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Post by gwynthegriff on Oct 4, 2022 16:44:47 GMT
Was to become? Became? Were to become sounds ok to me, but I am no carlton43. I wouldn't require language skills at the level of the Liberal Democrats in any case. Just enough to be understood and engage in society. B2 Level. You misunderstand. It was nothing to do with any errors in your post. (I didn't notice any.) It was about the difficulty of a language requirement in Scotland given its complex linguistic history. What would immigrants be required to learn for citizenship? English? Scots? Gaelic? Presumably any one of?
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Post by aargauer on Oct 4, 2022 16:59:14 GMT
Was to become? Became? Were to become sounds ok to me, but I am no carlton43. I wouldn't require language skills at the level of the Liberal Democrats in any case. Just enough to be understood and engage in society. B2 Level. You misunderstand. It was nothing to do with any errors in your post. (I didn't notice any.) It was about the difficulty of a language requirement in Scotland given its complex linguistic history. What would immigrants be required to learn for citizenship? English? Scots? Gaelic? Presumably any one of? I think that's only a theoretical problem. Nobody is going to know Gaelic without English, but sure in theory let people in Gaelic speaking areas have citizenship with Gaelic. Scots is clearly a distinct dialect of English. Not hugely dissimilar to Swiss German / High German) I would say you do the reading and writing test in standard English, and can do speaking / listening in Scottish standard English or Scots. It's a bigger problem in Switzerland with nominally 4 languages, the smallest of which (Rumantsch) is really a small language family with 4 or 5 separate languages, and the largest of which (German) is very distinct from the standard variety. To the extent that someone from the north of Germany cannot understand regular Swiss German and even Swiss Germans cannot understand eg Walser German spoken in the mountains. That's before we get into Franco-Provençal spoken in Eveline and local Italian dialects in Tessin...
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Post by therealriga on Oct 5, 2022 8:48:29 GMT
Coalition talks are ongoing, with discussions on 2 models.
1) JV + AS + NA 2) Those 3 plus Progressives.
The first would only have 54 seats which, given the fragmentary nature of Latvian politics, is seen as on the low side. The problem is that the Russian "For Stability" party, the populist Latvian First and the oligarch-led Greens Farmers are all ruled out, which only leaves Progressives, whose left-leaning social and economic policies put them at odds with NA in particular.
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Post by Devil Wincarnate on Oct 5, 2022 10:25:37 GMT
I would agree that Lithuanian society has not come to terms with what happened particularly well, but much as the Americans accidentally gave the Japanese an excuse to dodge that sort of self-examination, so did the Soviets to the Lithuanians. Lithuanians in Lithuania Proper definitely. But the Soviets murdered or deported the Prussian Lithuanians, who were culturally very dissimilar and lived totally different lives, purely for being German citizens. They were made to pay even if other Lithuanians were not. The self-examination point is on the money. East Germany is a prime example. We can consider economic factors of course, but a large reason for the return of neo-Nazism out East was that the rhetoric of the DDR was that communism washed away Nazism- whilst contending that West Germany was its continuity. Of course, this was nonsense. West Germany came to terms with its past after much struggle, and whilst absorbing millions deported from across Eastern Europe, even if by necessity it found a place for various men with shady backgrounds. Whilst East Germany merrily integrated Nazis into its structures without a word-and of course its Soviet paymasters were the single largest funders of postwar neo-Nazism.
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The Bishop
Labour
Down With Factionalism!
Posts: 36,531
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Post by The Bishop on Oct 5, 2022 10:28:16 GMT
To the Latvians, Jews were regarded as part of that Internationalist movement that had oppressed them. It was a time and a place of quite incomprehensible antisemitism. The Soviets were at it as well in Stalin's purges. And in civilized nations like the UK and USA they were largely not bothered as TBH they kind of half felt there was probably some justification. I don't believe antisemitism has gone away. The whole "capitalism ruined my life" schtick is riddled with it. TBF to the Latvians, the Lithuanians and Ukrainians were much much worse. Though the other two Baltic states weren't great - Estonia was one of the first areas outside Germany itself to be officially declared "Judenfrei" by the Nazis (interestingly, another place that "achieved" this early was Belgrade - which goes against some of the more simplistic accounts of WW2 in that part of the world)
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Post by rcronald on Oct 5, 2022 10:47:52 GMT
TBF to the Latvians, the Lithuanians and Ukrainians were much much worse. Though the other two Baltic states weren't great - Estonia was one of the first areas outside Germany itself to be officially declared "Judenfrei" by the Nazis (interestingly, another place that "achieved" this early was Belgrade - which goes against some of the more simplistic accounts of WW2 in that part of the world) Estonia was Judenfrei because there were no Jews in its territory in the first place. (Aka, it started the war as Judenfrei). Tito and the partisans are probably going to be admired in Israel until the end of time. (Fun fact, the first time my mum ever saw my grandpa cry was when Tito passed away in 1980)
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The Bishop
Labour
Down With Factionalism!
