits concentrated within 'the rich'.
What do you think of the thesis that, with most of Asia now integrated into the global labour market and at close to capacity employment, value is going to pass back from capital to labour and hence we'll see upward pressure on wages going forward?
So, generalising hugely, I reckon we'll end up with a handful of Global outlooks: European, North American, Middle Eastern/North African, sub-Saharan African, Latin, East Asian, South Asian and Russian (!). They'll all borrow from each other, some may co-exist in the same place and, of course, there'll be sub-sets. But the world is getting smaller and there is no going back on that.
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
It's not really "globalisation", it's capitalism. It's the same as when agricultural workers moved from the country to the towns to work in the factories. It was a fundamental cultural, social, political and economic change for them and I suspect they didn't all adapt smoothly.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
A good deal of research has been externalised. I'd rephrase your point as "why bother developing a robot when Google will do it for me?".
Many companies are, like ordinary people, consumers of technology rather than originators. I imagine that's largely due to to the shift to a services-based economy.
I disagree with the idea that it's simply capitalism. Technology has enabled populations to be both more mobile and more able to see what life is like in other countries. This provides both the motive and the opportunity to move.
I don't think this is necessarily the beginning of the end times, but we have to accept (in the words of William Gibson: "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed". We're importing people from the past; not an easy thing to deal with.
"We're importing people from the past; not an easy thing to deal with."
That's brilliant and sums up the problem.
But I'd say its even worse.
Germany is importing people from somewhere else's past and who want the benefits but not the responsibilities of the here and now.
In any case, the camps were used for very different purposes. The German ones were used to intern "undesirables" and political enemies, and as prisons for convicted criminals. The British ones were used to house Boer non-combatants while a scorched earth policy was followed. They were supposed to be a humanitarian institution (in days gone by the inhabitants would have been left outside to starve) but of course it didn't work out that way.
It is easy for prosperous societies to become decadent and throw money at any problem that turns up.
But what happens when the money runs out.
Lefties like you, because of your leftyness, believe in a magic money tree etc.
Suppose we start to have a recession, govt's can't sell debt and put up tax which simply takes out money from the productive part of the economy, people are starting to lose trust in the cultural part of govt and then lose trust in the economic part of govt. Money hoarding starts which leads to a mass depression.
People start to get very angry.
Europeans tend to be very nice, sometimes insufferably nice until they are not.
Then, they don't just get a little peeved or somewhat pissed off, they become very nasty.
Take the UK in the last war for instance, appease, appease, appease, fight alone for two years and then fire bomb Dresden just because we can. Angry Germans tend to send in the panzers and make that well known British invention of the concentration camp much more efficient.
Immigrants may simply be forced out of Europe.
A lot of innocent people will suffer.
And their suffering will be directly attributable to the lefty policies YOU advocate.
Shame on you.
You over-politicise and over-personalise an issue that everyone in the political spectrum finds difficult. FWIW, I've been a senior manager in the world's largest pharma company and I've run two successful private businesses, so I don't have fancy ideas about magic money trees. But it's entirely irrelevant to the debate - if you just told us what you'd do it'd be more interesting than having go at other posters.
The problem is that many governments or 'elites' refuse to accept that there are negatives caused by globalisation.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
It's not really "globalisation", it's capitalism. It's the same as when agricultural workers moved from the country to the towns to work in the factories. It was a fundamental cultural, social, political and economic change for them and I suspect they didn't all adapt smoothly.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
Agreed.
There's certainly a difference between economic growth dependent upon extra (and so cheaper) labour to growth dependent upon capital investment and higher productivity.
In the first the gains are concentrated among the ownership class with many of the original workers disadvantaged. Whereas the second sees the gains spread throughout the workforce.
In the UK we had economic growth based on the capital investment for a century or so up to 2000 and consequently increased general prosperity and equality. The return of cheap labour - either internally from migration or externally from China etc - has seen the benefits concentrated within 'the rich'.
What do you think of the thesis that, with most of Asia now integrated into the global labour market and at close to capacity employment, value is going to pass back from capital to labour and hence we'll see upward pressure on wages going forward?
