Catalans vote to split from Spain amid violent police crackdown

[konfab]

Gauteng as an example does not really work. Gauteng did not take anything from the rest of the country for its development.

Gauteng also doesn't really have its own language or culture. It has its own flavor of South African culture but it isn't really that much different from the rest of SA.

 

[Vrotappel]

The workers?

The workers follow the work not the other way around. LOL. Those workers send the Gauteng monies back home.

 

[mercurial]

Kick Barcelona out of La Liga

I guess we'll finally know if Barcelona can do it in Stoke on a cold, windy, Tuesday night.

 

[vic777]

Would you say the same if it was the Western Cape?

Hell yes, then I can emigrate to the Western cape

 

[Cius]

Gauteng as an example does not really work. Gauteng did not take anything from the rest of the country for its development.

How do you figure? Roads, water, electricity, rail lines, they all cost money, labour, and focus that could have been sent elsewhere. When the private sector wants to develop an industrial zone the government has to lay down a lot of infrastructure to enable that development and it costs billions. Those same billions could be invested elsewhere in other industrial areas but generally the private sector picks the spot for a good reason (access to skilled resources, transportation networks, etc). Thing is due to how development works you inevitably get a snowball effect where wealth congregates into specific areas. Its just he way economies develop. If each region that got lucky with that type of development decided to go independent it would lead to thousands of rich micro-states and massive regions of impoverished areas and it would not be fair. It would balloon inequality in the world. The poorer regions provide farm lands, water, etc for those industrial parts. They also often contribute the labour. Think of Mpumalanga, they carry a massive health cost due to poor air quality from the power stations that power most of SA. Yet MP is a fairly poor province. Is it fair to leave them high and dry when they have contributed as best they could but for whatever historical reasons the industrial centre of SA was developed in Gauteng and not there?

Catalan is similar. Geographically it is in the north east of Spain, so closer to the rest of Europe. Hence goods manufactured there are cheaper to export to say France or Germany than goods produced in central or southern Spain due to distance. Hence the private public partnership developed the industry in their region at the expense of development in other parts of Spain. Now they want to up and leave??? I don't think that is fair.

 

[C4Cat]

Eish brush up on your stats. The 90% is a clear indicator of what the total population will vote.

I don't know what stats class you took but that is pure nonsense. Ask for your money back, you clearly don't understand statistics

 

[NarrowBandFtw]

Catalan is similar. Geographically it is in the north east of Spain, so closer to the rest of Europe

Eh? Catalonia only sits on a small part of the French border, the bulk of it is the domain of other Spanish regions, regions that have harbours directly in the Atlantic, at worst Catalonia is on par with, not better off than, the rest of Spain when it comes to transport.

Hence the private public partnership developed the industry in their region at the expense of development in other parts of Spain. Now they want to up and leave??? I don't think that is fair.

To what extent was Catalonia developed by the national Spanish government as opposed to the local autonomous government? To what extent is public funds involved at all even? Lastly, Catalonia has been contributing a large portion of Spain's tax revenue for decades and getting a disproportionately small benefit compared to the rest of Spain, whatever benefits they had previously, they probably reckon they've paid it back many times over.

 

[NarrowBandFtw]

I don't know what stats class you took but that is pure nonsense. Ask for your money back, you clearly don't understand statistics

Even if you take the 40-something % number, that's a voter turnout on par with the last French presidential election. You wanna go tell Macron he needs to vacate his office, because the will of the people was not sufficiently determined? :crylaugh:

Democracy is majority rule, if the majority choose not to vote that is their problem, the result will still stand in any democracy.

