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BS: Romania's war on the poor
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Subject: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Jack Campin Date: 12 Feb 13 - 09:58 AM As a footnote in the UK contaminated beef scandal, I see Romania is attempting to deprive its entire rural poor of their main means of transport: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/horsemeat-found-in-british-supermarkets-may-be-donkey-8489030.html This is a far more serious concern than British people eating mislabelled but harmless meat products. I've seen how animal transport if used in Romania. It's far less ecologically damaging than the alternative (flaky quadbikes, usually) and the rural commnity simply can't function without it. The intention is presumably to drive the rural population off the land in an operation like the Highland Clearances, only on a much larger scale. And for the mainly Romanian elite, it has the useful additional effect that it will pretty near obliterate the Hungarian and Gypsy communities. It's an atrocity and needs to be stopped. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 12 Feb 13 - 01:23 PM Agreed Jack, but how, and by whom? Don T. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Georgiansilver Date: 12 Feb 13 - 01:43 PM Romania chose to join the EEC and as such the Country is being will be exploited by the rich. We used to travel overland to Romania with Humanitarian Aid before they joined and we often discussed the implications of it. We knew the poor would become poorer and the rich richer. It is a cheap place to run a business from and the cost of living is generally lower than most of the rest of Europe but the poor in country areas only just manage to subsist with their smallholdings/gardens. We passed many a horse and cart on the roads and in darkness almost hit a few at one time and another, because they had no lights to warn traffic of their presence. However, that is the way they have lived for centuries and it seems ludicrous for their government to ban their means of getting harvested food to market or to the city to sell.... How will they manage? They can't afford cars. I am sure their hospitals will soon have up to date equipment instead of the 1950's medical equipment purchased form the UK and other EU Countries when it became obsolete ...... Services and retail outlets will thrive... but only the well off will benefit...... I do feel for the Romanian poor! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Greg F. Date: 12 Feb 13 - 03:23 PM Hey, the Republicans in the U.S. of A. have been waging war on the poor since Reagan was in office. Where's the outrage about that? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Little Hawk Date: 12 Feb 13 - 03:47 PM Remember when the Cold War was declared over with the fall of the Soviet system, Eastern Europe was promised "democracy" and "freedom", and everyone was promised a Peace Dividend? That was a big lie. The poor have become poorer and the rich have become richer...everywhere. Civil liberties have been curtailed in our so-called democracies. Social programs have been cut. Public infrastructure has deteriorated. Military spending has gone up and there have been more wars and threats of even greater wars. We have probably never been less secure than we are right now, because no peace dividend was ever offered to the general public...or ever intended to be. Instead, we were delivered into the hands of a corporate-militarist movement intent on building itself a world empire ruled by a centralized elite. The rural Romanians are among those suffering the fallout from that. Things have gotten steadily more unstable in the world ever since the collapse of the Communist Bloc, because it removed the checks and balances of military-political power which were there to restrain our capitalist side from leaping into total irresponsible hubris and the certainty that they could dominate and exploit the entire world for their own gain. They figured that with the Russians out of the equation, no one was out there with the power to stop them. And they went hogwild. We see the results now all around us. The Russians see it too, they know they were robbed by the West, and they're re-arming now as effectively as they can. They will not be fooled again. Nor will the Chinese. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Richard Bridge Date: 13 Feb 13 - 06:23 AM A good SOTU from LH. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: GUEST,Tunesmith Date: 13 Feb 13 - 11:45 AM Don't worry about the poor in Romania! In a year or two, they'll be free to come to Britain, and our welfare state will make sure that they won't be poor over here! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Pete Jennings Date: 13 Feb 13 - 12:05 PM That's right, Tunesmith, and they'll be given child support so they can send the money home to their families... A barmy situation all round. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 13 Feb 13 - 01:21 PM Xenophobia rules, eh? Don T. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: GUEST,Tunesmith Date: 13 Feb 13 - 02:14 PM No, we just want a level playing field! Are the Spanish xenophobic when they refuse to give UK citizens working in Spain the same range of benefits as Spanish citizens would receive while working in the UK? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Jack Campin Date: 14 Feb 13 - 08:00 AM A Romanian trying to do something about it |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 14 Feb 13 - 11:00 AM You need to educate yourself about the real benefits situation in the UK before comparing it with Spain. They don't just get handed money as they get off the boat, whatever you may have been told. Don T. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Peter K (Fionn) Date: 14 Feb 13 - 12:13 PM A gem of a post from Little Hawk. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: GUEST,Tunesmith Date: 14 Feb 13 - 12:38 PM OK Don T, so what is attracting these immigrants here? And, we do attract the biggest number of immigrants from other EU countries. A lot more than Germany whose economy is thriving compared to ours! Again, why is Britain so attractive - if it's not a lot to do with our welfare system! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 14 Feb 13 - 08:57 PM ""OK Don T, so what is attracting these immigrants here? And, we do attract the biggest number of immigrants from other EU countries. A lot more than Germany whose economy is thriving compared to ours! Again, why is Britain so attractive - if it's not a lot to do with our welfare system!"" Hey, don't blame me if you're to f**kin' lazy to look up the rules and regs governing benfits for immigrants. I suppose you really want to believe that crap, rather than admit that they work harder and longer than our own, and take the jobs that our own won't accept. Don T. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: GUEST,Tunesmith Date: 15 Feb 13 - 03:49 AM That doesn't answer the question! Again, more immigrants come here than Germany. We have higher unemployment than Germany. Germany have a stronger ecomony than Britain. So what is the atraction? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 15 Feb 13 - 07:09 AM Maybe the Germans are more xenophobic even than you. They do have a fairly well documented record of that failing. Don T. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Jack Campin Date: 15 Feb 13 - 06:31 PM Some background on this. Telegraph, 2008 BBC story http://transylvanianhorseman.typepad.com/transylvanian_horseman/2008/01/horse-carts-ban.html The small Moldavian village I visited at that time was too poor even to use horses. Most goods were moved by oxcart, driven by elderly women since the men had mostly had to leave for Hungary or Germany to find work (one woman had not seen her husband for 11 years). They had a visit from the smug and slimy mayor of the district. He delivered a speech about how his administration was going to do great things for the village - by getting a tarmac road built to replace the dirt one. Dirt is far better for ox carts. Hardly anybody in the village had a motor vehicle - there had once been a few tractors, last maintained in usable condition by the Ceausescu regime and now rusting in sheds. So the effect was of the road would be to make the village less accessible for most of its people. Meanwhile the electricity failed, on average, a couple of hours a day, so refrigerated food would spoil; there was no piped water; and sanitation was by earth closets in the garden, with no way of isolating them from the groundwater feeding the wells. Were the mayor's pals going to do anything about the power and the sanitary infrastructure? Were they fuck. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Romania's war on the poor From: Jack Campin Date: 16 Feb 13 - 08:58 PM Rather a sentimental and touristy article, but the BBC has been reminded of the realities of this for Romanians: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21471747 |