America still feels like a very foreign country to me. And I am there a hell of a lot. In Texas and other states you can walk around freely openly carrying firearms. It's insane. But, generally, the whole outlook there is just different. I can't see that changing. Europe, though, is definitely homogenising. When I lived in Spain it was palpably very different to the UK in a huge number of ways. Now, there are still differences, of course, but far fewer. It's down to language, the internet and social media, cheap air travel, free movement, the decline of the Church's influence, the Champions League (seriously) etc. None of these things are going away. I suspect we'll cling ever closer to the things that still make us different, but Europeans are inevitably going to become ever more alike.
As a Brit living in the States for 25 years now, I totally agree that the US has a fundamentally different approach to societal and political issues than the UK and the rest of Europe. It centers on the fundamental relationship between the individual and the State, and hence the expectations of what are the individual's and the State's responsibilities, rights and limits respectively. On that axis, the UK is more European than American, although it is closer to the US than continental Europe.
So, generalising hugely, I reckon we'll end up with a handful of Global outlooks: European, North American, Middle Eastern/North African, sub-Saharan African, Latin, East Asian, South Asian and Russian (!). They'll all borrow from each other, some may co-exist in the same place and, of course, there'll be sub-sets. But the world is getting smaller and there is no going back on that.
The whole point of the King Canute story was that he wanted to demonstrate that he did NOT have the power to turn back the tide.
That stunt really did backfire didn’t it?
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
Quite the opposite. Canute was intelligent, well-read and very religious. He used a simple demonstration to show his fawning advisors that the power of earthly kings was limited and that only God had true power.
America still feels like a very foreign country to me. And I am there a hell of a lot. In Texas and other states you can walk around freely openly carrying firearms. It's insane. But, generally, the whole outlook there is just different. I can't see that changing. Europe, though, is definitely homogenising. When I lived in Spain it was palpably very different to the UK in a huge number of ways. Now, there are still differences, of course, but far fewer. It's down to language, the internet and social media, cheap air travel, free movement, the decline of the Church's influence, the Champions League (seriously) etc. None of these things are going away. I suspect we'll cling ever closer to the things that still make us different, but Europeans are inevitably going to become ever more alike.
That homogenisation is evident even in the case of Greece. It's a far less "different" place than it was 25 years ago (let alone 50).
The whole point of the King Canute story was that he wanted to demonstrate that he did NOT have the power to turn back the tide.
That stunt really did backfire didn’t it?
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
Quite the opposite. Canute was intelligent, well-read and very religious. He used a simple demonstration to show his fawning advisors that the power of earthly kings was limited and that only God had true power.
Sadly, it seems there is doubt whether Canute ever actually did the stunt with the waves.
The whole point of the King Canute story was that he wanted to demonstrate that he did NOT have the power to turn back the tide.
That stunt really did backfire didn’t it?
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
Quite the opposite. Canute was intelligent, well-read and very religious. He used a simple demonstration to show his fawning advisors that the power of earthly kings was limited and that only God had true power.
On that story, I wonder if it occurred before or after his young daughter is reputed to have drowned in a stream at Bosham? Either could add poignancy to the story.
America still feels like a very foreign country to me. And I am there a hell of a lot. In Texas and other states you can walk around freely openly carrying firearms. It's insane. But, generally, the whole outlook there is just different. I can't see that changing. Europe, though, is definitely homogenising. When I lived in Spain it was palpably very different to the UK in a huge number of ways. Now, there are still differences, of course, but far fewer. It's down to language, the internet and social media, cheap air travel, free movement, the decline of the Church's influence, the Champions League (seriously) etc. None of these things are going away. I suspect we'll cling ever closer to the things that still make us different, but Europeans are inevitably going to become ever more alike.
As a Brit living in the States for 25 years now, I totally agree that the US has a fundamentally different approach to societal and political issues than the UK and the rest of Europe. It centers on the fundamental relationship between the individual and the State, and hence the expectations of what are the individual's and the State's responsibilities, rights and limits respectively. On that axis, the UK is more European than American, although it is closer to the US than continental Europe.
