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EvanSchenck posted:Historically? The best part of Britain's food imports in the late 19th century came from the USA, with Europe east of the Elbe River (e.g. Eastern Germany and European Russia/Ukraine) in second place. British India actually had a food deficit and suffered periodic famines during British rule, which was due partly to the large population and lack of technical development in agriculture and transport, but more significantly to British mismanagement. They preferred India produce cash crops rather than foodstuffs, and in times of crop failure they put no effort into relief. Ireland as well. To give you an example, when the potato crop failed during the Great Hunger, Ireland exported almost a million gallons of butter during the height of the worst year of the famine. Throughout the whole famine, Ireland remained a next exporter of food. This continued well after the Great Famine, with everything from herring to peas being brought over for British consumption.
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Jan 18, 2014 05:06
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| # ? Apr 28, 2024 23:08 |
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Chapter VIII: The Folly of War (1883-1887) Te Deum laudamus: te Dominum confitemur... What? You wish to speak during the Mass of thanksgiving commemorating the late war? It's good we're sitting back here. Look out there, all those hypocrites in one cathedral. Do you remember how this started?   Te aeternum Patrem omnis terra veneratur... A bunch of pretentious fools, most of them down there, excepting the late King Ludwig, seized on the Czech crisis as an opportunity to prove our mettle. Members of a hypocritical older generation that happily sends its children off to die and then sing God's praises in this ostentatious cathedral when more of their children return than the enemy's.   They refused even to agree when the North Germans backed down...that's the tragedy, this war was fully avoidable. Those fools should be praying for the hundreds of thousands of lives whose blood is on their hands, not hearing the te Deum.    Tibi omnes Angeli... Oh, that's not the most farcical part of the last few years. Remember our "war" with the Sokoto Caliphate, where neither we nor our allies could get permission to go through French territory to fight them? It turned our country into the laughingstock of the world, though Sokoto would pay a far dearer price. Arrogant fools, the lot of them. Oh, and don't forget the British thinking they could take on half of South America in the middle of their war against us.   tibi caeli et universae Potestates... Don't shush me, if you wanted to hear the archbishop drone in a dead language you should have gotten a better seat up with the hypocrites in the faux-noble attire, the "Lords" of industry who have pretensions of an older and more venerable form of power. If they had any conscience whatsoever they would be getting on their knees, weeping, and praying for their immortal souls. They started this totally preventable war.    Tibi Cherubim et Seraphim incessabili voce proclamant... Not that religion is the problem, it isn't. The hollowing out of religion by "modern" men of "science," killing the idea that we are all children of Adam and Noah, reducing the miracle of life to chains of carbon molecules, proclaiming the pernicious doctrine that the weak dying and the strong living is the law of Nature when our Lord told us those very meek would inherit the Earth...that is the problem. It has turned this holy place into a theatrical display.  Sanctus...  Sanctus...  Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth... Have you ever reflected on how utterly sick the tradition of reciting Te Deum Laudamus after a victory is? I can guarantee you they haven't. They do it because people did it in the 18th century, and they did it because people did it in the 17th century, and so on. If those arrogant peacocks with their pocketwatches and monocles and their vapid wives gave any thought to the dead, it was solely that some sweeperboy wouldn't report to work next Monday because he had lost his legs in combat. If they had any thought of the enormity of the suffering they caused they'd be calling for us to have a Requiem Mass instead like they did when old Ludwig passed.  Pleni sunt caeli et terra maiestatis gloriae tuae. The very heavens and Earth rebel against the status quo. The sky is still dimmer even now and the eruption was three years ago on the other side of the world! I tell you, God is upset with the way things are.  Te gloriosus Apostolorum chorus Did you know that when we briefly occupied Berlin at the start of the war the people of Berlin held their first Mass, Protestant or Catholic, since the Atheist Anarcho-Liberal regime took office? People pretend to maintain the ancient emnities, but see the Dutch representative there and the Russian Ambassador up front? Protestant vs Catholic vs Orthodox matters not, what matters is our common disdain for the poison of Atheism, a poison which, I hear, has been spreading.   Te Prophetarum laudabilis numerus Once, atheism was a poison to strictly upper class tastes. Now, in Berlin, where all toxic ideologies start, they are calling the workers to drink from this tainted chalice. It has even spread to here. And who can blame them? Look at this crowd, these men of God. Worthless hypocrites, the lot of them! I can hardly blame someone for abandoning Christ after seeing the state of His "Christians..." but of course, nonetheless, we cannot have this.  