Article 13 Passed

[EQ2Alyza]

Yikes...

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-47708144

[Rumbah]

Well, the EU parliament passed it so it's a normal elected parliament. I don't know where that is a dictatorship.
If you don't like what your representatives vote for then let them know by not voting for them again (elections are in the end of may).

And don't get me wrong, I don't like article 13 and 11 at all and all the lobby work that got thrown at it. And if it ends in upload filters for everything I guess the European Court of Justice will have a look at it.
But that's democracy, too. In the end you might get some kind of compromise and something you don't like at all (but most people are ok with).

And if you have a better idea than free, open vote and secret ballot paired with seperation of power...

[Tirlititi]

And if you have a better idea than free, open vote and secret ballot paired with seperation of power...

Let's say... free, open vote and secret ballot on law proposals (instead of being forced to give this power to chosen representatives).
What about it?

[Rumbah]

What about it?

For very selected things I guess.
Else you would have to inform yourself on every single issue and that can be very complex if you, for example, haven't studied law.
Or you have to hear on what the representatives have to say explaining it to you but then they might just lie to you (Brexit, Trump, ...). Or there might be unpopular choices that could be for the greater good (raising taxes for social stuff).

So in an ideal world I'd be totally in but in reality there are some caveats I guess.

[Tirlititi]

You cannot reproach DLPB for not accepting the rules of the democracy and then reply to me that too much democracy would be bad because of how poorly educated the people are. That's a logical flaw

Btw, why would you want to use the expression "for the greater good" that could make you pass for a Harry Potter villain?

[Rumbah]

Ok, I just wanted to say that the statement "The EU is a dictatorship" is wrong. And that's not an opinion, it's just a fact.

The rest was just my opinion. And the law study thing was just an example. I didn't want to say that I think that the people are too stupid at all. It was about the "free, open vote and secret ballot on law proposals" for everything that I think that most people don't want to sit down for hours after work to learn about the new proposals for the week. Just reading and understanding them would take much time.

The governments of some european countries decided it's a good thing to start a common market and they made contracts. They were elected by their people. And my guess is that every change the EU made is in a contract, too, that the participating parties signed. So "leaving" means getting out of a ton of contracts and obligations (e.g. pension rights) that were signed. That means many negotiations in a magnitude not seen before. I don't know how you can solve it another way?
It's not like: "Oh, in 1957 I just wanted a common market and then I just blinked and all these contracts were signed although I didn't want to and everything is complicated now". It's just like it is nowadays, big problems are pretty complex and there won't be easy solutions.

And the laws the EU makes are mostly decided by the parliament that every EU citizen can vote for directly. So the people that decide are from your own country and elected. It's just federalism. And if then politicians blame the EU for anything then most likey their own party voted for it on a EU level (e.g. Article 13 that most of the european conservative parties voted for. So in 2 years the national parties will say: We have no choice, the EU says we must du this while themselves voting for it 2 years ago).


And sorry if some sayings may sound strange, English is not my native language.

[Kaldarasha]

Isn't it ironic to be pro Trump, who forces the EU to increase their budget for the military, but criticising the EU for increasing their military power?

[StickySock]

Isn't it ironic to be pro-EU and criticize America's military expansion and foreign interventions while simultaneously complaining that America no longer pays (as much) for the EU's defense? Isn't it also ironic that the nations of Europe fought two great wars to keep Germany from being in charge, only to give up their national sovereignty without a fight?

[olearyf2525]

Well said. Spengler was right.

Isn't it ironic to be pro-EU and criticize America's military expansion and foreign interventions while simultaneously complaining that America no longer pays (as much) for the EU's defense? Isn't it also ironic that the nations of Europe fought two great wars to keep Germany from being in charge, only to give up their national sovereignty without a fight?

[nfitc1]

...I am fed up of being told people who are pro Trump [..] are under-educated or didn't know what they were voting for.  How patronizing.

Unfortunately, since the 2016 election Americans are just voting for our least-hated politician rather than the one that represents us best. We're picking our preferred flavor of insane. That's my take from the conversations I've had with people. Neither first-party candidate was a desirable option seeing as they are both mentally/emotionally unbalanced in their own special ways. Trump is a compulsive liar and has little respect for the office of president preferring to believe he can run a country like a business. Clinton probably would have had government poking it's fingers in ALL the pots and mismanaging everything it touched.

[LordUrQuan]

Unfortunately, since the 2016 election Americans are just voting for our least-hated politician rather than the one that represents us best.

That's been going on a lot earlier than 2016.  Much of the problem revolves around how the candidates get nominated... they have to pander to their most rabid ideological members in order to secure the nomination, then somehow convince those of us who hate them all that they're somehow "reasonable" and "centrist" enough to deserve our vote more than the other guy (or in 2016, other girl).

[Ansem]

The EU is becoming - and has intentions of being - an empire.

It already is, for all intents and purposes.

Sure, on paper, we have the voting power but don't think for a second the crooked bureaucrats don't have loopholes in the system that allow the same old bastards to remain in power for as long as they choose to.

If the UK finally manages to pack up and gtfo, I congratulate. I wish my country could abandon this diseased ship too, but the problem is we did explicitly join the Union as it stands so we're deeper in the crap. I don't see us getting a fire escape, we'd have to fire and then escape.

[MysticLord]

Is it possible for the EU to have a military that is worth a damn? I can't imagine anyone risking their lives for a bunch of effete paper shufflers, or said shufflers fighting their own wars. Without the USA, Russian tanks could roll into the capital of any Baltic state in 2 days. Probably even with the USA defending.