On the whole yes, though there are exceptions like Switzerland. The UK is closer to Commonwealth nations like Australia, New Zealand or Canada than it is to either the U.S. or continental Europe
The whole point of the King Canute story was that he wanted to demonstrate that he did NOT have the power to turn back the tide.
That stunt really did backfire didn’t it?
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
Quite the opposite. Canute was intelligent, well-read and very religious. He used a simple demonstration to show his fawning advisors that the power of earthly kings was limited and that only God had true power.
Sadly, it seems there is doubt whether Canute ever actually did the stunt with the waves.
Well sure, stories like that are often just stories, but the important point is he (or someone at least) wanted people to take that point to make him look good, so whether he physically did it or not is secondary to the image he (or someone, about him) was trying to present, and it's a shame we so often take away the opposite message to that intended.
I see Amber Rudd is being a moron again. Saying that leaving the EU could lead to higher energy bills (based on absolutely no evidence at all) whilst ignoring the fact that membership of the EU is definitely causing higher energy bills because of the requirement for VAT.
But, and it’s a huge “but” – in fact a series of “buts” – things could happen to upset this “all else being equal” scenario. Here are four “known unknowns”: things that might happen to push the middle third of British voters towards the “out” camp.
A fresh refugee crisis might erupt in the final weeks of campaigning – a fresh influx of arrivals from Syria, say, or a significant number of people in camps near Calais getting into Britain via the Channel Tunnel.
A new Eurozone crisis – maybe Greece again, or Spain, or Portugal, or Italy – provoking voters to think that the EU’s economy is in a mess and we are better off increasing our distance from it.
Another Paris-style terrorist attack that voters think, rightly or wrongly, puts EU countries at greater risk than countries outside the EU
Boris Johnson, who steps down as the Mayor of London next May, joining the “out” camp. He is by far the most charismatic Conservative politician, and could go some way to neutralise David Cameron’s near-certain advocacy of an “in” vote. (By the same token, if Johnson recommends staying in the EU, this would be a big boost to the “in” camp.)
Waiting for Johnson's decision is increasingly becoming like waiting for Godot.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
Agreed.
There's certainly a difference between economic growth dependent upon extra (and so cheaper) labour to growth dependent upon capital investment and higher productivity.
In the first the gains are concentrated among the ownership class with many of the original workers disadvantaged. Whereas the second sees the gains spread throughout the workforce.
In the UK we had economic growth based on the capital investment for a century or so up to 2000 and consequently increased general prosperity and equality. The return of cheap labour - either internally from migration or externally from China etc - has seen the benefits concentrated within 'the rich'.
What do you think of the thesis that, with most of Asia now integrated into the global labour market and at close to capacity employment, value is going to pass back from capital to labour and hence we'll see upward pressure on wages going forward?
It will happen at some point but I believe there are still hundreds of millions of cheap workers still to be employed in Asia and Africa.
Then there is the issue of which workers will benefit first/most - I'd say the highly skilled on low wages in Asia. I certainly don't expect the moderately skilled on high wages in the West seeing upward pressure on their wages for a long time.
I've been asking on this site since 2007 how the West is meant to compete against peoples who are as intelligent and educated as we are and who are willing to work harder for lower pay and under fewer restrictions.
A trillion pounds of UK public debt further on and I've never seen a worthwhile answer.
The whole point of the King Canute story was that he wanted to demonstrate that he did NOT have the power to turn back the tide.
That stunt really did backfire didn’t it?
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
Quite the opposite. Canute was intelligent, well-read and very religious. He used a simple demonstration to show his fawning advisors that the power of earthly kings was limited and that only God had true power.
Sadly, it seems there is doubt whether Canute ever actually did the stunt with the waves.
Well sure, stories like that are often just stories, but the important point is he (or someone at least) wanted people to take that point to make him look good, so whether he physically did it or not is secondary to the image he (or someone, about him) was trying to present, and it's a shame we so often take away the opposite message to that intended.
Yes, it is a shame. And odd that so many people get it wrong.
