well over here in USA in one nearby city to me they had a pedophile mayor and in another nearby city they had a cokehead mayor who got re-elected so I dunno yay federal government. Also I think over here when people dislike federal government in particular it's people who want to secede from the union because obamasatan.jpg and they want to make their own currency out of slightly poop-stained monopoly money

there was one guy who disliked something the town mayor/council/group of ELDERS did and is like driving his truck around every week __________ TOWN COUNCIL UNTUSTWORTHY and he might have a point about something but it might be pissing and moaning like they taxed his yacht 1% more but I just liked it because it was the real-life equivalent of an all-caps rambling internet post

yeah it seems like anyone who talks about increasing local governments round here is looking create their utopia of unlimited gun ownership and legalized lynching. besides that it's not a subject for the most part

there is a big problem with local government in my state (possibly other states too) concerning development: when deciding to develop an area inside one town or municipality or whatever, the local government doesn't need to talk to/get approval from other nearby governments. this is pretty terrible for sustainability. a municipality could do something that would create a major ecological problem for the next town downstream/across the green corridor/whatever and the same applies to the economy and other forms of sustainability

not a well thought-out opinion at all, but if I had to make an argument based on this information I'd say local governments are great but they need some real integration and coordination with higher government and nearby local governments in order to be effective at development or sustainability at all

I understand the idea behind putting things in charge of local governments.  Local governments supposedly understand the area they govern much better than the federal government.  I think this is probably a bigger deal in America than the UK since we're much larger, but I suppose the same sort of thing can apply in the UK.  I think the bigger problem is that local governments have a lot of REALLY TERRIBLE opinions.  Some states would probably be their own countries given the ability.  I wouldn't be surprised if some local governments would be all for banning gays or Muslims or anything else they don't like from living in their town or their county.  The federal government is in the international sphere.  If the US federal government tried to kick all the blacks out of the country, I don't see our peers in the rest of the world taking that too well.  If some small county in Kentucky tried, nobody would even know.  It's also much harder to become an important figure in the federal government than in local governments.  I think that being more in the public eye than just in the crazy town you live in is what keeps the federal government at least a lot more on the straight and narrow than it COULD be.  Not saying the federal government doesn't get away with shit constantly, but it could get away with much more if it wasn't more noticable than small-town government.  This is more or less why I don't trust giving too much power to local government.

Speaking of terrible officials, the sheriff in my hometown has been investigated by the federal government and is up on all sorts of charges.  Here's a snippet of a news article:
"According to the indictment handed down by a special grand jury, as early as 2003, Hodge took money from his office’s drug and alcohol account—money typically used during undercover drug operations—for personal use. It also states he took fee and tax money."

I seem to remember also reading that he like...sold off a bunch of the office's guns and kept the money and all sorts of shit.  Over the time of these investigations there was a HUGE list of shit he did ripping off the state.  It's hard to put faith in local government when people like this are governing the area.  The federal government may be corrupt but local governments are ten times as bad since less people are keeping an eye on them.

I think the mix of federal/local government in the USA right now is about right.

It's nice that states have so much control over their own laws, because it allows for them to tailor the government for the needs of the populace and the geography, culture, and economy. It also adds a lot of variety to the government, so that if you disagree with the laws of your state, you can just move to another one that more suits your style without having to leave the country entirely.

Federal power is important too, though. It provides unity for local governments, and makes sure that certain important laws are enforced throughout the land. Without federal government, states would basically be independent sovereign nations, unorganized and inefficient, and conflicts of interest would escalate quickly.

I've heard opinions that Europe almost a federation of states at this point, or will be soon, what with the European Union and the Euro and such. From what I understand, though, the EU is basically an economic entity, and there is nothing approaching federal government on an international scale. Do you guys think that Europe will ever turn into a federation of states with an overarching sovereign government, or will the nations remain forever independent?

i am mostly posting in this topic for the NOSTALGIA of a self-proclaimed topic of the week!!! i am actually excited about this!!!(might be exhaustion*)


i am so jaded in regards to american politics that i barely have a functional opinion about it all anymore. be it state or federal government, there's this sickening undercurrent of corruption or just general favor granted to STUFF that does not really benefit the majority of people it represents, and especially not the rest of the world for that matter.

