European Parliament Election 2009

[Ducky]

In this June, every EU country has EU parliament election (between 4th and 7th June) So I thought we could discuss about it. Here's few quesetions to start with

- Are you going to vote? If not, why so?
- Do you already have candidate in mind or still searching for the best option?
- When you pick your candidate, do you just think them individually or does the candidate come from a certain party?
- How do you feel in general about EU parliament and MEPs?
- Do you think that one MEP can bring much to EU, even there is 785 of them?
- Do you feel that EU is big countries (France, UK, Germany, Italy) against small countries?
- Does your country have these "celebrity" candidates? Such as former athletes, tv hosts, singers etc.? How do you feel about them?


I personally pick candidate from my party (The Centre Part of Finland), but thinking who to vote. I know personally three candidates, but it's still difficult. Last time I decided I vote for young woman and so I did. She didn't get thru. So for me party comes first

And GOD I hate celebrity candidates.. wtf they think anyone can go there? Yeah right. Pisses me off.

I am against EU, but I think we cannot get rid of it so we just have to make it better. Groups in EP are bit strange, like my party is bit odd in political parties and at the moment it is in ALDE (liberals) even tho...it's not the most liberal party but they say they don't want to be in EPP-ED (conservatives) because... well they are way too conservative :lol:


We are way too honest for EU - we take everything literally and damn we have so much more rules, directives and recommendations in use than most of the countries. And yes, I feel that big countries, esp France kicks small countries asses - esp when it comes to agricultury policy


So what are your thoughts?

 

[Solitaire]

I will be voting in the elections. (well if my postal vote comes through in time because I will be away when they are on) Not that I think that the one MEP can make a difference, but might as well have someone in who I think would try and do something,
I vote for parties. Well, against certain parties anyway. I havent seen any celebrity candidates coming forward. I have had quite a few election leaflets through the door. Im generally opposed to celebrities in elections. Do they actually do anything?
With the current crisis in politics here in the UK at the mo, Im thinking its pretty much the same in the Euro Parliament. The majority might be doing a good job but a significant minority are just in it to get as much for themselves as they can. But hey, I'll still vote, so I suppose I'm still slightly hopeful, way deep down!

 

[Ducky]

^^ In UK crisis, are there politicians from many parties or just one? I've read about it, but don't remember the parties.

I voted on 27th already, was so hard to choose one - and I didn't (after all) vote for the person I decided a year ago I vote

Here (pre..whatever) voting has started better than last time. voting% sucks, I hope it gets higher (it's around 30-40% when it's EP election)

 

[BabaOReilly]

What do you mean by celebrity candidates, exactly? Just curious.

And I was wondering if you guys are forced to vote strategically too, like a lot of Canadians tried to do in the last Federal (countrywide) elections. Like, I didn't want the Conservatives to win, so I looked at a website dedicated to giving you the best options in your area to vote for in order to keep the Cons from winning... So I voted for someone I might not have normally voted for, simply because it was the best way to keep the crap party out. Seems like Soltaire might be familiar with this, as she said she votes "against" certain parties.

Anyway, not my elections obviously, but the way the world works now, I try to stay in tune with what's going on globally. We're all in this together afterall!

 

[talkingtocactus]

- Are you going to vote? If not, why so?
- Do you already have candidate in mind or still searching for the best option?
- When you pick your candidate, do you just think them individually or does the candidate come from a certain party?
- How do you feel in general about EU parliament and MEPs?
- Do you think that one MEP can bring much to EU, even there is 785 of them?
- Do you feel that EU is big countries (France, UK, Germany, Italy) against small countries?
- Does your country have these "celebrity" candidates? Such as former athletes, tv hosts, singers etc.? How do you feel about them?

- i am going to vote, mainly because i feel very strongly that everyone should and to not vote would be massively hypocritical.

- i am very seriously considering spoiling my ballot. to me this isn't the same as not voting - it's still making sure your tiny little voice gets out there somehow. i might go green/lib dems but i think a spoil is more likely. i was a politics student so i think not voting is virtually criminal, but i think spoiling is at least a way of doing something, even if nothing comes of it, which let's face it is usually the case with voting anyway.

- i tend to vote by party - i think the more fundamental core values of each party are more important than policy which changes so fast. i'm a traditional old labour girl really, i think what blair did to the labour party was scandalous and it's a real shame that now there isn't really any party to serve what they used to stand for. i used to vote labour every time but i really can't see it happening any more, unless they take a very hard left turn before the next election.