Te Martyrum candidatus laudat exercitus. Te per orbem terrarum sancta confitetur Ecclesia... Can you believe that not one single Christian nation responded to the inhuman atrocities of the Boxers? I knew missionaries over there, good men of God who improved sanitation and education and snapped opium pipes, but those pagans have no respect for treaty obligations and extraterritoriality. Because of the war, they got away with it, as well, though it came at a harsh price for the Chinese...their county was overcome with warlordism as the angry mobs they stirred up seized the capital, leaving their various governors to become fully independent, and even breaking their bonds with the Dalai Lama in Tibet.   Patrem immensae maiestatis... It takes the Russians an age and a half to mobilize their forces and get them into combat, and that lured the North Germans into a false sense of security. While they fought a series of bloody battles holding the Dutch at bay, they felt free to overwhelm us and the Russians with their brief numerical advantage. You remember those dark days.  Venerandum tuum verum et unicum Filium... Something like 75% of the men that fought in Weimar that day died. God sent his only Son to Earth to die for our sins, but what excuse do those people have for sending other people's sons to die?  Sanctum quoque Paraclitum Spiritum... I am haunted, my friend. The specters of the dead won't leave me alone.  Tu Rex gloriae, Christe... What was this war for? The glory of "Ludwig the Liberator," that's what. What do we have to do with India, or India with us?       Tu Patris sempiternus es Filius... The improvement of mining technology and the forging of steel...how utterly worthless. Steel only benefits those Czech fools in Bohemia and Moravia that got us into this war to begin with. Luckily, the importation of massive amounts of tobacco from our client "Kingdoms" of Haiti and Cuba continues unabated.     Tu ad liberandum suscepturus hominem... Ah, the Little Alpine War. The King of Italy thought he could liberate the men of Italy by marching north while we were occupied with the NGF.   Non horruisti Virginis uterum... The Italians, horrified at their miscalculation, cried out for their mothers, Virgin or not. King Ludwig, for once, let Italy off the hook with no indemnities.  Tu, devicto mortis aculeo South German troops were quite familiar with the sharpness of death by this point. The professional North German army had been almost wiped out, but a neverending stream of conscripts rose to take their place. Our men, exhausted, wounded, could not fight on.  Aperuisti credentibus regna caelorum... Engelbert is down there. Who would have thought a man that stout and out of shape would be a first-rate commander of men? At Fulda he showed a great many of our Northern brethren into the Kingdom of Heaven. I know not why even now I am prone to glorifying feats of arms in this pointless war...perhaps it is my childhood reading Caesar's commentary's and Arrian's Anabasis.    Tu ad dexteram Dei sedes While the French choice to place two thirds of their army in India proved beneficial in persuading the world that we had the power to free India, it also had its rather obvious downsides.    in gloria Patris... The Turks were savvy, striking Greece when the Great Powers had no ability to stop them.       Iudex crederis esse venturus... Conscripts save the day, for the first time in SGF's history. 300,000 men drafted. Do you understand that number? A great many never returned. Whatever else I have to say about the SGF government, it never turns to conscription unless there is literally no other option. Of course, war with conscripts is horrifying beyond measure.     War with just the professional army can be horrifying too, just for the other side. Meanwhile, we waited to be saved by Russia, for when Russia institutes conscription, their men continue to come, a neverending stream slowly but surely headed westwards.     Te ergo quaesumus... The fall of Paris was met with utter disdain here. How was it even possible? Why had France left all its troops in Madras, anyway?   Tuis famulis subveni... Women in Munich put flowers around returning soldiers, women in New York City vote on public policy. Which has a saner system, I wonder?      Quos pretioso sanguine redemisti... It was a bit over a year ago now that India ended its servitude to London and started producing goods for us. Was it worth it? Hardly, though I have to admit, I have picked up a taste for tea.   Aeterna fac cum sanctis tuis in gloria numerari. Britain continued its role as the enforcer of Brazilian imperialism. Few cared. Oh, the service is finally over? Oh, no, a sermon! Listen, I'm just going to leave now. Let's talk in the hall.    As you know, following in the lead of other Indian minors, princely states tried to modernize and meet the challenge of their giant neighbor, while the Laotians became the first in their neighborhood to welcome Western standards.  Who knows what's going on in Krakow these days.  Can you believe that the latest word from over there is that India is actually somehow losing?  