New EU Initiative - 'How to get an evil smoker to quit'

Plotician

http://en.helpers-eu.com/

Not sure whether to be amused, bemused, confused, or take it seriously and ask the questions:

A. Is this how we want the EU to spend our money?
B. Should we really be influencing children to think that smokers must be evil people?
C. Is this the early signs of how the EU is going to shape young peoples thinking on other issues in future as well?

All a bit strange, but it's an EU initiative so i guess it's within policy etc.

schween

It does say not suitable for viewers under 15 so unless people go about telling children smokers evil.

I laughed at it. Reminds me of Happy Tree Friends on YouTube.

evercloserunion

It seems rather bizarre. It's like a cross between Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends and Happy Tree Friends.

Looks harmless and kinda fun. But no doubt the usual suspects will be along shortly decrying this attempt by the arrogant bigwigs in Brussels to stamp on our freedom.

Plotician

Took me ages to find the 'not suitable for anyone under 15' message until i realised you had to actually start watching the video before you got the notice! (and then it was only a blip so i suspect it's a token gesture).

It's also possible to subscribe to the series from the age of 10 so a bit of a contradiction there too.

I'm for any effort to discourage smoking (even though a smoker myself), but I wonder what it cost to put it together (with all the translations etc) and how it's going to be marketed. Presumably they're hoping via Bebo and Facebook.

Daftendirekt

That was weird.

And unnecessary,

Plotician

I got curious and delved a bit. Interestingly 1% (about 1 billion euro per year) of the EU budget since 2004 (at least) has been spent subsidising tobacco growers - more than was spent on health research.

The EU has also in the past sued US tobacco corporates for alleged smuggling of cigarettes into Europe - seen as a direct economic threat.

Subsidies are supposed to be phased out in 2010, but will be replaced with other mechanisms that continue to subsidise tobacco producers.

Seems like a lot of money being thrown about in both directions!

ConsiderThis

Plotician wrote: »

http://en.helpers-eu.com/

Not sure whether to be amused, bemused, confused, or take it seriously and ask the questions:

A. Is this how we want the EU to spend our money?
.

Youi really have no say as to how the EU spends your money, or national government for that matter. They are now the masters, and we are their servants.

evercloserunion

ConsiderThis wrote: »

Youi really have no say as to how the EU spends your money, or national government for that matter. They are now the masters, and we are their servants.

And of course it's not even your money, since Ireland are not net contributors to the EU.

marco_polo

Plotician wrote: »

I got curious and delved a bit. Interestingly 1% (about 1 billion euro per year) of the EU budget since 2004 (at least) has been spent subsidising tobacco growers - more than was spent on health research.

The EU has also in the past sued US tobacco corporates for alleged smuggling of cigarettes into Europe - seen as a direct economic threat.

Subsidies are supposed to be phased out in 2010, but will be replaced with other mechanisms that continue to subsidise tobacco producers.

Seems like a lot of money being thrown about in both directions!

That is an unbelievably disingenuous comment, it will be replaced by mechanisms to support growers to produce crops other than tobbacco.

http://euobserver.com/9/27142

ConsiderThis

evercloserunion wrote: »

And of course it's not even your money, since Ireland are not net contributors to the EU.

That's part of the problem, as many seem to think in nationalistic terms re the EU.

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

Youi really have no say as to how the EU spends your money, or national government for that matter.

The system is called Representative Democracy - you have your "say" by voting for representatives that are closest to your beliefs. These representatives then get on with the boring stuff like making laws, passing budgets etc.

Most people don't actually want to vote on an item-by-item basis for all the items in a typical budget. :eek:

ConsiderThis

View wrote: »

The system is called Representative Democracy - you have your "say" by voting for representatives that are closest to your beliefs. These representatives then get on with the boring stuff like making laws, passing budgets etc.

Most people don't actually want to vote on an item-by-item basis for all the items in a typical budget. :eek:

I'm impressed that you think you know what most people want. I don't and only speak for myself. Also thanks for explaining what a representative democracy is, as I never knew what it was before. Now that we've seen the fall of communism, I wonder are we also seeing the capitalist systems also disintegrating before our eyes?

evercloserunion

ConsiderThis wrote: »

I'm impressed that you think you know what most people want. I don't and only speak for myself. Also thanks for explaining what a representative democracy is, as I never knew what it was before. Now that we've seen the fall of communism, I wonder are we also seeing the capitalist systems also disintegrating before our eyes?

What system would you like to see replace it?

Stark

Communism! Why not give it another shot. It's time for another Russian style revolution after modern capitalism has reduced people to working 40 hours a week, living in houses with one person per room with clean running water, sanitation, food, transport, disposable income etc. It's time for the common man to stand up and demand that we stop generating wealth lest the wealth generators have it better than us.

