Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin - This Week in Stupid (21⧸05⧸2017)

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May 21, 2017 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin

25:37

This Week in Stupid (21⧸05⧸2017)

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	Hello everyone, welcome to this week in Stupid for the 21st of May 2017.
	We live in interesting times, and this week we have some very good and very bad, and I'm going to start with the very bad, and I also have a lovely opportunity to show people why I hate the Conservative Party, and yet I'm probably going to end up still voting for them, because politics right now is bullshit.
	So last week I went over the Labour Manifesto, and to give you a brief summary, it's a fantasy that is never going to happen.
	It is not fully costed, as they say.
	There is a staggering amount of borrowing involved, and the potential implications are beyond the scope of people to accurately predict at this point.
	But thankfully, it's probably not going to happen.
	Unfortunately, the Conservative Manifesto is the complete opposite.
	Not only is it not a fantasy, it's not good either.
	It's in fact somewhat of a nightmare in some regards.
	And the worst part about it is that it probably will all happen.
	One of the more contentious points in it is the Conservatives apparently alienating the old people who get them elected.
	Under the new Conservative blueprint, a planned £72,000 cap on care costs, which have been due to come in in 2020, would be scrapped.
	Instead, the government would offer protection from the cost of social care for people with assets of £100,000 or less, a sharp increase on the current £23,000 threshold.
	However, an elderly person's property would be included in that value, and most houses in the UK are far more than £100,000.
	However, if you are an elderly person, you might well own a house.
	But that doesn't mean you have a great deal of wealth behind you.
	You may well have bought that house when it wasn't worth £100,000, and you might have bought that house for like £20,000 back in the 70s or something.
	Now, it's worth more than £100,000 and you might not have any wealth behind you, and you'll now be denied any government aid towards your care, which you would have paid for many times over with your taxes throughout your life.
	Not only do I not agree with the policy, I think it's a bloody stupid move.
	They're also removing the triple lock on pensions.
	The triple lock is basically a promise that they won't touch these things about the pensions.
	In this case, they're actually changing it so the winter fuel allowance would become means tested.
	Which, I mean, honestly, I'm not massively against that.
	Yes, if you can afford to pay the full cost for the winter fuels, then fine, you don't need government subsidy.
	But it's just bad optics, especially when combined with the previous change.
	They're planning to increase funding for schools by £4 billion by 2022, which is fine, I think that's a good idea.
	And they're planning to offset this cost by removing the free school lunches that kids currently have and replacing them with free school breakfasts.
	This is just typical conservative penny pinching.
	I don't know what the difference in price is because they haven't told us, but I imagine it's honestly not that much.
	They are planning to increase the amount of funding per head of the NHS, with a minimum spending increase of £8 billion in real terms over the next five years.
	That's fine, I think that's a good thing.
	I'm a full supporter of the NHS.
	The manifesto placed to embark on the most ambitious programme of investment in buildings and technology the NHS has ever seen.
	Great.
	Love it.
	And migrant workers and international students would face higher charges to use the NHS.
	Good.
	Health tourism is a real burden on the system and it needs to be discouraged wherever possible.
	This is a good thing.
	I'm rather dubious about the Tory tax promises.
	They say the VAT will stay the same and maybe it will.
	And they plan to keep tax as low as possible, and I'm sure they do, for certain types.
	The Tories would stick to the plan for corporation tax to fall 17% by 2020 and conduct a full review of the business rate system to make sure it is up to date for a world in which people increasingly shop online.
	Again, I don't mind this in principle.
	The problem is that it hasn't been particularly well elucidated.
	I don't actually know where I stand on this yet, because I am no fan of big corporations, as I'm sure people following me know.
	But there are arguments for and against raising and lowering the corporation tax, and I honestly haven't been persuaded one way or the other.
	If you have any ideas of what you think will happen with this, please do leave me a comment, because I would love to hear your opinion on it.
	So on immigration, they plan to reduce the annual net immigration to the UK to tens of thousands.
	Bollocks.
	Bullshit are you going to do this?
	I mean, I would love for that to be the case.
	I really would.
	But they also said that they weren't going to commit to a time scale for this, which really should tell you everything you need to know.
	I think it'd be beneficial for the poor people in the country if we were to reduce immigration to the tens of thousands.
