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What you want to say – 15th March, Week 11, 2017 March 15, 2017

Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.
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As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.

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1. GW - March 15, 2017

Ryanair sends strikebreakers to Germany.

The baggage-handlers at the Berlin airports are conducting a series of strikes to, among other things, increase the minimum hourly rate from 11 euros to 12. The workers have delivered a massive increase in productivity without seeing any of this reflected in their wages and conditions.

Ryanair sent untrained people to do the work of baggage handlers, regardless of the impact on airport security – simple strike-breaking.

In response the union has withdrawn the practice of giving 16 hours notice and will simply go out on a wildcat basis – the baggage handlers support the action by 98%.

The employers at the airport show signs now of being willing to negotiate.

What the fuck gives the parasitic O’Leary (Ryanair relies on a model of getting public authorities to provide his facilities for under cost price) the right to try to break strikes in Germany?

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

+1. absolutely disgusting, good on the union

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Alibaba - March 15, 2017

There’s nothing quite like the word ‘Scab’ to send the shivers down the strike-breakers backs. That’s how I remember it being used so effectively in the only time I went on strike myself. 

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Dr. X - March 15, 2017

“Ryanair relies on a model of getting public authorities to provide his facilities for under cost price)”

I’ve been vaguely aware of this for years, but can you recommend a good piece that documents it?

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GW - March 15, 2017

Your wish is my command. This is from an industry blog not some raving lefty.

The poster writes about airlines who …

are able to push operating costs and system maintenance onto their eco-system partners (airports, ground handling, local governments, taxpayers and customers).

Take the most obvious example of this. Ryanair. The company pressurises local governments to use EU structural funds to build an airline terminal for their planes to land. It refuses to pay for jetways to bring planes to the terminal. It refuses to pay for buses to ferry passengers from the plane to the terminal building. All three tactics are an attempt to pass on the fixed cost of infrastructure onto other stakeholders. An airport needs terminal buildings; it needs to have jetways and buses for its ground services to be adequate. So effectively, Ryanair is ‘free riding’ on the investments of other actors.

In biology this kind of behavior is know as parasitism.

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GW - March 15, 2017

The strikebreakers were from Ireland. The parasite sent an empty plane from Berlin to Dublin on Monday midday and it came back with a load of scabs.

Even so they only managed to service a tenth of the flights they normally run to Berlin.

I wouldn’t trust sending any baggage through Ryanair holds via Berlin airports for a little while. 😉

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2. Alibaba - March 15, 2017

Another example of how Trump speaks out of both sides of his mouth. Despite all the promises of good governance,  the Justice Department demanded the resignation of 46 US attorneys and one who refused to resign got the sack. I assume being forced to go, he lost all pension rights.

“One of America’s most high-profile prosecutors has been fired after refusing an order from the attorney general to resign. Preet Bharara, the 48-year-old US attorney for the southern district of New York, has made a name for himself taking on Wall Street corruption, terrorism and political malfeasance …”

It’s not looking good for those who defy the Trump administration. Still, there are those who are prepared to do so.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/11/new-yorks-prosecutor-considering-refusing-order-resign-force/

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3. GW - March 15, 2017

77,000 Dutch nationals living overseas can take part in today’s parliamentary elections.

Only Ireland and Greece of the EU nation states don’t allow nationals overseas to vote AFAIK.

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Jim Monaghan - March 15, 2017

Only 77000 citizens abroad, or is that a lowish number actually registered to vote.

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sonofstan - March 15, 2017

The reason why it would be so fraught for Ireland is because there would be way more than 77k. Exiles could easily swing an Irish election

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GW - March 15, 2017

Is that a bad thing? Arguably – if they have no knowledge of current Irish politics. But that could equally apply to those living in RoI currently.

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Aengus Millen - March 15, 2017

also you could easily implement a system like the french that limits over seas citizens to a set number of seats. You could even make all of north america a five seat constituency. This would be vastly bigger then any constituency in ireland but at least it would be something not some bs minster for the diaspora or senator appointed by the taoiseach

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

Yep that sounds like the direction they’d go

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

BTW just given the mention of the Dutch vote what sense of how things will go?