The massive expansion of healthcare is going to trigger a backlash. I hope the new Emperor, Otto is capable of... ... Did you just see the Emperor of the South Germans run, screeching and shouting nonsense, through the pews, ruining the Archbishop's sermon? I think we made the right decision to depart the service early. Anyway...  This elephant will never swim.   In humiliation, the government realized that it could not bring Sokoto to heel. It met a gruesome fate at the hands of France and Italy, with only its interior remaining under the rule of the Sokoto Caliph. Perhaps he should have stayed loyal to Munich and not opened himself up to this, eh?   The Chinese Empire looks to retake its land from the opportunistic warlords that seceded in its moment of weakness. A divided China is better for everyone, let us hope that they fail.     With peacetime came the return of peacetime concerns, like industry and securing the rubber supply and music. It will hopefully be a long time before we have another series of atrocities, another brutal campaign that we will have to say a Te Deum for.  What? They wouldn't dare.  They...but...  My friend, I suppose...I suppose I will meet you again, here, next year, for another Te Deum. I hear that the chapel across the hall has a child's chorus singing Miserere Mei, Deus. The words seem more appropriate for the current circumstances. The Great Powers   SGF Demographics  Crisis State Bohemia Demographics  The World, 1887 
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Jan 19, 2014 00:23
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This time Berlin needs to be brought to heel and learn it's rightful place in Europe. EDIT: I really hate India's monarchist flag.
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Jan 19, 2014 00:40
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theblastizard posted:This time Berlin needs to be brought to heel and learn it's rightful place in Europe. 100% agreed on both counts. I was fuming about those damned North Germans and their Czech pawns when that Bohemian Crisis popped up. I'm torn between Cutting Them Down To Size, which would prohibit them from participating in Crises while they remain disarmed, or just flat-out invading, burning everything down, killing every poor peasant they stick in a uniform, and occupying their country until all the factories go bankrupt and everyone starves. The main thing holding me back from the second approach is that I've tried to, if not necessarily be the good guy, at least not forcibly starve a country of 41 million people back to feudalism and that doing so might be rather bad karma.
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Jan 19, 2014 00:50
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Oh Christ almighty... If I were playing this game, I'd be rubbing my hands together right about now, because the "I poo poo on your face and take all your land" Great War (characterized by a 2:1 ratio of GPs on your side vs. their side) is a wonderful opportunity to tear the skin off a rival like he's a Weißwurst and then leaving him out to die. Kind of a shame you're not using the New Nations Mod, because the Rheinland country it adds would be a great nation to liberate from the NGF. It'd cripple them pretty heftily if they lost their major industrial core. As it stands, I suppose we could just humiliate them and cut them down to size and hope they get weakened enough from that.
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Jan 19, 2014 00:51
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TheMcD posted:Oh Christ almighty... I do still have 11 infamy, and it's 1887 and Great Wars and their 33% off wargoals don't come online until 1890. I suppose I could hold off from making any demands until then.
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Jan 19, 2014 00:54
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What's the definition of insanity, again?
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Jan 19, 2014 01:04
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AdventFalls posted:What's the definition of insanity, again? It's not the same thing over again. Last time, NGF had a standing prewar army of 300,000 men while I had a standing army of 180,000 men. Now, NGF has a standing army of 63,000 men while I have an army of 216,000 men. This is trying the same thing from a far inferior bargaining position and expecting different results.
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Jan 19, 2014 01:09
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It'll get a different result. Time to stomp the  out of them. No more factories, no more poor strata, no more rich strata, no more middle strata. The North German Nature Preserve.
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Jan 19, 2014 01:17
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The game doesn't believe that you don't want to form Germany and is trying to make it as easy as possible for you.
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Jan 19, 2014 01:22
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SIGSEGV posted:It'll get a different result. Time to stomp the Considering the way the crisis system works, I think this might be our only solution. The Liberator is dead, and we're currently being ruled by a supposed madman, I think we can justify going a little crazy on the NGF, especially since they're a despised rival.