- i think the eu overall is a good thing, i'm pretty pro membership but then i'm fairly anti federalising it, i think there has to be a happy medium.

- i don't think MEPs have that much influence though, sadly. sometimes they do - the euro court of human rights is a wonderful thing that should never be underestimated, but in day to day stuff i think there's too much bureaucracy.

- i like to think that the eu is about big countries and small countries working together but i'm sure there's dominance by certain players. i think it's probably a force for good though, getting the smaller and maybe less westernised nations to develop their infrastructures to improve things. countries in the old eastern bloc have clearly had a big boost by their eu membership (although of course the current economic crisis has pretty much wiped that out now).

- i don't think there are any here - unless you count the despicable specimen that is 'billy brit' :shifty: i'm just thankful for the small mercy that i don't live in italy where the entire cabinet is made up of berlusconi's playgirls :lol:

 

[Ducky]

What do you mean by celebrity candidates, exactly? Just curious.

well old athletes or tv-faces that have no experience in politics - of course there's those who actually study politics and so on but... like now social democrats has old world champ swimmer as candidate - has no experience in politics. Or last time there was tv-host, that (at that time) hosted short "celebrity news"

And I was wondering if you guys are forced to vote strategically too, like a lot of Canadians tried to do in the last Federal (countrywide) elections. Like, I didn't want the Conservatives to win, so I looked at a website dedicated to giving you the best options in your area to vote for in order to keep the Cons from winning... So I voted for someone I might not have normally voted for, simply because it was the best way to keep the crap party out. Seems like Soltaire might be familiar with this, as she said she votes "against" certain parties.

Anyway, not my elections obviously, but the way the world works now, I try to stay in tune with what's going on globally. We're all in this together afterall!

Umm... it's bit hard to vote like that. Of course here certain parties take votes from certain other parties... Well I just simply coudn't vote on 2nd round of presidential elecetion because there was left social democrat and conservative I cannot vote for sd and conservative candidate was just... icky. and then I got complaints that my no-vote was vote for sd


but in EP, there are groups... and from each country different parties go to different groups. Like our christians and conservatives go to biggets group EPP-ED (basicly conservatives and catholics and pope has big effect to this group - even tho our christians are not catholics )
My party is member of ALDE (2nd biggest), which is liberals... which is funny, because in my party there are still lot of people who are old fashioned and extremely religious and... well - some liberal things may feel strange for 'em, but then again - they don't want to be in conservative group

When I visited EP, they said they try to work together (Finns I mean, this time we get 13 MEPs) and of course small countries try to stick together

 

[BabaOReilly]

Hmmm... celebrities. Well, it worked for Schwarzenegger... Mind you, he married a Kennedy, so he had some extra political know-how backing him there, despite the fact that he's a republican.

Well, good luck with the elections. I'm still trying to get my head around how the EU works, so I'll keep reading here for some enlightenment.

 

[Stepherweps]

Ducky, you were wondering about the current political crisis in the UK, as you may or may not know, British politicians get an allowance, and they are allowed to make claims for things they may need, such as a second home in London, if it's far from their constituency, but as of late, it's been published in the media what a lot of these politicians have been claiming on their allowance, and really some of the things are ridiculous, I mean we've had politicians claiming over £1500 for a floating bird house, and other claiming for houses they don't live in, adult films, the list goes on... It's causing a lot of debate at the minute in the media, and many politicans are being forced to step down because of the expenses scandal...

Hmm... As for voting, I just turned 18 last week, so this is the first time that I'm going to be able to vote. I've already decided who I'm going to vote for, and for both my candidates it's because of the parties in which they belong to. Overall I don't really think the MEP's do very much, and I doubt that the ones from my country (Northern Ireland) will have very much say, seeing as there we only have 2 seats... I think in many ways it's dominated by the bigger countries... Over here we don't really have any celebrites, so nope, none are endorsing the elections... :lol:

 

[talkingtocactus]

Well, it worked for schwarzenegger...

and arguably it worked even better for reagan!

it's been published in the media what a lot of these politicians have been claiming on their allowance, and really some of the things are ridiculous, I mean we've had politicians claiming over £1500 for a floating bird house, and other claiming for houses they don't live in, adult films, the list goes on...