A EU army seems more for repression of internal expressions of nationalism (Yellow Jackets) than external defense. China does the same thing wrt mass executions of dissidents in different provinces - use military units from other areas. That's a bit paranoid
tbh. Good news for your cranky ursine neighbor, bad news for normal people.

[Rumbah]

Isn't it also ironic that the nations of Europe fought two great wars to keep Germany from being in charge, only to give up their national sovereignty without a fight?

Come on, "keep Germany from being in charge" sounds so nice. At least in WW2 the Germans invaded multiple countries and killed everyone not to their liking (jews, gays, disabled, ...). It was genocide. Not just "I want to tell you what to do".

No.  The US is its own country where its own electorate vote for the people who ultimately rule them - however flawed the system.  The EU is a super state that supersedes actual countries.  It would be like the Supreme Court making a ruling in the US and then the EU overruling it.

In the EU you vote for the people who rule you, too, the EU parliament. And you could argue that in the US it's similar as you vote your state government and for your USA government in Washington. There are things that Washington can decide and the states have to follow (there are even things that the president alone can decide without any vote). And there are things the states decide for their own. And I guess there's even a smaller division like county or city. Federalism.

The EU is becoming - and has intentions of being - an empire.  There's a very big difference. You're comparing night to day.

Imperialism is something different. If it would be an Empire it would be, e.g. Greece decides everything that's done in the EU. One country to influence/rule them all.

But you've got double standards since it's a socialist left dictatorship.

Again, that's wrong, it is no dictatorship. Free elections and alternation of power. It can be improved, yes, but it is not a dictatorship.

[Rumbah]

I'm not arguing a political opinion. You can have any opinion you like. For me this was mainly about a statement that was false and I wanted to correct it.

There are scientific criteria to those political/economic terms and "the EU is a dictatorship" is just wrong.
What you described there in your problem with the EU is federalism to me. And if you don't like federalism, fine by me. But it's not a dictatorship. Just like vaccination doesn't cause autism, the WHO's suggested thresholds are not completely arbitrary and the earth is not flat.

On a political point of view thing I think I don't your understand the argumentation. If the EU laws didn't supersede the local laws then I don't see the sense in EU legislation at all. If every country can do what it wants and ignore the EU stuff to their liking wouldn't it be the same "chaos" as without the EU? Or is that the point, that we don't need the EU?

[olearyf2525]

Edit: Not worth arguing with clowns who would defend these articles and the decrepit leftist boomers and Capitalist/Communist usurious systems who created them.

[StickySock]

Come on, "keep Germany from being in charge" sounds so nice. At least in WW2 the Germans invaded multiple countries and killed everyone not to their liking (jews, gays, disabled, ...). It was genocide. Not just "I want to tell you what to do"

"Come on" proceeded by facts that everyone knows = best argument.

"just 'I want to tell you what to do" - is everything. You don't get to kill those who are not to your liking without having the power to "tell you what to do". Sovereignty is everything. If you disagree, then await your inevitable "othering" via tribalism (or other derivations) and extermination just in the ways you have listed as examples from WW2.

[-Ric-]

Isn't it also ironic that the nations of Europe fought two great wars to keep Germany from being in charge, only to give up their national sovereignty without a fight?

This is a sad truth.

[LordUrQuan]

If you are part of the EU, you have to obey their laws. If your country law conflicts with the EU - your law has to be amended. ... The EU supersede your laws.

I'm still trying to figure out how that happened... last I looked Europe (the continent) was made up of some 20 different countries (well, states, but using that term here would confuse most of my American brethren), each sovereign and separate.  Some (like Germany) are federal unions just like the US, while others (e.g. Liechtenstein) have just a single government.  But the part that gets me is where people vote for their local and national stuff, and that's all fine and dandy. And while the nationals figured unifying certain things (common currency, Schengen cross-border travel w/o visa headaches, etc.) made pretty good sense, I'm pretty sure nobody ever asked for a political union to supersede their national sovereignty.  Which, from what little our addled mass media has fed us, seems to be the chip on the UK's shoulder... Brussels telling London what's best for London.

[LeonhartGR]

"Arguing while using memes" reference
Senator Mike Lee opens up about the Green New Deal

[[email protected]]

"Arguing with memes" reference
Senator Mike Lee opens up about the Green New Deal

Is this a new form of Chewbacca Defense? XD

[MysticLord]

This current stalemate is caused because neither party wants to leave the EU and because they don't want to carry the can for cancelling Brexit and denying the majority 17 million Leave vote that WON. And they have no way to squirm out of it with a soundbite - like they usually do. The entire nation knows we're being betrayed and that democracy is a sham, If I could vote a blood thirsty killer to execute every last one of them, I would.

Do what we do in the USA, send reality TV clowns into office until the globalist "elites" (parasitic paper-pushing weenies) take a hint. Mockery is more potent than violence in today's world. Calling someone a nerd and giving them a verbal wedgie while you stuff them into a rhetorical locker will bring more popular support to your side than random massacres.

With popular support you can do anything.

My advice to you is to take hints from Tucker Carlson and start a YouTube channel. Be thorough, be careful, cite your sources, and turn that rage to useful ends.

[MysticLord]

Maybe God will take pity on you and send the Russians to rule over you, as payback for the Crimean war. Couldn't be worse than the current government.

[Covarr]

NOPE. NOT DOING THIS.

I swear, I take a couple of days off...