Posts: 36,531
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Post by The Bishop on Oct 5, 2022 11:11:02 GMT
There were a few thousand Jews in Estonia at the start of WW2, according to Wikipedia.
Not many of course, but as you will know Denmark had a similarly small population and managed to save most of them.
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Post by aargauer on Oct 5, 2022 17:44:17 GMT
Though the other two Baltic states weren't great - Estonia was one of the first areas outside Germany itself to be officially declared "Judenfrei" by the Nazis (interestingly, another place that "achieved" this early was Belgrade - which goes against some of the more simplistic accounts of WW2 in that part of the world) Estonia was Judenfrei because there were no Jews in its territory in the first place. (Aka, it started the war as Judenfrei). Tito and the partisans are probably going to be admired in Israel until the end of time. (Fun fact, the first time my mum ever saw my grandpa cry was when Tito passed away in 1980) Sadly I don't think is quite true. Estonia had c. five thousand Jews who were almost to a man wiped out.
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Georg Ebner
Non-Aligned
Roman romantic reactionary Catholic
Posts: 9,230
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Post by Georg Ebner on Oct 7, 2022 21:45:16 GMT
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Georg Ebner
Non-Aligned
Roman romantic reactionary Catholic
Posts: 9,230
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Post by Georg Ebner on Oct 7, 2022 21:46:18 GMT
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Post by therealriga on Oct 25, 2022 11:20:24 GMT
The new government will be a 3-party coalition between New Unity, United List and National Alliance.
New Unity wanted the Progressives in, but the National Alliance blocked their full participation. With the 3 parties only having 54 of 100 seats, PM Karins of Unity offered the Progressives a confidence and supply arrangement instead for some policy concessions, but Progressives rejected that. It would not surprise me to see United List split during the 4-year term and Progressives to belatedly be involved.
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Georg Ebner
Non-Aligned
Roman romantic reactionary Catholic
Posts: 9,230
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Post by Georg Ebner on Oct 25, 2022 16:37:40 GMT
The new government will be a 3-party coalition between New Unity, United List and National Alliance. New Unity wanted the Progressives in, but the National Alliance blocked their full participation. With the 3 parties only having 54 of 100 seats, PM Karins of Unity offered the Progressives a confidence and supply arrangement instead for some policy concessions, but Progressives rejected that. It would not surprise me to see United List split during the 4-year term and Progressives to belatedly be involved. Roughly, what You had predicted - conGratulations!
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Post by therealriga on Dec 2, 2022 18:27:18 GMT
Nearly 2 months after the elections, Latvia still doesn't have a new government. In late October there seemed to be broad agreement on a 3-party coalition, but this hasn't happened yet due to wrangling over ministerial appointments and the "will they/won't they" plan to include the Progressives. Unity want them involved as a counterweight to the other parties. National Alliance are fighting against it. The Progressives themselves are split on the offer to join. Many of them feel they'd develop better in opposition, rather than being tied to Unity and the fortunes of the current coalition.
In one of the state companies where I work this is causing huge problems. The previous minister lost his seat and they can't set budgets or make meaningful decisions due to the possibility of the new minister taking a different tack.
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Post by rcronald on Dec 2, 2022 18:50:02 GMT
Nearly 2 months after the elections, Latvia still doesn't have a new government. In late October there seemed to be broad agreement on a 3-party coalition, but this hasn't happened yet due to wrangling over ministerial appointments and the "will they/won't they" plan to include the Progressives. Unity want them involved as a counterweight to the other parties. National Alliance are fighting against it. The Progressives themselves are split on the offer to join. Many of them feel they'd develop better in opposition, rather than being tied to Unity and the fortunes of the current coalition. In one of the state companies where I work this is causing huge problems. The previous minister lost his seat and they can't set budgets or make meaningful decisions due to the possibility of the new minister taking a different tack. As the only real left of centre party in the Saeima, P should definitely build itself in the opposition.
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Post by therealriga on Dec 25, 2022 11:43:37 GMT
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