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Jan 19, 2014 01:26
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If it were me I'd just be like gently caress you NGF,  , but most people are more patient than me.
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Jan 19, 2014 01:57
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So, enjoy this. Our military is totally up to date.  Did I say military? I meant army.  Our commercial tech is pretty solid, if not exactly cutting edge.  We shine in culture, we're going to want to move on Psychoanalysis soon to get us in position to finish off the Psychology line in 1900 and be the first to have Radios.  Our industry is up to date as of a decade ago. It needs to progress to take into account some very juicy new possibilities, especially Electricity.  Our professional army is 72 brigades strong, out of a potential 85. If we imposed a draft we could get 127 more brigades of conscripts.  Our top imports and exports, if anyone was curious.
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Jan 19, 2014 01:59
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What's your army comp like, anyway?
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Jan 19, 2014 02:09
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North Germany must burn.
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Jan 19, 2014 02:10
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So who wants to volunteer to be the guy in parliament who ends every speech with "Also, Berlin must be destroyed"
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Jan 19, 2014 02:17
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Force the release of Prussia, free the rest of the north Germans from Berlin's insanity.
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Jan 19, 2014 02:20
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Can you just form Germany to save the North Germans from themselves?
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Jan 19, 2014 02:37
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Ethiser posted:Can you just form Germany to save the North Germans from themselves? At least take the rhineland....
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Jan 19, 2014 03:03
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Emergency meeting of the Reichstag The Kaiser is...indisposed, and will be absent. Gentlemen, we have two pressing questions. What is to be our aim with the Bohemian Crisis? It is clear that the North German Federation will not cease the repeated sponsoring of minority populations in our fair realm to attempt to break away. In a sense, we are lucky. If a popular foreign power like Tsarist Russia championed the Czechs, all of Europe would abandon us and rally to that cause, and we would not prevail. Through sheer pigheadedness, the bourgeois dictatorship in Berlin insists on being the Czechs' patron, and will fall as a result as no one wishes to see Berlin become more powerful. And yet the constant wars to the north cannot go on forever. This must end, here and now. The question is how. A. Attempt to disarm North Germany peacefully, and make war if they refuse. Prussian militarism remains the poison at the heart of the NGF, and disarming is the cure. We will pose a counterultimatum to Berlin: that they disband 50% of their military, not build any new brigades or ships for 5 years, and pay us 50% of their revenue as reparations for the late war. We suspect that the Northerners will accept, but if they do not, we will go to war and we will win and force it. North Germany is barred from participating in crises while it is under a disarming treaty, so this will preserve the quiet for some years to come. B. We will go to war with North Germany again, to free the people of Saxony. Saxony will receive the former territories of all of the former petty Saxon duchies as well as the Kingdom of Saxony itself, and be a large, industrialized buffer zone between us and North Germany. C. We will Liberate the people of Hannover, dramatically shrinking NGF's presence in the northwest and removing close to 15% of its population. Hannover is mostly agricultural land, so it will not be the dramatic strike that some here are hoping, but the loss of population will still hurt NGF's army size. D. Release Prussia. NGF will lose 2/3rds of its territory to a reborn Hohenzollern state (Prince Wilhelm is here in Munich today, hoping that he can become King Wilhelm of Prussia). The rump NGF republic will retain the states of Hannover, Osthannover, Schleswig-Holstein, Hesse-Nassau, and Hessen. Question 2: Our minorities are incredibly out of hand. Nearly all of them are as militant as they can be due to our ruling (and only) Nationale Party's policy that only South Germans can be citizens. Some have called for removing the Nationale Party from power. A. Preserve the status quo. The Nationale Party allows the state to manage the economy in detail, retain a healthy high tax rate, set its own tariffs, and subsidize failing industry to prevent unemployment, and their Jingoistic military policy allows us to recruit as many soldiers as we afford. If bigotry is the price, then we shall pay the price. After all, we are the South German Federation, not the United States of the Danube or some such nonsense. B. Let the winner of the next election rule. Some in SGF are upset that our elections are elections in name only, with the winners deposed upon their victory by Imperial edict. One of our three Liberal Parties will likely win the next election, and we should let them take over. As a Habsburg emperor once said, "Fiat Justitiam Ruat Caelum," "Let justice be done though the heavens fall." If we are meant to deindustrialize and go heavily into debt to satisfy Free Market ideologues, well, it is the will of the voters. C. Better Red than dead. I trust no man in here is either a Socialist or a Worker, but his late Majesty was surprisingly tempted by the arguments of the Socialist Workers Party. Their Full Citizenship policy and their Planned Economy policy will allow us to both have our cake and eat it too...it would keep the economy in the hands of the state while allowing minorities a chance to enter into SGF society. There are multiple downsides: our policy of not allowing the poor to vote means that next to none of the electorate is likely to support a Socialist Workers Party cabinet and their Anti-Military plank might mean a drawdown of our impressive army. This option is not expected to do well...why would men of substance and property such as yourselves want a Socialist government? Thank you for your advice, gentlemen. I'll tell Kaiser Otto the results (not that he'll understand a word of it).
