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Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

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Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#111

Post by RandomName2020 »

Synaesthesia wrote: post #99
adrianratnapala wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are advantages and disadvantages to all systems. In European PR systems where many parties routinely end up in parliament, the real governing is done by elites stiching up a deal between themselves and all the proportinal voting just slightly alters the barganing chips brought to the table. The biggest case of this is Germany, which will be ruled by the grand-coalition for the forseeable future, more or less re…

To be honest, it's quite similar in the US too. That's why there isn't much difference between the Obama administration and the previous Bush administration - there was a real continuity in most respects. And even if Trump got elected, not much would change either.

Dunno, if "drain the swamp" passes, that'de be a very significant change.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#112

Post by RandomName2020 »

Synaesthesia wrote: post #99
adrianratnapala wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are advantages and disadvantages to all systems. In European PR systems where many parties routinely end up in parliament, the real governing is done by elites stiching up a deal between themselves and all the proportinal voting just slightly alters the barganing chips brought to the table. The biggest case of this is Germany, which will be ruled by the grand-coalition for the forseeable future, more or less re…

To be honest, it's quite similar in the US too. That's why there isn't much difference between the Obama administration and the previous Bush administration - there was a real continuity in most respects. And even if Trump got elected, not much would change either.

Dunno, if "drain the swamp" passes, that'de be a very significant change.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#113

Post by RandomName2020 »

jacquesm wrote: post #46
kahrkunne wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dutch here. We need at least 5 parties to make a government in the next election. Nothing ever changes here because everything has to go through many iterations of compromises if it even wants to leave the negotiation table. I wish we had a system like the USA.

> Nothing ever changes here because everything has to go through many iterations of compromises if it even wants to leave the negotiation table. That's a feature, not a bug. > I wish we had a system like the USA. You are missing the wood for the trees. The last thing you want in a country is an effective government that can push through it's majority agenda at the expense of the minority. That's why EU countries are…

> EU countries are as a rule quite far ahead on the curve of progress, see: abortion

EU (esp. Scandinavia) has much, much more tight regulations of abortion, compared to English world, esp. Canada, which has none. As a socially conservative I consider this good.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#114

Post by poshli »

hfsktr wrote: post #103
poshli wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The PP is a fringe radical party that if they somehow become the majority party in Iceland, they're not going to retain it for very long. I would not recommend that famous dissidents like Snowden move there immediately. I like visiting Iceland too, the few Icelanders I know can't wait to move though. The winter weather and high price of everything is a bit of a drag. I am not an expert on Iceland but I have read that…

Since you said flights were so cheap I got a bit curious and did a search for a 7 day trip (admittedly from the airport near, which is small). I was not expecting the drastic difference in prices there though. http://matrix.itasoftware.com/ To: KEF, RKV March 1 2017, 7 days Unlimited stops/airport changes. http://imgur.com/a/X3KYr Some of those flights are ridiculously cheap though so you were right.

The flight cost is almost negligible!

British Airways, and possibly other airlines, offer packages where you do a short layover in Keflavik or Reykjavik, then they provide you transportation to Blue Lagoon, then get you to your plane from Blue Lagoon.

Hotel and Airbnb and hostel costs are very high compared to everywhere else in the world.

Last time I went, I brought a small tent.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#115

Post by poshli »

nols wrote: post #15
jaza wrote: post #8

Could Iceland become the first country in the world to adopt Bitcoin (or an alternative crypto) as its national currency? If the Pirate Party wins, this could be one of the numerous cool experiments in government to take place.

Bitcoin can't handle the number of transactions required. It's simply not technically possible for the blockchain to be used as a country's (or medium sized city's) primary currency.

I'm a crypto currency hater, but there are other types of crypto coin that reach consensus in seconds.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#116

Post by adrianratnapala »

Synaesthesia wrote: post #99
adrianratnapala wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are advantages and disadvantages to all systems. In European PR systems where many parties routinely end up in parliament, the real governing is done by elites stiching up a deal between themselves and all the proportinal voting just slightly alters the barganing chips brought to the table. The biggest case of this is Germany, which will be ruled by the grand-coalition for the forseeable future, more or less re…

To be honest, it's quite similar in the US too. That's why there isn't much difference between the Obama administration and the previous Bush administration - there was a real continuity in most respects. And even if Trump got elected, not much would change either.

