The All Things Political Topic - Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation

[Gromnir]

4 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

Huh. I don't get the connection between oil and Van Gogh or sunflowers.

am even less understanding their anger at glass, 'cause is the protective glass which they decorated with soup.

in any event, am finding fault in the vandal's aesthetic as seems obvious they overlooked the chance to do their stunt in ny and to a warhol pic... though admitted ny might have been the main obstacle for these kids. am not giving them a break however as is no excuses in art.

regardless, as far as we can tell, the middle class socialist brats didn't do any real lasting harm, so, meh.  on the downside their ineffectual efforts means they will be forgotten that much quicker.

HA! Good Fun!

Edited October 14, 2022 by Gromnir

[Gorth]

6 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

Huh. I don't get the connection between oil and Van Gogh or sunflowers.

Maybe they were protesting against both sunflowers and Van Gogh for their reliance on oils?

[Gromnir]

37 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Maybe they were protesting against both sunflowers and Van Gogh for their reliance on oils?

is quite possible the vandals do not know the difference 'tween petroleum and plant-based fats.

am ok with that. young, dumb and...

am knowing we sound dismissive o' the protesters, and we are, but the kinda stoopid the vandals suffer is not a bad thing. am assuming they didn't do any real harm and their outrage may serve to motivate enough similar young and dumb people to change the world. probable not, but change needs to start somewhere. is an unfortunate truth but meaningful alterations to the dominant paradigm comes about when young and/or stoopid people ignore sober and smarty boomers. is tough to admit, but it is the people being unreasonable who make the world a better place. real change requires mind-numbing unreasonable which is why people such as Gromnir is poor suited to bring 'bout real differences. 

'course being unreasonable usual leads to wasted effort and harm, but we need young and dumb if we wanna save the _____________.

...

wanna punish the kids? make 'em clean the museum with non biodegradable paper towels and environmental harmful cleaning agents. 

HA! Good Fun!

[Gorth]

@Gromnir I might remember it wrong, but I'm sure you once had something to that effect in your signature (something along the lines of it takes unreasonable people to change the world).

Edit: Maybe I remember it wrong and I'm attributing the wrong signature to the wrong person, in which case apologies to both people

[Gromnir]

"the reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."-- george bernard shaw

HA! Good Fun!

ps am drawing a hard line in regards to violent change. is no doubt situations when violence is required but from our pov is never ok to indulge violence as a form o' protest. use violence in defense o' others who need protection from violent actors? in rare circumstances am ok with such, but presumption is to resist violence to bring 'bout change.

and

 

Edited October 15, 2022 by Gromnir

[BruceVC]

13 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

Huh. I don't get the connection between oil and Van Gogh or sunflowers.

Why you trying to make sense of what the radical left say and believe, its very seldom logical or appropriate 

[Gfted1]

Should have just tazed them.

[Gromnir]

that does not surprise us in the least. with such an observation we would assume most folks were trying to make a joke, but the years has taught us better. predict a double-down.

security/law enforcement shows up and they find two young women each of whom were on there knees with their left hand glued to the wall behind 'em, presumably spouting off 'bout oil and injustice. am not sure what sorta threat the young vandals coulda' possible presented given the circumstances, but 'course the natural reaction is to give the youths a teeth rattling jolt o' electricity. 

*insert eye-roll emoticon here*

'cause make victims outta the dopes would be the obvious way to handle the situation?

am suspecting the vandals changed no hearts or minds regarding fossil fuels, so from our pov their efforts were little more than self-indulgent narcissism. were yet another display o' the look at me mentality o' today's youth where instead o' doing the hard work to bring 'bout change, they instead went with a slap-dash effort garnered at generating a viral story which will no doubt be forgotten by next week. lazy. 

the kids with their soup is fails, but maybe the next group has a useful plan. as long as they ain't hurting anybody, am applauding their verve if not their sense.

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

 

[Hurlshort]

They brought attention to their cause though. Sure, it was head scratching attention, but their cause is plenty important. Why are we still so reliant on fossil fuels? Do people still think that's a positive thing? My hydrogen car creates H2O and the long term potential is that it might be able to replenish the fuel cells with ease. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/02/new-catalysts-steer-hydrogen-fuel-cells-mainstream

But hey, gas guzzlers gonna guzzle.

[Gromnir]

2 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

They brought attention to their cause though.

so what? before their stunt was anybody unaware o' their issue? overreliance on fossil fuels? serious?

they brought attention to a 'cause 'bout which almost everybody is already knowing w/o doing anything to shift opinions.

pointless.

narcissistic.

dumb.

garnering attention for a cause near everybody is already aware does not look to be useful. 

