"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
You missed "Please stop talking about it..."
Also "and it's all the fault of Remainers."
Funnily enough, people who deliberately make the country worse get more criticism than those who do it accidentally.
Now I'm confused.
Are you saying that the harms of Brexit were... An accident?
Are you Nadhim Zahawi?
(And not being harmful seems better to me than being harmful.)
"Not being harmful" wasn't an option before the referendum. Leaving would have been bad, at least in the short term. Staying in and getting more integrated would have been bad. Staying exactly as it was in the long term was impossible.
The bottom line is, Leavers in parliament had a choice between two versions of Brexit and chose the one they preferred. Remainers in parliament had the same choice and chose the one they didn't prefer.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
Does that include Brejoin, even Brejoin closer than before? (NB not whether we should, but do you see that as an option on the list, even it it's one to reject?)
That certainly could be an option, but it would require people to campaign actively for it and extol its benefints, not keep on whinging impotently about losing a vote what is soon to be a decade ago.
And if we're to Rejoin then absolutely it should be as full members, including the euro and Schengen and the EU army. The half-in status we previously had was no good for either side.
Yep. That was actually my opinion at the time of the referendum
I narrowly voted Leave but if we’d voted Remain then I would have said: that’s it then. All in. Full on Federal Union. Euro, Schengen, EU army
Might as well enjoy the fruits of being a superpower if you have to suffer the pains of surrendering so much sovereignty
So if we have another vote, and collectively vote Brejoin, you'll be fully in?
Yes
My PB stalker, the renowned ex PBer @SeanT wrote a Telegraph column to this effect. That if we are to stay in the EU then we might as well go the whole hog. Elected EU President, EU army. Everything
Nah. I voted to remain because I thought UK's semi-detached membership suited us and that we could possibly act as a brake on the mad progress towards complete EU integration and the loss of national democracy is entails. Also the economic hit from losing investment. In other words we were good for the EU and the EU was, kinda, good for us, sort of.
But we won't be rejoining. Starmer won't touch it with a bargepole. And unless there is a massive surge for the LibDems at somepoint under the banner of rejoin (chortle - just to write it down shows how unlikely it is), then he, and subsequent Labour leaders, won't be going there either.
It's official: NASA will partner with DARPA to develop & test a nuclear-thermal rocket. The 2027 mission will dust off decades-old nuclear tech, with the goal of faster spaceflight and bigger payloads. https://mobile.twitter.com/coreyspowell/status/1618317481785053184
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
Does that include Brejoin, even Brejoin closer than before? (NB not whether we should, but do you see that as an option on the list, even it it's one to reject?)
That certainly could be an option, but it would require people to campaign actively for it and extol its benefints, not keep on whinging impotently about losing a vote what is soon to be a decade ago.
And if we're to Rejoin then absolutely it should be as full members, including the euro and Schengen and the EU army. The half-in status we previously had was no good for either side.
Yep. That was actually my opinion at the time of the referendum
I narrowly voted Leave but if we’d voted Remain then I would have said: that’s it then. All in. Full on Federal Union. Euro, Schengen, EU army
Might as well enjoy the fruits of being a superpower if you have to suffer the pains of surrendering so much sovereignty
So if we have another vote, and collectively vote Brejoin, you'll be fully in?
Yes
My PB stalker, the renowned ex PBer @SeanT wrote a Telegraph column to this effect. That if we are to stay in the EU then we might as well go the whole hog. Elected EU President, EU army. Everything
Nah. I voted to remain because I thought UK's semi-detached membership suited us and that we could possibly act as a brake on the mad progress towards complete EU integration and the loss of national democracy is entails.
And remainers accuse leavers of having voted for unicorns!
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
There are enough Remainers who are fixated enough on forcing Leavers to recant in a humiliating way, that I don't think a quick rejoin is possible.
Time has to be allowed to heal Brexit wounds and make the case to rejoin to a new generation. I don't agree that Rejoin becomes impossible later. More than forty years of membership didn't make Leave impossible. Forty years on the outside won't make rejoin impossible either.
Leaving the EU, as has been said by many, is a process rather than an event.
The UK now had much more freedom of legislation, to decide her own future direction. The impression I get, looking in from the outside, is that the government has used very little of that freedom to actually do anything.
It’s been an economically and politically turbulent time, and we now have a PM who seems unable to think proactively, aided by a permanent bureaucracy that seems flat-footed and unwilling to think outside the box in any situation other than absolute emergency which was start of the pandemic.
I get the impression that too many people are afraid to diverge from what was required by EU membership, lest rejoining then becomes more difficult in future. If that attitude is indeed pervasive, then the failure to benefit from leaving the EU will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
Oh come on kinabalu, you're better than that. Still with this argument that leavers were labouring under the delusion that Britain was the power it was 100 years ago? Leavers knew how far Britain had fallen. If Leavers thought Britain was great and powerful and doing fine, they wouldn't have voted for change.
Anyway, off the top of my head, I have to say for myself this - my view is the following:
My view is that the risk of remaining was greater than the risk of leaving. I have a greater fear of a declining and sclerotic Europe than I do of a declining and sclerotic Britain. I believe in democracy as the best way of achieving a positive outcome for the people as a whole, and British democracy is far less imperfect than European democracy. The years since the referendum, and in particular covid, and to a lesser extent Ukraine, have demonstrated that Europe is no particular friend to Britain. Remember the 'stop Britain getting vaccines' drive? Remember the demonisation of the AZ vaccine? This was not a simple jockeying for position, this was actual spite. My view is that Britain is more able to evade this outside the EU than inside it - though it will always have to contend with it. I voted leave in the belief that there would be a short-term (i.e. first ten years) economic hit, but that British people will be better off in the long term out of the EU. The economic hit was much less than I anticipated. Leave was never a silver bullet. There remains lots wrong with Britain that needs to be addressed. Much of this is more easily done outside the EU, though of course much more is entirely separate from EU membership. The fact that we haven't yet addressed these matters is not a fault of leave (and indeed had we done so three years after leaving I would have been amazed). Don't confuse 'Britain is in a worse situation than it was a few years ago' with 'Brexit has caused Britain's woes. The impact of Brexit is dwarfed by that of covid and Ukraine. My leave vote was never certain. I ummed and ahhed and decided on balance leave was probably the safer vote. Had I known then what I know now I would have voted leave with much more certainty. I would certainly vote stay out given the option today. I was a soft Brexiter in 2016; I am probably a harder Brexiter in 2023 - though my mind is certainly not made up on what our future relationship with the EU should ideally be like, and I certainly wouldn't see it as a betrayal if it ended up looking like something else.
They are your reasons and you're best placed to express them. But there's a tell -
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
Interesting @TimesRadio focus group (swing voters) today. Labour potentially a long way to go to shift the damage done by the ‘Labour have no ideas’ attack by Boris. Polls may have them streets ahead but (at least among these swing voters) there’s still a lot of ambivalence.
We assume Labour will not win a landslide because they always screw it up.
But let's assume that does happen, what do the Tories do?
Leadership contest between Badenoch and Mordaunt?
FWIW I rather think Boris will be out of it. His time would come after a second defeat - say 2029. (Churchill was 75 when he won back power in 1951 - a point to bear in mind when trying to figure out BJ thinking.)
It's official: NASA will partner with DARPA to develop & test a nuclear-thermal rocket. The 2027 mission will dust off decades-old nuclear tech, with the goal of faster spaceflight and bigger payloads. https://mobile.twitter.com/coreyspowell/status/1618317481785053184
It’s late to the party. Maybe too early.
With on orbit refueling now baked into the Artemis project…. With aero-braking in an atmosphere at the other end, you get there quicker and with more payload.
This is because you have to use retro propulsion to slow a nuclear stage, at the other end. Either that or send the stage without testing. Unless you want to try retro-braking out for a nuclear reactor in Earths atmosphere…
Essentially, a chemical rocket will be cheaper and quicker than a nuclear thermal stage. For non sci-fi nuclear designs, at least.
This behind-the-scenes story on the Leopard-Abrams tango confirms to my mind that the biggest fallout from this affair will not be any (surely short-lived) reputational damage to Germany, but rather a severe blow to the idea of European strategic autonomy.
What would be in an EU Army, for anyone except Germany and France? How would it be commanded, funded, and how would the decisions to deploy the forces be made?
If you’re one of those countries sharing a border with Russia, Belarus or Ukraine, what advantage would such structure have over the existing NATO-backed system?
That said, the US involvement in NATO is going to scale down over time, as it looks more to Asia in the coming years. Europeans in general, need to be a whole lot more invested in their own security.
Interesting @TimesRadio focus group (swing voters) today. Labour potentially a long way to go to shift the damage done by the ‘Labour have no ideas’ attack by Boris. Polls may have them streets ahead but (at least among these swing voters) there’s still a lot of ambivalence.
