Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World • Hacker News Board

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#111

Post by distances » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:36 PM UTC

douche wrote: post #90

rsp1984 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a huge influx of refugees was a risk they took knowingly, and that I feel it is only responsible to deal with. Yes and since you mention responsibilities for destabilization, I would find it appropriate if the US felt some of it too. How many Syrian refugees have they accepted so far? 10k? It's pathetic, given that Europe is absorbing 100x or 200x the amount. I'd suggest that the Nobel-peace-prize-winning US presiden…

Maybe Europe should close the floodgates themselves, rather than bitch about we who have been struck by the lightning bolt of sense.

"Floodgates" isn't really the appropriate terminology when you're talking about refugees escaping a war zone for their lives.

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#112

Post by known » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:37 PM UTC

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pegida

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#113

Post by kuschku » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:37 PM UTC

zo1 wrote: post #87

newjersey wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a common solution I'm sorry for my naivety but what does that mean? I've heard this so many times. Do they want German troops on their borders? Do they want to sit back and relax while Germany feeds, clothes, and shelters their troops and law enforcement? Now, a common solution for the refugee crisis is not possible because the problem is not the refugee crisis. The problem is that the EU is TOO WEAK. Perhaps a nai…

At the very least, have a vetting + tracking implemention at the outer borders. As far as I can tell they had and did nothing . They had no plan, no structures in place, no way to track migrants entering Europe, nothing. That is just asking for chaos, trouble, and pissed off groups of local people. Basically, all I see is a blanket "let's open the borders" call, that allowed people to simply cross a border. It render…

The EU had a common border agency system for many years, had a way to track migrants, and had structures for this.

Yet they failed in late 2014, because Greece couldn't continue funding the Greek part of them anymore, and refused funding from Germany for them (because Germany said they'd only fund Greek border guard if they'd be replaced with FRONTEX officers).

That finally happened in late 2015.

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#114

Post by CM30 » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:37 PM UTC

lostlogin wrote: post #11

dschiptsov wrote: post #3

Why should people trust any government in the first place? Governments nowadays came to replace institutions of organized religions as the way to gain a high social status and security, and hence became as bloated, inefficient and corrupted as old, unreformed churches of the past. No sane people would 'trust' such social formations which sole purpose is self preservation and parasitic growth.

I think you need to look at "Churches of the past" a little harder. Churches had their time and while we haven't managed to get rid of them yet, we are a lot better of with a separation between them and the state.

What about outside the US, where there is no seperation of Church and State?

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#115

Post by marknutter » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:37 PM UTC

Throwaway23412 wrote: post #62

retrogradeorbit wrote: post #6

In my opinion this is the inevitable political crisis that unrestrained neoliberalism has lead us to. [ https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/31/witnes... ] I'd say this is the end of the ideology but I'm too much of a realist and I expect the powers that be to now double down on it and then try and profit from it all going up in flames. (But please don't assume I am some kind of socialist/anti-capitalis…

This coincides with a podcast interview I listened to with a renowned CPA. He said that the existing tax code in the U.S. is set almost entirely to incentivize growth, entrepreneurship, and investment. So, the tax code is full of all kinds of breaks for employers, job creators, investors, owners of assets, etc. The tax rate on most long-term capital gains is significantly less than income tax. Salaried individuals be…

But we do want growth. Would you prefer the opposite – stagnation? How's that working out for Europe? "Trickle-down economics" was never an actual concept. It was a silly characterization of policies that favored keeping corporate taxes low in the name of encouraging capital investment and it's been responsible for the strength of our economy over the past 40 years.

Everyone loves to rail against wealth inequality (talk about populism...) but nobody ever explains why wealth inequality is so bad. So the 1% has a large concentration of the wealth. If we took all their money and distributed it evenly among all citizens it would barely move the needle in terms of living standards. Someone having 1000 times more money than you doesn't really affect you. In fact, that money is likely floating around the economic system anyways in the form of investments.

Asking that the government liberate that money – which in terms of total tax revenue is a rounding error – does not seem like a good policy given how incompetent the government has proven itself to be when spending the money it already collects. I'd rather there be a few fat-cats sitting on yachts doing nothing (which is better than bombing brown people or spying on me) and have a Bill Gates and Elan Musk actually tackling important problems than have no fat-cats at all and a slightly larger government making all the same mistakes they make today with no visionary capitalists to speak of. Call me crazy.

