Canadian politics thread

[El Bastardo]

jfc you guys. what happened to our country

[sonick]

Originally Posted by El Bastardo

jfc you guys. what happened to our country

Global pandemic and climate change.

[Hondaracer]

Which seemingly did not effect many other countries that embrace their resources and support their own citizens?

[westopher]

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Which seemingly did not effect many other countries that embrace their resources and support their own citizens?

You really aren’t looking if you believe that.

[sonick]

Originally Posted by westopher

You really aren’t looking if you believe that.

Right? I knew that's exactly the type of response I expected.

Pretty much every developed nation is struggling with increasing inflation or even higher inflation rates than Canada is experiencing, risk of recession, and natural disaster due to climate change: https://tradingeconomics.com/country...inflation-rate

[The Producer]

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Which seemingly did not effect many other countries that embrace their resources and support their own citizens?

can you name one? I genuinely want to research which countries have been immune to the rapidly changing economic landscape of the last 30 months.

[TOS'd]

Originally Posted by The Producer

can you name one? I genuinely want to research which countries have been immune to the rapidly changing economic landscape of the last 30 months.

Germany and Ireland since he saw it first-hand over the last 2 weeks. /s

[Hondaracer]

Originally Posted by The Producer

can you name one? I genuinely want to research which countries have been immune to the rapidly changing economic landscape of the last 30 months.

Norway, Israel, Japan, Korea, Australia, Switzerland, etc.

Then if you start throwing in countries like UAE, Saudi Arabia, etc. they are not even close to our levels inflation. You can debate as to why, but I’m sure their citizens aren’t running out of money to put food in their kids mouths.

We’re doing awesome though, don’t worry about it

[unit]

cant speak for all of those but korea's currency is in freefall vs the USD rn

[sonick]

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Norway, Israel, Japan, Korea, Australia, Switzerland, etc.

Then if you start throwing in countries like UAE, Saudi Arabia, etc. they are not even close to our levels inflation. You can debate as to why, but I’m sure their citizens aren’t running out of money to put food in their kids mouths.

We’re doing awesome though, don’t worry about it

Do you do ANY sort of your own due diligence before you start randomly stating things you've read on twitter?

Every one of the countries you listed at the start of your post (I havent bothered looking at UAE, Saudi, etc.) have experienced the highest inflation rates the countries have recorded in the past 3 months than they have in the last 5+ years, with significant relative increases that likely rival what Canada has experienced.

Israel went from <1% at the end of 2019 to 5.2% in July (5.2x higher inflation). This is a higher relative increase compared to Canada, at 2% up to 8.1% that same time (approx 4x higher inflation).

Source: https://tradingeconomics.com/canada/inflation-cpi

[The Producer]

hey man - i just asked a question. You've provided some answers and now I'll do some research.

Norway has and always will be a wealthy country. I wouldn't mind as a citizen owning a piece of the national oil infrastructure.

Israel, I'm not touching that one.

Japan? interested. I'll check it out. Certainly their handling of the pandemic was better. That doesn't change that the raw materials they require from other countries to fuel the export manufacturing that drives their GDP hasn't been hit too. It wasn't exactly booming their before covid. Birth rate crisis still in progress.

Australia - I have no data. I'll look into it.

Switzerland is interesting, I didn't know that they had shielded themselves so well. I guess it shouldn't be surprising. I'm not sure how they can be polar opposite of Germany which is experiencing their worst inflation since WW2

The Arab countries you mentioned can't be directly compared to Canada.

[sonick]

Norway increasing interest rates: https://www.reuters.com/markets/euro...ed-2022-08-10/

Israel: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle...on-2022-10-03/

Australia: https://www.reuters.com/breakingview...al-2022-10-04/

Switzerland: https://www.reuters.com/business/fin...on-2022-09-26/

[The Producer]

Originally Posted by El Bastardo

jfc you guys. what happened to our country

ballooning wealth disparity

[sonick]

Originally Posted by The Producer

hey man - i just asked a question. You've provided some answers and now I'll do some research.

How insane is it these days where people can randomly state false information without accountability, and expect OTHERS to do the research themselves to find out they were wrong.

[Hondaracer]

All those places I listed have seen increased inflation, of course. however they are all FAR lower than Canada. Of course other places experienced inflation. My point is direct comparables don’t have people running out of money for groceries. Let alone HALF our population having trouble paying for them. When you dig deeper into CPI AND inflation rates most of South America and asia are also fairing better but I said direct comparables. .

Also keep in mind our population is far lower than most of those countries as well. All the while we’re writing blank cheques to special interest groups.

Everybody here driving P cars and BMW’s should be aight but there’s gonna be a lotttttt of people hopping on the struggle bus in the next few years. Hopefully you’ve got solid employment.

[mikemhg]

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Which seemingly did not effect many other countries that embrace their resources and support their own citizens?

Didn't you just say you came back from Europe?

You're not seeing what's happening to the pound and euro right now?

Come on.

[Manic!]

Originally Posted by TOS'd

Germany and Ireland since he saw it first-hand over the last 2 weeks. /s

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

Norway, Israel, Japan, Korea, Australia, Switzerland, etc.

Then if you start throwing in countries like UAE, Saudi Arabia, etc. they are not even close to our levels inflation. You can debate as to why, but I’m sure their citizens aren’t running out of money to put food in their kids mouths.

We’re doing awesome though, don’t worry about it

2022 inflation rate.
Canada 7%
Germany 7.9%
Australia 7.5%
Korea 5.71%
Ireland 8.7%
Japan 3%
Norway 6.5%
Israel 4.6%
UK 9.8%
US 8.2%

[mikemhg]

The inflation rate in Germany is expected to hit 10% this quarter, in Canada we're sitting at 7%.