Personally I think that the policy of being 'not the Tories' will be enough to see them over the line, even if only half heartedly.
More on selling Ted Heath from a 2003 profile of Jim Garrett:-
In 1968 Garrett was asked by his friend Geoffrey Tucker, an adman who had been seconded to be director of publicity at the Conservative Party Central Office, to assemble a team of communications advisers for Edward Heath. Way before the days of political spin doctors and image makers, the idea was to use the television medium to repackage "Edward" (who was out of touch, unpopular, pretentious, snobbish and rude) as "Ted" (who was interesting, generous, thoughtful and friendly).
Garrett put together a team which included Dick Clement (the writer of Porridge), Bryan Forbes (the film director), Barry Day (copywriter, then at Lintas), Sir Ronald Millar (later Thatcher's speechwriter) and Terence Donovan. The aim was to make sure it was Ted who was seen on television and rallies and heard on the radio, not Edward. The treatment worked. He won the 1970 General Election, his only electoral victory - he lost three others. But it was no simple task.
I remember the Heath election. As a young kid I had no idea what it was really about, but I do remember a genuine sense of (short lived) optimism expressed by the grownups.
I remember my dad being pleased about it. First time he voted Con. Sense (from him) of 'the country really needs this". And he stuck with him. He was royally pissed off about 1974. Felt Heath deserved to be backed not sacked.
Interesting @TimesRadio focus group (swing voters) today. Labour potentially a long way to go to shift the damage done by the ‘Labour have no ideas’ attack by Boris. Polls may have them streets ahead but (at least among these swing voters) there’s still a lot of ambivalence.
Personally I think that the policy of being 'not the Tories' will be enough to see them over the line, even if only half heartedly.
Starmer definitely isn’t Blair, but he comes across as innocuous enough.
He’ll do well enough to form a government, so long as he keeps plodding down the middle of the road, and doesn’t let the fringes of his party hog too much of the public conversation. The 1997 landslide was a factor of both the incumbent government being tired and having no majority, and of Blair being MOR enough to persuade millions of Tories to stay at home on the day.
If he wants a landslide though, he’ll need to be out there like Blair was, with a lot of policy announcements.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
Oh come on kinabalu, you're better than that. Still with this argument that leavers were labouring under the delusion that Britain was the power it was 100 years ago? Leavers knew how far Britain had fallen. If Leavers thought Britain was great and powerful and doing fine, they wouldn't have voted for change.
Anyway, off the top of my head, I have to say for myself this - my view is the following:
My view is that the risk of remaining was greater than the risk of leaving. I have a greater fear of a declining and sclerotic Europe than I do of a declining and sclerotic Britain. I believe in democracy as the best way of achieving a positive outcome for the people as a whole, and British democracy is far less imperfect than European democracy. The years since the referendum, and in particular covid, and to a lesser extent Ukraine, have demonstrated that Europe is no particular friend to Britain. Remember the 'stop Britain getting vaccines' drive? Remember the demonisation of the AZ vaccine? This was not a simple jockeying for position, this was actual spite. My view is that Britain is more able to evade this outside the EU than inside it - though it will always have to contend with it. I voted leave in the belief that there would be a short-term (i.e. first ten years) economic hit, but that British people will be better off in the long term out of the EU. The economic hit was much less than I anticipated. Leave was never a silver bullet. There remains lots wrong with Britain that needs to be addressed. Much of this is more easily done outside the EU, though of course much more is entirely separate from EU membership. The fact that we haven't yet addressed these matters is not a fault of leave (and indeed had we done so three years after leaving I would have been amazed). Don't confuse 'Britain is in a worse situation than it was a few years ago' with 'Brexit has caused Britain's woes. The impact of Brexit is dwarfed by that of covid and Ukraine. My leave vote was never certain. I ummed and ahhed and decided on balance leave was probably the safer vote. Had I known then what I know now I would have voted leave with much more certainty. I would certainly vote stay out given the option today. I was a soft Brexiter in 2016; I am probably a harder Brexiter in 2023 - though my mind is certainly not made up on what our future relationship with the EU should ideally be like, and I certainly wouldn't see it as a betrayal if it ended up looking like something else.
They are your reasons and you're best placed to express them. But there's a tell -
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
That sentiment is now most commonly found among hardcore Remainers: "What a little country we have become."
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
Oh come on kinabalu, you're better than that. Still with this argument that leavers were labouring under the delusion that Britain was the power it was 100 years ago? Leavers knew how far Britain had fallen. If Leavers thought Britain was great and powerful and doing fine, they wouldn't have voted for change.
Anyway, off the top of my head, I have to say for myself this - my view is the following:
My view is that the risk of remaining was greater than the risk of leaving. I have a greater fear of a declining and sclerotic Europe than I do of a declining and sclerotic Britain. I believe in democracy as the best way of achieving a positive outcome for the people as a whole, and British democracy is far less imperfect than European democracy. The years since the referendum, and in particular covid, and to a lesser extent Ukraine, have demonstrated that Europe is no particular friend to Britain. Remember the 'stop Britain getting vaccines' drive? Remember the demonisation of the AZ vaccine? This was not a simple jockeying for position, this was actual spite. My view is that Britain is more able to evade this outside the EU than inside it - though it will always have to contend with it. I voted leave in the belief that there would be a short-term (i.e. first ten years) economic hit, but that British people will be better off in the long term out of the EU. The economic hit was much less than I anticipated. Leave was never a silver bullet. There remains lots wrong with Britain that needs to be addressed. Much of this is more easily done outside the EU, though of course much more is entirely separate from EU membership. The fact that we haven't yet addressed these matters is not a fault of leave (and indeed had we done so three years after leaving I would have been amazed). Don't confuse 'Britain is in a worse situation than it was a few years ago' with 'Brexit has caused Britain's woes. The impact of Brexit is dwarfed by that of covid and Ukraine. My leave vote was never certain. I ummed and ahhed and decided on balance leave was probably the safer vote. Had I known then what I know now I would have voted leave with much more certainty. I would certainly vote stay out given the option today. I was a soft Brexiter in 2016; I am probably a harder Brexiter in 2023 - though my mind is certainly not made up on what our future relationship with the EU should ideally be like, and I certainly wouldn't see it as a betrayal if it ended up looking like something else.
They are your reasons and you're best placed to express them. But there's a tell -
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
Hm, I can see your point - but the counterpoint to that is the implication that gradual decline is the best we can do. To be clear, I'm talking about the (perceived) gradual decline of the last 25 years, during which real wages in Britain have been a tad stagnant, and unless you are living in one of a handful of lucky cities (which personally I am, but you don't have to look more than about ten miles to find those who aren't) you're not seeing a great deal of improvement. Leavers aren't harking back to the days of empire, or even the 1950s. Most of them aren't old enough. Just back to the days when their lot was gradually improving, rather than gradually diminishing.
FWIW, I think Britain was 'shackled' by the EU to a model not really run for Britain's benefit (just as, say, Italy is). In purely economic terms, I think there is greater growth to be found outside the EU. But leaving Europe is not by itself enough to achieve this, nor even the most important aspect.
Britain can't be regain its former greatness if by 'great' we mean being the #1 world power. It can, however, be 'great' again in the sense of being somewhere its citizens enjoy an ever-improving standard of living. Not the sort of greatness which swells the heart, but the sort of greatness that people need. It doesn't really matter if this is done within or without the EU, but my view is that except for a fortunate minority it is rather harder to achieve with Britain inside the EU.
More on selling Ted Heath from a 2003 profile of Jim Garrett:-
In 1968 Garrett was asked by his friend Geoffrey Tucker, an adman who had been seconded to be director of publicity at the Conservative Party Central Office, to assemble a team of communications advisers for Edward Heath. Way before the days of political spin doctors and image makers, the idea was to use the television medium to repackage "Edward" (who was out of touch, unpopular, pretentious, snobbish and rude) as "Ted" (who was interesting, generous, thoughtful and friendly).
Garrett put together a team which included Dick Clement (the writer of Porridge), Bryan Forbes (the film director), Barry Day (copywriter, then at Lintas), Sir Ronald Millar (later Thatcher's speechwriter) and Terence Donovan. The aim was to make sure it was Ted who was seen on television and rallies and heard on the radio, not Edward. The treatment worked. He won the 1970 General Election, his only electoral victory - he lost three others. But it was no simple task.
I remember the Heath election. As a young kid I had no idea what it was really about, but I do remember a genuine sense of (short lived) optimism expressed by the grownups.
I remember my dad being pleased about it. First time he voted Con. Sense (from him) of 'the country really needs this". And he stuck with him. He was royally pissed off about 1974. Felt Heath deserved to be backed not sacked.
I recall Heath's reply when asked if he really said "Rejoice! Rejoice!" on the news of Thatcher's resignation.