 

[konfab]

How do you figure? Roads, water, electricity, rail lines, they all cost money, labour, and focus that could have been sent elsewhere. When the private sector wants to develop an industrial zone the government has to lay down a lot of infrastructure to enable that development and it costs billions. Those same billions could be invested elsewhere in other industrial areas but generally the private sector picks the spot for a good reason (access to skilled resources, transportation networks, etc). Thing is due to how development works you inevitably get a snowball effect where wealth congregates into specific areas. Its just he way economies develop. If each region that got lucky with that type of development decided to go independent it would lead to thousands of rich micro-states and massive regions of impoverished areas and it would not be fair. It would balloon inequality in the world. The poorer regions provide farm lands, water, etc for those industrial parts. They also often contribute the labour. Think of Mpumalanga, they carry a massive health cost due to poor air quality from the power stations that power most of SA. Yet MP is a fairly poor province. Is it fair to leave them high and dry when they have contributed as best they could but for whatever historical reasons the industrial centre of SA was developed in Gauteng and not there?

Catalan is similar. Geographically it is in the north east of Spain, so closer to the rest of Europe. Hence goods manufactured there are cheaper to export to say France or Germany than goods produced in central or southern Spain due to distance. Hence the private public partnership developed the industry in their region at the expense of development in other parts of Spain. Now they want to up and leave??? I don't think that is fair.

Catalan is responsible for a fair portion of its roads and infrastructure. There are B.S things like this:

Spain’s Constitutional Court has ruled that Catalonia’s government has no say on the matter and has invalidated part of a Catalan law which aimed to ensure that no Catalan families got their utilities cut off for non-payment.

http://www.ara.cat/en/Spanish-Court-Catalan-Government-families_0_1555644612.html

The Spanish government didn't want Catalonia to pay for the energy subsidies for poor people in Catalonia because the Spanish Government wanted the people to be dependent on Spain rather than Catalonia.
http://www.catalannews.com/politics/item/ep-to-guarantee-energy-supply-amid-controversy-over-spanish-suspension-of-catalan-decree

For example, lets say the City of Cape Town decided to create a social grant for pensioners and fund it with ratepayer money because they saw the existing system didn't work well. The analogy would then be the South African government taking the City of Cape Town to court for stepping on their toes and doing their job for them.

 

[NarrowBandFtw]

Source: Catalonia's leader: 'We will declare independence in a matter of days'

Catalonia's pro-independence leader has said that the region will declare independence from Spain "in a matter of days."

Speaking to the BBC on Tuesday, the head of Catalonia's devolved government Carles Puigdemont said his administration would declare independence from
Spain "at the end of this week or the beginning of next."

Do it!

 

[f2wohf]

Eish brush up on your stats. The 90% is a clear indicator of what the total population will vote.

Those that did not vote were most probably not voting fearing for violence from the Spanish police. You seem to forget that the Police tried to stop people from voting.

The fact that 2 million people + 200 municipalities did not vote at all because is because the no voters agreed to not go vote at an illegal referendum.

If they did go vote, it would give legitimacy to the vote, which is the opposite of what the no voters want.

In addition, in 71 municipalities, there were more yes than voters, which shows it was clearly rigged.

Remember that the vote infringes 20 of the 34 rules of the electoral code and the ballot boxes were not transparent. Easiest thing to rig.

 

[Cius]

To those who like the idea of rich industrialised areas going independent to hog the tax have you thought about what happens in the long run in that scenario?

Say for instance that Gauteng goes independent, followed shortly by one or two of the other key industrialised metro's like Cape Town, PE, Durban etc. Say they add up to 80% of the tax base. They are rich, and the remaining 90% of SA basically overnight is as poor as Mozambique.

Thing is 90% of the food, and water comes from those big open areas. As their infrastructure crumbles the food providers loose efficiency and eventually fold jacking up food prices for those in the rich industrial areas. Perhaps they can buy from other countries but if the trend goes world wide the long term outcome is a trade war between the poor agricultural regions and the rich industrial regions. Supply and demand has made basic commodities like food cheap, as compared to the secondary and tertiary economies. The problem is you can't eat without the primary economy, nor can you do much in the secondary economy without the mining sector's commodities also provided by the primary economy sector which is mostly located in rural areas.