	Immigration went up under the Conservatives.
	Apparently, according to their document, it's 273,000 people who come to the country every year.
	That's lower than the figure I last checked out, which was 330,000, and I don't think they're going to reduce that by an order of 10, a magnitude of 10.
	It's just not going to happen.
	They can say it, but it's not going to happen.
	Companies employing migrant workers would see an immigration skill challenge double to £2,000 a year by the end of Parliament, with revenue generated to be invested in higher-level skills training for UK workers.
	Fine, I think that's a good idea.
	The party hopes that the plan will deter businesses of government from avoiding their obligations to improve the skills of the British workforce.
	Good.
	Okay, it's not all bad, but still.
	I mean, I don't think the main part of this is going to happen anyway.
	I'm more than happy for them to incentivise companies to use native labour.
	I think that's a healthy thing.
	Overseas students would remain in the immigration statistics, but the manifesto sets out plans to heighten requirements for students hoping to remain in the country to work after their course is finished.
	Okay.
	The Conservatives plan to increase defence spending by 0.5% more than inflation every year, which, okay, fine.
	And I'm sure that Theresa May would actually retaliate in the event that another nuclear power launches weapons at us.
	No, Jeremy.
	Just take note.
	All you have to do is say, yeah, if someone attacks us, we will retaliate in kind.
	That's all you have to fucking say.
	I am by no means a pacifist, and I fully appreciate the need for the armed forces to have top-grade fighting equipment.
	But I'm just looking at this thing, $178 billion for military equipment.
	i mean i haven't done the numbers i will at some point go through them i'm sure but this is just my initial impressions and i'm just like that just seems like a lot That just seems like an awful lot when compared to the penny pinching that's going on in schools.
	But then maybe they're thinking, well, we're moving into a more uncertain world, which I think we are.
	Maybe it would be to our advantage to have a strong military.
	I mean, in times of peace, prepare for war.
	And of course, they have a section on Brexit, which is, in my opinion, and I think the opinion of many other people, the most important issue we are facing in the next government.
	So the government may be willing to make a reasonable contribution to the European Union after Brexit.
	Fair enough.
	The document also pledges to come to a fair settlement for Britain's EU exit bill, but warns Brussels that the days of Britain making vast annual contributions to the European Union will end.
	Good.
	The manifesto confirms that the Tory Brexit would take Britain out of the European single market and customs unions.
	Good.
	The Conservatives have pledged to secure the rights of EU citizens living in the UK and British expats in Europe, as well as confirming Britain will remain part of the European Convention of Human Rights for the next Parliament.
	Fine.
	It also rules out a Scottish independence referendum until after Brexit is complete and aims to maintain as frictionless a border as possible between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.
	That's fine.
	I know I said at the beginning of this that, my god, this is a terrible manifesto, and so far, it actually doesn't seem that bad, does it?
	Well, I haven't got to the bad part yet.
	Theresa May to create a new internet that would be controlled and regulated by government.
	Okay, just off the bat, of course the internet is controlled and regulated by the government.
	But that's really not the problem with what they are proposing.
	The problem is that Theresa May is planning to introduce huge regulations on the way the internet works, allowing the government to decide what is said online.
	Particular focus has been drawn to the end of the manifesto, which makes clear that the Tories want to introduce huge changes to the way that the internet works.
	They say, some people say that it is not for government to regulate when it comes to technology and the internet.
	We disagree.
	No, of course it's for government to regulate.
	It's what you should regulate.
	What should you and should you not regulate?
	I personally don't think you should regulate people talking to one another.
	I do not think the government needs to be involved in that.
	But anyway, senior Tories have confirmed to BuzzFeed News that the phrasing indicates the government intends to introduce huge restrictions on what people can post, share and publish online.
	Just like to give a big shout out to all of the petulant left-wing activists who spent the last 10 years complaining to the government that they want more done about people disagreeing with them on the internet.
	Looks like you're going to get your wish.
	However, it's going to be power that's wielded by a right-wing government that has no sympathy for your ideological position.
	And so I just want to say, when you start getting censored, oh, I'll be there to complain that you're getting censored.
	I will definitely speak in your corner, but I'm certainly going to start by saying, I fucking told you so.