ConsiderThis

evercloserunion wrote: »

What system would you like to see replace it?

Thats an interesting question. While it seems to be true that most poeple in the western world are not sceptical about politicians, about politicians and about the motives of politicians, what I'd like to see is this country, Ireland, jailing politicians who break the law as a first step back to returning to democracy.

Notionally, we have democracy, but in practice the Taoiseach of the day has more power than many Kings and Queens had before him, and we live in a state where democracy acts more as a fig leaf for politicians than anything else.

On refelction, what i would like is politicians to represent the views of their constituents, rather than representing the views of government to their constituents.

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

I'm impressed that you think you know what most people want. I don't and only speak for myself.

Well, I admit I am making a bit of an assumption which maybe wrong of course. Offhand, I don't know of any minor, much less mass, political movement campaigning in favour of us voting on an item-by-item basis for all the items in the typical budget. If you do know of any, I'd love to see a link to their website.

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

On refelction, what i would like is politicians to represent the views of their constituents, rather than representing the views of government to their constituents.

That's not how representative democracy works. Based on this idea, you couldn't have parties such as Labour or the PDs as they'd be supposed to "represent the views of their constituents" - a position which would involve them simultaneously representating views that are diametrically opposed to each other.

It would render the whole point of elections meaningless. There literally would be no point in voting for (the candidates from) party A over (those from) party B or C.

If you want that we could just ban all parties apart from one. Based on past performance I'd guess that party would have to be FF. :eek:

ConsiderThis

View wrote: »

That's not how representative democracy works. Based on this idea, you couldn't have parties such as Labour or the PDs as they'd be supposed to "represent the views of their constituents" - a position which would involve them simultaneously representating views that are diametrically opposed to each other.

It would render the whole point of elections meaningless. There literally would be no point in voting for (the candidates from) party A over (those from) party B or C.

If you want that we could just ban all parties apart from one. Based on past performance I'd guess that party would have to be FF. :eek:

Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure we seem to mean the same thing when we talk abouit a politician representing the views of his constituents.

In any case, the point I was maknig was that I'd like to see politicians no longer seeing their role to represent the executive to their constituents, and instead represent their constituents views to the executive.

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

In any case, the point I was maknig was that I'd like to see politicians no longer seeing their role to represent the executive to their constituents, and instead represent their constituents views to the executive.

I'd suspect that most politicans endeavour to do both, maybe not always succesfully.

If the Government makes a decision there should be coherent reasons (even if you don't agree with them) as to why they decide to do X rather than Y. Clearly politicans have a role in explaining this to their constituents (or at least those who are interested enough to try to find out). Likewise, coherent well-argued contributions (as opposed to babbling nonsense!) should and probably is fed back by them to the Government. I'd suspect that, in general, organisations have a lot more success in getting their views across rather than Joe Bloggs who just turns up off the street.

namloc1980

ConsiderThis wrote: »

Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure we seem to mean the same thing when we talk abouit a politician representing the views of his constituents.

In any case, the point I was maknig was that I'd like to see politicians no longer seeing their role to represent the executive to their constituents, and instead represent their constituents views to the executive.

Isn't that what happens now?? Our TD's have constituency clinics where you, me or anyone else can go along and make our views known on a particular issue. If the TD doesn't do a good job addressing our concerns we can just not vote for him the next time.

ConsiderThis

View wrote: »

I'd suspect that most politicans endeavour to do both, maybe not always succesfully.

If the Government makes a decision there should be coherent reasons (even if you don't agree with them) as to why they decide to do X rather than Y. Clearly politicans have a role in explaining this to their constituents (or at least those who are interested enough to try to find out). Likewise, coherent well-argued contributions (as opposed to babbling nonsense!) should and probably is fed back by them to the Government. I'd suspect that, in general, organisations have a lot more success in getting their views across rather than Joe Bloggs who just turns up off the street.

There is a difference between the government explaining their decisions, and a TD representing the views of the government to their constituents.

The TD's role is to represent his constituents in parliament. Full stop. Once he starts to act on behalf of the government (as opposed to the parliamant) to do the opposite of that, he is compromised, as the two jobs are diametrically opposed.

Add to that, in our system where we have career politicians, we will usually find that the politician who wants to be considered for advancement will choose the latter route at the expense of the former, as he is dependent on his party boss's patronage.

Of course TD's have "clinics", although my understanding of these is that they are more about trying to decure a medical card for someone and teh like rather than an attempt to discuss the issues of the day.

Scofflaw

ConsiderThis wrote: »

There is a difference between the government explaining their decisions, and a TD representing the views of the government to their constituents.

The TD's role is to represent his constituents in parliament. Full stop. Once he starts to act on behalf of the government (as opposed to the parliamant) to do the opposite of that, he is compromised, as the two jobs are diametrically opposed.