We assume Labour will not win a landslide because they always screw it up.
But let's assume that does happen, what do the Tories do?
Do what all oppositions do. Wait long enough for the other side to screw it up and for the public to have forgotten that they screwed it up previously.
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left the EU
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
FWIW, I think Britain was 'shackled' by the EU to a model not really run for Britain's benefit (just as, say, Italy is). In purely economic terms, I think there is greater growth to be found outside the EU. But leaving Europe is not by itself enough to achieve this, nor even the most important aspect.
I think this would have been a fair comment if we had been in the Euro, which would have royally stuffed the UK economy back in 2007/8 & tied us to inappropriate interest rates set mostly for & by Germany the rest of the time.
But we weren’t in the Euro, so can you explain which parts of the EU model you think were inappropriate for the UK & how they resulted in the flat growth we’ve seen over the last fifteen - twenty years?
(Free trade? The restrictions on state subsidies for UK companies? Free movement of people?)
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
Oh come on kinabalu, you're better than that. Still with this argument that leavers were labouring under the delusion that Britain was the power it was 100 years ago? Leavers knew how far Britain had fallen. If Leavers thought Britain was great and powerful and doing fine, they wouldn't have voted for change.
Anyway, off the top of my head, I have to say for myself this - my view is the following:
My view is that the risk of remaining was greater than the risk of leaving. I have a greater fear of a declining and sclerotic Europe than I do of a declining and sclerotic Britain. I believe in democracy as the best way of achieving a positive outcome for the people as a whole, and British democracy is far less imperfect than European democracy. The years since the referendum, and in particular covid, and to a lesser extent Ukraine, have demonstrated that Europe is no particular friend to Britain. Remember the 'stop Britain getting vaccines' drive? Remember the demonisation of the AZ vaccine? This was not a simple jockeying for position, this was actual spite. My view is that Britain is more able to evade this outside the EU than inside it - though it will always have to contend with it. I voted leave in the belief that there would be a short-term (i.e. first ten years) economic hit, but that British people will be better off in the long term out of the EU. The economic hit was much less than I anticipated. Leave was never a silver bullet. There remains lots wrong with Britain that needs to be addressed. Much of this is more easily done outside the EU, though of course much more is entirely separate from EU membership. The fact that we haven't yet addressed these matters is not a fault of leave (and indeed had we done so three years after leaving I would have been amazed). Don't confuse 'Britain is in a worse situation than it was a few years ago' with 'Brexit has caused Britain's woes. The impact of Brexit is dwarfed by that of covid and Ukraine. My leave vote was never certain. I ummed and ahhed and decided on balance leave was probably the safer vote. Had I known then what I know now I would have voted leave with much more certainty. I would certainly vote stay out given the option today. I was a soft Brexiter in 2016; I am probably a harder Brexiter in 2023 - though my mind is certainly not made up on what our future relationship with the EU should ideally be like, and I certainly wouldn't see it as a betrayal if it ended up looking like something else.
They are your reasons and you're best placed to express them. But there's a tell -
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
Tbf it's one delusion that they've almost bought to fruition 5+ years later. One last push, lads.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
Exactly. Brexit accelerates UK's decline. This is unavoidable, but very few people - Remainers as well as Leavers - have accepted that.
Edit to add, there is to all intents and purposes, no Brexit opportunity. If there had been one, Leavers would have articulated it, everyone would accept it and we would move on. It's entirely about damage limitation.
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
Does that include Brejoin, even Brejoin closer than before? (NB not whether we should, but do you see that as an option on the list, even it it's one to reject?)
That certainly could be an option, but it would require people to campaign actively for it and extol its benefints, not keep on whinging impotently about losing a vote what is soon to be a decade ago.
And if we're to Rejoin then absolutely it should be as full members, including the euro and Schengen and the EU army. The half-in status we previously had was no good for either side.
Yep. That was actually my opinion at the time of the referendum
I narrowly voted Leave but if we’d voted Remain then I would have said: that’s it then. All in. Full on Federal Union. Euro, Schengen, EU army
Might as well enjoy the fruits of being a superpower if you have to suffer the pains of surrendering so much sovereignty
So if we have another vote, and collectively vote Brejoin, you'll be fully in?
Yes
My PB stalker, the renowned ex PBer @SeanT wrote a Telegraph column to this effect. That if we are to stay in the EU then we might as well go the whole hog. Elected EU President, EU army. Everything
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
That's a deliberately obtuse misrepresentation of what Driver said. We've left the EU. Perhaps unsurprisingly given who was in charge of that process, it has been an excrutiatingly slow, painful, and haphazard experience. The EU is not to blame - of course they have sought to punish the UK, but the actual damage has been caused by the hugely counterproductive behaviour of our own governing and administrative class, which has been obstruction if not sabotage at every turn.
As a consequence, we are still following the writ of EU law; our agencies and quangos are still working toward economically damaging EU goals, we have failed to secure our borders, we are still signed up to hugely expensive EU projects like HS2, we are still following EU rules on procurement and state aid (see recent RN ships built in Spain); we are still following their rules on taxation. The one time, more by knee-jerk accident than by cohesive strategy, that we followed a different path to ROEU, by setting up our own vaccine taskforce, it was a massive success. But surprise surprise, we allowed it to be squandered, and it was swallowed up again by the blob.
The fact that Brexit remains such a popular policy despite the broad and deep campaign against it suggests to me that, happily, a large section of the public are not remotely fooled by the incompetence of our own agencies being gussied up as the inevitable consequences of post-EU life. Nor will such a ruse get any easier as time goes on.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
Exactly. Brexit accelerates UK's decline. This is unavoidable, but very few people - Remainers as well as Leavers - have accepted that.
Exactly the reverse. Of the two options available it was and is the only one that would help us prevent further decline. We spent 40 years failing to manage that decline inside the EU and failed utterly.
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
So, in effect, doing the same as the amendment?
Except only for this specific individual, just to get the story off the front pages.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left the EU
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
Essentially yes. The task is damage limitation but that sounds a bit negative and churlish so requires some "making Brexit work" and "our best days lie ahead" presentation.
"This dangerous rapist should not be in a woman's prison"
Yvette Cooper, Shadow Home Secretary, tells @bbcnickrobinson it 'should be straightforward' that someone who has committed crimes against women shouldn't be housed with women
Exactly the reverse. Of the two options available it was and is the only one that would help us prevent further decline. We spent 40 years failing to manage that decline inside the EU and failed utterly.
Richard I would argue that yes we spent 40 years failing to manage decline - but that has nothing to do with the EU.
We will continue to decline outside - and that is what the public has now realised.
It needs to be said - for the 98th time - that much of this Brexit-or-not debate is about to be rendered laughably trivial by the AI Revolution which will sweep all humanity
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
So, in effect, doing the same as the amendment?
I suppose so. Not sure if the prison service would have done that anyway.
Point is that they are having to change their rhetoric on the matter. Labour have clocked this too, see Yvette Cooper this morning.
We assume Labour will not win a landslide because they always screw it up.
But let's assume that does happen, what do the Tories do?
Leadership contest between Badenoch and Mordaunt?
FWIW I rather think Boris will be out of it. His time would come after a second defeat - say 2029. (Churchill was 75 when he won back power in 1951 - a point to bear in mind when trying to figure out BJ thinking.)
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
So, in effect, doing the same as the amendment?
So the hypothetical scenario that can safely be ignored has come true.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
Oh come on kinabalu, you're better than that. Still with this argument that leavers were labouring under the delusion that Britain was the power it was 100 years ago? Leavers knew how far Britain had fallen. If Leavers thought Britain was great and powerful and doing fine, they wouldn't have voted for change.
Anyway, off the top of my head, I have to say for myself this - my view is the following:
My view is that the risk of remaining was greater than the risk of leaving. I have a greater fear of a declining and sclerotic Europe than I do of a declining and sclerotic Britain. I believe in democracy as the best way of achieving a positive outcome for the people as a whole, and British democracy is far less imperfect than European democracy. The years since the referendum, and in particular covid, and to a lesser extent Ukraine, have demonstrated that Europe is no particular friend to Britain. Remember the 'stop Britain getting vaccines' drive? Remember the demonisation of the AZ vaccine? This was not a simple jockeying for position, this was actual spite. My view is that Britain is more able to evade this outside the EU than inside it - though it will always have to contend with it. I voted leave in the belief that there would be a short-term (i.e. first ten years) economic hit, but that British people will be better off in the long term out of the EU. The economic hit was much less than I anticipated. Leave was never a silver bullet. There remains lots wrong with Britain that needs to be addressed. Much of this is more easily done outside the EU, though of course much more is entirely separate from EU membership. The fact that we haven't yet addressed these matters is not a fault of leave (and indeed had we done so three years after leaving I would have been amazed). Don't confuse 'Britain is in a worse situation than it was a few years ago' with 'Brexit has caused Britain's woes. The impact of Brexit is dwarfed by that of covid and Ukraine. My leave vote was never certain. I ummed and ahhed and decided on balance leave was probably the safer vote. Had I known then what I know now I would have voted leave with much more certainty. I would certainly vote stay out given the option today. I was a soft Brexiter in 2016; I am probably a harder Brexiter in 2023 - though my mind is certainly not made up on what our future relationship with the EU should ideally be like, and I certainly wouldn't see it as a betrayal if it ended up looking like something else.