	The plans will allow Britain to become the global leader in the regulation of the use of personal data on the internet.
	Well, that's just great.
	I don't even know what the hell's going to happen with this, but it's not going to be anything to our benefit, is it?
	And it's fair for the Independent to continue to point out the pattern of behaviour that the government has had in this regard.
	After the Investigatory Powers Act came into law that allow government to force internet companies to keep records on their customers' browsing histories, as well as giving the ministers power to break apps like WhatsApp so that messages can be read.
	I don't like that.
	I really don't like that.
	But what I don't like even more is that the government actually have a just reason for demanding it.
	That's what the thing I think I hate more than the fact that the government's doing this is that they can say, well, look at all of these terrorists that we need to catch before they kill a bunch of people.
	The Conservative government already has a bad history when it comes to pornography.
	A few years ago they outlawed arbitrarily, apparently, a bunch of sex acts from being filmed in pornography that was made in the United Kingdom.
	Why?
	I don't know.
	It just seems to have been, frankly, conservative moralising.
	And they say the new rules would include laws to make it harder than ever to access pornographic and other websites.
	The government will be able to place restrictions on seeing adult content, and any exceptions would have to be justified to ministers.
	Get fucked!
	I'll watch whatever porn I like, as long as it's made between consenting adults.
	It's not your business.
	I don't have to justify shit to you.
	I'll look at whatever degenerate bullshit I want, and it's nothing to do with you.
	The manifesto even suggests the government might stop search engines from Google from directing people to pornographic websites.
	We'll put a responsibility on industry not to direct users, even unintentionally, to hate speech, pornography, or other sources of harm.
	Oh, that's just fucking brilliant.
	I'm so glad the concept of hate speech exists.
	I'm so glad conservatives moralising about pornography exists.
	And I'm so glad that the conservatives are literally the only fucking party in the country who have even the vaguest chance of actually doing something decent with Brexit.
	This is a fucking clusterfuck.
	This is a pretty fucking abysmal Hobson's choice.
	We have got a bunch of communists who will probably end up ruining the country in the long run, or we've got a bunch of conservatives who are effectively going to end up stifling our civil liberties.
	Pick your poison.
	And the thing is, they're doing this out of a fantasy that they can make the online world as safe as the offline world, to have the exactly the same code of conduct.
	I don't think it's going to happen.
	They say in harnessing the digital revolution, we must take steps to protect the vulnerable and give people confidence to use the internet without fear of abuse, criminality, or exposure to horrific content, like porn.
	The manifesto claims in a section called The Safest Place to Be Online.
	The plans are in keeping with the Tories' commitment that the online world must be as regulated as strongly as the offline one, that the same rules should apply to both.
	And we're still not done with the bad news from this.
	The Conservatives will also seek to regulate the kind of news that is posted online and how companies are paid for it.
	If elected, May will take steps to protect the reliability and objectivity of information that is essential to our democracy.
	Yeah, I fucking bet you will.
	I don't trust these people at all to do anything of the sort.
	Not that I would trust the Labour government to do anything of the sort either.
	I don't think it is for the government to tell me what is true.
	Unfortunately, I think that is the job of an informed citizenry, to make sure that they do the due diligence in finding out what is real and what is not, and not simply accepting that what the government says is fact.
	I think that's dangerous and I think that will end up being abused.
	But like I said, I am practically forced to vote for the Conservatives because I don't think that Labour will manage Brexit correctly.
	I don't think they've got the spine to go against Europe.
	I think they will in fact concede and honestly, worst case scenario, I don't think that they will take us out of Europe.
	I think that if they don't get the deal they want, which they will never press for because they are just weak, then we will end up still within the European Union after having voted to leave.
	So I have to vote for the Conservatives, no matter how odious I find their manifesto on things like free speech and internet privacy.
	I don't like the government regulating social interactions.
	I think that should be for people to deal with themselves.
	I don't think being reliant on the government in this regard is wise to make good, healthy, mentally strong people.
	And I don't think that allowing them to continually creep into your private life is a good idea.
	I think it will create the kind of stifling nanny state that liberals in my day used to try and avoid.
	But I mean obviously quote-unquote liberals these days don't have a problem with that.
	The problem that they'll have is that this stifling nanny state will be dictated by conservative values.