Add to that, in our system where we have career politicians, we will usually find that the politician who wants to be considered for advancement will choose the latter route at the expense of the former, as he is dependent on his party boss's patronage.

All the patronage in the world won't elect a candidate the electorate don't like, and at the end of the day the party is dependent on getting TDs elected in order to be in government. The balance of power, therefore, depends on the local base of the politician, and every politician in Ireland is well aware of that fact. Those that have solid machines and a real popularity base in their constituency can go Independent if necessary - they'll still be elected. Examples are legion - the Healy-Raes, Lowry, Cooper-Flynn, the Blaneys.

The only candidates who are truly dependent on the party are those like John Hanafin (Mary Hanafin's brother) who have no personal standing with the electorate, and whose only hope is to be parachuted in by head office and anointed by the local TD as successor. It's a route that doesn't work very well, though, at least partly because the central party doesn't have much a machine on the ground to help such a candidate out.

Irish politics is localist, clientilist, and very close to feudal. It doesn't revolve around national issues because the parties aren't elected on the basis of national policy, but instead qualify for government almost accidentally by virtue of how many local representatives who happen to belong to their faction are elected in any given election.

That's why the question "would you vote for party X?" often returns an inaccurate answer - people might not want to "vote for Fianna Fáil", but they'll vote for, say, John McGuinness, who, admittedly, as it happens, and almost coincidentally, belongs to Fianna Fáil. The only constituencies that buck the trend are the really urban ones like Dun Laoghaire (although there are pockets in Shankill that vote for Mary Hanafin rather than Fianna Fáil) and other Dublin ones - and they are regarded as unpleasantly high-risk oddities.

cordially,
Scofflaw

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

There is a difference between the government explaining their decisions, and a TD representing the views of the government to their constituents.

The TD's role is to represent his constituents in parliament. Full stop.

I have to fundamentally disagree with you there. Parliaments, at the end of the day, are primarily legislative assemblies which make decisions on the laws for their respective areas.

Therefore, TDs, like other parliamentarians, main role is to act as legislators making decisions on the laws for the state. True, they do also have a secondary role to act as representatives on a day-to-day basis but this role is less important than their primary role.

For instance - the laws that the Oireachtas made decisions on in 1993 are largely still in force. The representations made back then - in parliamentary questions and the topical "business of the day" debates - are almost totally forgotten and irrelevant today. As such, it is the decisions that TDs make as legislators that effects us most.

Even if you say that the TDs role is "to represent his constituents in parliament" (full stop), I don't see how this could work in practice. Constituents have differening views on issues, how is a TD supposed to represent opposing views in practice? Argue with himself in the Oireachtas? Vote both ways on an issue to ensure everyone's view is represented (In which is anyone's?)?

For instance - when faced with the current budgetary crisis what is the TD to do? Some of his constituents probably favour a "Joe Higgins" high-tax solution, others a "Michael McDowell" cut-services approach, yet more a "Please God, make it go away approach". He can't represent all three equally - ultimately he has to opt for a position somewhere on the issue.

The TD's job as a legislator is to make a decision on this one way or another and pass/reject the relevant law on it (the budget in this case). To do so, he/she needs to act on what he/she and/or their party believes is the right thing to do. This needless to say is going to be a combination of what they personally believe (i.e. their "ideology"), the expert advice they get, and the representations they get from their constituents.

The representations are of course important - he/she would be foolish to ignore them out of hand - but, the other opinions may be more important. If the expert advice he get is "the country will be bankrupt in 12 months" and his constituents are all of the opinion "do nothing because the choices are horrible", does the TD do their consitutents any favours by pandering to public opinion and refusing to make a decision?

ConsiderThis

I agree that parliaments are legislative assemblies, although I also understand that they serve many purposes.

If you feel that the only way possible for a TD to represent his constituents in parliament is to argue with himself, and that he must represent all the views of all his constituents at the same time, then we disagree.

I also can't agree that a TD's main role is to act as legislators making decisions on the laws for the state, as legislation is made by the government, and whipped through no matter what the views are of other TD's.

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

I agree that parliaments are legislative assemblies, although I also understand that they serve many purposes.

If you feel that the only way possible for a TD to represent his constituents in parliament is to argue with himself, and that he must represent all the views of all his constituents at the same time, then we disagree.

My point was a TD, short of arguing with himself, cannot represent the view of all his constituents at the same time, hence, at some point he most make a decision to support a particular view and vote accordingly. At that point - for that particular vote - he becomes representative of only some of his consitutents.

Likewise, in aggregate, a TD will tend - even in a totally free vote environment - to come down at a particular point on the ideological spectrum. In other words, a Joe Higgins is unlikely to vote for Michael McDowell solutions and vice versa.

