Teacup Café XLI

[Mari]

Some people get clingy when they are with a certain type of person or in a certain type of relationship, but if they are with a different person or in a different relationship, they would not be. I doubt it's a character trait.

Earn, you're not happy you finally have a new government? Would new elections have changed anything substantial by the way?

[The last sane person]

Heh, been a while. How goes it? Trying to get things straightened on my end, but what all is new here?

[Earniel]

Hey Sane, long time no see! *waves*

Originally Posted by Mari

Earn, you're not happy you finally have a new government? Would new elections have changed anything substantial by the way?

Not really. It's been a while, I think, since Belgian political parties felt they were bound by election results. Ours certainly seem to have made a sport of how to twist election results any way they want to. They're surprisingly good at it, and can do it with such a straight face. It was about time we got a government, though. I think we beat countries like Cambodia and Iraq in lenghty government formation. Nuf said. Does go to show that if the Walloons say 'non', it will be 'non' unless somebody else says 'okay then'.

But I'm not sure whether not having a government is all that worse than having this government. The hypocrisy and underhanded techniques used in this formation was so bloody embarrassing and almost painful to watch. I have to say, Di rupo can play political games like a pro and he outmanouvred others artfully. A shame then, that these political games are often really low. It was so obvious the politicians were more interested in pressing their own agendas and securing their own posts than you know, good country management and getting this country out of a crisis. A crisis they helped create, since many politicians and ex-politicians line the big company boards over here. Yes Dexia, I'm looking at you.

The state reform this country needed, we didn't get. We did get some tidbits and some things we didn't even need or asked for, but regardless of what we really needed, we will nevertheless pay handsomely for it too! 500 millions a year extra out of our pocket for Wallonia and Brussels with no strings attached. We did however get a good load of new taxes (like we hadn't already one of the largest tax burdens in Europe).

The one thing I didn't see cut, though, were politicians' wages...

[Noble Elf Lord]

Saneee! Nothing much is new, the TCC still stops for a little while everytime I post here. :P Hope you're doing fine?

[Mari]

Wow, I didn't follow Belgian politics closely (heck, I barely know anything about Dutch politics except education related stuff), but that sounds really embarrassing.
It's awful when you can't look to your government for sensible governing though! Don't you guys have something like the Balkenende-norm we have here (though managers and stuff will find reasons to avoid that, but at least the public sector is restricted)?

[Earniel]

Well, I can equally admit that I haven't been following Dutch politics all that closely either. Only in the bits that overlap like say the deepening of the Schelde.

Had to look up the Balkenendenorm, no I don't think we have something like that. There has been some talk, though, to do something similar, but not too loudly and mostly by those who do not have so many spots in company councils. And the way they've fought the mere proposal to make all those commissions public... Not holding my breath for any change in that field any time soon.

Private sector is where the money is, in any case. A few governments back it was all the rage to privatise about every public company and asset we had left. (They needed it too, to sort out the deficit on the budget) Hence why nearly all the companies we once could have been proud of are now in foreign hands.

But yeah, embarrassing it all is.

[Mari]

Privatisation eh? The same happened here even though with the example of the UK we could have known THAT wasn't going to work, but who can resist a large bag of money? And of course this lead to chaos and everything becoming much more expensive etc., but they got their money.
Right now our beloved minister of Education has decided that Special Ed will lose most of its funding since kids should be encouraged to go to normal schools and teachers should just make time for them and their needs (are any alarmbells starting to ring yet?) and some of the money she gained by cutting Special Ed, will now be used for something called the 'prestatiebonus'. So the better the results of my students are, the more bonus I will receive (to a certain point of course) assuming that without this money I will not try my hardest to get them the best grades.
Research in the US, Canada and the UK has shown that this system encourages fraud, unfair grading and in general doesn't work because most teachers are already motivated to try their best and that grades do not actually go up when using this system, but of course the Netherlands have to conduct their own research and flush several millions down the toilet while at it.
Absolutely ridiculous if you ask me. And if EVERY research project on the subject so far has shown that it simply does not work, then why expect miracles? Just put that money back in Special Ed, so I don't end up with 40 kids in my classes (already have classes of 34 while 25 should be the norm!) of whom several kids need injections, special care, extra attention, extra time, a different way of handling them, or whatever. Teachers will be happier, the kids themselves will be happier.
NB: getting into a Special Ed-school here is pretty difficult. It's not like they stick every kid with a disability or disorder there and most kids going to schools like that really will not be okay in normal schools.

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by Mari

Right now our beloved minister of Education has decided that Special Ed will lose most of its funding since kids should be encouraged to go to normal schools and teachers should just make time for them and their needs (are any alarmbells starting to ring yet?) and some of the money she gained by cutting Special Ed, will now be used for something called the 'prestatiebonus'. So the better the results of my students are, the more bonus I will receive (to a certain point of course) assuming that without this money I will not try my hardest to get them the best grades.

No. Way. Even I can see where that will and can go horribly wrong! That sort of thing only creates more red tape. And if the Netherlands are like Belgium, you really don't need more administration. (Do you know we actually have a minister for Administration Simplification? He hasn't done a lot so far either, if you ask me...)

[Mari]

No! Really? That's just insane. How on earht did we get so institutionalised anyway? *shakes head*

[Earniel]

Yeah, bureaucracy will be the death of civilisation, I reckon. You know, this is the biggest reason why I'm not keen on splitting Flanders from Wallonia. Flemish bureaucrats are even worse then Walloon or Federal ones. Staying in Belgium actually keeps the 'regelitis' a tad under control. I shudder to think what the administration would turn into once we're alone with our own Flemish bureaucrats...

I remember a few cases where people got declared dead, due to some administrative error, and try as they might they could not get declared alive again 'cause the rules didn't allow for it. Sorry, can't help you. Next!(Clearly our administration is not prepared for a zombie invasion....) Eventually it took an article in the newspaper before the administration wanted to reverse the error. But then only, I suspect, because someone higher-up the chain picked up the phone and yelled at the government employee in question. But no apology, because hey, they hadn't done nothing wrong, nu-huh, the rules, you see.

Madness, I tell ya.

[Mari]

Definitely! You should ask them in the next elections what their plans are for a Zombie invasion. Give them something useful to make rules about.

[Earniel]

I'm not sure I want to give my government any ideas, because a new tax to pay for zombie prevention schemes really would be next.

[Mari]

Hadn't thought of that yet...

[Valandil]

Besides - they'd start classifying all these 'not-dead' persons as 'un-dead' persons!

[Earniel]

And then they'd get creative like mandating you can't obtain a building permit without papers to show you have included anti-zombie measures in with the building plans that naturally would cost you more because only certified zombie-experts could provide those papers. Non-zombie-proof cars will be impossible to insure at reasonable prices. People would have to obtain a zombie-survival license in high school. There'd be mandatory zombie history lessons. The zombie hunting season Undead Control would have to be regulated and given to Undead Management Units who really just care about the environment really, but sometimes get caught secretely releasing freshly bred zombies in the woods...

Trust me, I just might prefer the zombies.

[Rían]

ROFL!!! Well, the government isn't entirely useless - it's good for a laugh ...

[Varnafindë]

With anti-zombie measures like those, I might prefer the zombies as well ...

[Mari]

Yeah...

[Noble Elf Lord]

"Everyone needs a zombie plan."

[Earniel]

Are there any others plans except 'don't get bitten?'

I don't watch zombie movies myself.