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GW - March 15, 2017

Like that idea too Aengus.

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sonofstan - March 15, 2017

@GW – I meant fraught for the establishment. The idea of a million of us for whom civil war politics had ceased to have any relevance having avote would scare the bejaysus out of them

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Liberius - March 15, 2017

BTW just given the mention of the Dutch vote what sense of how things will go?

The spread in the last set of polls on yesterday had the PVV (Wilders) getting between 16 (I&O research) and 24 (Maurice de Hond) seats; That’s roughly 11-15%. The VVD have moved out in front so probably come first, though not far ahead of PVV, and indeed not far ahead of everyone else given how fragmented the political support for parties is (and there in lies the theoretical prospect of PVV being pushed below CDA, D66 and GL as well with an outsider chance of going below the SP, although not PvdA). First or sixth… Very fragmented, which should be kept very much in mind should PVV come first.

Peilingwijzer gives you a good impression of the situation.

http://peilingwijzer.tomlouwerse.nl/

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GW - March 15, 2017

WBS – I suspect the turnout will be high.

I’d like to think that the meeja’s darling will do less well than he is polling, because he’s already garnered all of the normal non-voters he would have had last time around. Instead the leftish non-voters may turn out and give the left a boost.

But who knows, and I’m very wary about polls at the moment.

Don’t forget that the relationship between the racist and neo-liberal parties are similar to those of the UKP and Tories – i.e. the latter have adopted much of the rhetoric of the former.

As I think I commented before the real story will be the punishment of the former Social Democrats for taking part in an austerity Government.

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Michael Carley - March 15, 2017

Depends: how strong an influence should you be allowed on a government that doesn’t affect you?

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GW - March 15, 2017

I assume that it’s the numbers registered, Jim. I guess there’s upwards of a million Dutch people living abroad.

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6to5against - March 15, 2017

I can see a genuine issue with citizens who have never been here, and have no knowledge of the country, having a vote in elections. But this shouldn’t be an excuse to deny the diaspora en masse any political involvement.

An obvious solution (I think) would be that any citizen who acquires the right to vote while resident here, should retain that right even if they leave the country.

That would limit it to those who have lived here as adults. and they’re as likely as anybody else to have a valid input.

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GW - March 15, 2017

That also sounds right. For purely selfish reasons 🙂

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4. jc - March 15, 2017

Further evidence that Colm Toibin is not a great political thinker:

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/colm-t%C3%B3ib%C3%ADn-the-north-must-become-an-independent-eu-state-1.3010252

It doesn’t appear to have crossed his exquisite mind that the worst possible outcome for Catholics in Northern Ireland would be to become citizens of an Orange rump state. He should stick to Henry James.

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

I read it with increasing disbelief. In addition to your point which is absolutely correct a comment BTL noted that there is literally no political force in the North that is pushing for that outcome. In other words it has no weight at all.

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EWI - March 15, 2017

Further proof that Tóibín is an imbecile who should keep his D4 opinions on the North to himself: his example in Fermanagh had its county council suppressed through force by NI the ‘last’ time the Ulster unionists found themselves with a free hand. Just what does he think will happen differently this time round? Ethnic cleansing will start on D-Day.

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5. GW - March 15, 2017

Polls close in the Dutch elections at 20:00 Irish time.

I don’t know how long the counting will take but they’re using a largely manual count because some publicly-minded souls (the Chaos Computer Club among others) demonstrated just how insecure the electronic voting technology they were planning to use is, both technically and operationally.

An expert from Amsterdam’s Free University Herbert Bos told RTL that if one of his students had handed in the electoral programme in class as an assignment, “he’d fail him”.

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GW - March 15, 2017

Turnout up 20% after lunchtime, compared with 2012.

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GW - March 15, 2017

Livestream ticker in English here.

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

Thanks GW

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GW - March 15, 2017

There will be exit polls I believe which tend to be accurate.