	And for people thinking, well, it's not that bad in Britain, no, it really is.
	It's really fucking petty.
	Let me give you an example from this week.
	Oi Bruce, get your dick out.
	Police open hate crime investigation after Caitlyn Jenner is heckled.
	Police in London have reported the open day hate crime investigation after a photographer shouted, Oi Bruce, get your dick out at Caitlyn Jenner as she was leaving the British LGBT awards in London.
	She'd had a wonderful time, but as she went to leave, the whole atmosphere changed, a representative for Jenner reportedly said.
	Someone shouted to her, then someone else threw something at her, it was horrible.
	Yeah, that is fucking horrible.
	I don't know what about the throwing thing, but the main thrust of this problem seems to have been that someone yelled something impolite.
	Well, thank God the police are on the case.
	Officers attended and spoke to one of the organizers, who alleged that a photographer had verbally abused a woman and a man as they were leaving the event.
	No arrests have been made, inquiries are ongoing.
	You're saying that these criminals are still at large?
	My god, we need a manhunt.
	Someone yelled, get your dick out at Bruce Jenner, therefore, police investigation.
	Come the fuck on!
	Come on, this is pathetic.
	It's pathetic.
	Yes, they were heckled.
	No, it's not very nice.
	It's not very nice.
	No, that person's a dick.
	And if we find out who he is, we can say, hey, look, that guy's a dick.
	But should we actually be having criminal investigations over someone yelling, Bruce, get your dick out?
	Honestly, I don't think we should legislate against hurt feelings.
	And I think that if you weren't trying to do this, people would probably be more accepting of it anyway.
	I mean, it really looks, look at look at Bruce Jenner's fucking face.
	It looks like the Emperor has no clothes.
	Because the thing is, this is all a pretense.
	And it's a fiction we all buy into.
	And I'm more than happy to do that on an individual case-by-case basis.
	If I knew a trans person who was trying to become a woman or a woman trying to become a man and they wanted me to address them by the trans pronoun of man or woman, which they weren't, I would still do it out of politeness.
	I wouldn't expect there to be legal ramifications if I didn't.
	And the reason I say that this is the Emperor Has No Clothes is because all it takes is for one guy to shout, Oi Bruce, get your dick out, and the whole illusion is shattered apparently.
	Now arrests have to be made for this kind of horrible speech crime.
	It's bollocks.
	It's fucking bollocks.
	And look at just the look on Caitlin Jenner's face.
	Look at this expression.
	I can't imagine what someone could say to me that would get me to have that kind of expression.
	The kind of expression that says, look, I've built up my whole fucking ego around this and I've got a giant fantasy around this and you're not allowed to say something for the protection of my worldview.
	I can't even imagine being in any position like that.
	And of course, YouTuber Count Dankula is going for his trial this week.
	In fact, I think at the time of recording it has actually passed, but I don't have any further information about it.
	I couldn't find anything before I recorded.
	So I'll give you an update when I do find something.
	But he faces a year in prison if he's found guilty of a hate crime for a joke.
	A joke at the expense of the Nazis, no less.
	So what you're saying is you can't mock the fucking Nazis by parodying them because that is somehow anti-Semitic.
	It's fucking ridiculous.
	Apparently many Jews have been left incensed at the videos, with the director of the Scottish Council of Jewish Communities telling the Daily Mirror that the Holocaust should not be joked about under any circumstances.
	Well, I have some bad news for you.
	Saying that means that people are going to joke about it.
	Because it's this again, it's this kind of preachy, moralizing, busybody bullshit that I hate.
	You have got no rights to tell people what they can and can't joke about.
	I don't care.
	I don't care about your feelings.
	I don't care about how upset you are about it.
	I don't care because you are infringing on other people's freedom of expression to protect your feelings and fuck your feelings.
	Fuck them.
	Ephraim Borowski.
	I don't give a shit how offended you are.
	To regard the meticulously planned and industrialized murder of six million people solely on the grounds of their ethnicity as a joke is outrageous.
	That's the fucking joke.
	And for someone who does so to claim to not be racist beggars belief.
	The fact that you can't distinguish a joke from something done with real intent is what really beggars belief to me.
	But once again, this isn't that he's legitimately offended.
	No.
	This is a way for him to gain influence.
	He can demand this.
