Pro-democracy HK tycoon Jimmy Lai convicted in national security trial

Of course no freedoms are unlimited, so I'm not sure why are you reading this literally?

> The question is, were they useful?

Are we talking about the same thing? I'm talking about the lack of freedom under British rule, and you ask if it was useful for HKers? While there are a lot of people in HK who are not happy about what China is doing now, there is almost no one who would take British rule over that. I actually talked with people about it in person when I was in HK.

It's not surprising per se but it does put things in perspective that Texas has a bigger footprint than every country in Europe.

BTW the population figure for Czechia is NaN, for some reason,

Maybe you can afford Universal Health Care after all...

A country with a business friendly, low regulatory environment, coupled with a high work ethic and poor work/life balance, if nothing else, is not going to be a country that falls behind.

Americans complain a lot, and the system isn't that comfortable or respectful, but they aren't facing existential economic irrelevance.

Really? Because IIRC, Britain has been steadily declining for over a century.

> The US recoevered from the 2008 crisis way better than everyone else, and nobody really understands why yet.

And Poland avoided the recession entirely.

The UK choosing to shut down most of its native financial sector is a good example. With RBS it was particularly mad because the government ended up being a massive shareholder and then they chose to shut down all the profitable parts of the business, and double-down on the worst parts. Natwest rates franchise was probably worth £5bn, they basically shut the unit down in entirety (and a lot of those people went to large hedge funds and just went back to generating hundreds in millions in revenue) meaning that the taxpayer lost tens of billions AND the economy was knee-capped for decades.

This is taken as an example to show that even when the incentives were there, the government took a decision for nakedly political reasons. In the opposite direction, they folded HBOS into Lloyds, this was done to protect Scotland (both the PM and the Chancellor had a large number of constituents who would have lost their job if these banks were shut down...they were bailed out) and the result was Lloyds needing a bailout about one year after the banking crisis ended in the US. Again, this was sold to the public as the result of "risky casino bankers on huge bonuses"...in reality, it was just poorly paid commercial bankers lending very large amounts of money to people who couldn't ever it pay back AND politicians then making terrible choices with other people's money to boost their chances in some byelection no-one remembers.

This attitude permeates almost everything the UK does. Schools, politics first. Healthcare, politics first. Electricity, politics first.

I genuinely do not understand how anyone can't look at the scale of political intervention into the economy in the UK and not understand why this might lead to lower growth than the US. In Scotland, the government is 60% of the economy, this higher than Communist states with no legal private sector, it is an incredible number. If you look at income distribution, after-tax income under £100k is as flat or flatter than Communist states too, again this is incredible.

What is surprising is that the UK's economy is growing so quickly. The supply-side in most sectors is almost completely gone, in some economically-significant sectors you have regulators effectively managing companies, very few workers have economically useful skills because of the strong incentives in place to acquire non-economic skills...and the economy is still growing faster than most of Europe. To be fair, almost all of that immigration of low-skilled labour into the UK which is going to be absolute time-bomb financially and the rapid growth in public-sector pay has also helped consumption (even more so, the UK is running a deficit of 5% of GDP with revenues growing 4%/year in an economy that is shrinking in per capita terms...obviously, this is not sustainable)...but growth is still way higher than reason would dictate.

Comparing this to the US is not serious in any way. You have a country that prioritises growth beyond reason and are comparing that with a country which is hostile to change beyond reason. There is no possible comparison. The decisions every government since 1997 has made have been intended to reduce growth, people happily voted for this, and are now upset that the economy is shit...why?

Cost inflation isn't unique to the United States.

Europe isn't a single country.

> yet the lifestyle of European citizens in those countries is much better than the lifestyle of the poorest Americans

Does this include the Romani people? Does this include the Ukranians being attacked by Russia?

Greece's housing cost burden is higher than 30 US states. Not all regions in the USA have faced serious property cost pressures. [1] [2]

"Day to day stuff" is a very broad category, and that includes items that are flat or decreasing in cost. In that sense I will point out that VAT is much higher in the EU than sales tax in most US states, with VAT rates of >20% being very common while the highest combined sales tax in the USA is just over 10%. Sales tax/VAT is a very regressive tax that harms the poor the most. For someone on the poor end of the spectrum in Europe, buying something like a computer or television is a greater burden than someone in the US.

I'm reminded of the natural gas price spikes in 2022 in Europe, and of how the EU's average electricity price is about 2-3x higher than it is in the US. The US has an extremely stable supply of basic needs like energy and food.