But I am talking about a different thing.

In any place where the big parties are old and "respectable", there will be a lot of similarities between them. But even if they are identical, they still compete with each other for power.

In a PR system, they compete less intensely. Indeed in Germany, with Merkel so firmly on top, the SPD leadership seems to be evolving to maximise its power as #2 rather than trying to win outright.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#117

Post by gpvos »

euroclydon wrote: post #98
rayiner wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also incorrect to assert Europe is more progressive on abortion. Europe's two largest countries, Germany and France, only permit abortion during the first trimester (12-14 weeks), and have mandatory counseling. Germany has a 3-day waiting period, and France had a one-week waiting period until last year. The Supreme Court threw out Arkansas's 12-week abortion law earlier this year. Two states have 20-week bans, a…

Europe might be more progressive on abortion. Ever notice the rhetoric on the "rare" part of "safe, legal and rare" is entirely limited to preventing unwanted pregnancies? Presumably abortions should be rare because they are intrinsically bad in some way. We use the tax system to influence all kind of behaviors, many of them health related, but we're not willing to use the tax system to make abortions more rare...

Using the tax system to discourage abortions must be the worst idea I ever heard.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#118

Post by euroclydon »

gpvos wrote: post #117
euroclydon wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Europe might be more progressive on abortion. Ever notice the rhetoric on the "rare" part of "safe, legal and rare" is entirely limited to preventing unwanted pregnancies? Presumably abortions should be rare because they are intrinsically bad in some way. We use the tax system to influence all kind of behaviors, many of them health related, but we're not willing to use the tax system to make abortions more rare...

Using the tax system to discourage abortions must be the worst idea I ever heard.

Why? We discourage smoking with the tax system. And I'm not talking about a regressive tax, like on smoking. It can be purely for rich healthy women.

If abortion should be rare, than why not tax it.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#119

Post by belorn »

mattferderer wrote: post #104
nomercy400 wrote: post #71

"They know what they’re against. But it’s difficult to find out what they’re really for." Well, reading what the Pirate Party wants to be, it makes sense they don't have things to be 'for'. They want to give the people more room to decide. The pirates just want to give the people that space. They don't care about all the topics traditional politics discuss and promote. They just want the people have have more of a sa…

The more I've tried to learn about issues, the more I've learned that they are often very complicated & require a lot of research. I feel this is to hard & time consuming for the average citizen. Electing people to represent your interests makes more & more sense to me every day. I do wish they were more open & transparent though in an easy to understand & honest method. Unfortunately it seems that is very difficult…

Representative democracy would work much better without lobbyist that, for reason that should be discussed, are represented much more than voters. Like the Utopian dream of communism, Representative democracy that actually represent their citizens seems to be one of those government types that people talk about but never actually achieve.

Take copyright law (since this is about the pirate party). were your interest represented when the elected people let Disney lobbyist buy a law that extended copyright? Somehow, a company that "give" millions to a political party is not a bribing and completely not doing so with any expectation of returns. One could ask why they spend those money, or why historically it is so effective to spend so much totally-not-a-bribe money.

From the representative politician view, issues are often very complicated & require a lot of research, which is too hard and time consuming. Easier to just choose the highest paying lobbyist and have them decide for you. That way, you picked the politician, and they picked the lobbyist, and the lobbyist decide the law.

Re: Iceland, a land of Vikings, braces for a Pirate Party takeover

#120

Post by dagurp »

avar wrote: post #86
dagurp wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a lot of negativity among young adults here in Iceland. I can understand them to some extent because housing has become insanely expensive because of inflation, lack of new housing and airbnb companies. What I don't undestand is the "everything is terrible" attitude that's been so poisonous in recent year. Yes, we have bad weather and most of our politicians are hopeless but it's always been like that. The gr…

As an Icelander living abroad for almost a decade now, if you think the grass isn't greener or the other side how do you explain the rapid increase in Icelanders who are expats over the last decade? Are all these people just wrong in thinking they've found a better live abroad?

Plenty of people have left and found a better life, I'm not trying to say otherwise. I just hate it when people use the weather and the government as reasons to move because every country has its problems. A large number of Icelanders move to another country sometime during their lifetimes but a large percentage of them move back at some point. That tells me that maybe things aren't so bad over here.
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