If the trend continues food prices go through the roof as food becomes more scarce. Mass inequality grows in the interim, and those independent industrial micro states will find that its very hard to remain as rich as they are if they are surrounded by failed poor states.

Anyways, everyone is allowed their opinion I guess, but I have a very strong view that what Catalonia is trying to do is a bad long term precedent to set that will lead to a lot of very negative consequences if the pattern is followed in other regions of the world.

I am also wondering what happens to minorities in countries that mostly have one dominant culture. Countries that have a few different cultural groups have their issues but they tend to be used to being different but equal in terms of groups. Mostly homogeneous cultures tend to be a lot worse at treating minorities equally and there are plenty of examples of that.

 

[f2wohf]

Even if you take the 40-something % number, that's a voter turnout on par with the last French presidential election. You wanna go tell Macron he needs to vacate his office, because the will of the people was not sufficiently determined? :crylaugh:

Democracy is majority rule, if the majority choose not to vote that is their problem, the result will still stand in any democracy.

That’s fine when the vote is legal. This can’t apply at an illegal and rigged vote.

71 municipalities had more yes votes than voters.

Some people voted 4 times.

https://www.elconfidencial.com/espa...dades-votaciones-referendum-cataluna_1453255/

 

[C4Cat]

Even if you take the 40-something % number, that's a voter turnout on par with the last French presidential election. You wanna go tell Macron he needs to vacate his office, because the will of the people was not sufficiently determined? :crylaugh:

Democracy is majority rule, if the majority choose not to vote that is their problem, the result will still stand in any democracy.

I don't disagree with you, I was just pointing out that the 90% yes vote doesn't represent what the total population would vote as Vrotappel claimed.

 

[NarrowBandFtw]

Anyways, everyone is allowed their opinion I guess, but I have a very strong view that what Catalonia is trying to do is a bad long term precedent to set that will lead to a lot of very negative consequences if the pattern is followed in other regions of the world

My view is the exact opposite, the more independent regions and countries the better. The EU has morphed over decades into something that resembles the USSR more and more. The more independence exists the more leaders will actually be held accountable, as the saying goes: absolute power corrupts absolutely, so limit the power ...

 

[NarrowBandFtw]

That’s fine when the vote is legal. This can’t apply at an illegal and rigged vote

And realistically, how will Catalans ever have a legal referendum when it is violently opposed by their national government?

They won't, hence an illegal vote is all they have ...

 

[C4Cat]

My view is the exact opposite, the more independent regions and countries the better. The EU has morphed over decades into something that resembles the USSR more and more. The more independence exists the more leaders will actually be held accountable, as the saying goes: absolute power corrupts absolutely, so limit the power ...

sure, a Europe continuously at war with itself is much better than what we have now. We miss the days when every country was fighting with its neighbours don't we?

 

[rietrot]

I don't disagree with you, I was just pointing out that the 90% yes vote doesn't represent what the total population would vote as Vrotappel claimed.

It does established a trend. Unless you have actual numbers of the people that abstained in protest(not everyone who abstained because they don't care or out of fear) the trend holds and 90% voted to leave.

Why didn't the remainers and spain just participate. Then the legal issues wouldn't have existed, but they knew they were going to lose.

 

[vic777]

My view is the exact opposite, the more independent regions and countries the better. The EU has morphed over decades into something that resembles the USSR more and more. The more independence exists the more leaders will actually be held accountable, as the saying goes: absolute power corrupts absolutely, so limit the power ...

Bit of a hectic comparison you've got going there, how in any way does it resemble the USSR?

 

[NarrowBandFtw]

sure, a Europe continuously at war with itself is much better than what we have now. We miss the days when every country was fighting with its neighbours don't we?

You're confusing correlation with causation, there is literally no proof whatsoever that the EU is the reason there is no more war, nor that independent European nations will suddenly wage war in this day and age.

So given there is no proof, we can ignore the "peace" factor of the all powerful EU, given that trade deals can be freely negotiated we can also ignore the free trade aspect. What else have you got?