Education costs have been flat or lower than the rate of inflation in the US since roughly 2016, so for the last 10 years the idea that education is becoming more expensive in the USA has been squarely false. [3]

Healthcare, I'll give you that one, the US is not faring well. But we can look at some systems in Europe having their own difficulties like the UK and Spain and it's not like healthcare isn't a challenge elsewhere. I will also point out that the US does have public healthcare for the poorest (Medicaid) and for all people over 65 years old (Medicare), and Medicare is a standout in quality among public healthcare systems in some outcome categories.

[1] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/europes-housing-cost-burden...

[2] https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/measures/cost...

[3] https://educationdata.org/college-tuition-inflation-rate

But. It's clearly a massive security issue.

> If you’re that keen, go join the reserves?

There is not currently a war, and if there was, there wouldn't be a choice but to join.

c. 40,000[1]–43,000 civilians killed[2]

c. 46,000–139,000 injured[2] Two million houses damaged or destroyed (60 percent of these in London)

Sure.. Okay.. France was worse, France is also no longer a world influence it was once.

America was a major force behind post-War decolonization. It was one of our terms of the European peace.

It's a big part of it. Traveling changed some of my skepticism on how "good" the USA was for the world into it might be one of the best things that ever happened to it.

So,

    $(US) + $(ALLIES) > $(US) 

    $(ALLIES) - $(US) < $(ALLIES) 

But Europeans definitely do not want that and up to a point, that's a good thing, yet Europe still needs a big enough force as a deterrent, and it currently does not have that.

Multipolarity means spheres of influence. That sort of works if a region has an undisputed hegemon. It means war if that title is contests.

The west could conceivably have liberated the Soviet block after WW2 and the post war world would have been a much better place, including a non communist China. That's my guess at least. Impossible to know, of course.

In reality, the Rosenberg documents wasn't very decisive. Stalin already had the Manhattan Project blueprints from Klaus Fuchs.

Concentration of wealth and power was (and is) the highest in communist dictatorships - literally a handful (i.e. less than 5) people control pretty much everything in Cuba. North Korea is ruled with an iron fist by 1 guy - that is some concentration of power, right? In Communist Romania / East Germany power was concentrated in 2 people (a couple). In USSR power was concentrated in the 7 members of PolitBuro. In China power used to be concentrated in the hands of Mao Zhedong, now it seems it is concentrated in the hands of Xi Ping (but I could be wrong about Xi Ping. Maybe he shares some power with other people). I could go on forever, baby!!!

Capitalism has its problems but capitalism is quite fine all kinds of political systems - see German capitalism before, during, and following Hitler's rule.

Does this matter? The question is whether the UK has a moral authority to tell China off over free speech. Nobody has said that different countries don't have varying types of restrictions on speech.

Even if I agreed with your characterisation of the US, you're talking about visitors, not residents or citizens. The UK also regularly denies visas for speech.

You're defending against whataboutism from China to the UK by invoking whataboutism from the UK to the US here.

> I looked up the case against Joey Barton and it looks like he was harassing people online which yes is illegal here.

No, harassment is a specific and different offence. He was convicted specifically for sending 'grossly offensive' messages, not harassing people. The definition of that crime is based on the content of the messages, not the pattern of their transmission.

> The Quran burning outside the Turkish Consulate was even more weak stuff from you. The guy was fined £240 and told not to do it again.

I don't really get how this refutes anything I've said. It's illegal to protest in this manner in the UK.

What is your argument here, that OK it's illegal but the punishment is not very severe so no problem? You understand that the specifics of _what_ is illegal is the criticism.

> Neither of these are about freedom of speech are they, they are about harassment online and deliberately trying to provoke muslims.

Neither of these is about harassment. Or they would have been convicted of harassment.

Authorities and government? Yes. Even if the current ones weren't born when history was made, it's their duty to understand the history of the country they are governing, and of how past decisions shaped the world as it currently is.

> I honestly don’t think the UK has done much to harm other countries since the Iraq War which obviously made everything worse.

The history of Hong Kong itself is deeply influenced by Great Britain's actions (as well as other world powers, of course), and it doesn't start with mainland China's takeover.

Another example of UK's actions deeply influencing the current world, unrelated to China, is Iran (and well, the Middle East in general). So the UK cannot simply point fingers at others and forget about how they helped shape the situation.

Care to explain?

PRC sees the writing on the wall and, being the pragmatic bunch that they are, will probably not invade Taiwan. Unless Xi really controls the country 100% (this I do not know since I am not a Chinese observer) and goes crazy like Putin did.

