European Parliament election, 2014

[bryant.coleman]

Results from the Netherlands:

[stompix]

European elections results 2014: Nigel Farage's Ukip on course to top poll as Europe takes a swing to the right


Ukip likely to beat Labour to first place, with Tories dropping to third for first time ever in a national election.

Nigel Farage inflicted another body blow on the three main political parties on Sunday night as Ukip scored a stunning victory in the European Parliament elections.

The anti-EU party dramatically built on its success in the local elections in England last Thursday when the results of the Euro poll on the same day were announced. A jubilant Mr Farage hailed the outcome as “an earthquake because never before in the history of British politics has a party seen to be an insurgent party ever topped the polls in a national election.”

Across the EU, nationalist and Eurosceptic parties made big gains amid predictions that they would double their strength in the European Parliament. In France, Marine Le Pen's Front National topped a nationwide poll for the first time in its history, with the anti-immigrant party predicted to take 25 per cent of the vote and win as many as 24 seats in the European Parliament.

Ms Le Pen said France had “shouted loud and clear” that it wanted to be run “by the French, for the French and with the French” and not by “foreign commissioners” in Brussels. Manuel Valls, France’s Socialist Prime Minister, said the victory was “more than a shock, it's an earthquake”.

Isn't it ironic that the anti-eu party is running in an EU parliament election?
Reading through all the uk politicians have to say , looking at how "close" they are to Europe , I wonder , why are they still members of the EU.

[DooMAD]

I am familiar with the website from which that chart comes, and I don't consider it credible.  How does it decide where to put the center?  It is arbitrary.

I use a non-arbitrary definition:  the status quo is center.  Anyone who wants modernize authority is a leftist, anyone who wants to diversify authority is a rightist.  Anyone who is more of a leftist than Marx is far left, anyone who is more of a rightist than Confucius (the man himself, not his disciples) is far right.

You are correct that Obama and Romney seem to fall pretty close to each other on a left-right spectrum, but the truth is that they are on the left.  This is because they both want to move the status quo to the left.  That is indisputable.  We know that Obama's policies are far left because of his actions on the lumpenprole (people that Marx did not care about).  Romney could have gone pretty far left when he was governor of Massachusetts, but he didn't.  So we can conclude that he (like most Mormons) is only a center leftist.

And I suppose the fact that by doing that, you get to move the goalposts every few years and redefine where the centre lies is just a fortunate coincidence?  No thanks.  If governance takes a sudden swing to the right, you can't just turn around and say "actually that's the new centre now" and anyone who's left of the old centre somehow just got more extremist even though their views haven't changed.  Nice try, though.

As for it being "nice" to see UKIP do well, I'll have to disagree.  Scapegoating minorities and blaming them for all your economic problems is the kind of backwards thinking that we, as a species, should have been able to move past by now.  That sort of BS should have ended with WW2.  UKIP are disgusting, vile creatures.

None of the top three parties addresses any of the concerns of the average person.  UKIP not only addresses them, but has decent solutions.  Also "move past by now"?  Do you see the demographic shifts that are happening around you?  How many children does the average Labour supporter have?  How many does the average UKIP have?  I'm guessing that the latter is at least twice the former.  In the US it will only be a couple of generations before we shed the progressives.  They'll be a few of inconsequential weirdos instead of the ruling class.

Their concerns are simply misplaced.  People buying into a farcical fear campaign because they're gullible and afraid doesn't make their views justified or in any way realistic.  If anyone voted UKIP because they genuinely believe people who have committed no other crime than being born within different arbitrarily drawn lines on the map will somehow destroy the country by coming here, then I'm sorry, but I think they've been manipulated.  Having less people coming from abroad won't miraculously fix any problems, so actually, no, UKIP don't have any "decent solutions".  Anyone who thinks it will change anything for the better is, quite frankly, broken in the head and in denial about the fact that their view boils down to the simple fact that they're scared of the boogeyman and the current boogeyman of choice is foreign people.  It's pathetic.

[bryant.coleman]

Results from Poland:

[Nemo1024]

“Saving” Ukraine? What a joke. The EU cannot even save itself.

I just read the Op-Edge on RT, which in part covers the EU election.
http://rt.com/op-edge/161664-elections-in-eu-ukraine/

Scroll down to "What a mess" section of the article.

[neighborrr]

As usual it was just a parade of scammers. I spoiled my vote!

[bryant.coleman]

As usual it was just a parade of scammers. I spoiled my vote!

Rather than wasting your vote, you should have voiced your dissent by voting for any of the anti-establishment parties (far-right, far-left or even parties such as the Pirates).

[DVFree]

As usual it was just a parade of scammers. I spoiled my vote!

Rather than wasting your vote, you should have voiced your dissent by voting for any of the anti-establishment parties (far-right, far-left or even parties such as the Pirates).

I'd vote for the Pirate party if it didn't get involved with the Greens who in my perception are just environmentally friendly capitalists. Ended up voting for the Socialist Party (GUE-NGL). But I wouldn't say there's anything like a wasted vote, the system is rigged anyway. Much better to be an active citizen daily and exercise your political power along with your co-citizens than participate in this faded republic.

[bryant.coleman]

Some people never stop complaining. 

French students in anti-National Front rallies

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-27629603

[elliwilli]

UKIP are a bunch of racists pretending not to be, its shocking and some of their ideologies are quite fascist, its quite unsettling to see them to have won in the UK...

[DooMAD]

UKIP are a bunch of racists pretending not to be, its shocking and some of their ideologies are quite fascist, its quite unsettling to see them to have won in the UK...

But on the plus side, they're not very good at holding on to their seats as a party.  Granted, this was for the local elections rather than the European one, but it's still indicative of their overall stupidity:

It’s taken just five days for one of UKIP’s new Councillors to find themselves at the centre of a row - with Redditch Councillor Dave Small accused of sickening racist and homophobic comments on Facebook.  Barely literate comments attributed to him, include branding African migrants “scroungers” and Elton John and Clare Balding “perverts”.

Yesterday UKIP expelled Mr Small for these comments (and rightly so), however it does raise concerns about what types of people have found their way into the UKIP party? In many cases these undesirables receive a large amount of 'protest votes at the current government', by people who genuinely want to see positive change in the UK. It's a shame that many of these UKIP voters whom actually support left wing policies (such as re-nationalising the railways, NHS and energy firms, more money and control for local authorities, better support and funding for education...etc) but instead vote for a party that's even more right-wing than the Conservatives.

So imagine you've now voted in a new council member, only to find out they harbour extremely racist and homophobic views, (not to mention substandard grammar). We would expect you to be feeling pretty cheated right now if you spent your vote on this guy.

How long do you reckon it'll be before we hear of more racist, fascist, homophobic and anti- immigration rhetoric coming from the UKIP camp? We expect the stories to come thick and fast - which so far they have done, especially since the mainstream media has focused its attention on tax dodging racist hypocrite Nigel Farage - and his band of eugenics supporting, gay hating merry madmen.

[bryant.coleman]

UKIP are a bunch of racists pretending not to be, its shocking and some of their ideologies are quite fascist, its quite unsettling to see them to have won in the UK...

UKIP are just a bunch of conservatives, who just happens to be Eurosceptic. They have destroyed all the nationalist parties in the UK, including the British National Party.