"henry, did you see this story with the kids and that sunflower painting?"

"nope"

"well, i know it sounds crazy, but it looks like producing and using fossil fuels is not only unsustainable but there are all sorts of health and environmental problems linked to fossil fuel use."

"huh."

...

a conversation held nowhere by nobody 'cause whatever is your position on fossil fuels, chances are you already got one.

serious though, what is wrong with people these days wherein getting attention is an end in and of itself as 'posed to a means to bring 'bout change? however, the soup can kids didn't hurt nobody and the damage they caused were negligible. perhaps the next collection o' wannabee world changers learns and improves on the scheme.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[Valsuelm]

4 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

They brought attention to their cause though. Sure, it was head scratching attention, but their cause is plenty important. Why are we still so reliant on fossil fuels? Do people still think that's a positive thing? My hydrogen car creates H2O and the long term potential is that it might be able to replenish the fuel cells with ease. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/02/new-catalysts-steer-hydrogen-fuel-cells-mainstream

But hey, gas guzzlers gonna guzzle.

Shining a spotlight on their nonsense cause was likely their main goal, and they actually did a very good job of doing so. Presumably damaging world famous art (but not really doing so), and then attempting to glue yourself next to it was a pretty ingenious attention getting ploy. Hopefully they eventually apply their thinking skills (if it was even them that thought of this, and they weren't pawns) to further exploring and researching the issue they that they are championing. Of course the billionaire/foreign owned media helped them get the word out, but that's to be expected, as the cause these girls are ultimately championing is the greater empowerment of the billionaire/trillionaire class.

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by Valsuelm

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

5 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

They brought attention to their cause though. Sure, it was head scratching attention, but their cause is plenty important. Why are we still so reliant on fossil fuels? Do people still think that's a positive thing? My hydrogen car creates H2O and the long term potential is that it might be able to replenish the fuel cells with ease. https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2022/02/new-catalysts-steer-hydrogen-fuel-cells-mainstream

But hey, gas guzzlers gonna guzzle.

I'll say that this got much more attention than when a man immolated himself on the steps of the US Supreme Court.

[Raithe]

Maybe not politics as such, but an interesting thing...

 

[Hurlshort]

Geography? We can spit on Russia from Alaska.

 

[majestic]

What a glorious day this was. Looks like a key player of our former and 'somewhat' corrupt government has turned and made some sweeping statements during fifteen days of questioning in exchange for potentially becoming a crown witness (i.e. reduces sentences if their testimony turns out useful and sheds new light on complex cases). Hopefully this is the breakthrough that will cleanse our political landscape of a whole lot of filth. I am under no real illusions that many of them will go where they belong, namely jail, but at least there is a good chance they will be removed from any official posts now.

I particularily want our President of the National Council gone. As president of the national council, it is his right and duty to preside over inquiry boards appointed by the national council. There currently is one of those working on the cases of corruption in our People's Party (ÖVP). Fun fact, the president of the board of inquiry and president of our national council, who is supposed to conduct the investigative work of the board on the topic of corruption in the ÖVP, is actually a member of... yes, right, the ÖVP. Because why not. I am certain there is no conflict of interest here. This is the sort of thing that would not be legal in any real nation on the planet. I mean, not even Trump could make that up.

Thomas Schmid apparently decided to cooperate with the authorities after being asked by Kurz (our former chancellor) to basically fall on a sword for him. Kurz told him that he should take all the blame and insist that Kurz was not invovled in any illegal activity and basically forced him to resign a while back. See, this is the sort of thing you get for not learning from history. A huge number of Thomas Schmid's messages were uncovered on a backup, and the attorneys of the WKStA have been pouring over them for a while. In one of them he called himself Sebastian Kurz's praetorian guard. Kurz should have seen that one coming, the preatorian guards were rather infamous for making Emperors, but also very readily deposing of them.

Also, to quote from the article:

Quote

Sincel leaving Austrian politics, Kurz has partnered with the Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel by working as a “global strategist” at Thiel Capital, his investment company.

Sounds about right, huh? Guy must be right up Thiel's alley.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

7 minutes ago, majestic said:

Sounds about right, huh? Guy must be right up Thiel's alley.

In more ways than one.

[Gorth]

2 hours ago, majestic said:

What a glorious day this was. Looks like a key player of our former and 'somewhat' corrupt government

Are you sure it's Austria and not Australia?

