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Brexit: Sir John Major says 'perfectly credible' case for second referendum https://t.co/TsTpGa4JYU
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The British 'democracy' has never had tyranny of the majority only because its broken voting system grants the tyranny to a minority, Mr Major.
Its all bullshine. Remain lost.. get over it. I have.
John Major has accepted the UK will not remain a full member of the EU but hopes the country will stay close to rump EU and the single market. – Seems reasonable, panic over.
The second referendum idea has been tainted a bit by the notion that it is a device to keep Britain in the EU. But if the two options were:
1) Whatever compromise deal TM comes out with
2) Total Leave, WTO rules, completely out of single market, complete control over immigration, no contribution to EU budget etc...
Then presumably that would be an acceptable second referendum to Brexiteers?
I think it's hard to argue that this would be subverting the original referendum result since both options mean leaving the EU.
Even hardcore remoAners are not traitors, even if they suggested just ignoring the referendum rather than trying to get a rerun. That's legal, if politically inadvisable and socially provocative. And the whole success of the Brexit vote is the idea if you lose once you're allowed to keep trying anyway, be it soon after or decades after. Pushing for a rerun or an ignoring of the referendum is many things and I fail to see much appetite or true justification for it, but it isn't traitorous, even if one thinks it is insulting and idiotic.
I get why many fellow brexiteers find such remoaning talk frustrating, even insulting, particularly if they still fear the result may be prevented, but that is still improbable, and regardless, people are allowed to ignore the expressed will of the people of they want. MPs might not get a say anyway, but even if they do, and they were to ignore, they'd face the consequences and brexiteers could also keep pushing.
Is tgat a scenario I want to see? No, but it isn't traitorous. A strong case for that, I think, though the prospects are dimming, and in the phony warboeriod we've seen plenty declare anything other than their preferred version of Brexit would be a betrayal. My preferred version or one accommodating the 48 not relevant to the hardest of the cores. The Europe also seems to have decided stopping contagion is preferable to mutual accommodation, their usual approach, and may seems to see anything but hardish Brexit as too difficult to achieve.
The guardian report says:
"Major said he accepted the UK would not remain a full member of the EU but hoped the Brexit deal would enable the country to stay as close as possible to the other 27 members and the single market"
One other suggestion is a ruse for the SNP. They've a principled position on not taking any peerages. Now that resignations from the Lords are allowed this could be a face saver. They could now say they'll accept the substantial number of peerages they are entitled to but will resign the lot once the A50 and ECA repeal bills are done. It would be a way of bending not breaking their pledge. If they could be persuaded to do it it would appeal to Salmond and Sturgeon's sense of mischief as well as their core strategy of achieving independence by provoking the English to leave the union first.
Two or three ex PM's being elevated alongside a new SNP group would throw a hand grenade into the Lords and provide much needed soft Brexit votes. Of course May could just refuse to nominate them. But that would be almost as much fun politically.
For that matter I don't recall John Major complaining about the "tyranny of the minority" when he was part of the minority that controlled the country.
Really though, it would be easier if the 5% of EUphiles left for Belgium, since they love the artificial EU so much they can go and live in a artificial country.
The post Merkel age will be about retrenchment in Europe. No more extension to the borders of Middle East and Russia, no more rigid adherence to the four freedoms (which haven't been that rigid given Cyprus' capital controls).
Europe 3.0 will be about staying together in spite of the contradictions within the EU. And probably trying to keep the various economies afloat despite too many internal contradictions.
I think we have a tendency to take comments by EU functionaries and minor continental politicians and take them as if they were Holy writ, when they are just personal opinions. It'd be a little like a French newspaper quoting Nick Clegg ("former Deputy PM Nick Clegg") and giving the impression he spoke for all Brits.
If people want to fight over Brexit types, that's very legitimate. I think hard will win politically and as a more popular version personally.
What is so hated by Major - and Blair and Branson etc - is when a majority of the plebs are overruling the wishes of a majority of the establishment.
Telegraph
The founder of Corona has left £2 million to every single resident of the impoverished Spanish village he grew up in
https://t.co/ZlgoZGhT2o
It would not say go back and renegotiate because it would be too late by whenever the referendum would be held.
I am not 100% sure that is what the likes of Major, Clegg, etc had in mind.
So let's get on with it and leave, and be rid of the lot of them.
Armed with further information, the British people have every right to change their minds if they so wish. And to do it at any time.
The tricky thing is if TM is keen to negotiate a deal very close to hard Brexit... then there is essentially no choice.
How do majorities become tyrannies ?
The obvious answer is when the result is all that matters and when supporting a view or a Party becomes akin to supporting a football team. The inability to accept even for a nanosecond the other side (the opponent, the opposition) might have something valid to say and more importantly your side might not be wholly correct is part of the check and balance democratic societies need.
