I think talking about Brexit is pretty much unavoidable, as everything else you mention hinges upon it, UTJ.
Errrr…apparently Junker pulled out a 2250 page “document” out of his bag an plonked it on the table. It was the trade agreement with Canada and he produced it to make a point. So…did he just happen to have that with him? If not and it was pre-planned and then the meeting leaked to the press…how is that not a perfect example of “posturing”?
99.99% one-sided, then 
Abbott, Corbyn, and McDonnell have rarely - if ever- needed to get down and dirty and campaign in an election. All three represent extremely safe London constituencies, the first two since the 1980s and the last since 1997. Their respective local CLPs have always been on the radical end of things, so not even any reselection pressure to speak of.
So they’ve all been able to play out fantasy protest politics for years, student union stuff, but in the big house. Ideological purity over rather more practical concerns about governance. And now they are in charge, and it’s not looking great, is it?
Add in Seumas (Winchester, Balliol, son of a former BBC Director General, Stalin fan and all round man-of-the-people) Milne as Director of Strategy, and it’s a right old clusterfuck.
For all New Labour’s faults under Blair and Brown, one thing they didn’t lack was competent people who knew in excruciating detail about policy (they had many years to prepare, after all), and a very robust media management and rapid-rebuttal set-up from pretty much day one. That’s what it takes to win against the Tory machine. Jam Man isn’t cutting it, I’m afraid.
Thing is you’d have to be blind to the E.U.'s actions over the the past decades to think that they are the only honest broker in this.
For all that they talk about about unanimity and solidarity and red lines…that is all just posturing and always has been.
Accession criteria to the E.U. ? They were happy to cook the books to allow countries in.
Financial crisis in Greece? happy to make offers and renege on them as it suits them, happy to make dire warnings and then ignore them as deals were struck
Free borders? except when individual countries decide that isn’t in their interests
They talk about paying what is owed and cracking down on tax avoidance whilst appointing Junker to high office, the architect of Luxembourg’s status as a tax haven.
My point being that anyone expecting either side to do anything other than look after their own interests is naive. Of course both May and the E.U. will start off by talking tough and set out their toughest criteria with the expectation that compromise will be necessary.
Anyone involved in high level deals knows this to be true. I guarantee that many of the red lines drawn by both parties now will be smudged, re-coloured, re-drawn and re-shaped by the time this is over.
I come back to a fundamental truth to this situation. If a secular, democratic, first-world nation with the abilities, talents and resources of the UK, with the 5th largest GDP in the world were suddenly to materialise 20 miles off the coast of the E.U.
a) the world would be interested in forging links with it
b) The E.U. would kiss its arse to get it to join but if it can’t tempt it, it would…
c) come to a sensible agreement
Do any of those threaten the EU’s existence? No. The EU has to show being outside the EU is worse than being in. Call it a protection racket if you will, but it’s not - it’s entirely rational defence of that which has been the engine of European prosperity since the war.
It’s amazing how the criticism of politicians as being liars and backpedallers is now seen as a virtue. So much for taking back control.
But that’s not what’s happening, is it? The UK isn’t appearing out of nowhere - it’s flipping the bird at its greatest trading partner because of lies, false promises, and delusions of grandeur, and in the face of mountains of evidence that, despite whatever Brexiters think, you will not get better trading deals outside the EU.
You seem to think Remainers think nobody will trade with the UK. That’s a strawman.
The fact is that there will not be better trade agreements than the ones we currently have.
In fact, there’s every risk they’ll be worse - because, despite what May insists, any deal is better than no deal, and Britain will have to make drastic compromises to minimise the damage that losing our EU trade links will cause. That means trade deals in the short and medium term will be far inferior and likely cause great harm to British manufacturers.
Example: The US is keen on expanding its meat exports, and the UK will be a prime target. But UK meat production risks being completely wiped out by the competition. Despite the rhetoric, unrestricted free trade is not the all-encompassing panacea that Brexiters think it is.
The EU wants a sensible agreement - that agreement is that the UK leaves the EU, pays its bills (whatever that sum may be), and trades with the EU as a third party, with due protections for the EU citizens in the UK.
The UK does not want a sensible agreement - it wants to leave the EU but no leave the EU, to have the advantages of membership with none of the obligations. And whenever Brexiters imagine Brussels is quaking in its boots that the UK might walk away and crash out, they shake their heads in amazement at the delusion.
And sure, perhaps in the long term things will stabilise. I’m pretty confident that they will. But what damage, what cost, in the meantime? And will it be worth it? Who will suffer? Will we protect these screwed over by this insane endeavour? And above all, will we be more free and wealthier? Really?
Like fuck.
Where?! Am I going blind? I’ve looked at that image and zoomed in and there is the word “Scum” there is a swastika, there is the letter “Q” on the other door. I honestly can’t see the word English on there. Where is it?
Right, so you have some graffiti from 2 years ago, and a woman fined £80 for distributing leaflets from 23 years ago.
In the meantime, I haven’t heard anything from the Tories condemning either the recent anthrax threats or the Britain First graffiti I linked to. Is that forthcoming?
Those are just two examples.
well…yes, clearly yes.
I didn’t
Cart before horse I believe. Post 1945 any reasonably advanced nation could guarantee the destruction of any other nation. That genie, now unbottled created the landscape upon which the E.U. could be built. The prosperity that came in the second half of the 20th century also came to countries outside the E.U. believe it or not. That is not to say that having inter-national agreements, free-trade areas is not a good thing…it certainly is, but it is also a valid argument that the current form, structure and oversight of the E.U. is not necessary to sustain it. Less could be more and I’m not alone in that belief.
