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[Helgoland]

Is it just my perception, or are Hollande and Putin ridiculously small?

[Darvi]

No, Poroshenko's just that tall.

[smjjames]

Or Poroshenko is a bit on the tall side.

[SirQuiamus]

And once again, standard protocol should be to forget the shooter and remember the victims. As someone said (I think it was someone on a talk show), the only things you can do to harm zealots is ignore them or refuse to take them seriously.

But this is an act of political violence, not your innocuous run-of-the-mill school shooting! However isolated and amateurish they may be, all murders with anything resembling a political motive have to be fiercely condemned, so that politicians can rake in the Populist Points as defenders of Freedom. We are living in a world where politicians and pundits are acting exactly like the terrorists want them to.

[Helgoland]

Do note that this is the Europol thread.

Regarding sizes: They both appear to be about as tall as Merkel, and she's not too far above the (female) average, is she?

[scriver]

Helgoland; either stop complaining every time somebody ad much as alludes the the US here, or stop constantly bringing up Germany in the Ameripolitics thread yourself.

[smjjames]

@surgimus: I think the point GreatOrder was making is to not give the shooter(s) their 15 minutes of fame, so to speak.

As for the heights, Merkel and Hollande are standing at an angle, which alters the perspective.

[SirQuiamus]

That was my point as well, although I obviously had a bit of trouble expressing it (apologies). I was implying that political leaders (such as the Danish PM) shouldn't be giving the attackers good PR by raving on about "the war between light and darkness," as if all Europe was involved in a balanced fight against some shady external foe. The fact of the matter is that Europe now has to deal with a new, home-grown generation of "terrorists" -- the fruits of bad policy and social exclusion. It was just revealed (to nobody's surprise) that the attacker was a 22-year-old gang member, born in Denmark. There was probably nothing to his "political activism," apart from the fact that he was tired of his life and wanted to kill some people before committing suicide-by-cop, and jihad is always a good excuse for doing the dumbest things. This kid was not an "enemy combatant" any more than Harris and Klebold were, and decorating him with an aura of Terrorism only encourages copycats.

EDIT: What comes to curtailing the 15 minutes of fame, there's very little that can be done in the Age of Social Media without also curtailing the precious, threatened freedom of speech. In the context of this thread, it might be useful (with regard to future attacks) to add a note to the OP, in order to deter new members from indulging in vacuous commentary (yes, I'll shut up now ).     

[Helgoland]

Helgoland; either stop complaining every time somebody ad much as alludes the the US here, or stop constantly bringing up Germany in the Ameripolitics thread yourself.

A tu quoque argument?
But alright, I hadn't noticed that the frequency was that high - I'll try to keep it down.

[scriver]

It's not an argument, we're not debating anything.

[TD1]

Why do you sound so argumentative then?

[Loud Whispers]

Do note that this is the Europol thread.

Ay, and depending on who you ask varying degrees of Yuropol is just Ameripol with a blue cherry on top

[Owlbread]

We certainly seem to be going down that route these days, what with all the talk from Labour/Tories etc to appeal to "working people". I think it's a really annoying euphemism along the same lines as the nebulous "middle class" Republicans and Democrats try to appeal to in the States. You know, nobody can say the words "working class" anymore because you'll get rejected as some kind of 1970s fossil; at least if you use "working class" now you can use it to refer to a class of people who, though they should be "working", no longer work and suffer terrible unemployment. The expression "working people" airbrushes the group that needs help the most (those in depressed former industrial centres) out of the picture in favour of all sorts of middle class people.

I think it's probably a good thing we don't use "middle class" as much as the Americans though, because in the USA it helps to perpetuate the myth that people from very impoverished backgrounds are just middle class people "in-waiting". We've still got that problem over here thanks to Thatcher, but maybe the economic crisis is starting to shift that, or at least highlight the flaws in that right-wing ideology.

I should add that I believe people should have the right to pursue their dreams and so on, make a lot of money and improve your social circumstances, but not everyone has the right mindset or is lucky enough to be able to do that and it would be a terrible shame if those that couldn't feel somehow inadequate.

[Owlbread]

Lewis Baston, political analyst, predicts the SNP will take 33/59 Scottish Westminster seats this year.

Rather than my vague speculation of what may happen this year, read this article instead to gain a better understanding of the marginals etc if you're interested in that sort of thing. The future of Scottish Westminster politics will become more and more important to the overall future of the UK as time goes on.

Baston also wrote a good piece on the comparison between Alex Salmond and Charles Stewart Parnell, leader of the Irish Home-Rulers back in the late 1800s who formed a big block in parliament, as the SNP hope to do. It's a fairly problematic comparison as he clearly shows, but that hasn't stopped a lot of people throwing it around. At least we can learn from it considering it's the closest thing we've ever had in British politics to what's possibly about to happen this year.

[mainiac]

Why do you sound so argumentative then?

Because the standard of arguments on the internet has changed to people telling each other things.  As a result when someone just wants to tell someone something it is taken as an argument.