Trust politicians?

[Alan]

Hi,

Do you trust your politicians? We use the word spin doctors for the public relations officers who promote the work of government ministers in order to explain what's happening to the population at large. The question is: Who is telling us the truth?

Alan
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[Fan of Arabian horses]

Hi Alan!

What a wonderful question! You know that you hit my favorite theme?

There is a wonderful idiom I remember:

Never trust a statistic you not had falsified yourself!

As politics always work using statistics, whom could I trust now? For me it?s similar to test-journals for cars. Every manufactorer of cars does have his own journal and one may guess what car is the best in such test journals, no matter what?s true or better the question is what did such journals test or what are the public relation officers talking about? I always have the feeling that they don?t tell the whole truth and one never have the opportunity to check what one is told.

By the way, the current government promised us voters that they would sink the taxes for everyone if they would be elected. What happens in fact? Recently after the election had happend the decided to raise the "Mehrwertsteuer" form 16 to 19 percent and employees can not any longer calculate their way to work when they come to do their "Einkommenssteuererkl?rung". Whom do you think I should trust?

Michael

[Alan]

Hi Michael,

Thanks for that. Interesting you should talk about the ones who promise to reduce taxes. At the last election one of the parties recommended increasing taxes for those earning a huge amount. Naturally all of us who weren't earning huge amounts thought it was a good idea but of course they didn't form the government. At the moment we're in that awkward stage where the ruling party under Master Blair are no longer flavour of the month and the opposition are painting themselves as very 'green', which is what everyone wants to be nowadays. We shall see. I think the acid test is that famous question you ask yourself about a politician: Would you buy a secondhand car from this person?

Finally a couple of translations: the tax is called Value Added Tax and the statement you make about what you earn is: Income Tax Return.

Alan
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[Fan of Arabian horses]

Hi Alan!

Thanks for your translation! And yes, do you know any politician you would trust that much to buy their second hand car? But not only that and promising some unachievable fortunes as taxes-advantages is how politicians do make themselves untrustworthy, at least for me.

But before I come across like an old grumbler I?d prefer to see whether there is any person at this site who trusts in the leaders of their country.

For the moment I?ll retire here. Thanks again!

Michael

P-S. Alan, what does "green" in Britain mean? Is it similar to the German "Greens"?

[nami]

Politician will never let you know the truth although they always said it is truth, they always cheat us, and what is the truth? I felt sometime the money is truth, money can do everything, with money you can get good education, with money you can get degree, with money you can get POWER-president, money is telling the truth although it is not real truth, but peoples consider it is truth.

[Yankee]

Hi Michael

You surely remember when the Berlin Wall fell. I was already in Germany by then and one thing that I remember very clearly was something Mr. Kohl said. He announced a new "temporary" tax (the "Solidarity Surcharge"). He said it would be a one-year tax.

I remember thinking at the time (while rolling my eyes, of course):
"Har har har. That's what they all say!" (all = all politicians, regardless of nationality)

How old is that "temporary" one-year tax now?

Amy
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Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

[Fan of Arabian horses]

Hi Amy!

Do you still remember what happened to Mr. "Saumagen at the Wolfgangsee" after he had been reelected in 1998? Beside of all the corruption that happened during his regency the government had made the biggest mistakes. If you ever come across Bert Engelmann?s book "Grosses Bundesverdienstkreuz mit Eichenlaub" I recommend you to read it and see how Kohl became the Chancellor. He was that one who stepped from one scale of grease (put his foot into his mouth) into the other!!!!

Michael

[Torsten]

As usual, Alan has brought up an interesting question and he has done it in his own subtle way. Because if you take a closer look at the issue, you are bound to come up with more questions. Can we trust our politicians? Only to a certain extend. Trust requires information. But who of us is willing to spend time on reading about our MP's and other government officials? In many cases it is more convenient for us to simply let the government do their thing and hope for the best. It is obvious that any country needs a government and politicians.

Those politicians are part of our community. If we don't trust them, we have to think about ways of replacing them with more trustworthy people...
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[spencer]

Hi Everybody,
I'd don't say that all politicans are crooked, but I just can't trust them.
We all know some things about body language, and we have our own ways to test the other person who we're dealing with.
If the other is trained to manipulate whole masses, you have no chance to see through them.
Can you trust someone who can lie as easy as you drink a glass of water?
Personally I hate them all.
Spencer

[ljiljan]

I am pretty new on this site but I have an urge to say something about on this....
I think that the majority of politicians actually started their careers with only one idea in their minds: "power". If you are too sensitive or too ethical you simply can't succeed in this dirty business. Because of such rules, only people with special traits can get to the top. You must be deformed in some way, to say what you don't think and to do it very persuasively. I think that almost all successful politicians have very distorted moral views.
In a country where I live it is so shamelessly obvious that they are all, more or less, corrupted, and insensitive to other people's troubles. They all have only one ambition: to get more power and more money.

Thanks.

Ljiljan

[Torsten]

Well, here is how I see it:
Any country needs a government that takes decisions and any government is as good and reliable as its people. A government and its politicians are always part of their population although the latter often wants to deny this simple fact. The vast majority of the people of any country will tell you that most politicians are corrupt and that you can't trust them. And consequently you will find a lot of politicians in any country that are indeed corrupt.

If the vast majority changed their view and started to think that politics are important business and that it's good to take part in the decision making processes, then we would have better politicians. As it stands, many people think: Politics? That's dirty business, let those crooks do their job and we won't be responsible if something goes wrong. We can complain about our politicians and they can do their dirty business.

By the way, it has been like this for ages and the situation changes only if we change it. No use waiting for our politicians to change.
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[Fan of Arabian horses]

[Jan]

Don't you think that in history only few movements or developments come from the top down.
Officials follow often just where the country is going itself, and any trust to the them has also the other side.

Ask yourself

Are politicians allowed/able to trust their countrymen?

Don't be to much cynical , people create history,
and people have been given power to do this.
(at least in our countries)

If kids are learn now some awful things, then tomorrow they can't suddenly change and become responsible trustworthy leaders.

Regards
Jan

[Tamara]

Hi

[Fan of Arabian horses]