You read what you want to read I guess. I wrote it as neither a virtue nor a vice, simply how business is done, how all business is done. And you’ll note that I don’t paint either side as lily-white.
How is it “flipping the bird”? It is entirely possible to pull out of a deal with neither side being at fault. At the end of this, the UK will still exist…just off the coast of Europe, wealthy, democratic, secular, technologically advanced and committed to the continuing success of Europe. At worst, whatever rancour may exists on both sides will disappear once the current raft of politicians die off (politically)
We simply have no way of knowing how it will pan out, the UK doesn’t, the E.U. doesn’t, certainly you and I don’t. The cumulative total benefit/deficit of all future trade deals to be done will not be clear for many years. One thing that is clear is that the UK will be free to pursue trade deals that are purely in our own interests.
if it is then it is yours I’m afraid seeing as I am a remainer and I think that the other nations of world will trade with the UK, I know other remainers think that way.
They will be different for certain, there may be more, there may be less we simply don’t know and probably won’t know the true fall-out (on both sides, UK and EU) for a good decade or so.
And that is utter nonsense I’m afraid. In any negotiation you have to be prepared to walk away, and your co-negotiators across the table must believe that, or you are screwed before you start. I assume you think that the E.U. are prepared to walk away from any deal and that they are right to do so? Why would the same rationale not apply to the UK?
That there’ll be compromises on both sides or no deal will be done, is pretty much certain.
But you just can’t lump everyone together like that. The number of brexiters I know that think “unrestricted free trade” is what is required I can count on one hand, they probably number the same as “remainers” who think the same.
And if youread the white paper.…the actual words…and listen to what Theresa May has said…her actual words…that is precisely what the UK wants as well. There will be negotiating over the divorce bill naturally but I can easily see the UK agreeing to an amount (probably brokered by a third party) that will guarantee a favourable trading deal.
Ultimately all that both sides want is something they can sell to their electorate.
The E.U. say that the deal cannot be better than what we have now but you to consider that both sides have different opinions on what “better” looks like and means. There is an element of “don’t throw me in the briar patch” to all this.
I don’t think “quaking in their boots” is right, but certainly they don’t want a sour relationship at the end of this…why would they? right there in foundation documents of the E.U. is the requirement to forge strong and friendly relationship with neighbours (which includes trade of course)…I’m assuming you believe the E.U. will stay true to their word?
Again, We just don’t know. Just like we will never know to what degree Europe would reform with us still in but agitating strongly for change (my preferred option). And does “wealthier” actually matter? is that the full measure of a country’s worth? If our GDP goes down but our industry is rebalanced away from a service economy will that be good or bad thing? If a rush of high-earners from the city decrease house prices will that be good or bad?
opinions vary of course.
‘We just don’t know’
But we have a damn good idea through the statistics that the Treasury and business supplied about how they felt about Brexit. As flawed as they apparently are, in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king, and the Leave side gave zero statistics on their side about their assumptions that the grass is greener after Brexit. Zero.
I find the idea that people will gamble on the extremely narrow possibility of a kinda sorter better life in ten or twenty years time against the certainty of relative prosperity now utterly mad. It entirely baffles me.
It’s an attitude that can be applied to anything. Should I built a house out of sugar rock? Yes, there’s a certainty that rain will wear it away, but there’s a possibility that the laws of physics will change in a few hours so that sugar rock is impervious to rain. Besides, the scientists who warn about the effects of rain on sugar rock are scaremongering.
Umm… no. People simply didn’t believe them.
And this was their genius. There was no plan because they knew they would be fighting each other afterwards
Really? Not my understanding. And belief is irrelevant - unless you think gut feeling should trump everything. There are some who don’t believe in climate change either.
And that’s supposed to comfort me how?
Quartz - basically this:
You say that people simply didn’t believe them.
On what basis did they not believe them? What information did they have that made them doubt it?
If it’s simply that they had a gut feeling that they’re wrong…don’t you see anything appalling with that?
Because they were clearly hysterical, stupid, and wrong. Surely you remember the prediction of global financial collapse? And the one about starting WW3? Simply for voting for Brexit.
It isn’t. But perhaps you might learn from it.
You mean those claims that were completely overspan by Leavers to create strawmen to knock down? It wasn’t Cameron who claimed WW3, it was Johnson, being a shrill jackass as always.
Anyway, even if you think they’re hysterical or absurd doesn’t come into it.
If you want to be taken seriously, demonstrate why it’s hysterical or absurd by providing your own damn evidence.
Remain win the argument by default otherwise.
Funny how the Referendum showed otherwise. You and I may not like the result (or perhaps you do?) but I respect it and am moving forward. You seem to be stuck in the past.
They won a vote, but they haven’t won the argument.
You may be content to carry on sustaining something which has a whacking great big black hole of reasoning, evidence or purpose to it, for no gain, but I don’t.
I am hoping that by having the conversations I can finally discover what it is about Brexit that makes sense to those who support it.
But increasingly I am even more astounded at the pointlessness of it. This is more than simply Tory v Labour, where both may use facts and statistics but twist and interpret them to fit their narrative.
This is much worse. This is where one side does that…and the other side simply makes everything up, chants mantras, and promises the earth.
What is a CLP in this context? Constituency Local Party or People perhaps?