I don't think Ukraine can win with the way things are going unless the West joins the fighting or Russia collapses. Waiting until Russia collapses will quite possibly be a long time which will result in a Pyrrhic victory for Ukraine. They will have an entire generation of dead men at the rate things are going.

The problem is not about the law itself. It is about how the law is defined, and moreover, the system of checks and balances. In a decent democracy, the national security law does not override the people's rights written in the constitution. The government is bound by the law to uphold due process and to respect people's basic rights, even if the suspect may have broken a law. While in authoritarian states, the constitution is basically just a joke. Don't you know China's absurd history of human rights violations?

> Lai gettign 3 judge speedrun because he's simply an obvious comprador traitor.

A quick search states otherwise. He was prosecuted by three government-picked judges, and there was no jury, which violates the standards of a fair trial.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/12/15/asia-pacific/po...

> And let's not forget this NSL dalying was an failure of HK making, i.e. basically failed state behavior that HK incompetence generated. Frankly that's demonstration HK isn't ready for democracy at all.

Democracy means the people are in power, not the dictator. If the Hong Kong people can only vote for someone that Beijing favors, then that is not democracy. It is not possible to have a democratic system that a dictator has control over, by definition.

> ...that's what PRC did, protect 1400m people from HK traitors...

If they really wanted to protect their people, they would create a true democratic system for the city. There is no reason any western country would put sanctions on a democratic entity. And don't forget the fact that they fought really hard to gain control of the city, only to later claim it is a "huge risk to national security".

> You're conflating disset (speech) with collusion (treason), Lai colluded, which is unprotected speech anywhere.

There are no normal countries that would put people into jail for mere political speech as "treason." Such laws are only applied to acts like espionage or leaking classified information, and even those cases are bound by checks and balances.

I too think the situation is probably mirrored from China's side. I hope there are some people over there who can also understand there's some middle ground, that neither side is totally right or wrong, and that we both perceive the world in half-truths and thought-terminating cliches.

And yes, because I live in the West (well, Latin America, anyway) I'm more upset about the distortions from "our" side. I don't really get to witness the Chinese side. I'm very skeptical even of what "our" side claims the distortions on the Chinese side are, since I don't get to witness them directly and I have reason to be skeptical of my side's narrative.

You've repeated this claim a few times in the thread, so sorry if this is repetitive, but just to recap:

1. Fatah is not allowed to build an airport in Palestinian territory -- the Israeli military controls its airspace.

2. Fatah is not able to determine who comes in and out of the territory -- Israel controls both its border with Israel (which I suppose is reasonable) and its border with Jordan (which is not).

3. Fatah does not control the population registry or decide who can receive a Palestinian ID card -- Israel does.

4. Fatah does not have a monopoly over the use of military force in the West Bank -- the Israeli military can (and does) operate wherever it wants to within the territory.

5. Fatah does not control who can move where within the West Bank -- there are many Israeli-only settlements and Israeli-only roads, with access controlled by the Israeli military and police. Even when moving between Palestinian areas, residents are often subject to Israeli checkpoints (with long lines).

Is Fatah allowed to control some civil matters, e.g. the education system? Sure.

I will let others reading this be the judge of whether this constitutes "Fatah control" or "Israeli control". To me, the answer is clear.

> Israel is under no obligation to provide services to foreign governments, especially those compromised by antisemitic terrorist organizations.

Obviously. Nobody is complaining, for example, that Israel doesn't provide services to Iranians or Syrians or Yemenis. Those are legitimately foreign countries that Israel doesn't control.

...

Taking a look at the rest of the thread, it seems that, having had no success justifying your ludicrous position that "Israel doesn't control the West Bank", you've instead pivoted to explaining how the fact that they control it is Palestinians' fault, or at least justifiable due to Israel's legitimate interest in preventing terrorism.

Well, which is it? Does Fatah control the West Bank, or does Israel control it but the occupation is justified?

There's a lot I could say about this topic, too, but I don't think I'll bother. Galloping from one canned talking point to the next faster than the points can be refuted is not a good-faith debating style and a waste of time to engage with.

Not to mention how the Israeli government allows over 700,000 illegal settlers to flood the West Bank and does absolutely nothing to stop them from stealing land or attacking Palestinians. The Israeli military has ultimate authority there. Like the other commenter said, it's a fantasy to claim otherwise.

[0] https://books.google.com/books?id=B1ZIIDeEc5AC&pg=PA511#v=on...

Btw, how many Palestinians are studying at Ari’el University in the West Bank?