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Jan 19, 2014 03:13
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Free Saxony. We need to strike the industry, for that is what makes the NGF strong. Status Quo. We need to hold the control over our financial state as long as possible.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:16
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A and C. Any further wars would be disastrous, as would letting our industrial heartland become the nexus of Crisis after Crisis. Its only a matter of time until a power thats actually dangerous takes interest.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:18
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1D 2C Maximum ambition.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:18
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A and C
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Jan 19, 2014 03:18
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Free Prussia, and keep the Status Quo.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:21
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A and C sounds good to me.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:21
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1D 2C
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Jan 19, 2014 03:23
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I find it somewhat worrying that even without the natural gravitation towards socialism Vicky 2 has developed, we're still heading towards socialism.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:27
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A and C!
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Jan 19, 2014 03:27
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This is where we all throw off our cloaks to reveal our bright red undershirts! DC
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Jan 19, 2014 03:30
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E! I reject the false choices presented to us! Are we really so blind to the reality of the situation? The only way to end the insanity of the North Germans is to bring them under the rule of Munich!
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Jan 19, 2014 03:34
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I realized that I should have posted the list of parties. The current projected election winner is the Nationalliberale Party, so if you pick the most popular party (B on the second question) they'll...probably be in unless one of the many other liberal parties overtakes them.   
Patter Song fucked around with this message at 03:38 on Jan 19, 2014 |
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Jan 19, 2014 03:35
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Free Saxony and let the Socialists try ruling things. They'll inevitably fail and then we can return peacefully to our good, nationalist values.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:39
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1A2C The goal of every Victoria 2 game is to get the Socialists in power! And peace is nice too, gotta keep those NGF warmongers in line.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:43
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The most popular party is the Nationalliberale, who stand for Free Trade, Lassiez Faire, Pluralism, Limited Citizenship, and Jingoism. The second most popular party in the SGF is the Freisinnige Partei, which stands for Free Trade, Lassiez Faire, Pluralism, Limited Citizenship, and...Pro Military. We have an electorate that made two parties whose platforms are basically totally identical into the two most serious parties. Could you imagine the debate between a Nationalliberale candidate and a Freisinnige candidate? The only excitement would be on military affairs, and even then, Jingoism vs Pro Military is a rather muted disagreement.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:53
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Patter Song posted:The most popular party is the Nationalliberale, who stand for Free Trade, Lassiez Faire, Pluralism, Limited Citizenship, and Jingoism. The second most popular party in the SGF is the Freisinnige Partei, which stands for Free Trade, Lassiez Faire, Pluralism, Limited Citizenship, and...Pro Military. They're both liberals, so it's essentially just a debate on who gets to drive the car and who gets to pick the radio station, as they'd both basically end up ruling anyway. Not that it matters, since it seems the Reichstag has shown its true colors, and they are red, red, and even more red.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:57
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Patter Song posted:We have an electorate that made two parties whose platforms are basically totally identical into the two most serious parties. How unrealistic. This would clearly never happen in real life.
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Jan 19, 2014 03:59
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reminds me of the Futurama joke. Freisinnige Partei: I say, your desire to go to war with 100% of the world goes too far! Nationalliberale: And I say, your desire to go to war with 90% of the world doesn't go too far enough!
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Jan 19, 2014 03:59
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B and B.
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Jan 19, 2014 04:01
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| # ? Apr 28, 2024 23:08 |
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D, B.
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Jan 19, 2014 04:11
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