The TOTALLY None US Political Thread

As most of the politics discussed here are American, and as a large percentage of our readers are not from the US, I felt it important to set aside a thread where we could discuss the political issues of every other country but the US for a change!!

Here's a mild suggestion for a possible topic: In the 21st century, should we do away with all those small European monarchies and change them to something else, like a Republic??!!

Why bother? The European monarchies are functionally parliamentary democracies anyway — the royals have absolutely zero political power. OTOH they provide some entertainment and a sense of historical continuity. I think of them a bit like all those lovely monuments and castles and cathedrals and museums and Roman ruins and what not. None of them serve a truly useful purpose, but they're nevertheless considered meaningful and valuable enough to be worth the relatively small cost of maintaining them (compared to overall costs of government).

Put another way, there's a lot of stuff that we could do with doing away with, but IMO the relatively innocuous European royal families are pretty far down that list. Such as the wacky, dysfunctional, and undemocratic governance structure of the European Union, only made marginally less absurd by the Lisbon Treaty.

Not that I'd object strongly to the idea either, mind.

Yeah, I know, but as I don't know a great deal about European politics it seemed a reasonable place to begin. We have this discussion all the time down here about our own Gov't, as technically we're a monarchy also since Betty 2 of the UK is our Head of State!!

I think of them a bit like all those lovely monuments and castles and cathedrals and museums and Roman ruins and what not. None of them serve a truly useful purpose, but they're nevertheless considered meaningful and valuable enough to be worth the relatively small cost of maintaining them (compared to overall costs of government).

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Acctually IMHO ( and this goes for sweden ) they are more than worth all they cost.

They have been doing a lot for Sweden… and as an example when they visited China it was a really big thing there, it was broadcasted on TV and 100's of millions watched and it really helped between relation of Sweden and China.

The wedding of the swedish princess is expected to bring a lot of PR and revenue to Sweden this year.

On top of that they are engaged in a lot of charity work.

Simply put, to keep them is well invested money.

As most of the politics discussed here are American, and as a large percentage of our readers are not from the US, I felt it important to set aside a thread where we could discuss the political issues of every other country but the US for a change!!

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I would love to get this thing going... however it is much harder than US politics.. as there you have two sides which can never agree to each other. In european politics we tend to agree much more.... in swedish politics the only thing ( almost ) being discussed is tax tax and tax. Should we lower the tax.. should we raise the tax??? and in the end the difference is not that huge. A 100 euro more or less in the wallet.... and ussually there'll be some other tax to eat it up.

Since this is about International politics...

A row is threatening to erupt in the European Union over plans by interior and justice ministers to extend security powers. The European Parliament announced its resistance within hours of the ministers' meeting.

...Influential members of the European Parliament have announced their opposition to the proposals of Europe's 27 interior and justice ministers to tighten airport security by extending the scope for dragnet operations....

....The European Parliament has increasingly defined itself as a guardian of human rights in recent years, and is already in a long-term dispute with the Council over the Swift agreement, which allows banks to pass on account details to the United States.

full article

IMO Justice ministers should be line up and shot on a sadistic manner .

Mini rant about the swedish gouverment debate article today:

Basically the swedish prime minister is writing "We need to lower the tax, so the people working in the public sector ( such as health care, take care of elederly and sick ) etc can get more salary"

Just how stupid does he think the swedish people are? it is an obvious excuse to lower the tax…. because what is paying these peoples salaries are the tax! If he lowers the tax, the gouverment will have LESS money to pay these people.

The gouverment did a lot of good things but they appear to be completely crazy about lowering tax….. this takes the prize though… how stupid do they think the swedish people are?

If they lower the tax it's like people would get more money

Y'all have politics over there? How quaint. I thought we annexed most of the world over the last few decades anyway.

Now, now...don't get your berets all askew. I's just playin'.

@ dte; of course they have politics. The communists and the socialists have to have something to fight over or else the fascists will have nothing to do.

(Kidding also. Completely. It's quite a relief to see a political thread that doesn't involve our insane circus over here, but rather someone else's insane circus. )

GothicGothicness said:

Mini rant about the swedish gouverment debate article today:

Basically the swedish prime minister is writing "We need to lower the tax, so the people working in the public sector ( such as health care, take care of elederly and sick ) etc can get more salary"

Just how stupid does he think the swedish people are? it is an obvious excuse to lower the tax…. because what is paying these peoples salaries are the tax! If he lowers the tax, the gouverment will have LESS money to pay these people.