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CL - March 15, 2017

“In total, six parties are forecast to receive more than 10 per cent but none is set to receive more than 20 per cent, according to most polls.”
https://www.ft.com/content/6bc14dee-0909-11e7-97d1-5e720a26771b

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baalthor - March 15, 2017

Our evoting machines came from the Netherlands – dunno if they are still using the same ones …

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6. GW - March 15, 2017

Pot-Kettle-Black dept:

For sheer hypocritical brass neck the government lobbyist for the IFSC whingeing about regulatory arbitrage deserves a prize.

This from an establishment whose sole economic strategy, besides forced emmigration and housing bubbles has been to offer the lowest corporation taxes, the worst corporate regulatory oversight, the worst data protection law, the worst libel laws etc. etc. to transnational capital.

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7. Liberius - March 15, 2017

Dit is de exitpoll van onderzoeksbureau Ipsos, in opdracht van de NOS en RTL.

VVD 31
PvdA 9
PVV 19
SP 14
CDA 19
D66 19
CU 6
GL 16
SGP 3
PvdD 5
50Plus 4
VNL 0
Denk 3
FvD 2

http://nos.nl/liveblog/2163344-nederland-kiest-vvd-in-exitpoll-veruit-de-grootste-groot-verlies-pvda.html

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

Thanks a million Liberius. If accurate that will certainly wipe a few smiles off alt-right faces. GL didn’t too badly.

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Liberius - March 15, 2017

It’s worth pointing out that Ipsos’ ordinary polls have been some of the lower ones for the PVV, I don’t know what the methodological differences are with the exitpoll though.

DENK incidentally are a pro-multicultural party founded by two former PvdA Turkish-Dutch MPs.

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

Interesting, and the leader of GL has parents who themselves were immigrants. Terrible news for the PvdA though hardly unexpected and they brought it on themselves.

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Liberius - March 15, 2017

and the leader of GL has parents who themselves were immigrants.

It does worry me though that people are getting very enthusiastic for Klaver given his background in the less than militant CNV trade union federation, and previous support for raising the retirement age; although he did invite Piketty to speak in parliament, so that might indicate something, but I’d still be wary of him, a touch too much of the Trudeau glitz and glamour.

Good election as well by the looks of it for the PvdD (Party for the Animals) who sit with GUE-NGL in the EU parliament, GL sit with the Greens.

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Liberius - March 15, 2017

I don’t know what the methodological differences are with the exitpoll though.

Answering my own question;

De exitpoll van onderzoeksbureau Ipsos die de NOS en RTL om 21.00 uur hebben gepubliceerd, is gebaseerd op peilingen bij veertig stembureaus.

So from outside the polling stations, against what I think is phone mode for their ordinary polls.

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8. GW - March 15, 2017

So the seats for the previous austerity government parties have been halved and the former Social Democrats who took part in that are in existential danger.

The fascists will take or share second place among a bunch of other parties with similar results.

Despite the success for Green Left, it’s a puzzle why the Socialist Party couldn’t pick up more votes from the former Social Democrats. There’s a plausible theory that they shouldn’t have ruled out cooperation with the neoliberal VVD until after the election. Lessons for die Linke there, I think.

So the vote for Nexit was about 15%. I’m sure the English pro-Brexit meeja outlets – Daily Heil, Torygraph, Socialist Worker etc. – will put it down to the kiff in the air, but little Britain stands increasingly alone.

I’d put a small amount of money on no government formation for two months, given that the smallest coalition has to be four parties strong. A six party centre & left coalition is theoretically possible.

Green Left would be foolish to take part in a VVD led government but I fear they will.

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WorldbyStorm - March 15, 2017

That’s a very interesting question re the SP. It’s an intriguing party and one would think it a natural home for disenchanted Social Democrats…

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jc - March 16, 2017

My understanding is that the SP is vehemently anti-EU and has taken the position that immigration should be limited in the interests of Dutch workers. Those positions would scare off a decent number of people who would otherwise be attracted to a party positioning itself on the left end of social democracy. It also seems to have an authoritarian internal party culture with an older white male leadership group. Given its history in 1970s Maoism, there might be some parallels to the internal culture of the WP in the 1980s/early 1990s.