Economies are very complex and our problems certainly differ from Europe's, the moral of the story is we're all getting fucked hard right now. To lay that entirely on JT is obtuse and disingenuous (I'll reiterate I'm not a massive fan of the guy).

[sonick]

Originally Posted by mikemhg

Economies are very complex and our problems certainly differ from Europe's, the moral of the story is we're all getting fucked hard right now. To lay that entirely on JT is obtuse and disingenuous (I'll reiterate I'm not a massive fan of the guy).

+1000 to this.

I also dont see how the alternative traditional conservative approach of "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" tricke-down economics would be any better in this scenario.

[sonick]

Relevant article for anybody curious of what is actually going on (assuming you believe NYT as a trustworthy source of information)

The First Global Deflation Has Begun, and It’s Unclear Just How Painful It Will Be https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/04/o...yQAKnU8itAGhBM

[Hondaracer]

Originally Posted by mikemhg

Didn't you just say you came back from Europe?

You're not seeing what's happening to the pound and euro right now?

Come on.

Well yea the pound is trash

Scotland is pretty much fucked now due to Brexit

[68style]

And who put Brexit into play? Wasn’t it the Conservative party trying to Make UK Great Again?

Interdasting

[Hondaracer]

It’s not always a conservative VS liberal argument

It’s a statement that people are struggling under the current situation and clearly shit ain’t working

[El Bastardo]

WARNING: Multi-paragraph over-simplification of Brexit incoming.



UK politics are complex. In this case, however, you can trace a direct line from Brexit (and the current issues in the subsequent years since) to Thatcherism.

The artificial inflation of the UK economy under the Thatcher government saw serious mis-steps in an effort to lower unemployment. She inherited a bad seat at a particularly bad time, but stripping away public-focused rent-controlled housing away from the population and allowing it to be privatized started the broader privatization movement of formerly government-owned entities.

Yes, this led to some really great times for the right people. Some folks in the right position got rich. It strengthened the pound... but it also made UK exports less affordable.

Strikes in industries impacted by her policies created harder times for blue collar workers and cemented their position closer to the poverty line than not. Cuts in funding to higher education made it less attractive, and more expensive, keeping social and economic mobility out of reach to many.

Yeah, further privatization of UK industries happened after she was replaced but a combination of an artificially inflated Pound and a strengthening post Cold War European market meant that the UK was no longer the prettiest girl at the dance.

What does this have to do with Brexit? I'll tell you.

Since the UK now had to compete with the rest of the EEA, it meant their economic growth slowed. Yes, they had an incredibly advantageous position given their historical relationships with North America and Oceana, but Europe developed as a single economic zone thanks to the Euro. The UK had to compete with itself, as it were. Propping up Greece left a sour taste in a lot of folks' mouths too. Brexit really began to pick up around this time because if Greece couldn't be kicked out of the EEA/Eurozone, why should the UK be forced to prop it up?

Gordon Brown, a member of the "Left" (not really) Labour Party navigated through the economic downturn that began in 2009 (again, exacerbated by Greece) and was replaced in 2010 or 2011 or whatever by the Conservative government again. This is where folks were really fired up about bigly expensive gas, the rising costs of well... everything... and again, the EU and those damned Greeks.

The Conservatives are back in office, suddenly the postal service is privatized and people are worried about their healthcare turning into an American style system where you have to choose between seven-figure debt or death. This is around the time of the rise of social media and there is a movie called Brexit with Benedict Cumberbach which is great at explaining why leveraging people's fears over eroding social safety nets led to Brexit. Even Tory PM David Cameron who held the vote was regretful of Brexit moving forward.

UNSURPRISINGLY the majority of self-identified Brexit "Leave"ers are also conservative.

The UK Conservatives trimmed the fat so much they had nothing left to trim but the biggest expense of them all, the milita... no.. wait... the healthcare system. And Brexiteers leveraged that to spring the UK from the "oppressive" EEA to save the 350 million pounds being sent every week or whatever to the EU to put in the pockets of the UK again. Trimming the fat instead of spending/investing into the country was the UK Tory playbook since Thatcher. She directly led to it, even though she couldn't've expected it to.

And I haven't even touched on the racism, y'all. Holy shit.

Brexit's biggest supporter, UKIP (United Kingdom Independence Party) was the polite face of the further right-wing/conservative realm.
They operated in the same space as the British National Party and later with Britain First, National Action, and the English Defense League. (This association is dubious as I'm presenting it, but "trust me bro".. its gonna make sense)

Some things were happening in the UK at the time like the fears being still present after the 7/7 bombings (UK's 9/11 basically), some high-profile Indo-Pakistani sex grooming gangs making the news circuit, and allegations of police coverups/empty investigations into other groups that were stopped due to a police policy of "not wanting to appear racist by investigating non-white Britons" etc. Also, the worry of Turkey being admitted into the EU and the UK being "overrun by 70 million Turks" was a string that kept being plucked.

All of these played very well with folks who identified themselves as being right-wing/small-c conservative.

As a result, and in spite of the evidence refuting a lot of the fears being played, folks who may not have been otherwise politically motivated took the polls to vote on Brexit.



So yeah, Brexit was definitely a conservative thing.


Nobody is better off because of Brexit.



edit: lol i just re-read the post and realize i mis-interpreted hondaracer's comment, thinking that he was saying the conservatives weren't responsible for brexit. oops. i sperged out anyway.

Live image of my autism activating today:

[sonick]

Originally Posted by Hondaracer

It’s not always a conservative VS liberal argument

It’s a statement that people are struggling under the current situation and clearly shit ain’t working

lol when it's the conservatives in charge when shit happens, "its not always a conservative vs liberal argument."

when liberals are in charge when shit happens, it's because of the liberals.