Luckily we got rid of our right wing government not that long ago (making the world just a little bit of a better place)

 

[Gorth]

Toss up between completely random and politics... but I guess WHO is unfortunately going to be a politically charged subject. An interesting graphic showing who the top donors to this particular branch of the UN is (no, it's not China, despite what many seems to think). At least all those money you spent on Windows ME went somewhere useful

https://www.who.int/about/funding/contributors

[Gfted1]

IRS: Here are the new income tax brackets for 2023 (cnbc.com)

Smh. We need to at least double this across the board.

[Gromnir]

9 hours ago, Gorth said:

Toss up between completely random and politics... but I guess WHO is unfortunately going to be a politically charged subject. An interesting graphic showing who the top donors to this particular branch of the UN is (no, it's not China, despite what many seems to think). At least all those money you spent on Windows ME went somewhere useful

https://www.who.int/about/funding/contributors

 

the pandemic changed things a bit. in the spring o' 2020 trump announced a halt to who funding, which were not complete unjustified given the who position on china, but recognizing the circumstances, the US as the primary who contributor sudden halting funding during a pandemic were nevertheless monumental foolish. 

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/who-funds-world-health-organization-un-coronavirus-pandemic-covid-trump/

gives you an idea what the numbers looked like before the pandemic, so...

btw, we never expected china to be a huge contributor, but a large number o' pre covid global pandemic nightmares cooked up by epidemiologists involved influenza outbreaks originating in southern china, 'cause that is the origin point o' a significant number o' previous influenza threats and the influenza strains typical is starting with birds before making the leap to humans... humans in china. cultural biases against frozen meat and the prevalence o' highly unsanitary practices in chinese markets meant that all those big brain folks were looking at china as the next likely epicenter for pandemic.

who refusal to cross china is probable less 'bout funding than it is concern for their mission. cut off access to china would be devastating to current and future efforts to deal with the spread o' infectious diseases.

HA! Good Fun!

Edited October 19, 2022 by Gromnir

[Malcador]

Another one bites the dust. Interesting lady.

 

[Malcador]

 

[Raithe]

 

And for the other somewhat amusing take on things:

Michael Cohen: Trump won't run for office in 2024 because he's making too much money by not running (msn.com)

Edited October 19, 2022 by Raithe

[Gorth]

8 hours ago, Gromnir said:

who refusal to cross china is probable less 'bout funding than it is concern for their mission. cut off access to china would be devastating to current and future efforts to deal with the spread o' infectious diseases.

Yeah, my post was mostly me with a raised eyebrow at the media coverage China got in this situation compared to the real impact of their contribution. Not that it isn't a lot of money, but it is still a small amount (compared to other donors, including pre-Trump USA) relative to the amount of noise generated. I suspect the quoted part is the real reason behind the sense of China throwing around their weight a bit. Sometimes you (WHO) just nod, smile and get on with your work somewhere, while quietly rolling your eyes.

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, Gorth said:

Yeah, my post was mostly me with a raised eyebrow at the media coverage China got in this situation compared to the real impact of their contribution. Not that it isn't a lot of money, but it is still a small amount (compared to other donors, including pre-Trump USA) relative to the amount of noise generated. I suspect the quoted part is the real reason behind the sense of China throwing around their weight a bit. Sometimes you (WHO) just nod, smile and get on with your work somewhere, while quietly rolling your eyes.

the who value charter includes:

The values of the WHO workforce furthermore reflect the principles of human rights, universality and equity established in WHO’s Constitution as well as the ethical standards of the Organization.

Our decisions are fair, transparent and timely

We practice the advice we give to the world
We engage with everyone honestly and in good faith

We hold ourselves and others accountable for words and actions

etc.

am recognizing the charter is aspirational, but if you make such claims, eventual somebody is gonna read and then question who behaviors which don't match their guiding principles. is fair to question inconsistencies.

would be refreshing honest if who admitted their ultimate and overriding goal is to save lives;  while they wanna try and do their job the right way, those who is dying unnecessarily and in agony is gonna be the victims o' who integrity if the health org does not periodic cave to the political ambitions o' the world's movers and shakers. if self-interested nations playing politics wanna sacrifice bodies in an effort to defend their ignominy or alternative to perceptive achieve a mythical moral high ground, who nevertheless needs make hard choices 'bout how best to help those ordinary citizens o' the world who need help. 

then again, maybe the who folks is as dirty as the ioc, fifa and the boy scouts-- on the take simultaneous from multiple competing bad actors. such split loyalties necessarily leads to mixed messaging. 

in the absence o' hard proof, am gonna assume who is not as corrupt as fifa.

HA! Good Fun!