The anonymity of the Internet (and other media) allows a) a greater degree of partisanship because, within the laws of libel and slander, it's a bear pit and b) it's easier to end up in your own echo chamber and all that does is re-enforce your own views rather than challenging them.
It also derives from the notion of "accepting the result". Democracy means you are sometimes (or if you are a Lib Dem) often on the wrong side of the result. It's one thing to accept the result but that doesn't invalidate your viewpoint. I've often defined a majority as "the largest number of people wrong about any given subject at any given time" but that doesn't mean I think I am somehow "right". It's not about right or wrong, good or evil, City or United, red or blue, black or white - the EU Referendum was about shades of grey as we are now discovering.
Opinions change and perspectives change with time - we now assume Brexit and the election of Donald Trump are ground breaking neo-revolutionary moments. In 20 years, that's how they may seem or they may seem entirely trivial. I don't know.
It is vital that everyone has the opportunity to win, to prosper, to achieve.
But it is equally important that the possibility of failure and defeat exist - that nobody is guaranteed to get their own way permanently and at the expense of others.
What we are seeing from some parts of the establishment is a refusal to accept that, a refusal to accept that their wishes are not always paramount.
#BREAKING: #Turkey President Erdogan threatens to open borders to migrants after EU Parliament vote. More to come...
Fear of our vote, my vote, being ignored has led to some bizarre views, like you cannot revisit subjects, referenda are binding in law rather than effect even though the law says otherwise, and no one should be able to challenge the government over its own interpretations of its powers. Going '52-48' in response to remoAners, even if we think them wrong, ignores the complexities and can include unforeseen implications, such as saying we are not allowed to reconsider (which is what is meant when saying people are traitors fir suggesting it).
Let's keep working for Brexit, and overcome those who think we need to revisit it, not try to shout them down. If they will have no traction with the public, the public will take care of them directly.
Good day All.
If it is a hard deal then a referendum would only be able to ask:
1) negotiated hard deal; or
2) no deal = WTO = hard Brexit
I agree that there is a decent Brexit deal to be done. It's one that involves remaining as much a part of the single market as possible. The problem is that it is a deal which Theresa May - so fixated on remaining PM - cannot do because she is terrified of the Tory right.
LibDem councillors in Liverpool:
63 2003
60 2004
57 2006
53 2007
46 2008
33 2010
22 2011
9 2012
4 2016
Brexiters always claimed this as a price worth paying. I wondered whether, now that this abstract concept is becoming real and will affect real people (the poorest, most likely), any Brexiters were revising their view to any extent.
Seems you not.
Who are they ? I've never met any of them. If we define an "Establishment" as a group of people enjoying a monopoly of power in perpetuity, then the whole democratic exercise is a façade. Fair enough.
One could argue in 1997 after 18 years of single party rule, there was a democratic revolution which ousted one Establishment and brought in another and that is the nature of all revolutions - American, French, Russian even back to the Norman Conquest if you want - the replacement of one power bloc by another.
Those who claim they want to overthrow "the Establishment" often just want their turn at the top - it's the truth of most revolutions.
Those leading all the various leave and Remain campaigns were never going to be materially affected by whatever the outcome was.
Same as the old boss
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYMD_W_r3Fg
BTW, I'm not sure you can class Gulen as an "Islamic extremist". Having said that, I still haven't been able to put my finger on *what* he is.
Even if they aren't, the perception they might will add to LePen's chances of victory as will every terrorist attack between now and May.
The Daily Mail are busy attacking IFS this morning for saying wages have stagnated.
This would be true EU or not.
Get that within a decade the village will have ceased to exist in anywhere near its current form.
The real learning for me is that we have a failing unwritten constitution. How was it allowed to get this far? How was it possible to ratify Maastricht and then Lisbon without plebiscites? We've been the slowly boiled frog for an age and are making a final leap towards a more direct democracy. I suppose in every country politicians try to rule rather than serve - that is what constitutions are for. Ours, or rather our lack of one, seems to be looking very threadbare these days.
"The document stamped "secret" was called, in keeping with films and books of that era, "The Omega Project".
Civil servants noted that "for the majority it would represent the abolition of the NHS".
But in spite of what was described as the nearest thing to a Cabinet riot in the history of the Thatcher administration, the prime minister secretly pressed ahead with the plans - before later backing down."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-38101020
That Spanish village story has all the makings of a good novel: whether it ends up as whimsy or tragedy or success, who can say.
Edit : I see @Cyclefree agrees which is usually a good indication that I'm right. But this story ends up as tragedy. How many lottery jackpot winners make a good go of it?