The gouverment did a lot of good things but they appear to be completely crazy about lowering tax….. this takes the prize though… how stupid do they think the swedish people are?

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I must say that I dont get your political analysis You are claiming to be politically active with one of the government parties? The one ideological idea they've pushed through with the lowering of taxes (making us only the second highest taxed country in the world) is to make it profitable to work, particularly for those with low incomes. The conservative party has gone from tax cuts mainly for the wealthy to tax cuts targeted at low and middle income earners.

Lower taxes for low income earners gives greater incentive to go from welfare/unemployment to work. It has a HUGE impact on public finances when people become employed rather than live off the dole. Before the current government's tax cuts the net effect of going from unemployment to a low income job could be negative due to taxes and increased costs for travelling and job lunches….

I would say good luck to anyone trying to merge Norway with another country. We've twice rejected EU membership, and the "no" fraction is still in majority. Key word: "Sjølråderett" - for you unfamiliar with the Hero's tongue: "We make our own decision, no matter what!!!!"

Besides, the two most likely candidates would be Sweden or Denmark. We were in union with Denmark from 1319(?) to 1814, and with Sweden from 1814 to 1905. And most of us aren't particularly eager to repeat that.

Personally I would'nt resent if we joined Sweden (or they joined us). BUT DON'T TELL ANYONE I WROTE THIS!

As for our monarchy - I think that a monarchy is in principle incompatible with democracy. But our current king is behaving well, so I'm in no hurry to get rid of him. Although, if a referendum was held to day, I'd definitely vote no.

As for taxes - I don't think I pay too much. IMO we get a lot in return for what we pay.

I must say that I dont get your political analysis You are claiming to be politically active with one of the government parties? The one ideological idea they've pushed through with the lowering of taxes (making us only the second highest taxed country in the world) is to make it profitable to work, particularly for those with low incomes. The conservative party has gone from tax cuts mainly for the wealthy to tax cuts targeted at low and middle income earners.

Lower taxes for low income earners gives greater incentive to go from welfare/unemployment to work. It has a HUGE impact on public finances when people become employed rather than live off the dole. Before the current government's tax cuts the net effect of going from unemployment to a low income job could be negative due to taxes and increased costs for travelling and job lunches….

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Great that you are taking the argument!

Acctually employment has been decreasing since we got into power ( yes it is because of the crisis I know ) and we lowered the tax. Mr Borg is saying we have such a great public finance.

But we are firing a lot of people in public sector / schools / health care etc, and the retired is getting less money. This is not what we promised at all!

We already did tax cuts.. and the way the swedish system works it is still benefiting the rich people the most….. the tax is lowered by % for everyone with an income under 3000 euro … yeah… if you have 1500 euro salary and the income is lowered by 1% you get a whopping 15 euro more…. if you have a salary of 10000 euro you still get 30 euro more even if only the low income tax is changed.

I think tax cuts are more than enough…. we cannot cut them if we cannot keep our promises about the wellfare system. Not everyone is agreeing with Reinfeldt and Borgs extreme hunt for tax cuts…. and the way they motivated it with more money for people in public sector is just plain out wrong!! People in the private sector will benefit a lot… while people in public sector will be fired or getting no salary increases! If you want the public sector people to earn more YOU RAISE THEIR SALARY! not lower the tax for everyone! So that what makes me mad about that particular article.

http://www.dn.se/opinion/debatt/hojda-loner-behovs-om-vi-ska-klara-valfarden-1.1030983

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Also notice the ridiculess title….. it says "Higher salaries are needed in order for the the wellfare system to survive"

But if you read the article… they don't want to raise salaries for the people working in wellfare… instead they want to lower the tax for everyone!

I cannot see the monarchy as more than putting alive humans in a museum for others to watch. I find the whole idea disgusting.

But like it's been said, the monarchy aren't more than PR. They have no juridical powers.

Swedish politics is getting very interesting.

Swedish politics consists on one hand the 4-party right wing coalition (social or classic liberal/conservative parties). On the other hand we have the left wing coalition 2-party (social liberals/socialists).

