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Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#611

Post by amusedcyclist »

spoils19 wrote: post #592
amusedcyclist wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Her policies were terrible. Gutting the tax base, subsidizing energy demand in an inflationary environment. Almost all conservative policies are terrible but these ones were so bad that there was a run on the pound. I'm glad you're not running the country i live in

> Almost all conservative policies are terrible This seems hyperbolic and doesn't really fit with the HN guidelines. As most HN commenters lean conservative, I recommend reading the room first. In addition, every leader on the world stage enact primarily conservative policy because it's effective. While there are some outliers, it's easy to see just from reading the news and listening to independent thinkers what the…

HN does lean conservative, I don't. Are you telling me I shouldn't express my views on here because people would disagree with me ? "In addition, every leader on the world stage enact primarily conservative policy because it's effective". Do you have any sort of proof for this claim ? Who are the supposed "independent thinkers" you listen to ?

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#612

Post by fomine3 »

kergonath wrote: post #605
Macha wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The public in public houses presumably comes from the fact that they're open to the public to enter. There's obviously the implied need to buy something if you spend a length of time there, but compare to a private house (I.e. a residence) where the public does not by default have permission to enter.

It’s the same thing in all cases: the meaning is in general “open to the general public”, often by opposition to what came before or what was the norm at the time (private schools, private salons, and unlisted companies respectively; in all cases you needed to get invited or accepted somehow and entry was restricted). The issue is that language drifted and now “public” generally means “owned by the public” rather tha…

It's like "open system" isn't so open compared to current "open source system". It was open compared to mainframes.

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#613

Post by smegger001 »

brnt wrote: post #430
cameronh90 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For all parliament's faults, it's still largely populated by well educated, intelligent individuals who are skilled orators and debaters. Even some of the most awful parliamentarians would easily talk circles around me in any kind of debate. For anyone not aware, a large number of our politicians come from a background at public schools such as Eton, and read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Oxford. Institutions…

> skilled orators and debaters. I don't think this is quite the benefit some think it is.

Socrates would agree with you on that. he thought rhetoric was a bad thing because it could be used to argue against reason and ethical good.

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#614

Post by random314 »

rayiner wrote: post #530
rootusrootus wrote: post #517

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making abortion an effective wedge issue was an excellent strategy by the GOP, no doubt. And continuing to pursue gun control is an unforced error on the part of the Democrats (though they eased off quite a bit on that starting with Obama, to be fair). IMO the Democrats would have been better off focusing most of their effort on something like single payer health care, along with minimum wage and housing affordabilit…

> Making abortion an effective wedge issue was an excellent strategy by the GOP, no doubt. Calling abortion a “wedge issue” leads you to thinking about it the wrong way. Sure, democrats say abortion is an unimportant distraction the GOP likes to trot out—but only insofar as everyone unilaterally accepts their position on it. They certainly didn’t treat it that way when Roe was repealed. There’s no “wedge issues.” The…

> There’s no “wedge issues.” The electorate cares about what it cares about.

Aka, propaganda doesn't actually exist. At the very least, my team doesn't do it.

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#615

Post by mannykannot »

iLoveOncall wrote: post #217
castis wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Legitimate only means that the :rules: were followed and nothing more. It does not mean that the rules or the system they reside in are just.

I never claimed otherwise. I just answered to the comment stating that she was illigetimally in her position, as if the UK was a dictatorship, which isn't the case.

The word legitimacy can be interpreted in either a normative way or a “positive” (see positivism) way. The first meaning refers to political philosophy and deals with questions such as: What are the right sources of legitimacy? Is a specific political order or regime worthy of recognition? As such, legitimacy is a classic topic of political philosophy.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/legitimacy

While I agree with you that it would be incorrect to baldly dismiss Truss' premiership as illegitimate, I feel that uniqueuid's comment was using the term according to the above usage, suggesting, perhaps, that the law of the land is anachronistic, or less than optimal according to democratic principles.

