What's Going on in Europe

Topic: What's Going on in Europe (Read 257055 times)

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #925 – 2017-09-29, 14:39:14

Mapping Where Europe's Population Is Moving, Aging, and Finding Work

London is currently the youngest capital region in the EU. With Brexit, that will change to Copenhagen.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #926 – 2017-09-29, 18:06:21

Quote from: jax on 2017-09-09, 11:39:19

Emmanuel Macron, in Greece, Calls for ‘Rebuilding’ E.U.

That would require letting Greece and others go bankrupt and start again, what with them having to have the Euro and all.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #927 – 2017-09-29, 22:51:29

There are some in Greece who feel they would be better out but the shambles is becoming routine in the country and anyway the EU on finance is not that great is it? In additino it's finances each year never get cleared when the books are done.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #928 – 2017-09-30, 05:41:14

Greece may not be the issue. It will be a measure of relative power if any reform will be for the EU as a whole or for the Eurozone. France would prefer the latter, but not Germany. The countries in the EU that are not in the Eurozone are: Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden, Four of these eight are neighbours of Germany. None of these eight are neighbours of France.

Of the original ~~twelve~~ eleven EU members, only Denmark is not in the Eurozone. Founding members are bold (only West Germany was among those six). Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain ~~and United Kingdom~~. In addition Austria, (Greek) Cyprus, Malta, the three Baltic countries, Slovakia and Slovenia are in the Eurozone.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #929 – 2017-10-01, 00:10:33

Well I am glad we are at long last getting out of the EU.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #930 – 2017-10-03, 06:26:15

Macron visited Tallinn Old Town. His main purpose was a date with Merkel.

Estonia is currently chairing the EU.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #931 – 2017-10-05, 01:33:02

All this European thing of kissing and cuddling we are damn stuck with.It doesn't matter who is "running" Europe the system is a farce and still in economic woes.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #932 – 2017-10-08, 12:24:51

Catalonia is a complex problem for me.
At one hand, anything bad for Spain is good for us but at the other hand I can't support such an imbecility and have to stand for Filipe VI.

Well, it's not the first time Madrid gets our help.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #933 – 2017-10-09, 01:31:40

King Filipe VI was right and I think that the idea of independence is wrong. Although the area might be comfortable financially a number of financial ones are planning to move if they go ahead with this daft attempt at separation.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #934 – 2017-10-09, 23:45:21

Quote from: rjhowie on 2017-10-09, 01:31:40

King Filipe VI was right and I think that the idea of independence is wrong.

Are you Catalan or Spaniard at least? In the meantime I even start wondering if you are a Scot.

It's funny or rather sad how in the past, the EU was actively promoting the split-up of a state (Yugoslavia) when it fitted its interests by referring to the right to self-determination for every nation. For Catalans this right doesn't exist anymore, period.
Instead, our brought into line mainstream is feeding us with fake news.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #935 – 2017-10-10, 00:56:53

Yep krake, I am a scot and a Scottish Unionist and have no time for the would-be Brigadoons who want independence her which isn't going to happen! The Scottish Nationalists lost MP's to the Labour Party but the Conservatives did even better with the Liberal Democrats getting a small improvement. Even in the last Local Town Council elections the Scots Tories (Conservatives dear ex-colonist) swooped right across Scotland. The nats were always rubbishing the Tories yet that corner did so walloping well in local and nationally. Anyway there is another area in Spain mumbling about independence. Watching interviews on Channel 4 think it was here the parties interviewed in the streets of Barcelona were leftist.

Anyway I am glad we are heading out of the EU as it was a controlling nonsense thing and President Obama should have kept his damn nose out of the process. The European union is only partly democratic and is an economic failure a matter that has been running for several years now. Each year when the books are being checked f or being balanced they cannot complete it and that is a damnable disgrace.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #936 – 2017-10-10, 09:04:19

The predominant diplomatic principle is fait accompli.

Of course it's up to Spain to decide whether Catalonia should be independent or not. By the look of it the ruling PP coalition is of the opinion that Catalonia should be independent, at least they act that way. Bit like the Scots, the Catalans seem lukewarm about independence, so it is up to the Madrid government to stoke up the fires. Rajoy too shall pass, and overall the Catalans seem comfortable.