	And people go, oh God, a Jew's demanding we don't joke about the Holocaust.
	I mean, God, who wants to be the first to break that social convention?
	Who fucking cares?
	Who gives a shit?
	This guy wasn't in the fucking Holocaust.
	The only reason he's being asked his opinion in the fucking first place is because he's Jewish.
	That's it.
	It's not like he has some deep insight into this.
	It's not like we have to give a damn.
	It's all about his fucking feelings.
	Honestly, I am just so sick of grievance mongering.
	I am really tired of it.
	I mean, they don't give a shit when they say, oh, you know, you know who the problem is?
	White men.
	I mean, there's no problem with that.
	That's just completely common in almost every newspaper in the entire Western world.
	You will find articles about that on anything that isn't a hard right newspaper.
	But fucking hell, man.
	You make one joke about the Nazis and suddenly, oh, oh, everyone's up in arms.
	No, get Ben.
	Honestly, just piss off.
	You either have consistent standards or you don't hold them at all.
	And in your case, British government, you don't fucking hold them.
	That's it.
	If Dankula goes down for a shit post, I don't even know what we can do.
	But I think we've got to do something.
	We've got to petition someone.
	We've got to make some kind of noise about it.
	Because fuck that shit.
	I think our rights to joke about things is fucking sacred.
	I think it's important.
	I think it's a necessary outlet for social pressure and stress and for people to express themselves.
	Other people's feelings shouldn't be used to prevent that, especially if they're people you don't personally fucking know.
	How could I be trying to insult someone I don't know?
	I don't know what would be insulting to them.
	They have taken the offence in this case.
	Not that it was given to them.
	Honestly, it's fucking horseshit.
	So this week, I do actually have the luxury of ending on a high note.
	The politicised rape charges against Julian Assange have been dropped.
	Salon.com's coverage is, of course, amazing.
	Julian Assange, alleged rapist and likely misogynist, just caught a major break from Sweden.
	Swedish prosecutors announced on Friday they were dropping the rape investigations of WikiLeaks founder according to a report by the New York Times.
	They emphasize that this is not because they believe Assange is innocent, but rather due to the improbability of them being able to apprehend Assange for their investigation within the foreseeable future.
	I can conclude based on evidence that this probable cause for the crime still exists.
	But because Ecuador is refusing to cooperate in their investigation and they'd used up all their other possibilities for getting Assange, my assessment is that the transfer can't be executed in the foreseeable future.
	This isn't to say that Assange can now leave the Ecuadorian embassy with impunity.
	Because he refused to surrender to British authorities in June 2012, the police in London have a warrant out for his arrest, and they say they would feel obliged to execute that warrant if Assange sets foot on British soil.
	Julian Assange did nothing wrong.
	We should let him go.
	That's my opinion on this.
	Julian Assange has...
	I'm just staggered.
	He has done things that I would just not have the balls to do.
	I would never have the balls to open up an agency that was dedicated to leaking government secrets.
	I would expect to get a bullet.
	I would never even think about going into hiding and going on the run for seven years, finding refuge in the embassy of Ecuador, and fucking godspeed to them, because no one else was going to fucking take him in, I don't think.
	And it was like that on Russia, wasn't it?
	Go and join Edward Snowden out in Moscow.
	But seriously, this guy has legitimately sacrificed his own personal freedom.
	It's like he's been under arrest for the last seven years while he has been coordinating with Wikileaks and providing us the necessary information we need about what's going on behind the scenes.
	Wikileaks has never been wrong.
	Wikileaks will provide us information about Hillary Clinton, John Podesta, and the CIA that we would otherwise never have been given.
	And it made a demonstrable impact on the elections.
	Hillary Clinton herself said that she thinks that Wikileaks cost her the election.
	She's fucking wrong.
	The malfeasance revealed by Wikileaks cost her the fucking election.
	But she'll never admit it.
	Because if she does, then it's out.
	Then it's in the open.
	Then again, the Emperor has no fucking clothes.
	But yeah, the Mets should fucking drop the charges.
	Stop being a bunch of fucking crybabies.
	This is a clear case of a politicized witch hunt against the man from the authorities who are working in conjunction with the American authorities who are doing this because he's busy fucking with their shit.
	Well, that's too damn bad.

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