Finnish politics

In some countries, most people take care of their own pension by saving and investing in a private pension fund that invests the money in their behalf. In theory, they're supposed to invest in long-term, low-risk plans so that the clients won't lose their money but in practise, if the funds are managed poorly, a lot of money gets invested into high-risk programs and lost. Some of the investments are insured, some aren't. If someone loses their investments in a private pension scheme, they wind up costing a lot to society 'cause they've got to be saved by social support.

In some countries, a large portion of pensions is handled by workers simply putting a percentage of their salary in savings accounts and hoping that by the time they retire, they'll have enough money put aside to make it comfortably through the rest of their life. These people are extremely vulnerable to inflation. Unlike national pension plans, in which the pensions are periodically adjusted for inflation and cost-of-living indices, people who have everything invested in a savings account have no protection.

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Hmm, it was interesting to read about the political parties o-o I mean, from point of view of someone like me who knows nothing, all political parties seems equally incompetent. For every good thing they want something that I consider bad. But yeah, that was enlightening..

...But wait, we have 3 communist parties? ._. What are those called in Finnish? Since I never have heard of them...

From biggest to smallest:

Suomen Kommunistinen Puolue (Communist Party of Finland);

Kommunistinen Työväenpuolue (Communist Workers' Party);

Suomen Työväenpuolue (Worker's Party of Finland).

edited 13th Apr '11 11:02:41 AM by BestOf

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I think I have heard of SKP in history books ._. And last one somewhere more recently...

None of these parties have had seats in Parliament in ages, but most (or maybe all) of them have seats in city councils in places where, mostly for historical reasons, these parties are popular.

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Hmm, I see..

@Best Of: Those who've got part of their retireent on a savings account have the (perhaps inadequate) protection of interest on savings, which is often tax-exempt in certain countries as long as it's been set aside in a retirement account.

Insured pension funds are in theory ideal.

You exist because we allow it and you will end because we demand it.

The True Finns were formed from the ruins of Suomen Maaseudun Puolue, or the Finnish Rural Party, which was destroyed from the inside by petty bickering. This election campaign has been very interesting, as the media has been giving the True Finns rough time and trying to dig up all possible dirt from the party candidates backgrounds and trying to scare people into thinking that the earth will swallow Finland if the True Finns are given power.

I think the True Finns are displaying symptoms of a persecution complex - and their supporters even more so!

For example, Soini does not support abortion in any circumstances because he's Catholic. But when he was asked about it, he burst out "no one else gets asked these questions", while every party has a position on these issues, and so do their leaders. So it's not as if no one else gets asked, it's just that Soini is the only one who stands to lose votes when he gets asked the same questions so he plays the victim card.

He plays that card a lot - like when he complained that he was given less time to speak in the televised debate between the leaders of the 4 largest parties, while in reality he was given as many opportunities to talk as everyone else, but his answers were shorter on average so he wound up speaking less (but often saying more because of his direct manner of expression) than the other party leaders.

Here's a post describing the history of the party in more detail.

I think the perception that the media is overly critical of Soini is not based on reality - the only party that the Finnish media is not attacking under this election is Kokoomus, and that's because Kokoomus supporters and members own majority shares in many Finnish media companies. The fact of the matter is that when it comes to actual facts - statistics and so on - Soini is less qualified than, say, Katainen, Urpilainen or Arhinmäki (but probably more qualified than Kiviniemi).

Also, his positions on many things are, like those of Räsänen, the leader of the Christians, very different from those of the majority of the population and other parties, so of course the media is going to focus on the differences and the controvercy because it's what people want to read about. If Arhinmäki or Katainen said as controversial things as Soini, it wouldn't be persecution if the media reports on it and inspects the relation between these positions and those of other groups.

It's as simple as that.

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Timo has said that they are not going to change the finnish law on abortion, it is just his personal belief. Soini would be hard-pressed to do a worse job than the current government has.

Also one of the reasons for the rise of the True Finns popularity is the contempt that the other party leaders have shown towards ordinary finnish citizens and how they have become detached from ordinary peoples lives.

Yeah, I'm not complaining about his position - just that he shouldn't have claimed that no-one else gets asked or that he's being persecuted when his positions on such "private" social matters are asked. If he was exempt from answering those questions, that'd be persecution against the other party leaders, who do have to answer them.

And I agree that Soini would not be worse than Katainen or Kiviniemi, though he's pretty much the only credible politician and unifying force in the party. He even made candidates sign pledges not to change parties after the elections, as if such promises would be binding.

Personally, I don't wish that Perussuomalaiset would get in government, but if they do, I hope the government is co-led by the SDP (and potentially Centre, though they'd be better off without) and that they'll let us in. The Greens are not going to be in a government with the Perussuomalaiset in them, and vice versa.

