I WANT MY MONEY BACK!

If there's going to be a fart in a video, I want a pavement-cracking ripper louder than a ship's horn. I want a blast radius. I want weeping men and shrieking women. I want people 200 miles downwind to think Bhopal fucked Chernobyl and the offspring came blasting out of that woman's ass like The Four Horsemen riding out of Hell. I want sermons written about it. I want it commemorated in legends as epic as a Viking saga and as long-lived as The Canterbury Tales. I want it spoke of only in whispers. I want the Alpha Centuri LIGO to peg so hard that the aliens look at it and mutter, "Ohhhhhh, fuck..."

This was none of those.

This wasn't a full-on fart, it was an asterisks on a turd. This was a "tee-hee" fart, not a "OH JESUS FUCK -- EVACUATE THE WEST COAST AND CALL THE ARMY!" butt-blast. I'd be ashamed to call this one of my own; I'd wrap it in a blanket and dump it in front of the SPD station down the street so our Boys in Blue could take one look at it, sadly shake their heads, and forswear their sacred duty by tossing it in a dumpster.

Mordhaus, you promised me a fart video and you gave me two monochromatic outcomes of butter and corn syrup consumption babbling on; waddling parentheses around a feeble "pbt".

SIR, I DEMAND BETTER OF MY FART VIDEOS AND I -WILL- SEE YOU IN COURT!!

(I farted)

SPD (Germany): 23%
PSOE (Spain) : 22.6%
SPÖ (Austria): 26%
PS (France): 10%
PvdA (Netherlnds): 5.7%

Those are just some of the latest election/polling results of social-democratic parties in continental Europe. Corbyn's Labour came in at 40.1%. Yet somehow, Corbyn (and Sanders) is painted as the destroyer of his party's electability.

Watch all the trolls come out of the woodworks again, after claiming for months and months that Corbyn would be the ruin of Labour. And keep track of all the hacks who will still maintain that neoliberal party apparatchiks are the only option to win elections. The mental gymnastics will be hilarious, and the smear campaigns against Corbyn will be even more ferocious. They cannot let anyone challenge the neoliberal consensus and get away with it.

Edit: https://twitter.com/TKMarx/status/873157244967432192

The article linked above mentions Röpke and Eucken as champions of free market capitalism, so to speak. Ironically, Bernie Sanders is quite in line with many of Walter Eucken's core ideas. For instance, Eucken declared legal responsibility to be an absolute necessity for competition within a market economy. Meaning that under Eucken's notion of capitalism, US prisons would be filled to the brim with white collar criminals from Wall Street and just about every multinational corporation, including Volkswagen.

Ludwig Erhard, credited by many to be the main figure behind the German "Wirtschaftswunder" (nothing wonderous about it), postulated real wage growth in line with productivity and target inflation as an imperative for a working social market economy. Again, very much in line with Bernie Sanders. Maybe even to the left of Sanders. A 5% increase in productivity and a target inflation of 2% requires a wage increase of 7%, otherwise your economy will starve itself of the demand it requires to absorb its increased production. You can steal it from foreign countries, like Germany's been doing for more than a decade now, but that kind of parasitic behaviour is generally frowned upon. Minimum wage in the US according to Erhard would be what now, $25-$30? So much for Sanders' $15...

Sennholz further mentions the CDU as a counterweight to the SPD. Well, the CDU's "Ahlener Programm" in 1947 declared that both marxism and capitalism failed the German people. In fact, it put significant blame for Germany's descent into fascism at the feet of the capitalistic system and called for a complete restart with focus NOT on the pursuit of profit and power, but the well-being of the people. They called for socialism with Christian responsibility, later watered down and known as social market economy or Rhine capitalism.

As for the economic policies conducted by the occupation forces: German industry, and large corporations in particular, were shackled for the role they played during the war. If you work tens of thousands of slaves to their death, you lose your right to... well, anything. If they had stripped IG Farben, Krupp and the likes down to the very bone, nobody could have complained. No economic liberties for the suppliers behind a genocide.

Next in line, the comparison with Germany's European neighbours. Sennholz wrote that piece in '55, so you can't really blame him for it. Italy had more growth from '58 onwards, France had more growth than its devastated neighbour from '62 onwards. The third Axis power, Japan, had significantly more growth from '58 onwards.