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Jim Monaghan - March 17, 2017

The Dutch SP on migrants “Large-scale unregulated labour migration puts pressure on wages

The opening of the borders to central and eastern European (CEE) workers just a decade ago has led to labour market dislocation in the countries from which people have been attracted and repression, exploitation and underpayment in the Netherlands. The SP wants to see rogue temping agencies banned and work permits introduced for workers from CEE countries.

by Tijmen Lucie

The opening of the borders to central and eastern European (CEE) migrant workers has, particularly in sectors such as construction, horticulture, road transport and the food industry, led to repression and exploitation. Rogue temping agencies have had a free hand in putting people, especially those from central and eastern Europe, to work at low wages, using a number of dubious legal constructions. In this way worker is set against worker, wages are forced down and working conditions deteriorate.

The SP’s 10-point plan to combat oppression, exploitation and underpayment.
We halt at point 1.

The Netherlands must take back control over who can come here from CEE countries to work. Free movement of workers must be scrapped. Employers should be required once again to apply for a permit if they wish to employ workers from CEE.
This stand has some history:

Dutch advance socialist case against immigration Nov 24, 2008 Neil Clark

Whether the SP’s present impasse is due to problems with the low level of labour movement activity, the “comparative dearth of social mobilization in recent years” (which like in the UK, has been in a downward spiral for some time), the – unconvincing – strategy of “revolutionary reformism”, and the impermeability of Dutch politics and civil society to radical left ideas, as Finn (above) indicates, or that they’ve been sidelined by Wilders’ brand of national populism, are matters for debate.” from https://tendancecoatesy.wordpress.com/

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9. Colm B - March 15, 2017

The GL is not really that radical. It not quite Blairite but it is a good deal to the right of Die Linke or even the Corbyn wing of the Labour Party. It has much more in common with the middle class liberal style Green parties than with left parties despite its origins in the radical left. Of course, its better that GL succeeds than Wilders, the VVD or the PvdA,

The SP is much more of a workers party and well to the left of the GL. Its not radical left, despite its roots in Maoism, but it is a social democratic party in the old-fashioned sense of that word – what Marxists would call a left-reformist party and it has some radical left elements within it.
I may be wrong but I think the SP’s ambivalence about coalition with the right in the past and its inability to deal clearly with the issue of racism has caused it to stall in recent years – still, it seems to have held its own if the exit poll is right.

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10. Tomboktu - March 16, 2017

Labour did badly in the Dutch election. I see it called ‘PASOKification’ this morning. Apt that Dijsselbloem’s party should suffer so. I don’t know the innards of the Dutch electoral system, but I hope he’s out too.

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Liberius - March 16, 2017

Unfortunately he’s third on the list so unless their voters have jumped quite a few others up the list he’s safe.

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Liberius - March 16, 2017

Just for clarity, an individual candidate needs 25% of the quota (the quota being roughly 0.67%) to be jumped up the list. In 2012 with 75% turnout this translates as a quota of 62,828 and an individual target of 15,707.

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Tomboktu - March 18, 2017

Does this mean he is likely to lose the finance ministership? If so I assume that would mean he couldn’t be chair of the eurogroup.

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Liberius - March 18, 2017

That would depend on whether PvdA go into government again, and whether whether the other parties want him to take that job rather than one of their own. I’d say no to both, but the first is less sure, these social Democrats can be amazing glutons for punishment.

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Liberius - March 18, 2017

De Partij van de Arbeid moet niet gaan meeregeren in de komende coalitie, heeft PvdA-partijleider Lodewijk Asscher gezegd op een bijeenkomst met PvdA-leden in Utrecht. Asscher reageert hiermee op oproepen van bezorgde leden die de gedecimeerde partij buiten een centrumrechtse coalitie willen houden.