For as long as I have lived the right wing only won twice, including right now.

The interesting thing is that Sweden is about to get their first nationalistic conservative party, the Swedish Democrats, who every party said they will not work with (parties even have the potential risk of loosing voters if they say they will work with the Swedish Democrats).

On the other hand, the Christian Democrats is likely to fall out so the right wing will loose 4%. The Christian Democrats is kinda like a softer version of the Swedish Democrats without the nationalist angle. They are value conservative but a very soft kind. Many of their voters have demanded a harsher approach though, which is why many have moved from the Christian Democrats to the Swedish Democrats.

The Christian Democrats have been in the right-wing coalition, and many times acted as a roadblock, vetoing several ideas the otherwise liberal right-wing have wanted to do. In that regard they have had tremendous power for a 4% party. Without them, the Right Wing will probably loose their next election, on the other hand they might be able to begin a new line of politics now when they do not need to think about the Christian Democrats anymore.

On the left side though we have a new party, the a green party with the environment as their primary agenda. But the relationship between the social liberal social democrats (the largest of the Swedish parties) and the socialist left-party (also 4-5% close to dropping out) was strained when the social democrats said they would dump their old socialist friends but later changed their minds.

Even more trouble is the new leader of Swedens largest party, the Social Democrats, who have tremendously low approval rating. She still have the chance of becoming the first female prime minister in Sweden though.

If there was the ability to vote for minus votes (-1 vote instead of +1) I would know exactly what to vote for, but right now I might skip voting as I see trouble in both wings. The right wing, who are supposed to be liberal, have moved towards a control-state, which is incredibly alien to me and many like me.

GothicGothicness said:

Great that you are taking the argument!

Acctually employment has been decreasing since we got into power ( yes it is because of the crisis I know ) and we lowered the tax. Mr Borg is saying we have such a great public finance.

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Well our public finances are solid (and will be no matter who wins the election, as only the post-communists are against taht framework). The claim that we are borrowing to cut taxes is bollocks. Your assumption that the firings in the public sector are due to the tax cut is also wrong. It has been funded by raising revenue in other areas (for instance increased beer tax). To make sure that the tax cuts are funded is one of two major paradigm shifts by the conservative party, shifts that made them electable and made it possible to win the last election…

We already did tax cuts.. and the way the swedish system works it is still benefiting the rich people the most….. the tax is lowered by % for everyone with an income under 3000 euro … yeah… if you have 1500 euro salary and the income is lowered by 1% you get a whopping 15 euro more…. if you have a salary of 10000 euro you still get 30 euro more even if only the low income tax is changed.

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Well that is how tax cuts work, 1% of 3000 is more than 1% of 1500. Still these cuts are very much targeted at low and middle income earners as they as you say are capped. 3000 Euro a month is not an income that makes you "rich". The medium income is about 2700 (a moderately experienced nurse or teacher makes thereabouts). You will most likely get a starting salary over 3000 after you finish your education. This is the second paradigm shift, the low- and medium income earners see relatively bigger tax cuts. Someone who makes 1.9k a month (say a cleaner) or 3k a month (say a fresh engineering graduate or an experienced senior nurse) has seen a 25% reduction in income tax, while someone making 4k a month (your average CEO of a small business, or a more experienced engineer) has gotten a 19% reduction.

The alternative would have been to raise the limit for how much you can earn before you start paying taxes (say the first 10k a person makes is exempted), but while more transparent that wouldnt have reduced the marginal effect that discouraged people from working more or from going from welfare to work.

I think tax cuts are more than enough…. we cannot cut them if we cannot keep our promises about the wellfare system. Not everyone is agreeing with Reinfeldt and Borgs extreme hunt for tax cuts…. and the way they motivated it with more money for people in public sector is just plain out wrong!! People in the private sector will benefit a lot… while people in public sector will be fired or getting no salary increases! If you want the public sector people to earn more YOU RAISE THEIR SALARY! not lower the tax for everyone! So that what makes me mad about that particular article.