Why did some European and Asian countries grew much more rapidly than the US? Fair Deal? Nope, Bretton-Woods. Semi-fixed exchange rates caused the Deutsche Mark and the Yen to be ridiculously undervalued compared to the Dollar, thus increasing German and Japanese competitiveness at the cost of the US. Stable trade relations created by the semi-fixed exchange rates plus the highly expansive monetary policy in the US – that's what boosted Germany's economy most of all. Sort of like China over the last two decades, except we were needed as a bulwark against the evil, evil Commies, so the US kept going full throttle.

Our glorious policians tried the same policies (Adenauer/Erhard) in East Germany after reunification, even though global conditions were vastly different, and the result is the mess we now have over there. The entire industry was burned to the ground when they set the exchange rate too high, thus completely destroying what little competitiveness remained. Two trillion DM later, still no improvement. A job well done, truly.

Anyway, if anything, Bernie Sanders' program is closer to post-war German social market economic principles than to the East-German bastard of socialism, state capitalism and planned economy imposed by an autocratic system. However, even that messed up system produced significantly less poverty, both in quality and quantity, than the current US corporatocracy. No homelessness, no starvation, proper healthcare for everyone – reality in the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). And despite the fact that they were used as cheap labour for western corporations, no less. My first Ikea shelf was produced by our oppressed brothers and sisters in the East. The Wall "protected" the West from cheap labour while letting goods pass right through – splendid membrane, that one.

PS: Since that article was written in '55, I have to mention one of my city's most famous citizens: Otto Brenner. He was elected head of the IG Metal, this country's most influential trade union, in 1956 after having shared the office since 1952. The policies he fought for, and pushed through, during his 16 years in charge of the union are very much in line with what Sanders is campaigning for.

1) "The Democratic Party in Europe would be a far-right party".

I don't think it would be. A decade ago, yes. But not today.

Look at what Blair (Labour) and Schröder (SPD) did to the left-of-center parties in their respective countries: they moved to the right, significantly. And by doing so, the entire political sphere was pushed to the right. Tory and CDU, the former right-of-center parties are not that different from the Democratic Party, nowadays at least.

The French are still holding on to the alignment of their political system. However, the austerity enforced by conservative moralists, mainly the troika of IMF/ECB/EU Commision as well as the German establishment, is putting immense pressure on Hollande to "encourage" a political shift to the right.

2) Resistance from within the political system.

We have two of these parties in this country, parties that, to some degree, oppose the establishment in areas of significance. They manage to mitigate some of the damage the establishment tries to inflict upon society, but if we're honest about it, most of it is only postponed by a comparatively short period of time. One might even argue that it's just for show so that the illusion of choice is kept up...

In any case, they cannot create the level of fear neccessary to keep the other parties in check. For that to change, the ownership structure in traditional media would have to be changed, radically. As of now, the marginalisation of anti-establishment forces is working effectively and any attempts at meaningful change are demonised.

3) A recently published document by JP Morgan illustrates just how openly their efforts against democratic societies are being waged these days:

Political systems around the [European] periphery typically display several of the following features: weak executives; weak central states relative to regions; constitutional protection of labour rights; consensus building systems which foster political clientalism; and the right to protest if unwelcome changes are made to the political status quo.

The shortcomings of this political legacy have been revealed by the crisis.

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by taranimator.

Germany's hitherto second largest political party, the SPD (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschland) has finally developed a small laicistic wing. Religion is sociologically a very private matter for most people here, although with a societal overtone that the church is always right, and always present (I guess it's the same for Switzerland, only a bit more anti-muslim). Atheism has not yet hit German society as a matter of public discourse, like in the UK.
Here's hoping for a Germany in which the biggest party doesn't have the word "christian" in its fucking name.

In reply to this comment by hpqp:
Gah, hope she gets replaced soon.

That's cool information, but I don't think it is relevant to the dupe issue. For me, the question is, if we edited this video to be only the new camera angle and gave it a title like "New Camera Angle of Seattle Shooting of Woodcarver" or some such, would it have gotten this many votes? I doubt it would have made it out of the PQ. Just a look at the comments shows you that people are not outraged about that new camera angle... they are outraged at the audio and video that was already in @Matthu's original clip. I suspect the vast majority of these votes came because no one saw Matthu's video the first time through the Sift. That is why I contend the new video angle is not a substantial addition to the video (for the purposes of Sifting) and that Matthu deserves these votes.

