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New Ukrainian thread because of latest news. http://youtu.be/BrwqiAdqQMY http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35976086 Discuss.

Meanwhile in Turkey - Turkish army shoot peaceful civilains. Video (warning, disturbing images) So non-democratic actions! I'm sure in near future NATO establish no-fly zone over Turkey, send ground troops and overthrow this totalitarian dictator.... Oh shi! Turkey is NATO member, in other words Western democraties crap one's pants again. Just interesting how Bruce and other western neocons "democracy"-worshipers explain why in same situation Serbian/Syrian/Lybian/Ukrainian government must be violently overthrow, but Turkish government must be untouchable.

Canadians try ban ethnic-Ukrainian musician because of his anti-Junta sentences. https://twitter.com/ValLisitsa http://www.forbes.com/sites/jenslaurson/2015/04/19/free-speech-rachmaninov-and-twitter-posts-how-the-ukrainian-war-invaded-torontos-stage/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/music/2015/04/08/tso-sets-a-dangerous-precedent-menon.html

Own "Maidan" in US is started http://youtu.be/LhJ6H9vlEDA http://youtu.be/n-vZ48WSJrA Description of video Obama must be happy, democracy come to his country also.

The BBC is featuring a piece about a report by Princeton University Prof Martin Gilens and Northwestern University Prof Benjamin I Page on the influence citizens of the U.S. have on policy, based on income level. http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 In this report, the professors looked at answers to survey questions between 1981 and 2002 and broke down the answers according to income level. Then they looked at which income level had the most influence on policy decisions. http://www.princeton.edu/~mgilens/Gilens%20homepage%20materials/Gilens%20and%20Page/Gilens%20and%20Page%202014-Testing%20Theories%203-7-14.pdf Abstract: "Each of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics – which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic Elite Domination, and two types of interest group pluralism, Majoritarian Pluralism and Biased Pluralism – offers different predictions about which sets of actors have how much influence over public policy: average citizens; economic elites; and organized interest groups, mass-based or business-oriented. A great deal of empirical research speaks to the policy influence of one or another set of actors, but until recently it has not been possible to test these contrasting theoretical predictions against each other within a single statistical model. This paper reports on an effort to do so, using a unique data set that includes measures of the key variables for 1,779 policy issues. Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism." They conclude that the system as is strongly favours the economical elite compared to the average citizen, and that while citizens of the U.S. "do enjoy many features central to democratic governance, such as regular elections, freedom of speech and association and a widespread (if still contested) franchise [...] if policymaking is dominated by powerful business organisations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America's claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened."

I don't know if anybody has been following the news in Egypt recently. I know we had a 'Syria' thread, but couldn't really find anything about Egypt. Egypt opposition leaders face 'incitement' probe '...and so it begins' I suppose few people are truly surprised. The old dictator is gone and a new dictator starts consolidating power by persecuting the opposition leaders and removing them. Question is, are islamist dictators an improvement over secular dictators? I would put my bets on 'Not'. Will Egypt become the next Iran? I suppose the only thing preventing them from joining forces is the insurmountable barrier of their differences (Shiite/Sunni).