Now, of course, we - the voters can just abdicate our responsibilites - and just leave it to the individual TDs to make the decisions for us. However, why should we? The whole benefit of having elections is that we get to choose and, in a representative democracy, that means voting for those representatives and parties that are closest to our own personal views.

ConsiderThis wrote: »

I also can't agree that a TD's main role is to act as legislators making decisions on the laws for the state, as legislation is made by the government, and whipped through no matter what the views are of other TD's.

Again, we disagree . The Government can't get anything through the Oireachtas unless a majority of the TDs support it. Hence, TDs as legislators must decide to support government proposals for them to pass.

Personally, I'd be happy to see a looser whip system in place. I don't see any reason why the Dail committees couldn't initate legislation on occassion based on reports they draw up. Maybe TDs over-emphasise the role of their parties in the Oireachtas. It would be interesting to see why they feel that this should be the case...

ConsiderThis

View wrote: »

My point was a TD, short of arguing with himself, cannot represent the view of all his constituents at the same time, hence, at some point he most make a decision to support a particular view and vote accordingly. At that point - for that particular vote - he becomes representative of only some of his consitutents.

Likewise, in aggregate, a TD will tend - even in a totally free vote environment - to come down at a particular point on the ideological spectrum. In other words, a Joe Higgins is unlikely to vote for Michael McDowell solutions and vice versa.

Now, of course, we - the voters can just abdicate our responsibilites - and just leave it to the individual TDs to make the decisions for us. However, why should we? The whole benefit of having elections is that we get to choose and, in a representative democracy, that means voting for those representatives and parties that are closest to our own personal views.



Again, we disagree . The Government can't get anything through the Oireachtas unless a majority of the TDs support it. Hence, TDs as legislators must decide to support government proposals for them to pass.

Personally, I'd be happy to see a looser whip system in place. I don't see any reason why the Dail committees couldn't initate legislation on occassion based on reports they draw up. Maybe TDs over-emphasise the role of their parties in the Oireachtas. It would be interesting to see why they feel that this should be the case...

The most important piece of legislation for a long time is the NAMA legislation. Not one single voter voted for it, int he form of voting for a memebr of a party who advocated it, at the last election as it wasn't mentioned in any manifesto.

I'd be happy to vote to abolish the whip system as it impoverishes the role of TD's, and gives the executive far too much power. I'm all for democracy, and the whip system often means we have something more akin to a system where the Taoiseach can act much like a feudal king of old.

Incidentally, I don't know of anyone of calibre who wants to be a TD nowadays, as the job is largely pointless. It seems to be more about striking attitudes and soundbites rather than about actually being able to do anything more than scrambling to secure more fovernment money ( ie our money) for their own constituency to ease the path of re-election. Whatever happened to George Lee?

View

ConsiderThis wrote: »

The most important piece of legislation for a long time is the NAMA legislation. Not one single voter voted for it, int he form of voting for a memebr of a party who advocated it, at the last election as it wasn't mentioned in any manifesto.

I'd agree with you there. I am not a NAMA fan (I thought the reason we had examinership was to handle situtations like this). However, we do have representatives that we elected and it is up to them to get on with the task of legislating and governing.

ConsiderThis wrote: »

I'd be happy to vote to abolish the whip system as it impoverishes the role of TD's, and gives the executive far too much power. I'm all for democracy, and the whip system often means we have something more akin to a system where the Taoiseach can act much like a feudal king of old.

Agreed but it is largely up to the TDs to define their role. They do have the power to be more independent, it just seems they don't want to use it.

ConsiderThis wrote: »

Incidentally, I don't know of anyone of calibre who wants to be a TD nowadays, as the job is largely pointless. It seems to be more about striking attitudes and soundbites rather than about actually being able to do anything more than scrambling to secure more fovernment money ( ie our money) for their own constituency to ease the path of re-election. Whatever happened to George Lee?

Largely, this has always been the case. The Oireachtas has always tended to be dominated by Teachers, Lawyers and Publicans. Hence, our tendency to mess up the economy every couple of years.

Our electoral system does not encourage creative thinking by TDs I'm afraid...

ConsiderThis

View wrote: »

I'd agree with you there. I am not a NAMA fan (I thought the reason we had examinership was to handle situtations like this). However, we do have representatives that we elected and it is up to them to get on with the task of legislating and governing.



Agreed but it is largely up to the TDs to define their role. They do have the power to be more independent, it just seems they don't want to use it.



Largely, this has always been the case. The Oireachtas has always tended to be dominated by Teachers, Lawyers and Publicans. Hence, our tendency to mess up the economy every couple of years.

Our electoral system does not encourage creative thinking by TDs I'm afraid...

I'm afraid that our electoral system puts off the top brains, and the career politicians, who rely on their party leader for patronage, ensure that TD's are not in a position to be more independent, as they invariably choose to put their dependence on their part leader for promotion ahead of their independence.