De leden schaarden zich in meerderheid achter Asscher: 80 procent van de aanwezigen stemde tegen meeregeren met een coalitie met de VVD. Algemeen wordt aangenomen dat de partij door de kiezers is afgerekend op de jarenlange nauwe samenwerking met coalitiepartner VVD.

Not so keen on more punishment then, neither the leader nor the members want to participate in another government with the VVD, a standpoint that is probably heightened by the fact that with far fewer seats their influence over this new coalition would be diminished compared to the last (not that they used that influence well anyway).

http://nos.nl/artikel/2163843-asscher-pvda-moet-niet-gaan-mee-regeren.html

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WorldbyStorm - March 18, 2017

V like the LP here, survival wins out over power. Just.

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11. CL - March 16, 2017

” Obama, still resident in Washington, will be active—behind the scenes or from a cloud above them—in lending the party he neglected in office suitable guidance and energy to ensure the Democrats remain a congenial, avowedly middle-of-the-road vehicle for capital in 2020. He, not Trump, is likely to be the leading impediment to any expansion of a Sanders-plus insurgency uniting downwardly mobile millennials, hard-pressed workers and restive minorities on any more radical and genuinely internationalist platform of a sort that would merit the term left.”-Perry Anderson.
https://newleftreview.org/II/103/perry-anderson-passing-the-baton

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12. sonofstan - March 16, 2017

The Grauniad web site front page currently has a headline referring to someone called Enda Kelly.

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13. Jolly Red Giant - March 17, 2017

The PSNI have been carrying out raids on homes of pro-choice activists in the North confiscating abortion pills – warrants have been issued and phones, laptops and bank statements of pro-choice activists have been confiscated.

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GW - March 17, 2017

Yep: Raid on Helen Crickard’s home reported in BT.

Political policing at its finest.

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14. sonofstan - March 17, 2017

Just noticed the monorail at B’ham airport has a ‘financed by the EU’ plate on it. Wonder if these will survive Brexit or will there be an office charged to take all of this awkward history down?

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Michael Carley - March 17, 2017

Naturally. You don’t see “financed by the surplus value of colonized peoples” plates, do you?

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15. Michael Carley - March 17, 2017

The Guardian letters column on empire:

In Africa, for example, the British transformed a borderless continent inhabited by warring tribes and clans, ravaged by disease, into modern nation states. They built hospitals, schools, elaborate networks of roads, railway lines, air and sea ports. Crucially, they introduced the rule of law, which protected all Africans irrespective of their tribe, clan or religion.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/16/india-brexit-and-the-legacy-of-empire-in-africa

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Aonrud ⚘ - March 17, 2017

It’s amazing how prevalent that defence of empire still is. All that work of modernising peoples who had no capacity for self-determination.

Balfour in 1910:

“…never in all the revolutions of fate and fortune have you seen one of those nations of its own motion establish what we, from a Western point of view, call self-government. That is the fact. It is not a question of superiority and inferiority. I suppose a true Eastern sage would say that the working government which we have taken upon ourselves in Egypt and elsewhere is not a work worthy of a philosopher-that it is the dirty work, the inferior work, of carrying on the necessary labour.”

We were just helping out because we’re really good at organising!

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Michael Carley - March 17, 2017

And remember that’s a letter in the Guardian, although it does come from a body called African Solutions [sic] to African Migration. Interesting that all the letters there can find a kind a word for the empire. In. The. Guardian. I daren’t look at the Daily Mail.

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Aonrud ⚘ - March 17, 2017

Exactly. You might expect it from some old toff Tory stereotype, but you here the modernisation argument across the board.

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CL - March 17, 2017

Bill Warren of BICO argued that imperialism played a progressive role.