The other side of the story for Labour. of course, is that if the party recommits to Trident Corbyn and the hard left are finished. Trident may well be the proxy battle for Labour's heart and soul.
Labour did fight the 1964 election on a platform opposed to Polaris at the peak of the Cold War. Despite the Tories making it a major campaign issue Labour still gained office.
Did they propose the scrapping of our nuclear deterrent? We still had the V Bombers, did they propose unilateral nuclear disarmament? Did Wilson scrap the Nassau agreement? To be fair Corbyn is indeed proposing to take us back to 1964, having said that it is a 14 year improvement on UKIP.
It's down to language, the internet and social media, cheap air travel, free movement, the decline of the Church's influence, the Champions League (seriously) etc.
I remember saying on some college course (it may have been something to do with EuroDisney) that 'European culture' ** consisted of beer and football.
** As opposed to individual German, French, Italian etc cultures.
In a recent survey conducted by AlJazeera.net, the website for the Al Jazeera Arabic television channel, respondents overwhelmingly support the Islamic State terrorist group, with 81% voting “YES” on whether they approved of ISIS’s conquests in the region.
The poll, which asked in Arabic, “Do you support the organizing victories of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS)?” has generated over 38,000 responses thus far, with only 19% of respondents voting “NO” to supporting ISIS.
Al Jazeera Arabic’s television audience is largely made up of Sunni Muslims living in the Arab world. Its biggest viewership numbers come from Egypt and Saudi Arabia, along with a large amount of satellite television viewers in the United States, according to research estimates. AlJazeera.net is most popular in Saudi Arabia, the United States, Egypt, Morocco, and Bosnia and Herzegovina, according to the Alexa webpage analytics site. Al Jazeera claims that it has over 40 million viewers in the Arab world.
''That homogenisation is evident even in the case of Greece. It's a far less "different" place than it was 25 years ago (let alone 50).''
Whenever I'm in Spain, it feels really British. Much less alien than New York.
I think it really depends. In parts of places like Spain or Portugal it feels very much like Britain, I am sure that having so many British ex-pats certainly has something to do with it. And I think yes in the big cities across Europe they do feeling increasingly similar.
However, in my personal experience anyway, if you go well away from tourist areas and the big cities, places like Portugal are still quite different. 3 years or so ago I visited the area between Porto and Lisbon in Portugal, and it was quite eye opening the difference e.g. It was very clear women's place was in the home and they were expected to cook from scratch every day. There were no large endless numbers of chain stores or supermarkets, in fact the local food store had only just started opening for a few hours on Sunday (after church of course) and certainly no 24hrs shopping.
It was nothing like the UK, unlike say if you visit the Algarve.
''It's all happening faster in Europe for all the obvious reasons. But I think it's a global trend that will reach everywhere in the end.''
I know it's a curious and perhaps daft example, but it struck me when watching the world darts over Christmas.
The overwhelmingly British audience love the top class Dutch players to bits and often support them over locals. There really is genuine mutual affection.
Another sporting example is the European team of the Ryder Cup.
To me, all that's needed is time and patience. Europe will homogenise naturally if only its leaders would let it. They are just so impatient for a superstate.
The whole point of the King Canute story was that he wanted to demonstrate that he did NOT have the power to turn back the tide.
That stunt really did backfire didn’t it?
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
Quite the opposite. Canute was intelligent, well-read and very religious. He used a simple demonstration to show his fawning advisors that the power of earthly kings was limited and that only God had true power.
Yes, but he's lost control of the story which has been rewritten to make him look like an idiot. Predictably, I think. Alistair Campbell would never have allowed it.
Comments
I think this is it:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-34270077
https://twitter.com/ThomasPride/status/685786489632993280?lang=en
lol
The fact is Germany en mass did meekly acquiesce in Merkel's madness and patted themselves on the back for so doing.
Are you denying that ?
All these phobias, homo, xeno, Islam etc are just lazy stereotypes, people are people and should be treated accordingly, the perpetrators in Germany should be dealt with in the same way a gang of young English would be, for example. Our football hooligans over the years have been quite rightly dealt with severely with little sympathy from us at home. I've quite often cheered as foreign police have baton charged our drunken morons.
