General Politics Thread

[Tibbermoresaint]

7 minutes ago, Binos said:

Don't be silly

It's still an attempt at control

But a completely different mantra

It's the same mantra at heart.

A very interesting article, @Detournement, thanks for sharing it.

[welshbairn]

1 hour ago, sophia said:

Tell me about it. The flat rate overdue fining policy is in no way progressive.

The last generation of rich pensioners pay fuckall as well. Barricade the libraries!

[Binos]

8 minutes ago, Tibbermoresaint said:

It's the same mantra at heart.

A very interesting article, @Detournement, thanks for sharing it.

From communism

No

But control, yes

[Detournement]

The biggest difference between Putin and British ministers is that he takes responsibility for the living standards of his citizens.  May and Cameron if they actually speak about wages discuss them in abstract terms as if they have as much control over them as they do the weather or the tides. This is why he is far more popular than they are. 

The realist way he talks about international relations is a contrast to western leaders who expend great effort denying their own agency.  

[welshbairn]

He certainly cares about his oligarch mates.

 

https://wir2018.wid.world/files/download/wir2018-full-report-english.pdf

Edited June 29, 2019 by welshbairn

[NotThePars]

Think it’s laughable to suggest Putin is overly concerned with the average Russian outside of being a chauvinist on the world stage and shoring up his approval ratings. I’m inclined to agree with Tony Wood that Yeltsin and Putin are neoliberals who have benefitted from the leftovers from the Soviet welfare state while they systematically try to dismantle what’s left or let it fall apart.

[Detournement]

Other than Tibbermore Saint I don't think is calling Putin a socialist or denying that Russia is massively unequal country. Graphs comparing the USSR with a capitalist country are a bit daft though. 

In the UK we have politicians who quite openly want to make life more difficult for large sections of the population. I don't get the impression that Putin or United Russia have that attitude (probably because they have decided it would be against their long term interests). 

[Detournement]

Just now, NotThePars said:

Think it’s laughable to suggest Putin is overly concerned with the average Russian outside of being a chauvinist on the world stage and shoring up his approval ratings. I’m inclined to agree with Tony Wood that Yeltsin and Putin are neoliberals who have benefitted from the leftovers from the Soviet welfare state while they systematically try to dismantle what’s left or let it fall apart.

There are massive differences between Yeltsin and Putin. Yeltsin was going to turn Russia into another Latin America for the benefit of American capital and managed to lower life expectancy by five years in only four years.

Putin and his cohort put a stop to that,  instituted a Russian nationalist version of capitalism and have undeniably raised living standards for the majority.  

[welshbairn]

Quote

Since the early 2000s, the national net wealth owned by Russia’s rich and super rich has skyrocketed. The first post-Soviet millionaires gained control over a significant part of the country’s industrial property back in the mid-1990s, during the initial privatization, but their share of the net wealth didn’t peak until 2008. Since then, the one hundred billionaires ranked by Forbes control 6–10 of Russia’s net wealth (depending on financial markets and the shifting value of Russian enterprises). About 65 percent of Russia’s net wealth belongs to the top 10-percent earners (according to the World Inequality Database, this includes, for example, most of the people who own apartments in Moscow — people who own property worth more than 3.72 million rubles, or $56,185). The poorest half of the population owns less than five percent of the country’s net wealth.

In other words, Russian wealth stratification is the worst of any of the major economies analyzed in the World Inequality Database. Things are not improving, either: the share of Russia’s national wealth owned by the middle class has dwindled over the past decade, as white collar workers have struggled against a weakened ruble and the repercussions of the 2008 financial crisis.

Russia’s millionaires and billionaires have moved most of their wealth abroad. According to “From Soviets to Oligarchs,” offshore wealth is about three times larger than Russia’s official net foreign reserves (about 75 percent of national income versus around 25 percent). Rich Russians have as much financial wealth stashed outside the country as the entire Russian population has inside Russia itself. The explosion of private wealth in Russia, moreover, has come “almost exclusively at the expense of public wealth,” insofar as the sum of private and public wealth has scarcely increased relative to national income (from 400 percent in 1990 to 450 percent in 2015).

 

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2019/01/23/the-top-1-controls-a-third-of-the-wealth-and-the-poor-are-getting-poorer-how-russia-became-one-of-the-most-unequal-places-on-earth

[Detournement]

2 minutes ago, MixuFixit said:

Is this one of the good nationalisms in your view, it's hard to keep track.

If you have the choice between the subject of nationalist capitalism or being the subject of imperialism you obviously choose the former. 

 

[welshbairn]

4 minutes ago, Detournement said:

If you have the choice between the subject of nationalist capitalism or being the subject of imperialism you obviously choose the former. 

 

Bit of a quandary for the Chechens and the Crimean Tatars.

Edited June 29, 2019 by welshbairn

[Detournement]

Aye but I don't think there is any point changing from the current UK economic system to the one laid out by the Growth Commission. 

 

[BFTD]

30 minutes ago, Detournement said:

There are massive differences between Yeltsin and Putin. Yeltsin was going to turn Russia into another Latin America for the benefit of American capital and managed to lower life expectancy by five years in only four years.

Ah, I've missed all the jokes about Boris Yeltsin's affinity for the drink.

[Detournement]

19 minutes ago, MixuFixit said:

We wouldn't drop another bomb either directly or as 'advisors'.

That would be satisfying for us but not really important if the bombs are still dropping. 

I also don't think we should make any assumptions about the politics of an independent Scotland.  The more power held in Hollywood,  the greater efforts capital will make to control that power eg AirBnB.

[NotThePars]

There are massive differences between Yeltsin and Putin. Yeltsin was going to turn Russia into another Latin America for the benefit of American capital and managed to lower life expectancy by five years in only four years.
Putin and his cohort put a stop to that,  instituted a Russian nationalist version of capitalism and have undeniably raised living standards for the majority.  

And has since stagnated into a policy of inertia which is obscured by more desperate posturing with the west. The differences between the two aren’t as night and day as commentators assume.

[Detournement]

It definitely is. 

UNICEF estimated that the transition to capitalism caused 3 million excess deaths in Russia.  The Lancet estimate that in the whole Eastern bloc the upper limit is 10 million deaths. 

The economic system now is obviously exploitative but Russians are aware due to their memories of the 90s things could be much worse.

[welshbairn]

Great to see how Putin has forced the oligarchs to invest their plunder to diversify the economy away from raw materials, instead of buying up high end property around the globe, as he's promised from day one.

https://www.madeinrussia.com/en/catalog/consumer-goods/

[Baxter Parp]

16 hours ago, Scott Leitch said:

Having read these forums for some time I'd say Baxter Parp is the worst poster. Misguided degenerate. 

Thank you, I take that as a complement.

[Detournement]

2 hours ago, MixuFixit said:

2. Sure we can. I have 20 years experience of my vote actually doing something.


Indy Scotland would be a completely different political environment. As soon as power moved to Scotland it would be immediately followed by shit loads of corporate lobbyists with bags of cash and an energised right wing media. You would also see plenty of 'centrists' who are happy to play along with centre left politics in the context of devolution move to the right once fiscal powers arrived.

[Detournement]

7 minutes ago, MixuFixit said:

Na there's much more centre left in general. A lot of it is stuck in hopeless Labour or Libdem votes just now.

I'm talking less about voters than politicians.