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“No man undertakes a trade he has not learned, even the meanest; yet everyone thinks himself sufficiently qualified for the hardest of all trades, that of government.” Socrates
Have you heard about the 336,000 euro bike shelter the Irish Government has built for themselves? Gold it is and encrusted with diamonds! Well it isn’t, but it should be for that price. No, it’s your basic run-of-the-mill shelter pictured below, with space for an unprecedented 36 bikes. 336,000 euro to save the politicians' arses from getting wet when they mount their bicycles to peddle off home. Yeah right! What do you call a politician on a bike? A bloody miracle!
Divine acrobatic Jaysus in a wheelbarrow, how can it cost 336,000 euro for a bike shelter? Well, according to an official statement The structure consists of a steel framed, glazed canopy to ensure long term durability, adding that the materials used were "carefully selected not only for their durability, but also for their compatibility with the historic setting of our national parliament”.
Translation: We gave the contract to one of our mates and told him the taxpayer is footing the bill so no expense spared.
“It is terrible to contemplate how few politicians are hanged. ”
― G.K. Chesterton
Why do we need government again? Oh yeah, it’s to steal our hard-earned and squander it on weapons, junkets, feathering their nests and sticking their noses into our business with their ever-expanding surveillance systems... paid for by us. It's them spending our money. They're the ones who need to be surveilled.
We complain and complain yet every time those elections roll around off we toddle to put our little X in the box to choose which gang of psychopaths and their highwaymen is going to screw us for the next 4 years. When will we realise that even if we voted in the 12 apostles, Mother Theresa and Mahatma Gandhi, it'd make no difference? Politics is fundamentally about wielding power to punish your enemies and reward your friends, and the people are always the enemy. According to Machiavelli, society is always divided into two classes: the rulers and the ruled.
"They lie to us, we know they're lying, they know we know they're lying, but they keep lying to us, and we keep pretending to believe them."
Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
And do you know what the icing on the cake is? If you want to protest you need the state’s permission. If you want to sue them you need their consent.. And where do you take your case against them? Why before judges appointed and paid by them! And should you manage to win a settlement, they have no money. Governments are pure consumers. They don’t produce anything. They have only our money, so we compensate ourselves. How funny is that?
"But what about the poor?" I hear you cry. The poor? Why there'd be no poor if the government wasn't eternally extorting us. Have you seen how generous people are on Go Fund Me and the like? We'd all be living in mansions with gold taps...well I would be anyway and that's all that matters.
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Bike shelter image ripped off from Irish Independent
The other image is my own
If I don't have the authority to write my rules down and force them onto you, and you don't have the authority to write your rules down and force them onto others, and neither of us can delegate an authority we don't have, where do the cops get their authority?
Rule by force is the disease, who and how are symptoms.™
Exactly! We will not comply:)
Sigh
Listening to the reports on the Space X spacewalk today. The reporter commented, without a hint of irony, that the private company was able to get the walk done more quickly and more cheaply than if it had been done by government.
Kudos. You outdo Swift (Jonathan, not Taylor😂)and Twain in your social commentary.
In business, it's well known that you double your price when dealing with government, and I'm not joking. My legal services company handled the state's agency work... at the normal rate. What can I say? I was young and idealistic.
Ah ha, I might have known you'd be a Swiftian.. Jonathan, not Taylor
'A young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout' 😂
😂
That Swift quote...reminds of your blog on Weekend Experience, describing how much you enjoy being around children😁
I recall my father quoting it to me when I was but a wee nipper. I never fully trusted him after that:)
Frankly, I'm not impressed... I think your guys need to learn a few things from our guys. You should see the kind of money our officials spend on things like a sports ground in a God-forsaken village with only a few dozen toothless grannies waiting for the inevitable end.
Jeez, you're very hard to impress. What about 2.2 billion for a children's hospital they started building in 2016 but haven't completed yet?
I could have built that for €300,000. but it would have had an En Suite and a barbecue.
I have seen a lot of other money wasted in my dealings with government departments and it has made me sick as I grovel for a few pence to make an arts project.
There are still a lot of brown envelopes doing the rounds. What pisses me off the most is that people still vote for these idiots.
Hahaha, maybe you can start Bike Sheds "R" Us and make a fortune.😂
As to voting...down with that sort of thing!!
Here, here, here.
We had a bus shelter built in the village, costing 50K. If you sit and wait while it’s raining, your legs will still get soaking wet. Someone very clever built it, prioritizing the little bookshelf behind it. Can you believe that?
Everything you said is true, @deirdyweirdy, but it made me laugh with the way you joked about it! 😆💗
50 grand? Sounds like there were a few brown envelopes involved there., but legs dry out quite well, while books do not:)