They are your reasons and you're best placed to express them. But there's a tell -
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
Hm, I can see your point - but the counterpoint to that is the implication that gradual decline is the best we can do. To be clear, I'm talking about the (perceived) gradual decline of the last 25 years, during which real wages in Britain have been a tad stagnant, and unless you are living in one of a handful of lucky cities (which personally I am, but you don't have to look more than about ten miles to find those who aren't) you're not seeing a great deal of improvement. Leavers aren't harking back to the days of empire, or even the 1950s. Most of them aren't old enough. Just back to the days when their lot was gradually improving, rather than gradually diminishing.
FWIW, I think Britain was 'shackled' by the EU to a model not really run for Britain's benefit (just as, say, Italy is). In purely economic terms, I think there is greater growth to be found outside the EU. But leaving Europe is not by itself enough to achieve this, nor even the most important aspect.
Britain can't be regain its former greatness if by 'great' we mean being the #1 world power. It can, however, be 'great' again in the sense of being somewhere its citizens enjoy an ever-improving standard of living. Not the sort of greatness which swells the heart, but the sort of greatness that people need. It doesn't really matter if this is done within or without the EU, but my view is that except for a fortunate minority it is rather harder to achieve with Britain inside the EU.
To be factual, one cannot say that it is impossible that Britain should become the world's number 1 power again. Nothing is impossible. But what we should all want is a Britain that is stable, peaceful, prosperous and free. I'm not particularly interested in whacking other countries over the head and telling them how to live. I've always found it to be the pro-EU side who are obsessed with Empire, national prestige and being part of a 'big powerful bloc'. Why they feel so desperate to be part of someone's gang probably goes back to childhood.
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
I'd say the 2 extreme positions are -
(i) Biological sex should be replaced entirely and without caveat by self-id'd gender identity.
(ii) Gender identity is a nonsense and legally recognized transition shouldn't be allowed.
(ii) being more commonly held than (i).
Both the English system and the Scottish reforms are in the space between the 2 - with Scotland closer to (i) and England closer to (ii).
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
Does that include Brejoin, even Brejoin closer than before? (NB not whether we should, but do you see that as an option on the list, even it it's one to reject?)
That certainly could be an option, but it would require people to campaign actively for it and extol its benefints, not keep on whinging impotently about losing a vote what is soon to be a decade ago.
And if we're to Rejoin then absolutely it should be as full members, including the euro and Schengen and the EU army. The half-in status we previously had was no good for either side.
I voted Remain but would have voted Leave if that was the only option.
Membership of the Eurozone and Schengen means the end of the UK as an Independent nation state, we just become a region of a Federal EU superstate led by Berlin, Frankfurt and Brussels.
The Eurozone is already nearly its own nation with its own President, Parliament and courts and regulations as well as its own currency, open borders within it and soon its own army too
FWIW, I think Britain was 'shackled' by the EU to a model not really run for Britain's benefit (just as, say, Italy is). In purely economic terms, I think there is greater growth to be found outside the EU. But leaving Europe is not by itself enough to achieve this, nor even the most important aspect.
I think this would have been a fair comment if we had been in the Euro, which would have royally stuffed the UK economy back in 2007/8 & tied us to inappropriate interest rates set mostly for & by Germany the rest of the time.
But we weren’t in the Euro, so can you explain which parts of the EU model you think were inappropriate for the UK & how they resulted in the flat growth we’ve seen over the last fifteen - twenty years?
(Free trade? The restrictions on state subsidies for UK companies? Free movement of people?)
Well there's free trade - of goods, which we import, but not so much of services, which we export - and with Europe, which is not growing, but not with the rest of the world, which is. And under thousands of regulations, which are designed for the benefits of German manufacturers and others with the clout to send lobbyists to Brussels. I don't really see that free trade as it was constituted is obviously a benefit to the UK. Restrictions on state subsidies - I'm not sure why we'd want to do this, but nor can I see why we'd want external rules preventing us from doing so. Free movement of people - doesn't strike me as obviously a benefit to British people.
I agree we were a lot less screwed than we would have been had we joined the Euro.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
Oh come on kinabalu, you're better than that. Still with this argument that leavers were labouring under the delusion that Britain was the power it was 100 years ago? Leavers knew how far Britain had fallen. If Leavers thought Britain was great and powerful and doing fine, they wouldn't have voted for change.
Anyway, off the top of my head, I have to say for myself this - my view is the following:
My view is that the risk of remaining was greater than the risk of leaving. I have a greater fear of a declining and sclerotic Europe than I do of a declining and sclerotic Britain. I believe in democracy as the best way of achieving a positive outcome for the people as a whole, and British democracy is far less imperfect than European democracy. The years since the referendum, and in particular covid, and to a lesser extent Ukraine, have demonstrated that Europe is no particular friend to Britain. Remember the 'stop Britain getting vaccines' drive? Remember the demonisation of the AZ vaccine? This was not a simple jockeying for position, this was actual spite. My view is that Britain is more able to evade this outside the EU than inside it - though it will always have to contend with it. I voted leave in the belief that there would be a short-term (i.e. first ten years) economic hit, but that British people will be better off in the long term out of the EU. The economic hit was much less than I anticipated. Leave was never a silver bullet. There remains lots wrong with Britain that needs to be addressed. Much of this is more easily done outside the EU, though of course much more is entirely separate from EU membership. The fact that we haven't yet addressed these matters is not a fault of leave (and indeed had we done so three years after leaving I would have been amazed). Don't confuse 'Britain is in a worse situation than it was a few years ago' with 'Brexit has caused Britain's woes. The impact of Brexit is dwarfed by that of covid and Ukraine. My leave vote was never certain. I ummed and ahhed and decided on balance leave was probably the safer vote. Had I known then what I know now I would have voted leave with much more certainty. I would certainly vote stay out given the option today. I was a soft Brexiter in 2016; I am probably a harder Brexiter in 2023 - though my mind is certainly not made up on what our future relationship with the EU should ideally be like, and I certainly wouldn't see it as a betrayal if it ended up looking like something else.
They are your reasons and you're best placed to express them. But there's a tell -
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
Hm, I can see your point - but the counterpoint to that is the implication that gradual decline is the best we can do. To be clear, I'm talking about the (perceived) gradual decline of the last 25 years, during which real wages in Britain have been a tad stagnant, and unless you are living in one of a handful of lucky cities (which personally I am, but you don't have to look more than about ten miles to find those who aren't) you're not seeing a great deal of improvement. Leavers aren't harking back to the days of empire, or even the 1950s. Most of them aren't old enough. Just back to the days when their lot was gradually improving, rather than gradually diminishing.
FWIW, I think Britain was 'shackled' by the EU to a model not really run for Britain's benefit (just as, say, Italy is). In purely economic terms, I think there is greater growth to be found outside the EU. But leaving Europe is not by itself enough to achieve this, nor even the most important aspect.
Britain can't be regain its former greatness if by 'great' we mean being the #1 world power. It can, however, be 'great' again in the sense of being somewhere its citizens enjoy an ever-improving standard of living. Not the sort of greatness which swells the heart, but the sort of greatness that people need. It doesn't really matter if this is done within or without the EU, but my view is that except for a fortunate minority it is rather harder to achieve with Britain inside the EU.
To be factual, one cannot say that it is impossible that Britain should become the world's number 1 power again. Nothing is impossible. But what we should all want is a Britain that is stable, peaceful, prosperous and free. I'm not particularly interested in whacking other countries over the head and telling them how to live. I've always found it to be the pro-EU side who are obsessed with Empire, national prestige and being part of a 'big powerful bloc'. Why they feel so desperate to be part of someone's gang probably goes back to childhood.
We can only be number 1 again if we rebuild the British Empire, Putin has shown the age of Empire is over
It needs to be said - for the 98th time - that much of this Brexit-or-not debate is about to be rendered laughably trivial by the AI Revolution which will sweep all humanity
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
Does that include Brejoin, even Brejoin closer than before? (NB not whether we should, but do you see that as an option on the list, even it it's one to reject?)
That certainly could be an option, but it would require people to campaign actively for it and extol its benefints, not keep on whinging impotently about losing a vote what is soon to be a decade ago.