How many 100s of millions more migrants/immigrants/refugees do you expect to try and enter Europe?
Do you think mad, lunatic, idiotic, bonkers, bullshitter or feeble minded best describes Merkel?
Do you agree that a willingness to obey orders and an inherent sense of superiority is part of the modern German character?
In all seriousness I enjoy when some on the left start down this route, as it makes a change from the more prominent complaints from the right.
Muslim immigration is different. It is based on a religion which teaches bigotry and is anti-integration, where homosexuals, women and non-Muslims are seen as scum and death comes with a trip to paradise and 72 virgins. When the immigrants chose not to integrate and believe they can foist their sick practices (FGM and child marriage) onto the hosts then that is where the problem lies. The only solution is to prevent Muslim immigration whilst allowing non-Muslim immigration.
Concerning your last paragraph I think the key is language. While European nations retain separate languages their cultures will remain somewhat distinct. However I've read that linguists are predicting a lot of European languages to die out within a century, far more than everyday sense would suggest.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3391297/PETER-OSBORNE-Labour-MPs-handed-knife-assassinate-Corbyn.html
The original NS article is utterly brutal with respect to Corbyn -
"He might once have fitted the role of a deputy manager of a northern friendly society — kind, polite and compassionate yet unable to help his client — but he is intellectually unsuited to be a minister of any kind, let alone the Prime Minister. Either he goes, or the party itself is a goner."
My popcorn floweth over.
;-)
Instead , they are like Gregor Gysi who thinks that most indigenous Germans are closet nazi's who have to be outbreed by importing loads of potential rapists who are more likely to vote Die Linke.
You know, just like the labour party did in this country.
The very same mentality that the authorities in Cologne have.
Is it too much to ask that the Corbynistas might support a reduction in the licence fee?
The wonders of jetlag notwithstanding, having recently returned from the US (a country not without its own immigration issues), I've not heard a lot about what happened in Cologne and it wasn't widely covered on the US news media (at least in the immediate post-New Year period).
Thanks as always for the article, David. As usual, plenty in it with which I don't entirely agree. The primary motivations for Merkel's decision were economic and humanitarian (possibly in that order, possibly not). The provision of a pool of potentially very cheap labour would in theory safeguard future German economic growth - one can argue the Gastarbeiter from Turkey and Yugoslavia were a big part of West Germany's own economic revolution especially in the 60s and 70s.
We have the same here - the street cleaner, the office cleaner and the building site labourers are now Romanian and Bulgarian where they would once have been Indian or Pakistani but that's allowed others to move onwards and upwards just as those who came off the land to work in the factories eventually made enough money to move from the slums to the suburbs.
As others have said, there are millions of unemployed elsewhere in the EU but they aren't or wouldn't be as cheap a labour source as sub-Saharan Africans.
I suspect Merkel's actions also derive from her own heritage - she's a Pomeranian by birth I believe and the experience of the displaced Germans from eastern Europe (notably East Prussia) both during the winter of 1944-45 and after the war isn't widely known in the West but was a humanitarian disaster in which thousands perished.
This becomes the problem - we are who we are and we are the sum of our experiences and that is as much true of political leaders as anyone else and David alludes to the "shame" of the Germans. Well, perhaps but had Merkel slammed the German door closed in the autumn, what would have happened ? Possibly one major disaster but instead Merkel has initiated a series of cumulative minor disasters which may have more serious political and economic consequences down the line.
Ultimately it's about management and the semblance of control - Merkel perhaps believed she and the German "system" could assimilate and control the incoming migrants and use economic prosperity as a mechanism for maintaining order (when people are making money they are less likely to make trouble). The problem is that's a skin-deep facade (as it is here) and, as others have argued, cultural and traditional attitudes and differences are much harder to assimilate than economic ones.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=S3p7m7-4gOw
I have never met a German who thought he was superior. Indeed for Germany it appears that there is exactly the opposite problem. And the willingness to obey orders however mad was roundly crushed 70 years ago.