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I agree that it isnt the best argument for the tax cuts (except for some vague claim that what is good for the economy as a whole will benefit the public sector as well), but you will have a hard time arguing that the sackings in the public sector have been driven by the fairly moderate (we still have the second highest taxes in the world, damnit!!!) tax cuts. Instead you have schools firing staff because a small baby boom generation just finished school (and we are going to see more of that), and municipalities firing people due to the crisis lowering tax revenue, not due to these tax cuts. Had employment levels stayed the same then local tax revenue would have stayed the same as well.

At any rate I think the oppositions suggested tax hikes have the potential to be nasty, the populist wealth tax (abolished by this government in 2007 IIRC) reintroduction will probably make capital re-migrate and cost us investment and revenue at the other end, all because of a populist need to nail the "wealthy". For non-Swedes: The previous wealth tax was, as such taxes tend to be, full of loopholes and mainly affected the at most moderately wealthy, with less fluid assets. The super rich such as H&M tycoon Persson got "family business"-clause exemptions or moved their money to dodgy places like the Caymans. Previous (socialist) ministers of finance as well as the tax man have called the tax "practically optional" and it produced miniscule revenue.

Also notice the ridiculess title….. it says "Higher salaries are needed in order for the the wellfare system to survive"

But if you read the article… they don't want to raise salaries for the people working in wellfare… instead they want to lower the tax for everyone!

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I knew which article you meant right away, I read that paper as part of my breakfast routine. Not exactly a piece of great substance I certainly agree that the title of the debate article is extremely stupid. There isnt just a lack of concrete proposals of how to achieve this, the government doesnt even control the issue at all! As said these people are employed by municipalities and our system is decentralised enough for the towns to be allowed to set their salaries on their own.

The government could make a case that the tax cuts affect employment and that every person going from welfare to work adds some 10-15000 euros to the annual revenue of the municipalities, but that is too indirect and wont sell in the election campaign.

Overall I think they should have focused on another point in the article, namely to give the public servants/nurses/whatever more control over their work situation, but that would also have been a bit fuzzy.

Good thing it is early in the election cycle, this crap will be forgotten come september…

JemyM said:

I cannot see the monarchy as more than putting alive humans in a museum for others to watch. I find the whole idea disgusting.

But like it's been said, the monarchy aren't more than PR. They have no juridical powers.

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I agree, the whole thing is repugnant in principle but irrelevant in practice. It is wrong to have public positions awarded by the lottery of birth, but the only ones harmed are the royals themselves who live in golden cage, fed with silver spoons but watched over by paparazzi sine birth. As long as the public likes the royals there are more cost-effective fights to fight than the republican one.

The Christian Democrats have been in the right-wing coalition, and many times acted as a roadblock, vetoing several ideas the otherwise liberal right-wing have wanted to do. In that regard they have had tremendous power for a 4% party. Without them, the Right Wing will probably loose their next election, on the other hand they might be able to begin a new line of politics now when they do not need to think about the Christian Democrats anymore.

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While I dont intend to vote for them I dont quite share your hostility towards the reactionary christian democrats (for starters they totally lack the racism of the Sweden democrats, so I dont think it is fair to paint them in the same corner as those ex-nazis), they do stand up for the freedom to be a bigot which also is important This is only halfway in jest, since there is a pretty serious risk of tyranny of the majority when we have a broad consensus on various issues. The Christian democrats for instance (grudgingly and defensively, but still) ended up with the most liberal suggestion in the gay marriage debate: To secularise marriage completely!

I also think that they, as long as no other right-wing party is under threat of collapse, will get enough support votes to stay in the parliament…


And if they disintegrate I'd expect some other right-wing party to beat the conservative drum to pick up their former voters. On the whole I think we have three camps in the electorate, voter groups of about 20% of ideological socialists, liberals, and conservatives, plus 40% uncommited. The parties dont really match that, but as far as they cater to these groups, we have ex-commies (socialists), greens (liberals and some socialists), soc-dems (socialists and some liberals, conservative blue collar voters, the reason they are so big is that they can attract all colours), liberals (liberals), center (liberals and some rural conservatives), christian democrats (conservatives), and conservatives (market liberals and traditionally king-and-country conservatives, but both aspects have been toned down massively). If the christian democrats disappear that will leave a serious gap and Sverigedemokraterna will try to scoop as many of the conservatives as possible, while one or more of the right-wing parties will try to take the rest. I would expect the liberals under their current leadership to be the most likely candidates, baton- and order- Björklund wouldnt have to do any major makeover…

JemyM said:

If there was the ability to vote for minus votes (-1 vote instead of +1) I would know exactly what to vote for, but right now I might skip voting as I see trouble in both wings. The right wing, who are supposed to be liberal, have moved towards a control-state, which is incredibly alien to me and many like me.