And if we're to Rejoin then absolutely it should be as full members, including the euro and Schengen and the EU army. The half-in status we previously had was no good for either side.
Yep. That was actually my opinion at the time of the referendum
I narrowly voted Leave but if we’d voted Remain then I would have said: that’s it then. All in. Full on Federal Union. Euro, Schengen, EU army
Might as well enjoy the fruits of being a superpower if you have to suffer the pains of surrendering so much sovereignty
So if we have another vote, and collectively vote Brejoin, you'll be fully in?
Yes
My PB stalker, the renowned ex PBer @SeanT wrote a Telegraph column to this effect. That if we are to stay in the EU then we might as well go the whole hog. Elected EU President, EU army. Everything
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
That's a deliberately obtuse misrepresentation of what Driver said. We've left the EU. Perhaps unsurprisingly given who was in charge of that process, it has been an excrutiatingly slow, painful, and haphazard experience. The EU is not to blame - of course they have sought to punish the UK, but the actual damage has been caused by the hugely counterproductive behaviour of our own governing and administrative class, which has been obstruction if not sabotage at every turn.
As a consequence, we are still following the writ of EU law; our agencies and quangos are still working toward economically damaging EU goals, we have failed to secure our borders, we are still signed up to hugely expensive EU projects like HS2, we are still following EU rules on procurement and state aid (see recent RN ships built in Spain); we are still following their rules on taxation. The one time, more by knee-jerk accident than by cohesive strategy, that we followed a different path to ROEU, by setting up our own vaccine taskforce, it was a massive success. But surprise surprise, we allowed it to be squandered, and it was swallowed up again by the blob.
The fact that Brexit remains such a popular policy despite the broad and deep campaign against it suggests to me that, happily, a large section of the public are not remotely fooled by the incompetence of our own agencies being gussied up as the inevitable consequences of post-EU life. Nor will such a ruse get any easier as time goes on.
The ships are RFA not RN. The reason they are partially being built in Spain is that no British shipyard has the appropriate combination of expertise and available capacity. It's got nothing to do with being a member of the EU or not.
Interesting @TimesRadio focus group (swing voters) today. Labour potentially a long way to go to shift the damage done by the ‘Labour have no ideas’ attack by Boris. Polls may have them streets ahead but (at least among these swing voters) there’s still a lot of ambivalence.
Their ideas/policies do seem to be the same as the current government, they just promise to deliver them better.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
I would have launched a huge consultation exercise, starting the day the agreement to leave was signed, and would have prioritised export industries, housing, and the environment, all areas confined by EU law that was in many cases gold-plated by the blob. I’d have had one group of business leaders in No.10 every week, and be listening to them directly.
Instead, the government is basically asking the cabinet office and treasury to review EU laws, then pushed it back a few months - meanwhile, there’s a restless and divided party, with little in terms of legislation to deal with. They’re acting much like the dog days of Major’s government, a total waste of a 70+ majority. Parliament should be busy every day, debating a whole pile of legislation that could make a difference before the next election. Yet nothing.
It needs to be said - for the 98th time - that much of this Brexit-or-not debate is about to be rendered laughably trivial by the AI Revolution which will sweep all humanity
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
If you are running AI's expectations management, you can expect a p45 before too long.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
We don't see that middle sentence very often. And for good reason.
It needs to be said - for the 98th time - that much of this Brexit-or-not debate is about to be rendered laughably trivial by the AI Revolution which will sweep all humanity
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
If you are running AI's expectations management, you can expect a p45 before too long.
I am completely right about this. Your narrow accountant’s mind is at work again
The next ten-twenty years will be like the first decades of electricity
It seems to me that Labour has now got a pretty centrist/sensible view on the trans debate as far as I am concerned.
We should be supportive of people wanting to transition, lifting people up not abusing them or making life harder.
We should be respective of biological women in terms of female-only spaces, sports.
Seems fairly sensible to me?
In theory, yes. However, it risks being undermined on the perception front by the treatment dished out to Rosie Cooper and comments like Starmer's "the vast majority of women don't have a penis".
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
That's pretty well what I thought you might come up with.
Interesting @TimesRadio focus group (swing voters) today. Labour potentially a long way to go to shift the damage done by the ‘Labour have no ideas’ attack by Boris. Polls may have them streets ahead but (at least among these swing voters) there’s still a lot of ambivalence.
Their ideas/policies do seem to be the same as the current government, they just promise to deliver them better.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
I would have launched a huge consultation exercise, starting the day the agreement to leave was signed, and would have prioritised export industries, housing, and the environment, all areas confined by EU law that was in many cases gold-plated by the blob. I’d have had one group of business leaders in No.10 every week, and be listening to them directly.
Instead, the government is basically asking the cabinet office and treasury to review EU laws, then pushed it back a few months - meanwhile, there’s a restless and divided party, with little in terms of legislation to deal with. They’re acting much like the dog days of Major’s government, a total waste of a 70+ majority. Parliament should be busy every day, debating a whole pile of legislation that could make a difference before the next election. Yet nothing.
"Gold plated by the blob" is a tell, given that it's nothing to do with Brexit either way.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
*Change the EA rules around dredging to make it easier to avoid winter flooding
*Change the EA rules on new water infrastructure so that we have enough reservoirs to serve our vastly increased population
*Abandon interconnector projects to the EU, which result in us (for some reason) importing vastly expensive EU electricity, and exporting our own pre-subsidised energy at firesale costs. Instead upgrade our own grid.
*Suspend VAT on domestic fuel, including in NI.
*Replace EU rules on state aid and procurement (admittedly no other EU country has ever paid any attention to them anyway)
*Support the expansion of our fishing fleet and ban foreign megatrawlers that hoover up fish and damage fish stocks from our waters
*Re-orient agricultural policy to support UK food production, after decades of damaging EU policy, which we're still implementing
*Help UK auction houses/the art market by removing droit de suite payments, which were imposed by the EU and drove business to America
Shall I go on?
These are the minimum that would be expected of any sane country leaving an organisation and no longer being subject to its laws.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
That's pretty well what I thought you might come up with.
I would also make larger condoms available for the more “girthy” man like myself. Ridiculously, these are banned by the EU so as to not embarrass left wingers
It comes down to the matter of confidence in the UK.
Brexiters didn't and (judging from the posts) still don't have the confidence that our government and institutions can manage the UK in the way that it *should* be managed and would be bullied and picked on by the nasty EU.
Remainers had and have confidence that our government and institutions can manage the UK for better or worse and that we were able to stand up to the very same nasty EU when we needed to.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
This particular case is highlighting, for the first time, the absurdity of the position some people are taking on Trans rights to the general public. I think the whole debate was difficult to understand for most people until this came up.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
In fact, Sturgeon has just intervened and essentially blocked this person from going to a women's prison.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
That's pretty well what I thought you might come up with.
I would also make larger condoms available for the more “girthy” man like myself. Ridiculously, these are banned by the EU so as to not embarrass left wingers
BREAKING: The head of HMRC says Nadhim Zahawi did NOT make an "innocent error", pointing out that there are "no penalties" for such "innocent errors"
No penalties for innocent errors? That doesn't sound right.
He has clarified that there are penalties if someone has been careless or sloppy but not wilfully dishonest.
There are penalities for being wilfully dishonest - They finish at something like 150% of tax owed and were the band that Zahawi would have been close to if he wasn't abusing his power as head of HMRC when trying to settle his affairs.
I've heard of people being fined 100%+ for way smaller mistakes than Zahawi "made" and can see plenty of reasons to belief it wasn't anything less than completely dishonest.
BREAKING: The head of HMRC says Nadhim Zahawi did NOT make an "innocent error", pointing out that there are "no penalties" for such "innocent errors"
No penalties for innocent errors? That doesn't sound right.
He has clarified that there are penalties if someone has been careless or sloppy but not wilfully dishonest.
There are penalities for being wilfully dishonest - They finish at something like 150% of tax owed and were the band that Zahawi would have been close to if he wasn't abusing his power as head of HMRC when trying to settle his affairs.
I've heard of people being fined 100%+ for way smaller mistakes than Zahawi "made" and can see plenty of reasons to belief it wasn't anything less than completely dishonest.
Obviously there are penalties for dishonesty. The point reported in the media is that the penalty means it wasn’t an innocent or ‘honest’ mistake - it must either have been deliberate dishonesty or at the least a penalty for extreme carelessness.
It needs to be said - for the 98th time - that much of this Brexit-or-not debate is about to be rendered laughably trivial by the AI Revolution which will sweep all humanity
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
If you are running AI's expectations management, you can expect a p45 before too long.
I am completely right about this. Your narrow accountant’s mind is at work again
The next ten-twenty years will be like the first decades of electricity
https://mobile.twitter.com/FLFusion/status/1618596858582163459 Larger than the Z-machine at @SandiaLabs, M4 will have a stored electrical energy of c.100 megajoules & the capability of launching projectiles at 60KMs per second. This speed on impact inside our target will accelerate to c.200KMs per second with our unique amplifier technology.
