This Promises To Be Hugely Entertaining

[bozo]

D.P.
We are familiar with " union busting "here in the U.K.
You may be aware of an ex-prime minister of ours called Margaret Thatcher, a big pal of your Reagan, who made it her mission to slaughter the British trade union movement which prior to her becoming p.m wielded great power on behalf of working people.
She famously provoked a strike by our miners whose union she rightly saw as the one to go for, in the belief that if she beat them she could beat any union.
A general strike by all unions should have been instigated, but to its disgrace and shame, the unions' organising council, the TUC, left the miners to fight alone...and Thatcher crushed them.
Following on from that, all manner of draconian anti-labour legislation was enacted, emasculating the trade unions.
Worse still, union leaders continued to lay down before the Thatcher juggernaut and no help was on hand from the Labour Party, the party formed by the trade unions to give them a political voice at the highest level, but which got dragged rightwards under successive career politician leaders, Kinnock, Smith, Blair, Brown and now Miliband.
The public sector unions are striking this very week over attacks on pay and pensions being proposed by the current coalition government of Liberals and Conservatives. You would have hoped they would be getting support from the opposition Labour Party, but sadly it is continuing its reluctance to support its own supporters by cautioning against the action.

The only bit of good news here is that Thatcher, the evil one, is very ill and expected to die pretty soon. Bring it on!

Sorry if I've gone a bit off topic, but the hurt is quite deep.

Thanks for your insight into your travails!

[DeistPaladin]

A general strike by all unions should have been instigated, but to its disgrace and shame, the unions' organising council, the TUC, left the miners to fight alone...and Thatcher crushed them.

I saw the tail end of a movie once on that tragic time in your nation's history. Perhaps I was assuming things were so much better in Europe because "the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence".

Still, I think things may be worse here because of the influence of Fox and other right wing propaganda.

[Minimalist]

Remember that Iowa picked Huckabee last time, who crashed and burned with the more mainstream Republicans.

There are no more mainstream republicans any longer. They have been chased out by the crazies. That's why Arlen Specter knew he had no shot at being re-nominated as a republican in Pennsylvania.



So, D-P, you see what I mean. We are pretty much there. I recall George Carlin remarking one time ( I think on Bill Maher's show ) "Germany lost WWII but fascism won."

[Anomalocaris]

Please, don't remind me. I'm still trying to wash the stink off from those eight years.

That, however, was the past. I'm concerned about this being our future.

Evidently she does not believe in minimum wage. She sucks tea party dicks in public for free.

---

From a Brit perspective, how come you get so many poor candidates for the highest office in your country?

If you think the candidate for the highest office is poor, you should see what makes up the rest of the country.

[The Grand Nudger]

Faux News panders to a demographic, it's infotainment, it's not having an influence on society, its the product of our society. Gotta take the good with the bad, no sense in scapegoating a bunch of actors looking to make a buck.

[Autumnlicious]

I warrant that it is quite a nice thing that the incumbent has, historically, had a huge advantage.

I wonder if the Republicans are throwing their craziest to the voters, then will back off in 2016 with a slightly more moderate candidate.

It's the old "Frog in boiling water" approach -- scare us with the nutjobs so the semi-nutty seem less terrifying.

[DeistPaladin]

Faux News panders to a demographic, it's infotainment, it's not having an influence on society, its the product of our society. Gotta take the good with the bad, no sense in scapegoating a bunch of actors looking to make a buck.

I disagree. The USA has been indisputably moving to the right for the last 20 years, about the same time that right wing talk radio and Fox got off the ground. Reagan was to the left of Obama on some issues. W Bush, who used to define the right wing, now seems like a centrist. Our society is being pumped full of propaganda and misinformation and this is having a notable effect on our political discourse.

[JohnDG]

It surprised me to find out how dumb MB truely is, she even get's her american history wrong. I really hope people don't vote for somebody even dumber than bush. If I had to vote between her and sarah palin, I'd vote for sarah because of her super vision, which allows her to see russia from her house.

[The Grand Nudger]

Correlation does not prove causation. I honestly wasn't aware that the drift and Faux occurred around the same time, even that would lead me to the conclusion that Faux is pandering, but my opinion on this is just opinion. Its embarrassing either way isn't it?

[Epimethean]

I remember when Ferarro was not considered competent for V.P. Now, we've got soap opera hucksters who don't know 3rd grade history running for the top job.