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CL - March 17, 2017

-“Tharoor charts the destruction of pre-colonial systems of government by the British and their ubiquitous ledgers and rule books; the punitive taxation of farmers and mismanagement of famines in which millions died; the imposition of laws against homosexuality and sedition used to this day by authoritarian Indian governments; and the extreme protectionism (in everything from textiles to shipbuilding) that crippled India’s world-class manufacturing sectors and its pre-existing international trade networks. “Britain’s Industrial Revolution,” he writes, “was built on the destruction of India’s thriving manufacturing industries.”…

If the more nostalgic Brexiters think trading with former colonial nations will in some way compensate for the costs of leaving the EU, they should first examine the blood-soaked history of their country’s relationship with India. It could be a revelation.”
Inglorious Empire: What the British Did to India, by Shashi Tharoor,
https://www.ft.com/content/1885a53e-07d4-11e7-97d1-5e720a26771b

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Ed - March 20, 2017

I did a quick search to see if that guy had any other contributions, oh boy:

“David Cameron may have left office “with his domestic policy agenda largely unfinished” (“Cameron slides into political afterlife”, July 13), but he will be remembered for transforming one of Africa’s most wretched countries, Rwanda, into a resounding success story. Previously known for the 1994 genocide in which 1m people were killed in 100 days, Rwanda is today universally recognised for its unrivalled discipline in government, fighting corruption and, above all, using British aid money extremely well. The result is a rapid economic growth and social transformation underpinned by record enrolment in primary and secondary schools, and universities, as well as by the number of female members of parliament.”

https://www.ft.com/content/4f43f9a6-4793-11e6-8d68-72e9211e86ab

Jesus H Christ. The picture of Rwanda is fairly idealized (Kagame and the RPF are pretty nasty authoritarians, although their worst crimes have been in the DRC, not at home), but it’s true enough to say that Rwanda is pretty efficient, low on corruption, etc. But the idea that all of this – which was apparent long before Cameron became Tory leader, never mind prime minister – should be credited to that clapped-out old Etonian beggars belief. We’re talking Myers/RDE levels of Uncle Tomism here.

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16. CL - March 17, 2017

“Two days after Trump’s election last November I made a speech in the Seanad that has now been viewed over 40 millions times on platforms worldwide. It is my contention that in this era of fear and uncertainty the Irish have a historic and moral obligation to take a stand for justice and equality.”-Aodhan O Riordain.
http://www.thejournal.ie/readme/aodhan-o-riordain-its-time-that-irish-people-took-a-stand-against-racism-we-were-the-terrorists-at-one-time-3287103-Mar2017/

“Irish lawmaker Aodhán Ó’Ríordáin and other critics called on Irish-Americans to take a stand against President Donald Trump and his xenophobic policies.”
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2017/03/16/irish-americans-called-stand-against-trump-and-racism

” I find it curious that Aodhán Ó Riordáin is spending St Patrick’s Day in the United States speaking at an Irish Stand event (Life & Style, March 13th). This event stands in opposition to increased deportation powers by the US executive branch.
There are those of us who remember his instrumental role in the passage of the International Protection Act 2015….
This legislation, inter alia, increased deportation powers of the Garda Síochána­ including restricting the constitutional protection of inviolability of the home. It also curtails family reunification, which is particularly concerning for unaccompanied refugee children and protecting their rights….
It is a pity Labour is engaging in telescopic philanthropy on the migration issue. They cannot legislate in one direction in government and take aim at a foreign state from the comfort of the Opposition benches in the other. – Yours, etc,
BRIAN DINEEN LLM,
http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/letters/aodh%C3%A1n-%C3%B3-riord%C3%A1in-s-irish-stand-1.3013443

Frederick Douglass in Cork, 1846:

“his horror at the conditions of the poor in rural and urban Ireland as the Famine took hold enraged him. He describes to Garrison the streets teeming with wretched beggars and homeless, starving children whose pleas “were such as to make me ‘blush and hang my head to think myself a man’. I speak truly when I say I dreaded to go out of the house.”
It was a sensitivity that, as his biographer William McFeeley notes, was probably not shared by many of his liberal hosts who were quick to deplore the treatment of Africans in America but could not see their fellow countrymen begging on their doorsteps.”
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/the-escaped-slave-and-the-irish-emancipator-1.580149

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Aonrud ⚘ - March 17, 2017

I liked Joan Collins’ reply to A’OR’s new-found moral stance. It seems to have produced some entertaining responses as well.