The EU wasn't much involved in Yugoslavia, nor in Czechoslovakia, until it reached the fait accompli stage. Some EU members were more proactive, but basically it was a post-communist power struggle unlikely to be resolved in any other way.

Many, Americans in particular, have a romantic view of the rebel. It's better for the self-image to look at their founding fathers as rebels rather than as traitors. Then again, most coutries are founded on treason, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia inclusive, at the cost of millions of lives in WWI. Had they lost, they would have died as traitors. They didn't, so fait accompli.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #937 – 2017-10-10, 23:11:40

Nonsense.

Catalonia is not some kind of another Portugal able to defeat Leon and Castille (Madrid) continually for more than one thousand years.
Catalonia will never be independent.

Catalonia is a product of EU funds injected by Madrid to them, they will collapse the moment the funds and companies, both industrial and financial, leaves the place. As it happens right now.
Bye bye "independence".

A collapsing Spain is too much good to be true. And at the same time the biggest danger and horror Europe has ever faced.
Better to keep it as it is.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #938 – 2017-10-11, 02:06:19

The Catalan thing is a damnable farce. Te "referendum turnout was 40% of the population and even with 90% of that turnout is not a basis for anything. The financial corner has said they will leave the place if it continues this departing nonsense. On top of that I do not think the media reporting is very positive either. Channels with people over there to do interviews especially with politicians tend to yak to the nationalist lot and virtually ignore the other side who want to stay in Spain. That is a built-in bias from tv reporters. One passing tv report showed the local parliament in session and the want out lot were clapping on the move against Spain but the other side sat quite so do they not count??

Another ridiculous report from here in GB was that the SNP were coming out supporting the illegal referendum and ignoring the fact about percentages. I wouldn't put that lot in charge of anything not even a public toilet. Spain is right not to lie down.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #939 – 2017-10-11, 10:17:21

Always "for" the indigenous peoples, eh, RJ?

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #940 – 2017-10-12, 01:16:10

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #941 – 2017-10-13, 00:40:57

We'll see what happens… Spain sided with Hitler, way back when. (Of course, you sided with the communists. didn't you?

) The Catalans aren't really indigenous: They've only been there for all of recorded history! They need to be pets of the multicultural globalist cabal, to get street cred! Right.
You have your own opinions, RJ. But owing to a lack of intelligence which likely led to your lack of education, you can't support them with argument.

Do you even know why some Scots want to leave the union?
I doubt it.
Likewise, I doubt you ken nor care why Catalans want to secede from Spain.

History is -for you- a nondescript book that mentions relatives you never knew, and would likely spit on you — for the obvious reasons.

I'm interested in what happens in Spain: I suspect that I have two children traveling through…

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #942 – 2017-10-13, 06:12:20

Quote from: jax on 2017-10-10, 09:04:19

Many, Americans in particular, have a romantic view of the rebel. It's better for the self-image to look at their founding fathers as rebels rather than as traitors. Then again, most coutries are founded on treason, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia inclusive, at the cost of millions of lives in WWI. Had they lost, they would have died as traitors. They didn't, so fait accompli.

Speaking of traitors and rebels, I’ve always found it most amusing, particularly since the debate over Confederate monuments continues to rage, that the descendants of dear victors in the US Civil War brand loads of descendants of Southerners from the CW as “traitors” for having an affinity for anything to do with the South in the CW.

For instance, I enjoy hearing the song “Dixie Land” from time to time. In this era of goddamned hipsters, I have actually been called a traitor as such.

I point out that the term traitor is subjective, and as such, use the example you use above for the Revolutionary War. I also point out that in the RW, one of the issues fought over, was the main issue fought over in the CW, only in the RW, Yankees were fighting to preserve that most despicable and abhorrent institution.

[/video] http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5HeZtFH1Trg [video]

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #943 – 2017-10-13, 20:10:46

The UK has a new enemy.
Chancellor Philip Hammond calls Brussels "the enemy".