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When it comes to liberties the climate is far from ideal I could list a number of negatives for all parties except for the greens (which are unelectable to me for other reasons), and sadly the two big ones are the worst. Social democrats (who I wouldnt consider social liberals, even if there is a partial overlap of goals) have Thomas Bodström, main mover behind EU-level restrictions on freedom of speech and prepared to ignore integrity for the sake of hunting the terrorist bogeyman, coupled with their traditional disregard for the individual. The conservatives have a strong tradition of "tough on crime" claptrap and are eager to pander to business interests in the digital debate. The liberals (Fp) have switched to baton populism under major Björklund, the post-commies (which I grudgingly might vote for if all the other parties were destroyed by a nuclear apocalypse and the choice was post-commies vs post-nazi Sweden democrats) want to screw any entrepreneur over and disrespect property rights, etc…

So in the south park tradition we are left with the choice between giant douche and turd sandwich. Personally I dont see anything on the red side of the fence that will tempt me to jump over. Bodström is particularly slippery, but there are bigger ideological issues with respect to constitutionalism and the lefts belief in democratic centralism (e g when the elected politicians decide something that IS right, screw the individuals who might get into "society's" way). Depending on your viewpoint and your priorities you might come up with a different conclusion.

Zaleukos said:

When it comes to liberties the climate is far from ideal I could list a number of negatives for all parties except for the greens (which are unelectable to me for other reasons), and sadly the two big ones are the worst. Social democrats (who I wouldnt consider social liberals, even if there is a partial overlap of goals) have Thomas Bodström, main mover behind EU-level restrictions on freedom of speech and prepared to ignore integrity for the sake of hunting the terrorist bogeyman, coupled with their traditional disregard for the individual. The conservatives have a strong tradition of "tough on crime" claptrap and are eager to pander to business interests in the digital debate. The liberals (Fp) have switched to baton populism under major Björklund, the post-commies (which I grudgingly might vote for if all the other parties were destroyed by a nuclear apocalypse and the choice was post-commies vs post-nazi Sweden democrats) want to screw any entrepreneur over and disrespect property rights, etc…

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And then there's the Central party (ex Farmer's Party) who everybody forgets about because they're so generic…

Übereil

The center party is certainly lacking any obvious soul at the moment, but I wouldnt consider them generic, they rather mix a few positions that by Swedish standards are fairly radical. It's not enough to make a core to identify with, or mobilise their old cadre of core voters (which used to be pretty extensive) though....

Probably. IMHO my analysis was funnier though.

Übereil

"Vi inom centerpartiet har alltid velat --- och kommer alltid att vela"

You will most likely get a starting salary over 3000 after you finish your education.

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Which world are you living in? There is almost no work which has this as an average starting salary…. if you live in Stockholm, and have a master in economics… yes maybe you'll get this as starting salary……. but average starting salary are much lower than that. For example for people who study law one of the best paid educations, you get. 2700 euro on average starting salary.. and that's about the highest one!

Your assumption that the firings in the public sector are due to the tax cut is also wrong. It has been funded by raising revenue in other areas (for instance increased beer tax)

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They could have raised beer tax without lowering income tax. The firing in the public sector IS because most countys are losing money! Most schools have too big classes, and the same is true for daycare centers so they are certainly not cutting down for this reason.

Well that is how tax cuts work, 1% of 3000 is more than 1% of 1500. Still these cuts are very much targeted at low and middle income earners as they as you say are capped. 3000 Euro a month is not an income that makes you "rich".

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Another option would be to add another tax level, or lower the level for the higher income tax. We might have a different idea of rich but if you earn over 3000 euro month… you are among the top 5 % of the world… so yeah for me that is rich. If you are a family and both have income of 3000 euro / month. You might have cost for house like 1000 euro, other costs 1000 euro. That give you the possiblity to save 2000 euro month….. so yeah I think the tax is not too high at all. Poor households if the tax was 1% more every month and they could only have 1880 euro left everymonth….