We are aiming for 'ignition' with Machine 4, exemplified by a fuel gain of 100 or more. This machine is the building block for the pilot power plant, validating our world-leading simulation codes while de-risking the design of high-gain targets for power production.
BREAKING: The head of HMRC says Nadhim Zahawi did NOT make an "innocent error", pointing out that there are "no penalties" for such "innocent errors"
No penalties for innocent errors? That doesn't sound right.
He has clarified that there are penalties if someone has been careless or sloppy but not wilfully dishonest.
There are penalities for being wilfully dishonest - They finish at something like 150% of tax owed and were the band that Zahawi would have been close to if he wasn't abusing his power as head of HMRC when trying to settle his affairs.
I've heard of people being fined 100%+ for way smaller mistakes than Zahawi "made" and can see plenty of reasons to belief it wasn't anything less than completely dishonest.
Obviously there are penalties for dishonesty. The point reported in the media is that the penalty means it wasn’t an innocent or ‘honest’ mistake - it must either have been deliberate dishonesty or at the least a penalty for extreme carelessness.
Oh it was deliberately dishonest - my actual point is that were Zahawi not the ultimate boss of HMRC at the time of his settlement (a rather large conflict of interest that should never have been allowed) I suspect the fine would not have been 30% but 100%+.
Andrew Bridgen sues Matt Hancock for £100,000 over Covid vaccine row
Hancock accused Bridgen of spouting ‘anti-Semitic, anti-vax conspiracy theories’ after he compared effects of the vaccines to the Holocaust
According to the seven-page “letter before action”, Mr Bridgen wants Mr Hancock to “retract and delete the defamatory statement contained in the tweet complained of with immediate effect”.
It adds that he should “apologise for the tweet complained of - both orally in the House of Commons - and in writing on Mr Hancock's personal Twitter account”.
And he said Mr Hancock should “acknowledge full and final settlement of any prospective claim in the form of a payment of £100,000 - to be transferred into a legal fund on behalf of persons seeking collective redress for vaccine harms (under the UK Government's Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme)”.
Mr Bridgen's legal action is being funded by the Reclaim Party and the ‘Bad Law Project’.
Laurence Fox, the leader of Reclaim, said: “The Reclaim Party and the Bad Law Project is providing its full support to Mr Bridgen and we want a full apology from Mr Hancock.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
I’m paying that kind of money and the dog is aged 3. Turns out the mutt has fits
Andrew Bridgen sues Matt Hancock for £100,000 over Covid vaccine row
Hancock accused Bridgen of spouting ‘anti-Semitic, anti-vax conspiracy theories’ after he compared effects of the vaccines to the Holocaust
According to the seven-page “letter before action”, Mr Bridgen wants Mr Hancock to “retract and delete the defamatory statement contained in the tweet complained of with immediate effect”.
It adds that he should “apologise for the tweet complained of - both orally in the House of Commons - and in writing on Mr Hancock's personal Twitter account”.
And he said Mr Hancock should “acknowledge full and final settlement of any prospective claim in the form of a payment of £100,000 - to be transferred into a legal fund on behalf of persons seeking collective redress for vaccine harms (under the UK Government's Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme)”.
Mr Bridgen's legal action is being funded by the Reclaim Party and the ‘Bad Law Project’.
Laurence Fox, the leader of Reclaim, said: “The Reclaim Party and the Bad Law Project is providing its full support to Mr Bridgen and we want a full apology from Mr Hancock.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
I’m paying that kind of money and the dog is aged 3. Turns out the mutt has fits
Can you really blame it?
We had a poster on here named Fitz once.
Just between Eadric disappearing and Leon turning up.
https://mobile.twitter.com/FLFusion/status/1618596858582163459 Larger than the Z-machine at @SandiaLabs, M4 will have a stored electrical energy of c.100 megajoules & the capability of launching projectiles at 60KMs per second. This speed on impact inside our target will accelerate to c.200KMs per second with our unique amplifier technology.
We are aiming for 'ignition' with Machine 4, exemplified by a fuel gain of 100 or more. This machine is the building block for the pilot power plant, validating our world-leading simulation codes while de-risking the design of high-gain targets for power production.
building is supposed to start next year with the first tests from what I read in 2027.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
I’m paying that kind of money and the dog is aged 3. Turns out the mutt has fits
Can you really blame it?
We had a poster on here named Fitz once.
Just between Eadric disappearing and Leon turning up.
How many accounts has Sean actually had? It must be at least 6?
Andrew Bridgen sues Matt Hancock for £100,000 over Covid vaccine row
Hancock accused Bridgen of spouting ‘anti-Semitic, anti-vax conspiracy theories’ after he compared effects of the vaccines to the Holocaust
According to the seven-page “letter before action”, Mr Bridgen wants Mr Hancock to “retract and delete the defamatory statement contained in the tweet complained of with immediate effect”.
It adds that he should “apologise for the tweet complained of - both orally in the House of Commons - and in writing on Mr Hancock's personal Twitter account”.
And he said Mr Hancock should “acknowledge full and final settlement of any prospective claim in the form of a payment of £100,000 - to be transferred into a legal fund on behalf of persons seeking collective redress for vaccine harms (under the UK Government's Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme)”.
Mr Bridgen's legal action is being funded by the Reclaim Party and the ‘Bad Law Project’.
Laurence Fox, the leader of Reclaim, said: “The Reclaim Party and the Bad Law Project is providing its full support to Mr Bridgen and we want a full apology from Mr Hancock.
Andrew Bridgen should be done for high treason, hanged, drawn and quartered.
For making us all endorse Matt Fucking Hancock.
This Bridgen ?
What value would you place on his reputation in the unlikely event he were to succeed in his lawsuit ? ...In April 2022, High Court Judge Brian Rawlings ruled against Bridgen, stating that he "lied under oath and behaved in an abusive, arrogant and aggressive manner", was "an unreliable and combative witness who tried to conceal his own misconduct", and "gave evasive and argumentative answers and tangential speeches that avoided answering the questions". ..
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
*Ditch HS2, or bring the current work to some sort of reasonable conclusion - perhaps build a garden city at the end of it that we were planning to build anyway.
What has HS2 got to do with the EU - it's core infrastructure that has been sold inappropriately since the very first announcement.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
Highlights how we got here, though.
All sorts of stuff got balmed on being in the EU, with varying degrees of plausibility. Hacks like Christopher Brooker made a career out of it.
Trouble is that, now we don't have an external bogeyman to blame, we have to find an internal one. Which means that even the Brexit Benefit of "once The Telegraph can't blame Brussels, the UK will have to actually solve its problems" is an illusion.
Andrew Bridgen sues Matt Hancock for £100,000 over Covid vaccine row
Hancock accused Bridgen of spouting ‘anti-Semitic, anti-vax conspiracy theories’ after he compared effects of the vaccines to the Holocaust
According to the seven-page “letter before action”, Mr Bridgen wants Mr Hancock to “retract and delete the defamatory statement contained in the tweet complained of with immediate effect”.
It adds that he should “apologise for the tweet complained of - both orally in the House of Commons - and in writing on Mr Hancock's personal Twitter account”.
And he said Mr Hancock should “acknowledge full and final settlement of any prospective claim in the form of a payment of £100,000 - to be transferred into a legal fund on behalf of persons seeking collective redress for vaccine harms (under the UK Government's Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme)”.
Mr Bridgen's legal action is being funded by the Reclaim Party and the ‘Bad Law Project’.
Laurence Fox, the leader of Reclaim, said: “The Reclaim Party and the Bad Law Project is providing its full support to Mr Bridgen and we want a full apology from Mr Hancock.
Andrew Bridgen should be done for high treason, hanged, drawn and quartered.
For making us all endorse Matt Fucking Hancock.
This Bridgen ?
What value would you place on his reputation in the unlikely event he were to succeed in his lawsuit ? ...In April 2022, High Court Judge Brian Rawlings ruled against Bridgen, stating that he "lied under oath and behaved in an abusive, arrogant and aggressive manner", was "an unreliable and combative witness who tried to conceal his own misconduct", and "gave evasive and argumentative answers and tangential speeches that avoided answering the questions". ..
The funniest outcome in some ways would be for Hancock to lose but the judge to set damages at five pounds on the grounds Bridgen has no reputation worth more than that.
That would exasperate Hancock and bankrupt Bridgen.
Just as the EU was blamed for most things before Brexit the reverse is now happening .
I can imagine it’s frustrating for Leavers but what goes around comes around !