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #944 – 2017-10-13, 20:30:44

May I say in passing Colonel, I pointed out a wee while back that Washington was a slave man and so was the leading light in the preparing of the Constitution and he also had relations with female ones. Lincoln was a two-faced sly man who made it plain in private circles that blacks were not to be given too much of a push in the US. Leading up the war slaves were often imported in the North! So it is rather ludicrous of people to condemn the CSA and that is that- as if the North was so damn virtuous! General Lee was a greatly principled man and was loved by those he led and his statues should have been damn well left alone. T have the South picked on regarding black people is so two-faced. as well when one considers the way they were treated i the union Army and after the Civil War. Three out of three for "Dixie" by the way.......

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #945 – 2017-10-22, 00:41:52

Quote from: rjhowie on 2017-10-13, 12:30:44

Washington was a slave man and so was the leading light in the preparing of the Constitution and he also had relations with female ones

As always, RJ, you know so little fact that even your jibes ring hollow: Jefferson had nothing to do with preparing our constitution; he was away in France as our ambassador at the time…

But as Knute Rockne said, "Most men, when they think they're thinking, are only rearranging their prejudices."

Speaking of which:

Quote

A new German law introducing state censorship on social media platforms came into effect on October 1, 2017. The new law requires social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, to censor their users on behalf of the German state. Social media companies are obliged to delete or block any online "criminal offenses" such as libel, slander, defamation or incitement, within 24 hours of receipt of a user complaint -- regardless of whether or the content is accurate or not. Social media companies receive seven days for more complicated cases. If they fail to do so, the German government can fine them up to 50 million euros for failing to comply with the law.

This state censorship makes free speech subject to the arbitrary decisions of corporate entities that are likely to censor more than absolutely necessary, rather than risk a crushing fine. When employees of social media companies are appointed as the state's private thought police and given the power to shape the form of current political and cultural discourse by deciding who shall be allowed to speak and what to say, and who shall be shut down, free speech becomes nothing more than a fairy tale. Or is that perhaps the point?

Meanwhile, the district court in Munich recently sentenced a German journalist, Michael Stürzenberger, to six months in jail for posting on his Facebook page a historical photo of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, shaking the hand of a senior Nazi official in Berlin in 1941. The prosecution accused Stürzenberger of "inciting hatred towards Islam" and "denigrating Islam" by publishing the photograph. The court found Stürzenberger guilty of "disseminating the propaganda of anti-constitutional organizations". While the mutual admiration that once existed between al-Husseini and German Nazis is an undisputed historical fact, now evidently history is being rewritten by German courts. Stürzenberger has appealed the verdict.
(the rest)

How do Europeans react to this? (I'm of course asking actual Europeans…)

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #946 – 2017-10-22, 08:58:54

Quote from: OakdaleFTL on 2017-10-22, 00:41:52

Quote
A new German law introducing state censorship on social media platforms came into effect on October 1, 2017. ...
(the rest)
How do Europeans react to this? (I'm of course asking actual Europeans…)

EU action needed: German NetzDG draft threatens freedom of expression

As a brave American, what alternatives would you propose?
To storm The Bundestag or the EU head quarters with assault rifles?

BTW, what's about the erosion of civil rights in the USA (assuming that you did notice any, I wouldn't be surprized at all if you didn't)?
Has any American fired a single shot to sop it?

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #947 – 2017-10-22, 09:29:31

Quote from: OakdaleFTL on 2017-10-22, 00:41:52

How do Europeans react to this? (I'm of course asking actual Europeans...)

Unfortunately Germany is a little bit more like America now.^[1] I echo @krake. How many new bullet holes in the Capitol?

¹See, e.g., https://www.eff.org/issues/ip-and-free-speech ↵

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #948 – 2017-10-23, 11:25:46

French President's Dog Takes a Piss in the Élysée Palace During Televised Meeting

[video]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXbINtvTF2E[/video]

Charwomen from the Élysée Palace must consider themself lucky for serving Macron and not Caligula.
Imagine the cleanup if instead of Macron's dog, Caligula's pet would live at Élysée.

Re: What's Going on in Europe

Reply #949 – 2017-10-23, 22:10:40

The dog is not educated, he should had been trained to take a piss in the Bundestag.
In alternative, into Trump's feet.

Canine diplomacy it's a lost art.