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I'd hope that the future government would be Coalition-Centre-True Finns, but that is very unlikely to happen, as the True Finns oppose the bailouts for southern European countries. It's funny that the Left Alliance and the True Finns have some same ideas, such as pulling out of Afghanistan, not going to Libya and opposing the bailouts.

Soini surely remembers SMP's fall, and so he has decided to get his peoples loyalty in that manner. And the True Finns have good and credible candidates this time.

In my opinion, the fact that Jussi Halla-Aho has not been kicked out of the True Finns is proof that Soini believes in No Such Thing as Bad Publicity. He's consciously keeping the extreme members onboard to generate controversy, which makes the party better known.

Context, in case non-Finns are still reading the thread: Jussi Halla-Aho is a member of the True Finns party, has been elected into the Helsinki city council and is a candidate for the current general election. He writes a blog about politics, and has expressed very strong anti-immigration ideals there. In 2008, he wrote a blog-entry where he said that he wishes for female members of the Green Party to be the ones to get raped by immigrants, when they come to Finland and start raping people (because that's what immigrants do, according to him). At one point, he wrote that Islam is the religion of pedophilia, and suggested that robbery and living on social support are genetic traits of the Somali people.

He was sued for incitement against an ethnic group and breach of the sanctity of religion, but faced on serious consequences.

edited 15th Apr '11 2:12:10 AM by Kerrah

Sounds like a hilarious guy. Shame my Finnish is too sucky to read blogs.

Well, it seems to me that Kerrah hasn't read Halla-Aho's blog himself, and relies on second hand information concerning it. Yes, he did say that Islam is a religion that sanctifies pedophilia, and he based that on the historical example of Mohammed, who married a girl named Aisha before she hit puberty. And as Mohammed is the ideal example of what a devout muslim ought to be, he thus deducted that islam is a religion that sanctifies pedophilia. And about the rape thingy, he wrote that if someone should get raped by immigrants, it would be just that it would be those who have advocated most strongly for third world- immigration and multiculturalism. And the blurb about the somalis being genetically predisposed to live on welfare and rob bypassers was a response to a columnist who wrote that alcoholism and alcohol-related violence is genetically coded to finns. His intent was to see if the law treated finns and somalis equally. It did not.

Please do read Mr. Halla-aho's blog yourself instead of relying on second-hand information.

He wasn't sentenced for his comments about the somalis, he only got fined for the comment about Islam.

Bugger, my mistake.

Your point being?

So in other words, two wrongs make a right?

Even though I haven't read the blog, your "clarifying" post didn't teach me anything I hadn't learned before.

So, it's now Saturday in Finland. I'll still have to do a couple of hours of campaign work today (or tomorrow, depending on whether or not you consider the hours between 00:00 and when you go to bet part of the previous day), and Sunday's going to be the big day.

We're going to gather at the house of one of our campaign workers with plenty of beer and watch the results of the vote count. Then whether anyone from our party in this region passes or not - and whether the results are good or bad nationally - the beer will come in handy.

I really hope my friend passes...

edited 21st Jan '14 6:22:22 AM by BestOf

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Bumping this in case anyone wants to add anything before the final election day. The results start to come in at around 8 o'clock PM tomorrow... I won't be here to post the results immediately, as I'll be watching the results come in with most of the actives in our city's Left Alliance. When I come home (which will be after midnight and I might be drunk), I might post the results, or maybe I'll wait till Monday. We'll see...

edited 21st Jan '14 6:16:41 AM by BestOf

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Thanks for posting all this stuff Best Of. It is fascinating.

Hope it goes well for the party you are supporting!

By the powers invested in me by tabloid-reading imbeciles, I pronounce you guilty of paedophilia!

Frankly, even with the message that made me start this thread, I'm absolutely amazed that anyone outside Finland cares about this. I mean, OK, maybe I would've thought that people from other Nordic countries and maybe Germany would care enough to read this thread, but that's about it.

Turns out there actually were many who wanted to know more about our politics.

But yeah, I'm glad I wrote this stuff - now I'll just have to copy my posts somewhere and I'll be able to use these bits to explain stuff about our politics in case anyone asks, and I won't have to write all this again. I'm also glad that people have actually read my mega-posts. Glad, and amazed.

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Politics in foreign politics is cool because it's probably less corrupt than politics in the home country.

I think it is important and good to understand how other countries and cultures work, broadened horizons and everything.

Also even more so as you are a fellow EU country.

By the powers invested in me by tabloid-reading imbeciles, I pronounce you guilty of paedophilia!