I would be just as happy if everyone who voted for this video went over and voted for Matthu's clip too, but the only way to fairly ensure this will happen is to dupe this one and transfer all the votes, since a lot of people who voted probably have moved on to other vids and still don't realize this was on the Sift already. (Also, I suggest giving Matthu's vid a promote so that it continues to be up on the front page and gets publicized.) That's my position, anyway.

@Norsuelefantti The problem with taking it out of discussion is that a lot of people who are interested in hammering out what is and is not a dupe may not be interested in the contents of this vid, never watch it, and therefore be completely unaware there is any controversy about it. I'm gonna give a shoutout to @dag to ask for his thoughts on the both these matters (whether this vid is a dupe and also whether "it'll miss out on votes" is a good enough reason to return something from SiftTalk).

For your reference dag, the other vid in question is: http://videosift.com/video/Dashcam-Video-of-Seattle-Police-Shooting

>> ^Pantalones:

The additional angle is not insignificant. It's the only video investigators had that showed the distance between Birk and Williams and it played a huge role in the SPD Firearms Review Board's decision. (Which found the shooting unjustified.) It also showed Birk taking cover behind a traffic signal box after Williams was dead; good cover from someone holding a knife. You can kill it if you want to, but the second angle shows Birk's tactical error and was a huge part of the ruling and subsequent uproar.>> ^SDGundamX:
discuss
The second angle adds absolutely nothing to the video, since the audio is exactly the same and nothing really happens that we didn't already know was happening from the other vid. I think Matthu deserves these votes... he Sifted essentially this same vid more than 5 months ago. I think it would be fair to dupeof this one and add this as a backup embed to his. But I'm interested in what other Sifters think. Is the addition of the camera angle that shows us what we already knew was happening enough to make this not a dupe?
FYI from the Sift FAQ (bolded parts my emphasis):
Duplicates will be discarded. A duplicate video is one which contains content already on VideoSift in a published, queued, personal queued, or dead video submission. Minor changes in content, like a few additional insignificant seconds of video or alternate background music, will still be considered dupes. The only exception to this is if the change in audio makes a significant difference to the video content.
>> ^Pantalones:
It's not a dupe. This has a second camera angle that shows the scene of the shooting rather than just the audio.
As a local, this was appalling to watch. Dan Satterberg will need to prosecute W to win back votes from the left. Then again, his next election won't be until 2014. As for Seattle PD, it's wrong to assume all Officers are this reckless, but if there are enough rotten apples, it might make sense to look at the tree.

The additional angle is not insignificant. It's the only video investigators had that showed the distance between Birk and Williams and it played a huge role in the SPD Firearms Review Board's decision. (Which found the shooting unjustified.) It also showed Birk taking cover behind a traffic signal box after Williams was dead; good cover from someone holding a knife. You can kill it if you want to, but the second angle shows Birk's tactical error and was a huge part of the ruling and subsequent uproar.>> ^SDGundamX:

discuss
The second angle adds absolutely nothing to the video, since the audio is exactly the same and nothing really happens that we didn't already know was happening from the other vid. I think Matthu deserves these votes... he Sifted essentially this same vid more than 5 months ago. I think it would be fair to dupeof this one and add this as a backup embed to his. But I'm interested in what other Sifters think. Is the addition of the camera angle that shows us what we already knew was happening enough to make this not a dupe?
FYI from the Sift FAQ (bolded parts my emphasis):
Duplicates will be discarded. A duplicate video is one which contains content already on VideoSift in a published, queued, personal queued, or dead video submission. Minor changes in content, like a few additional insignificant seconds of video or alternate background music, will still be considered dupes. The only exception to this is if the change in audio makes a significant difference to the video content.
>> ^Pantalones:
It's not a dupe. This has a second camera angle that shows the scene of the shooting rather than just the audio.
As a local, this was appalling to watch. Dan Satterberg will need to prosecute W to win back votes from the left. Then again, his next election won't be until 2014. As for Seattle PD, it's wrong to assume all Officers are this reckless, but if there are enough rotten apples, it might make sense to look at the tree.

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by vaporlock.

The thumbnail image for this video has been updated - thumbnail added by lucky760.