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#616

Post by rayiner »

random314 wrote: post #614
rayiner wrote: post #530

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Making abortion an effective wedge issue was an excellent strategy by the GOP, no doubt. Calling abortion a “wedge issue” leads you to thinking about it the wrong way. Sure, democrats say abortion is an unimportant distraction the GOP likes to trot out—but only insofar as everyone unilaterally accepts their position on it. They certainly didn’t treat it that way when Roe was repealed. There’s no “wedge issues.” The…

> There’s no “wedge issues.” The electorate cares about what it cares about. Aka, propaganda doesn't actually exist. At the very least, my team doesn't do it.

Thinking your political opponents are duped by propaganda just means you lack the ability to think outside your bubble and understand people who have different values and priorities. Certainly abortion views are not the result of GOP propaganda, seeing as how it’s illegal in two dozen countries across Europe, Asia, and Africa, and the subject of careful compromises in all but a few liberal democracies. (Views on immigration, same sex marriage, multiculturalism, etc., aren’t the product of “propaganda” either. Most people in my home country of Bangladesh would agree with the GOP on all those issues—especially if the shoe were on the other foot and you were talking about e.g. hearing people speak foreign languages in Dhaka—but they certainly don’t have positive views of the GOP itself.)

This myopia is a great shortcoming of democrats (of the last 20 years—the party used to be savvier in the past), because it leads them to believe that politics is about lecturing and badgering, instead of building coalitions of people who agree more than they disagree.

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#617

Post by smugma »

cameronh90 wrote: post #245
hairofadog wrote: post #90

I know this topic is important in substance and the thing I'm about to say is an aesthetic issue, but as an American watching this unfold I have admired the Brits for the sense of heart that still seems to be present in their politics. I'm referring to the parliamentary sessions in which, even though they're savagely roasting each other, they're doing in a way that feels somehow good-hearted and doesn't lay bare the…

For all parliament's faults, it's still largely populated by well educated, intelligent individuals who are skilled orators and debaters. Even some of the most awful parliamentarians would easily talk circles around me in any kind of debate. For anyone not aware, a large number of our politicians come from a background at public schools such as Eton, and read Philosophy, Politics and Economics at Oxford. Institutions…

The book “Chums” is about how UK politics is dominated by PPE majors from Oxford (and frequently Eton or similar before).

In addition to being out of touch and classist, a main thesis of the book is that Oxonians learn “to write and speak for a living without much knowledge”. This worked well for England for hundreds of years but more recently has led to disaster where actual knowledge and expertise matter eg implications of Brexit, pandemic response, etc.

Review: https://amp.theguardian.com/books/2022/may/01/chums-how-a-ti...

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#618

Post by chx »

reducesuffering wrote: post #566
chx wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> hatred that seems to be all we have left in the USA. UK and USA, they make a very interesting pair https://eand.co/how-america-collapsed-and-became-a-fourth-wo... > Both nations, too, now, are nasty places . They feel so markedly different than the great social democracies of Western Europe and Canada. The atmosphere and mood are ones of constant, omnipresent hostility — to everyone, from everyone

That’s a lot of poetic words to poorly explain why 4x as many Canadians choose to immigrate to the US than US to Canada…

There was this song a few years ago...

https://youtu.be/9yv_rl3MYKA

> everything is fine if you are a straight white male muggle

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#619

Post by roflyear »

rsynnott wrote: post #304
Symmetry wrote: post #238

1) I really like that in the UK system if the leader is crazy the party can just kick them to the curb rather than basically having to support them even when they do terrible things. 2) The US system of open primaries where anybody can vote that we adopted in the 70s seems like a mistake in retrospect and there's a good reason no other country does things this way. The UK Conservative party's system, adopted in the 2…

US parties _can_ do that, too (and notably did with Nixon). The refusal to do it with Trump was a moral failing of the Republican leadership, not an inherent systemic limitation.

Does it matter? It will never happen again in the US.

Re: Liz Truss resigns as UK prime minister

#620

Post by mcv »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #587
mcv wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you've got that exactly backwards. Parliament is the representation. Because of proportional representation, parliament represents all groups in the country, and not merely the majorities in each district.

What? Parliaments obviously cannot represent every group within any given country. For example, non-residents, tourists, diplomats, etc..

You're right. Parliament represents only the entire electorate. And only really those opinions that are shared by enough people to be worth an entire seat. Still, it's far better representation than you get in a district system, where only local majorities of the electorate in each district are represented.
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