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#116

Post by internaut » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:37 PM UTC

conanbatt wrote: post #56

retrogradeorbit wrote: post #6

In my opinion this is the inevitable political crisis that unrestrained neoliberalism has lead us to. [ https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/31/witnes... ] I'd say this is the end of the ideology but I'm too much of a realist and I expect the powers that be to now double down on it and then try and profit from it all going up in flames. (But please don't assume I am some kind of socialist/anti-capitalis…

If I were to make a broad connection between the lack of trust in government, I would attribute it to the aging of the democratic institution. In the last 15 years, scandals around voting have been huge in many elections, and the advance of technology is making how the politicians run look antiquated and unrepresentative. I think this is more of a general response against governments who don't have the capacity to fu…

> Milton friedman would have said to let the banks fail, but the governments didn't, and that expectation is one of the causes cited for banks taking such large risks.

This can't be repeated enough. The banks should have bit the dust. A great many pensioners and households would have suffered, but then the government could have introduced emergency bankruptcy laws and ameliorated the worst of it. The crash would have provided its own antidote.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/viewpoints/analysis/bankruptcy-...

In my country every person I ever talked to was against the bank bailouts. Democracy didn't happen here and neither did capitalism. That's the inconvenient reality for the left and right. Their old enemies aren't to blame. What we have is a failure of governance, not ideology.

The European Union officials were right behind the government in this. We actually have phone recordings of corrupt bankers describing manipulating idiot government officials.

http://www.thejournal.ie/the-anglo-tapes-9-jaw-dropping-quot...

Then later the EU forced the debt down our throats. With friends like this...

I'd like to know what the leftist solution is to that. We can't replace unelected officials. Because they seem to just go back to their hobby horse of blaming the capitalism ideology for this.

One capitalist solution would be to get rid of central bank controlled interest rates. The governance problem remains unsolved though and all this could basically happen again.

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#117

Post by kuschku » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:41 PM UTC

venomsnake wrote: post #52

Noseshine wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But in the UK (see: brexit) and in the USA (see: Trump) > there definitely is a populist shift in progress. In Germany too, at least partially: The right-wing and very new "AfD", a relative newcomer, now has almost 1/10th of the votes (depending when you take the poll, results fluctuate).

Out of EU immigration (intra -EU too, but it is a bit subdued) is of great concern to great many people. Since the AfD is the only German party willing to listen about said concerns - you can safely assume they will become more popular.

That's not even true.

Not a single German party has been pro out-EU immigration. Not a single one.

In fact, the current government even made it harder for asylum seekers to stay, or bring their family, and expects to deport the majority of them in less than 3 years.

Please read the official parliamentary protocols, and not the very wrong spin the media put on it.

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#118

Post by wallace_f » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:42 PM UTC

kuschku wrote: post #108

wallace_f wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Ah, one of those comments. Please don't be condescending and derisive in your argument if you politically disagree with them. I'm sick of seeing that, and it's almost always not productive in an ethical way. Everyone has the right to be heard and share their opinion. If you are right, then you can win your argument on its merits, not on how you frame your opponent.

The other comment was condescending and name-calling - this one was just pointing that out.

So don't diminish your own argument by dropping to their level.

What is the condescending insult you're referring to by the way? Lefties?

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#119

Post by keithpeter » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:42 PM UTC

mrmffh wrote: post #16

jacquesm wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latest plan seems to be to cut corporate taxes to try to stop the larger companies from leaving the UK, and possibly to attract new ones. The race to the bottom started with Ireland, suggestions are to cut the tax to 15% in the rest of the UK, with some voices pushing for 10% or even 5% corporate tax. Of course this has nothing to do with using the opportunity created by the brexit power vacuum to reward some spe…

Race to the bottom (i.e. competition) is a good thing, it reduces waste and inefficiency.

Back to OA and my UK perspective. You've seen the reaction to the mild austerity (compared to, say, Greece or even Spain) in the Brexit vote. Go too far down the 'race to the bottom' thing and you'll see a lot more reacting. There are political limits and neo-libralism is only one possible perspective, not a natural law.

Re: Trust in Government Is Collapsing Around the World

#120

Post by DanBC » Mon, Jul 04, 2016, 1:42 PM UTC

tomp wrote: post #98

DanBC wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But look at eg Cornwall, who voted to leave and then realised it would mean losing a bunch of EU funding. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/brexit-cornwa... https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jun/26/cornwall-fea...

Or maybe, they want out of the EU, but retain the level of funding they get (which should result in lower costs for the UK government, which was a net payer to the EU)?!

But Leave promised all of that money to the NHS. Were they lying when they did so?

http://imgur.com/indvx6a