the saddest thing is it's been going on forever but people haven't been that bothered/interested. it's kind of a shame when it takes a scandal to make people sit up and listen.

it's also really bad that no PM will ever consider raising MPs' salaries - they earn considerably less than comparable corporate jobs but everyone knows that if a PM proposed raising salaries there'd be uproar (notably from the sun and the mail, no doubt). i'd much rather they had a pay rise once in a while that we all knew about than they just did everything under the table and lied. people think it's the money that's the issue - it's not, it's the deceit. if they had decent salaries with a fixed, published expenses allowance it'd be less easy for them to get away with duck islands, gold monogrammed drain covers and all that crap. it's quite interesting tho how not a single mp can really take anyone down on this - they're all at it, all got their snouts in the trough.

orwell had it right all along: "No question now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."

 

[Ducky]

Well, good luck with the elections. I'm still trying to get my head around how the EU works, so I'll keep reading here for some enlightenment.

Well, http://europa.eu tells you pretty much everything It's simple really, when you remember the system, where isn't so much to remember after all

I guess one of the hardest part is all the official languages of EU :lol:

And oh, the most confusing thing ever - Do not mix European Council and Council of Europe :lol: :lol:

Ducky, you were wondering about the current political crisis in the UK, as you may or may not know, British politicians get an allowance, and they are allowed to make claims for things they may need, such as a second home in London, if it's far from their constituency, but as of late, it's been published in the media what a lot of these politicians have been claiming on their allowance, and really some of the things are ridiculous, I mean we've had politicians claiming over £1500 for a floating bird house, and other claiming for houses they don't live in, adult films, the list goes on... It's causing a lot of debate at the minute in the media, and many politicans are being forced to step down because of the expenses scandal...

Yeah, I read about those and what they've purchased I was just wondering were they from a certain party or many parties.

Ah scandals - We have scandals about text messages and emails (one minister had to resign because sending... certain type text messages to some dancer ) Too bad all the women that have been involved (texters have been men) have done it just to get to tabloids and get money. And tabloids pulling headlines and when you actually read what messages have been about, you see nothing bad has happened but damage is already done.
So it feels media itself has drifted away from real politics and is after scandals. Makes me mad when our national broadcasting company goes along with those...:scream:

I know this isn't a part of EU elections, but today one member of our national parliament died suddenly, she was only 42 She was member of my party and such a great and inspiring woman

 

[shazza_018]

Ducky, you were wondering about the current political crisis in the UK, as you may or may not know, British politicians get an allowance, and they are allowed to make claims for things they may need, such as a second home in London, if it's far from their constituency, but as of late, it's been published in the media what a lot of these politicians have been claiming on their allowance, and really some of the things are ridiculous, I mean we've had politicians claiming over £1500 for a floating bird house, and other claiming for houses they don't live in, adult films, the list goes on... It's causing a lot of debate at the minute in the media, and many politicans are being forced to step down because of the expenses scandal...

Yeah, I read about those and what they've purchased I was just wondering were they from a certain party or many parties.

Certains parties is the short answer, as far as I know Labour and The Conservatives for sure, not too sure about The Liberal Democrats.

It's generally been a cross party thing and is annoying the heck out of people.

I'm not sure if I can vote in these elections lol.

 

[talkingtocactus]

it's definitely cross party, but really, it's a minor scandal by comparison with the fact that the lords still exists and we're still a bleeding monarchy. actually i think the lords has some function but not as it stands, it needs some serious reform. as for the monarchy, they should abolish it asap. up the republic!!!

[/off topic] sorry!

 

[talkingtocactus]

so did everyone vote? i think some of the euro countries still have a few days left - our uk voting was today. i didn't spoil my ballot - i was very tempted to but i think the greens were a more useful option

 

[shazza_018]

so did everyone vote? i think some of the euro countries still have a few days left - our uk voting was today. i didn't spoil my ballot - i was very tempted to but i think the greens were a more useful option

I voted just a few minutes ago, a new experience for me as a first time voter! . I managed to not spoil my ballot too .

 

[talkingtocactus]

i hope you enjoyed it enough to do it again

i was talking to my dad earlier and he made me *wish* i'd voted for the Socialist Labour Party, he was ranting on about how old style socialism has no place in the world and blah blah - i very nearly did vote for them as it happens but didn't at the last minute, but he really made me want to go and change my vote! my parents always manage to remind me just why i'm so strongly socialist!