I would suggest you know very little about either Germany or the Germans and so are still resorting to stereotypes that are more than a lifetime out of date.
As I understand it Die Linke provokes very strong negative reactions for the reason you mention. Maybe the Greens are a more serious threat to the SPD.
I do wonder, though if the instinct for stability we have been talking about will save the SPD. I mean, we are talking about the German Social Democrats, one of the most storied of European political parties. They are not going to just disappear.... are they?
I some how doubt the rule abiding German's will go with the approach the French and Italians have tried from time to time which is just drop them at the airport in their home country and middle finger to the courts.
Partially because they do not suffer from these negatives themselves.
Refusal to acknowledge the negatives exacerbates their effects.
If they don't want to be dumped at the airport in Damascus, then maybe the international community can build a prison camp somewhere in the region to lock them all up. But it absolutely has to be the case that they forfeit any right to live in the EU after they have shown such contempt for their hosts.
Given Guantanamo, world leaders are definitely not going to agree prison camps.
I think the host country's legal system has to deal with criminals, as it usually would, if necessary with significant custodial sentences. Of course, that costs money.
Nevertheless the Germans did meekly acquiesce to Merkel - as has been said its impossible to imagine another European country having such little political criticism of such a decision.
Likewise the patting themselves on the back did occur - the banners in the football grounds being the most visual illustration.
Still my thanks for being willing to discuss the issue rather than trying to stop any discussion as some here have done.
I wonder if he had an eleventh century ancestor of Seumas Milne advising him.
In comparison, we have had about million Poles, the vast majority who turned up speaking English and educated / skilled with things the UK needed (in fact many did jobs well below their skill set), and even then there are huge pressures on services.
I can't help think about the "suburbs" around major cities in France like Paris to envision how it is more likely to go in Germany.
But it *needs* to happen. Civil society will quickly be replaced by vigilante mobs, even in somewhere as law abiding as Germany, if the general population of women feel they can't leave the house without some random stranger feeling them up in the street.
But what happens when the money runs out.
Lefties like you, because of your leftyness, believe in a magic money tree etc.
Suppose we start to have a recession, govt's can't sell debt and put up tax which simply takes out money from the productive part of the economy, people are starting to lose trust in the cultural part of govt and then lose trust in the economic part of govt. Money hoarding starts which leads to a mass depression.
People start to get very angry.
Europeans tend to be very nice, sometimes insufferably nice until they are not.
Then, they don't just get a little peeved or somewhat pissed off, they become very nasty.
Take the UK in the last war for instance, appease, appease, appease, fight alone for two years and then fire bomb Dresden just because we can. Angry Germans tend to send in the panzers and make that well known British invention of the concentration camp much more efficient.
Immigrants may simply be forced out of Europe.
A lot of innocent people will suffer.
And their suffering will be directly attributable to the lefty policies YOU advocate.
Shame on you.
Economic development in the capitalist model is predicated on cheap labour and the opportunity for those at the bottom to earn money and move up the ladder so the factory workers moved from the slums to the suburbs and developed new political, social and economic attitudes.
Each advance in economic development has been fuelled by new sources of cheap labour and raw materials and eventually by technological development which always lags behind. At the moment, many organisations prefer to employ someone rather than spend the money either on R&D or on improving processes.
Why spend millions developing a robot who could keep the streets clean in all weathers when you can employ a Bulgarian with a broom ? The company doesn't have to pay for his housing or care about what he does when he's not working. Even in the public sector, there is still huge recruitment of lower-paid staff (often Agency so they don't appear on the official payroll) to perform basic manual administrative tasks.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jan/09/my-syrian-refugee-lodger-helen-pidd
Re buying Boris with the Foreign Office, that's going to unbuy Hammond isn't it?
With the rise in user-posted content, things like mistranslation - either accidentally or deliberately - become a serious problem if not checked. This sort of thing could quickly go around the English speaking Tw@ttershere without anyone checking that was was written is what she actually said.
Having the car stoned because we drove somewhere where the local youth didn't want us was one of those.