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fergal - March 17, 2017

CL and Aonrud- you just don’t get it…Aodhan does of course. 40 million hits on youtube, omg as the kids might say- I’m sure Trump is bricking it now that Aodhan has him in his crosshairs.
On a serious note, this is just a crock of shite. Faraway politics are …faraway- he can throw shapes in NY, it doesn’t cost anything and won’t undo the misery people went through while he was minister or whatever in fg-labour’s austerity juggernaut.
This is identity politics writ large- a cul de sac inhabited by political opportunists.

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17. GW - March 17, 2017

So – important matters…

Is Sheelah’s day today or tomorrow?

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Gerryboy - March 18, 2017

The Australians have their sheelas, but we celts have our sheela-na-gigs. More primordial.

http://www.knowth.com/sheela-na-gig.htm

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18. sonofstan - March 17, 2017

http://www.salon.com/2017/03/16/asking-for-a-friend-enda-kenny-puts-a-tormented-twist-in-the-st-patricks-day-tradition/

A patriot is someone who knows how to hate their (ancestral) country properly…

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19. CL - March 17, 2017

“Supposing that Theresa May really believes, as her patronising rejection of another poll in Scotland might suggest, that “the Scottish Question” can be indefinitely delayed, then she will be joining a long dismal list of British leaders down the centuries who made the same mistake about Ireland…..
The break-up of Britain is not something that may or may not happen as the result of a second referendum, but is already upon us. The confrontation between English and Scottish nationalism is not going to moderate or evaporate. The one certainty is that “The Scottish Question” and Brexit have come together to destabilise Britain for years to come. “-Patrick Cockburn
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/brexit-scottish-referendum-english-nationalism-damaged-union-for-good-a7635796.html

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20. CL - March 18, 2017

“A top counterterrorism adviser to President Donald Trump faces growing calls to resign after a series of news reports alleging he has ties to a far-right Hungarian group with historical links to the Nazi party.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/sebastian-gorka-vitezi-rend-david-irving_us_58cc5d3ee4b00705db4faa3e?section=us_politics

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21. Gerryboy - March 18, 2017

Chuck Berry, one of the original great rock stars in the 1950s and 60s, has just died aged 90.

http://www.lemonde.fr/musiques/article/2017/03/18/le-musicien-chuck-berry-legende-du-rock-n-roll-meurt-a-l-age-de-90-ans_5096953_1654986.html

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sonofstan - March 19, 2017
22. sonofstan - March 19, 2017

dylan about Berry, from whom he stole a fair bit:

“I was still an aspiring rock n roller. The descendant, if you will, of the first generation of guys who played rock ’n’ roll – who were thrown down. Buddy Holly, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins, Gene Vincent, Jerry Lee Lewis. They played this type of music that was black and white. Extremely incendiary. Your clothes could catch fire. When I first heard Chuck Berry, I didn’t consider that he was black. I thought he was a hillbilly. Little did I know, he was a great poet, too. And there must have been some elitist power that had to get rid of all these guys, to strike down rock ’n’ roll for what it was and what it represented –not least of all being a black-and-white thing.”

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Joe Mooney - March 19, 2017

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23. Tomboktu - March 20, 2017

Another excellent Monday post by Tom Healy at the Nevin Institute’s blog

http://www.nerinstitute.net/blog/2017/03/19/are-women-workers-in-the-public-sector-paid-too-mu/

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24. Michael Carley - March 20, 2017

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25. GW - March 20, 2017
GW - March 20, 2017

My control of a simple link just about qualitatively matches the Brexiteer’s grasp of their negotiating position.

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Aonrud ⚘ - March 20, 2017

Yep, you Brexited that link, GW 🙂 Fixed now.

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26. sonofstan - March 20, 2017

Nice summary:
“This attitude has led Britain to leave an organisation it never bothered to understand, in the hope of a future it did not examine”.

From this
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/mar/20/brexit-press-dutch-elections-geert-wilders

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