This blame-Brexit campaign is possibly going to succeed as well
I used to scoff at predictions we would Rejoin. Now I am not so sure at all. Tho the Rejoiners need to act fairly fast - next 5-10 years - because the UK will in time pivot further away from the EU, as it necessarily develops a new economic model that actually works
As shown on TV last night
Yep. I can see the polls and I can see the trend. We are possibly heading for Rejoin if the Rejoiners play it cleverly
That said the Remainers have shown crass ineptitude and boorish arrogance in the past, and if they allow people like you to be heard, gloating, sniping and bitterly exulting, they will badly miss the window of opportunity
We left. We were told leaving the EU would be beneficial to the nation. Shouldn't the Leavers who told us to suck up our defeat in 2016 be cracking on with making Brexit work?
Everybody should.
Brexit's fucked. Lost cause. It's like one of those doddery, blind 19 year old Labradors that people can't bear to have euthanised because they loved its younger self so very much. So they persist with cocktails of drugs and 2 grand vet bills while kidding themselves they see signs of improvement as they clean up yet more liquid shit.
Nope. Brexit is a part of history, a given fact, an axiom. What we do from here is for everyone to decide. Everyone does want to make the country better than it is at the moment, right?
"Brexit was a mistake. An act of self-harm based on a delusional outdated view of Britain and the world. What do you have to say for yourself, Leavers?"
"It happened."
This is about where we are with the debate, I think.
This debate should be over. The Brexit facts are these:
We have left
We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg
Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etc
All of which boils down to “How do we manage the decline?” rather than “How do we take advantage of the opportunity?”.
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
So what's your alternative list of opportunities ?
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
That's pretty well what I thought you might come up with.
I would also make larger condoms available for the more “girthy” man like myself. Ridiculously, these are banned by the EU so as to not embarrass left wingers
If they fit on your head, then the girth is fine.
In any case, they are not banned by the EU. Another bendy banana fib (not necessarily Leon's, I hasten to add).
Andrew Bridgen sues Matt Hancock for £100,000 over Covid vaccine row
Hancock accused Bridgen of spouting ‘anti-Semitic, anti-vax conspiracy theories’ after he compared effects of the vaccines to the Holocaust
According to the seven-page “letter before action”, Mr Bridgen wants Mr Hancock to “retract and delete the defamatory statement contained in the tweet complained of with immediate effect”.
It adds that he should “apologise for the tweet complained of - both orally in the House of Commons - and in writing on Mr Hancock's personal Twitter account”.
And he said Mr Hancock should “acknowledge full and final settlement of any prospective claim in the form of a payment of £100,000 - to be transferred into a legal fund on behalf of persons seeking collective redress for vaccine harms (under the UK Government's Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme)”.
Mr Bridgen's legal action is being funded by the Reclaim Party and the ‘Bad Law Project’.
Laurence Fox, the leader of Reclaim, said: “The Reclaim Party and the Bad Law Project is providing its full support to Mr Bridgen and we want a full apology from Mr Hancock.
Andrew Bridgen should be done for high treason, hanged, drawn and quartered.
For making us all endorse Matt Fucking Hancock.
This Bridgen ?
What value would you place on his reputation in the unlikely event he were to succeed in his lawsuit ? ...In April 2022, High Court Judge Brian Rawlings ruled against Bridgen, stating that he "lied under oath and behaved in an abusive, arrogant and aggressive manner", was "an unreliable and combative witness who tried to conceal his own misconduct", and "gave evasive and argumentative answers and tangential speeches that avoided answering the questions". ..
The funniest outcome in some ways would be for Hancock to lose but the judge to set damages at five pounds on the grounds Bridgen has no reputation worth more than that.
That would exasperate Hancock and bankrupt Bridgen.
I think he's being crowd (of numpties) funded.
He perhaps has a case which can be argued even if not won, since his complaint is about being associated with antisemitism.
Does equating his pet conspiracy theory with the Holocaust amount to antisemitism, or is it just offensive and imbecilic ?
It needs to be said - for the 98th time - that much of this Brexit-or-not debate is about to be rendered laughably trivial by the AI Revolution which will sweep all humanity
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
If you regard Brexit as primarily a question of identity, rather than economics, then AI would make identity more important to people as economic questions become less important - assuming AI leads to a super-abundance that is shared relatively equitably - and correspondingly the question of Brexit will look larger in people's minds.
Comments
The bottom line is, Leavers in parliament had a choice between two versions of Brexit and chose the one they preferred. Remainers in parliament had the same choice and chose the one they didn't prefer.
But we won't be rejoining. Starmer won't touch it with a bargepole. And unless there is a massive surge for the LibDems at somepoint under the banner of rejoin (chortle - just to write it down shows how unlikely it is), then he, and subsequent Labour leaders, won't be going there either.
His net approval rating stands at -19.0%; no party leader elected since 2010 has reached this low so quickly other than Liz Truss.
http://electionmaps.uk/polling
https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1618568858922778626
That said, Truss is almost off the chart!
It's official: NASA will partner with DARPA to develop & test a nuclear-thermal rocket. The 2027 mission will dust off decades-old nuclear tech, with the goal of faster spaceflight and bigger payloads.
https://mobile.twitter.com/coreyspowell/status/1618317481785053184
The UK now had much more freedom of legislation, to decide her own future direction. The impression I get, looking in from the outside, is that the government has used very little of that freedom to actually do anything.
It’s been an economically and politically turbulent time, and we now have a PM who seems unable to think proactively, aided by a permanent bureaucracy that seems flat-footed and unwilling to think outside the box in any situation other than absolute emergency which was start of the pandemic.
I get the impression that too many people are afraid to diverge from what was required by EU membership, lest rejoining then becomes more difficult in future. If that attitude is indeed pervasive, then the failure to benefit from leaving the EU will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
"knew how far Britain had fallen"
The notion that "we" had become a sadly reduced shell of our former greatness. That this could be regained if free of the shackles of the EU.
This is kind of what I was alluding to. I think this sentiment - which IS a delusion - was a big driver of Brexit.
FWIW I rather think Boris will be out of it. His time would come after a second defeat - say 2029. (Churchill was 75 when he won back power in 1951 - a point to bear in mind when trying to figure out BJ thinking.)
With on orbit refueling now baked into the Artemis project…. With aero-braking in an atmosphere at the other end, you get there quicker and with more payload.
This is because you have to use retro propulsion to slow a nuclear stage, at the other end. Either that or send the stage without testing. Unless you want to try retro-braking out for a nuclear reactor in Earths atmosphere…
Essentially, a chemical rocket will be cheaper and quicker than a nuclear thermal stage. For non sci-fi nuclear designs, at least.
If you’re one of those countries sharing a border with Russia, Belarus or Ukraine, what advantage would such structure have over the existing NATO-backed system?
That said, the US involvement in NATO is going to scale down over time, as it looks more to Asia in the coming years. Europeans in general, need to be a whole lot more invested in their own security.
https://freemovement.org.uk/high-court-casts-doubt-on-british-citizenship-of-children-of-eu-citizens/
Home Secretary: Jack Straw.....
He’ll do well enough to form a government, so long as he keeps plodding down the middle of the road, and doesn’t let the fringes of his party hog too much of the public conversation. The 1997 landslide was a factor of both the incumbent government being tired and having no majority, and of Blair being MOR enough to persuade millions of Tories to stay at home on the day.
If he wants a landslide though, he’ll need to be out there like Blair was, with a lot of policy announcements.
FWIW, I think Britain was 'shackled' by the EU to a model not really run for Britain's benefit (just as, say, Italy is). In purely economic terms, I think there is greater growth to be found outside the EU. But leaving Europe is not by itself enough to achieve this, nor even the most important aspect.
Britain can't be regain its former greatness if by 'great' we mean being the #1 world power. It can, however, be 'great' again in the sense of being somewhere its citizens enjoy an ever-improving standard of living. Not the sort of greatness which swells the heart, but the sort of greatness that people need. It doesn't really matter if this is done within or without the EU, but my view is that except for a fortunate minority it is rather harder to achieve with Britain inside the EU.
"Actually, I think I said it three times."
A rare example of Heathian humour.
Even the r/Scotland subreddit has worked this out (though they might be being brigaded by r/UK). This case isn't even related to the recent s35, but it does show that dismissing the various safeguarding amendments was misguided politically, MSPs not picking up the signal from constituents.
- We have left the EU
- We have little prospect of joining any time soon, including "best of both worlds" arrangements such as the Single Market
- Brexit causes friction, reduces opportunities and influence, and makes us poorer
The debate should be how we deal with this, eg- Brexit reduces our tax base. Should we raise taxes to maintain public services or accept these will be degraded?
- Should we join EU initiatives such as Galileo as second-class participants, but these initiatives might be useful to us?
- Do we dynamically re-align our regs with EU equivalents to stay in line with changes made by the EU?