Many companies are, like ordinary people, consumers of technology rather than originators. I imagine that's largely due to to the shift to a services-based economy.
I disagree with the idea that it's simply capitalism. Technology has enabled populations to be both more mobile and more able to see what life is like in other countries. This provides both the motive and the opportunity to move.
I don't think this is necessarily the beginning of the end times, but we have to accept (in the words of William Gibson: "The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed". We're importing people from the past; not an easy thing to deal with.
There's certainly a difference between economic growth dependent upon extra (and so cheaper) labour to growth dependent upon capital investment and higher productivity.
In the first the gains are concentrated among the ownership class with many of the original workers disadvantaged. Whereas the second sees the gains spread throughout the workforce.
In the UK we had economic growth based on the capital investment for a century or so up to 2000 and consequently increased general prosperity and equality. The return of cheap labour - either internally from migration or externally from China etc - has seen the benefits concentrated within 'the rich'.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Years'_War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_War_of_Independence
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish–American_War
Shows exactly how worried they are about actually winning an election at this stage.
When the EU collapses, the economic tensions and social strife will probably lead to a resurgence of nationalism and cultural identity, with differences being exalted rather than abandoned.
Of course, some similarities are related to new technology.
Any alien group that oversteps its welcome as guests risks a backlash. One historical example was the attempted Judeo-Bolshevist revolution in Munich immediately after WW1, which led to the rise of the NSDAP.
One way of discouraging excessive settlement of people with alien values is to have legislation in place which is in line with the values of the host country but uncomfortable for the alien group in question. An example would be the alcohol prohibitions in certain Islamic states. European states could similarly ban practices contrary to indigenous Christian values, even if they are mandated by Sharia law.
If people with different values wish to live in peace in another country with different values, they need to keep a low profile, not demand "rights" and recognise that they will forever be guests in that country, whether or not they gain citizenship. If they do this they are more likely to be tolerated by the host community. The German word gastarbeiter is apt, particularly as there citizenship is generally determined by blood, not residency.
http://esharp.eu/debates/the-uk-and-europe/the-uk-eu-neck-and-neck-debate
That's brilliant and sums up the problem.
But I'd say its even worse.
Germany is importing people from somewhere else's past and who want the benefits but not the responsibilities of the here and now.
Especially on this issue, because Boris has stated we should campaign for Out, then use that to get concessions and stay in.
Whenever I'm in Spain, it feels really British. Much less alien than New York.
Another thick Europhile.
Then there is the issue of which workers will benefit first/most - I'd say the highly skilled on low wages in Asia. I certainly don't expect the moderately skilled on high wages in the West seeing upward pressure on their wages for a long time.
I've been asking on this site since 2007 how the West is meant to compete against peoples who are as intelligent and educated as we are and who are willing to work harder for lower pay and under fewer restrictions.
A trillion pounds of UK public debt further on and I've never seen a worthwhile answer.
To be fair Corbyn is indeed proposing to take us back to 1964, having said that it is a 14 year improvement on UKIP.
It's all happening faster in Europe for all the obvious reasons. But I think it's a global trend that will reach everywhere in the end.
** As opposed to individual German, French, Italian etc cultures.
http://linkis.com/wordpress.com/rN3kr
However, in my personal experience anyway, if you go well away from tourist areas and the big cities, places like Portugal are still quite different. 3 years or so ago I visited the area between Porto and Lisbon in Portugal, and it was quite eye opening the difference e.g. It was very clear women's place was in the home and they were expected to cook from scratch every day. There were no large endless numbers of chain stores or supermarkets, in fact the local food store had only just started opening for a few hours on Sunday (after church of course) and certainly no 24hrs shopping.
It was nothing like the UK, unlike say if you visit the Algarve.
I know it's a curious and perhaps daft example, but it struck me when watching the world darts over Christmas.
The overwhelmingly British audience love the top class Dutch players to bits and often support them over locals. There really is genuine mutual affection.
Another sporting example is the European team of the Ryder Cup.
To me, all that's needed is time and patience. Europe will homogenise naturally if only its leaders would let it. They are just so impatient for a superstate.