it's just amazing the degree to which shit gets fucked up. a friend of mine worked for a government sponsored weatherization organization. SOUNDED GOOD!! government money to fix up lower income homes so two inches of snow doesn't causes houses to explode. WHERE DO I SIGN?!? apparently nowhere, because the people in charge of this organization simultaneously had no idea what the fuck they were doing and were also CROOKS and ended up breaking a multitude of laws, pocketing an inordinate amount of cash, and ended up weatherizing like a tenth of the houses they were expected to service(most of which, i might add, were done poorly and against basic safety standards[INSULATION, ][/INSULATION,]). they were trying to make my friend the FALL GUY for all their crooked deeds, even though he was PROFOUNDLY INCONSEQUENTIAL FILE CLERK, but he managed to ESCAPE and is currently collecting unemployment due to HOSTILE WORK ENVIRONMENT. this is probably an AWFUL EXAMPLE since it's just one government project that got horribly fucked up, but it's not encouraging that this sort of thing can happen at all. government bureaus have people to check up on shit like this(they are usually named DOUG or BOB), but it gets messy when you have to clean up larger scale messes like this.

i don't really know where i'm going with this, but basically in an ideal world you would need the state and federal governments to work together to make sure the other is kept in-line. you get the state government figuring out what's best for them, and the federal government to make sure the state government isn't celebrating SHIT IN SOUTH DAKOTA'S DRINKING WATER day or something. but i personally believe neither are capable of acting so responsibly without forcing all pertinent government employees to wear SHOCK COLLARS and be monitored 24 hours a day by the populace. sadly this will never happen and there is no FEAR amongst the ranks of the government because they have awesome guns and all we have is GLENN BECK COMPLAINING ABOUT COMMUNISM LIKE IT'S 1953 which does exactly ZERO PEOPLE any fucking good.

i guess i am inching closer to the george carlin mentality where i am just sitting back waiting for the bombs to drop. i feel like a massive douche for being THAT GUY WHO THINKS X COMEDIAN HAD IT FIGURED OUT, but this is seriously a good mentality to have when confronted with profound futility.

so yeah i have posted in the topic of the week like it's 2004 again. this is arguably the most ill-informed, badly conceived post i have ever made on this message board but i was too excited to hold back. imho it is almost funny though.


*it is definitely exhaustion btw. i have fucking mad tunnel vision atm

... the emancipation of the working class can only be achieved by the working class itself. Communism, for Marx, stands for a classless society. He argued that human history begins when Man has created social relations in which humanity is no longer an exploitable resource but a purpose. His critique of bourgeois society does not merely wish to expose its true character, that is the accumulation of human machines on the pyramids of accumulation for accumulation’s sake. He also, and importantly, showed that the constituted forms of bourgeois social relations are forms of human social practice. This is the material basis for his revolutionary demand that all relations which render Man a forsaken being have to be abolished in favour of the society of the free and equal, a society of human dignity where all is returned to Man who, no longer ruled by self-imposed abstraction, controls his own social affairs and is in possession of himself.

if all government officials were made to listen to IDM none of this would happen

IDM Intelligent Delegation Music


Edit: Seriously could somebody tell me if a virus like this would even be possible?? Like remember in Link's Awakening where if you stole from the shop your name changed to THIEF in big capital letters. Like could someone make a word-substitution code that does the same thing but on computers and is a really good virus and spreads to like everywhere, and we replace like every word pertaining to politics, like senator etc. so even if you went in a public library 9 times out of 10 you would go on a news site and it would be like 'today THIEF (somebody's name) spoke with suchandsuch' and maybe it would print this way the newspapers would have to cross it out and edit it by hand with a Sharpie marker

Florida and South Carolina law explicitly ban the sale of 40 oz. malt liquor beverages.  32 oz. is as much as you can get.

I never understood the idea behind laws like this. There is nothing stopping someone from buying as many 32 oz. bottles as they want and pouring them into a giant barrel. A swimming pool even. And then doggie-paddling in it.

You've also got rules where one county in a state might be entirely dry, another allows alcohol sales anytime and yet another allows sales any day but Sunday.  But people will just drive a ridiculously small distance to go to another county to get the alcohol they want.  I really don't see why shit like that needs to be micromanaged at a county level.

Fuck the caaancil. Pick my bins up. Fuck the caaaaaaaaaaancil. Fuck the caaaaancil tax

we should all live in the woods and hunt squirrel for food

Videos in supermarkets? Do they not have CCTV there already?

Now I know that we're laughed at for being a bit of a policestate (by Dorothy anyway), but I really like that CCTV cameras are everywhere. I mean, I don't care if they see me doing whatever, as they only really watch the cameras in an area when they're looking for a specific crime. It isn't like there's a guy sitting there managing to watch thousands of screens, and I think they'd take like an army of people to do one each.

must post song

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFbKsJBRr0o