- Do we agree a more liberal visa regime with the EU to partially allow citizens and enterprises to go about their business?
etcBut we weren’t in the Euro, so can you explain which parts of the EU model you think were inappropriate for the UK & how they resulted in the flat growth we’ve seen over the last fifteen - twenty years?
(Free trade? The restrictions on state subsidies for UK companies? Free movement of people?)
So long as government keeps looking to answer the first question, the decline is inevitable.
Edit to add, there is to all intents and purposes, no Brexit opportunity. If there had been one, Leavers would have articulated it, everyone would accept it and we would move on. It's entirely about damage limitation.
As a consequence, we are still following the writ of EU law; our agencies and quangos are still working toward economically damaging EU goals, we have failed to secure our borders, we are still signed up to hugely expensive EU projects like HS2, we are still following EU rules on procurement and state aid (see recent RN ships built in Spain); we are still following their rules on taxation. The one time, more by knee-jerk accident than by cohesive strategy, that we followed a different path to ROEU, by setting up our own vaccine taskforce, it was a massive success. But surprise surprise, we allowed it to be squandered, and it was swallowed up again by the blob.
The fact that Brexit remains such a popular policy despite the broad and deep campaign against it suggests to me that, happily, a large section of the public are not remotely fooled by the incompetence of our own agencies being gussied up as the inevitable consequences of post-EU life. Nor will such a ruse get any easier as time goes on.
"This dangerous rapist should not be in a woman's prison"
Yvette Cooper, Shadow Home Secretary, tells @bbcnickrobinson it 'should be straightforward' that someone who has committed crimes against women shouldn't be housed with women
We will continue to decline outside - and that is what the public has now realised.
It’s like we’re a bunch of cavemen arguing about the best way to paint aurochs - as the neighbours have just started farming einkorn wheat and guaranteeing yearly harvests
Point is that they are having to change their rhetoric on the matter. Labour have clocked this too, see Yvette Cooper this morning.
We should be supportive of people wanting to transition, lifting people up not abusing them or making life harder.
We should be respective of biological women in terms of female-only spaces, sports.
Seems fairly sensible to me?
(i) Biological sex should be replaced entirely and without caveat by self-id'd gender identity.
(ii) Gender identity is a nonsense and legally recognized transition shouldn't be allowed.
(ii) being more commonly held than (i).
Both the English system and the Scottish reforms are in the space between the 2 - with Scotland closer to (i) and England closer to (ii).
Membership of the Eurozone and Schengen means the end of the UK as an Independent nation state, we just become a region of a Federal EU superstate led by Berlin, Frankfurt and Brussels.
The Eurozone is already nearly its own nation with its own President, Parliament and courts and regulations as well as its own currency, open borders within it and soon its own army too
Restrictions on state subsidies - I'm not sure why we'd want to do this, but nor can I see why we'd want external rules preventing us from doing so.
Free movement of people - doesn't strike me as obviously a benefit to British people.
I agree we were a lot less screwed than we would have been had we joined the Euro.
First we have to bin off every single remaining EU law. Including GDPR
Jacob Rees Mogg is right on that one
Personally I would then seek political and military union with the White Dominions. And invade Ireland
Instead, the government is basically asking the cabinet office and treasury to review EU laws, then pushed it back a few months - meanwhile, there’s a restless and divided party, with little in terms of legislation to deal with. They’re acting much like the dog days of Major’s government, a total waste of a 70+ majority. Parliament should be busy every day, debating a whole pile of legislation that could make a difference before the next election. Yet nothing.
“Breaking: Transgender woman convicted of rape will not be held in all-female prison, Sturgeon says”
https://twitter.com/skynews/status/1618585655503618053?s=46&t=2Ip9HHG-Qyca60hLeow6lg
Why? What was the point?
The next ten-twenty years will be like the first decades of electricity
What's the real list ?
*Change the EA rules around dredging to make it easier to avoid winter flooding
*Change the EA rules on new water infrastructure so that we have enough reservoirs to serve our vastly increased population
*Abandon interconnector projects to the EU, which result in us (for some reason) importing vastly expensive EU electricity, and exporting our own pre-subsidised energy at firesale costs. Instead upgrade our own grid.
*Suspend VAT on domestic fuel, including in NI.
*Replace EU rules on state aid and procurement (admittedly no other EU country has ever paid any attention to them anyway)
*Support the expansion of our fishing fleet and ban foreign megatrawlers that hoover up fish and damage fish stocks from our waters
*Re-orient agricultural policy to support UK food production, after decades of damaging EU policy, which we're still implementing
*Help UK auction houses/the art market by removing droit de suite payments, which were imposed by the EU and drove business to America
Shall I go on?
These are the minimum that would be expected of any sane country leaving an organisation and no longer being subject to its laws.
Magnifique.
It comes down to the matter of confidence in the UK.
Brexiters didn't and (judging from the posts) still don't have the confidence that our government and institutions can manage the UK in the way that it *should* be managed and would be bullied and picked on by the nasty EU.
Remainers had and have confidence that our government and institutions can manage the UK for better or worse and that we were able to stand up to the very same nasty EU when we needed to.
I missed it.
Looking on line, it seems that there is a population around the Airedale area.
HS2 (in it's initial enterity) is core infrastructure to allow more trains to / from London and Birmingham while allowing increased capacity for slower local services on the old lines.
And given you started with a completely irrelevant hobbyhorse topic - I doubt you've given the other ideas any thought either.
They quickly go from agreeable and exotic curiosity to slightly boring and persistent reality. Like heavy snow. They REALLY screech
I admire their adaptivity tho. Incredible birds in that way. Evolved in the tropics yet love the UK
I've heard of people being fined 100%+ for way smaller mistakes than Zahawi "made" and can see plenty of reasons to belief it wasn't anything less than completely dishonest.
Edit: that breed is not just 'terrier', so very useful for Sandy R's parakeet hunts, if his aim is better next time.
https://www.gundogmag.com/editorial/gundog_breeds_gd_airedale_1107/176200
https://mobile.twitter.com/FLFusion/status/1618596858582163459
Larger than the Z-machine at @SandiaLabs, M4 will have a stored electrical energy of c.100 megajoules & the capability of launching projectiles at 60KMs per second. This speed on impact inside our target will accelerate to c.200KMs per second with our unique amplifier technology.
We are aiming for 'ignition' with Machine 4, exemplified by a fuel gain of 100 or more. This machine is the building block for the pilot power plant, validating our world-leading simulation codes while de-risking the design of high-gain targets for power production.
My issue with the Government's approach is that it damages devolution.
Hancock accused Bridgen of spouting ‘anti-Semitic, anti-vax conspiracy theories’ after he compared effects of the vaccines to the Holocaust
According to the seven-page “letter before action”, Mr Bridgen wants Mr Hancock to “retract and delete the defamatory statement contained in the tweet complained of with immediate effect”.
It adds that he should “apologise for the tweet complained of - both orally in the House of Commons - and in writing on Mr Hancock's personal Twitter account”.
And he said Mr Hancock should “acknowledge full and final settlement of any prospective claim in the form of a payment of £100,000 - to be transferred into a legal fund on behalf of persons seeking collective redress for vaccine harms (under the UK Government's Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme)”.
Mr Bridgen's legal action is being funded by the Reclaim Party and the ‘Bad Law Project’.
Laurence Fox, the leader of Reclaim, said: “The Reclaim Party and the Bad Law Project is providing its full support to Mr Bridgen and we want a full apology from Mr Hancock.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/01/26/matt-hancock-sued-andrew-bridgen-covid-vaccine-holocaust-row/
I'm on Team Hancock.
For making us all endorse Matt Fucking Hancock.
Just between Eadric disappearing and Leon turning up.
What value would you place on his reputation in the unlikely event he were to succeed in his lawsuit ?
...In April 2022, High Court Judge Brian Rawlings ruled against Bridgen, stating that he "lied under oath and behaved in an abusive, arrogant and aggressive manner", was "an unreliable and combative witness who tried to conceal his own misconduct", and "gave evasive and argumentative answers and tangential speeches that avoided answering the questions". ..
All sorts of stuff got balmed on being in the EU, with varying degrees of plausibility. Hacks like Christopher Brooker made a career out of it.
Trouble is that, now we don't have an external bogeyman to blame, we have to find an internal one. Which means that even the Brexit Benefit of "once The Telegraph can't blame Brussels, the UK will have to actually solve its problems" is an illusion.
There will always be a bogeyman.
That would exasperate Hancock and bankrupt Bridgen.
https://twitter.com/RishiSunak/status/1618192094119747584?s=20&t=x9vxogNTHRFuWPN2tN7cgw
He perhaps has a case which can be argued even if not won, since his complaint is about being associated with antisemitism.
Does equating his pet conspiracy theory with the Holocaust amount to antisemitism, or is it just offensive and imbecilic ?
And if there's a distinction, is it actionable ?