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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » If only David Davis was as competent a minister as he is self aware
UK’s #Brexit Secretary nothing if not self aware: hot mic @Channel4 captures him telling colleague “really probably employed for my character more than my intellect” https://t.co/Tmgj1vqUnW
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I've started thinking most of the people are living on their whits... Would be interesting to know how many PB'ers are popping Valium by the handful.
I think there is some benefit to be had with Brexit, but the main gains will be democratic and social. Brexit wasn't won on the back of an economic argument, it was won in spite of a strong economic argument against it.
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is about to start.
Essentially, low confidence leads to high savings rates, leads to reliance on external (i.e. export) demand. It's been the rut the Eurozone has been stuck in for some time, and which was identified as "Euroglut."
The interesting questions to me are:
1. Will the marginal utility of saving diminish over time? That is, will Germans decide they have saved enough at some point, and lower their propensity to save? If they do, it could kick off a virtuous circle there
2. What are the measures that Eurozone governments could implement to lower savings rates? I would suggest mortgage interest tax relief, particularly in places like Italy could have an extremely beneficial effect, especially in countries where personal debt is de minimis.
We can already see the effects of a possible trade war on the German economy (it's rapidly slowing). Of external demand really does slow down there is almost no chance that domestic demand will replace it. As we always point out, not everyone can be Germany and outside of the Eurozone, Germany wouldn't be Germany, it would be much more like Scandi countries.
A curious if slightly febrile atmosphere about this evening as the pro-Government apologists claim there's nothing to see and others seemingly expecting the sky to fall in any moment.
Politics isn't like that of course.
As we've seen so before, it's all a play and we may simply be seeing some bites thrown to the audience to keep them interested or it may mask a more fundamental crisis at the heart of Government.
Most if not all parties are coalitions or factions and it's very often only mutual self-interest or fear that keeps them together. Fundamental disagreements can be masked and ignored for longer or shorter periods but eventually there comes a point when individuals have to decide which way to jump.
The Conservative Party held together remarkably well during the Referendum but that did not and could not solve the disagreements within the Party. Cameron might have hoped the air would have been cleared and has either side won 70-30 that's probably would have won with the losing side as dead as AV, pineapple on pizza or anyone thinking Solo is a decent film.
The A50 process has therefore been less about resolving the future economic relationships of Britain and the EU and more about resolving the tensions within the Conservative Party and a weak Prime Minister (who weakened herself in a fit of self-indulgence last year) trying to hold the various groups together.
The question now becomes less which faction prevails but what the losing faction will do.
Ah yes. Astonishing to think how all that was completely blown out of proportion. I suppose the press was determined to teach young Messrs Cameron and Osborne a lesson for their presumptions, and an obscure tax reform concerning heated foods came along. Most odd.
I'm still not convinced Merkel wont go before May
Germany has a bigger leadership crisis than the UK
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jun/06/may-to-give-nhs-significant-cash-boost-jeremy-hunt-reveals
"“She is unbelievably committed. You should not underestimate how committed she is to the NHS. So she is absolutely 100% behind getting this right,” Hunt said.
"I’ve been making the NHS’s case that we need significant and sustainable funding increases to meet the demographic challenges we face, and the prime minister completely appreciates that."
Whilst she has managed to hold the party together she has largely done so by avoiding or deferring hard decisions. I don't really criticise her for this. There are too many on both sides of the argument who seem desperate to have a fight in an empty room and would have been more than happy to go to the mattresses over something that wasn't even a possibility so far as the EU are concerned. The EU have also not helped by refusing to engage on substantive issues until very late in the process but that is the nature of the beast and one of the many reasons we are leaving in the first place.
What we are facing now, however, are some hard "decisions". I put that word in inverted commas because if we want a deal (and we do) they are not decisions at all but a negotiating position. This is where the White Paper is important. We need to be clear about what we want before we can decide whether we can get it or not. The party, the country and the cabinet are not unified in what we want.
A different leader would have spent these months setting out a clear vision of what they wanted and invited others to follow. In fairness May tried that In January and then September 2017 in 2 speeches and in the second one in particular she gave the impression of having an objective in mind but there has not been a comprehensive effort to build a consensus around that objecive. May gives the impression of preferring room for manoeuvre to clarity.
The clear impression is that next week is crunch time. Either May leads and persuades a majority of those in the Commons to follow or she is really finished. At the moment it looks pretty 50:50 to me. It will be somewhat less if she cannot bring Davis with her.
DD needs to resign if he can't agree with the government's decision.
do you ?
her remit is Europe, not one sixth of it
currently she is a woman pushing yesterdays agenda on tomorrows world
today her ploy was to boast of increasing Europes military power by decreasing defence spending
how will that work ? She still ultimately wants the \us to do all the work for her but
Obama has gone
The same happened a few weeks before the Phase 1 agreement and then suddenly a deal was reached and besides some last minute posturing it all got signed smoothly.
It's deja vu all over again.
But I can see that Merkel is still Chancellor despite doomsday predictions to the contrary over and over again
What is the point in going ahead with Brexit, when it is a worse deal than we have at the moment? Johnson before the 2016 referendum said that we could vote Leave, try to get a better deal and then stay if things were no better.
Brexiteers have to get out of the mind set that because the gun is loaded we should blow our brains out. There is always a choice not to do it!
Just 3 seats changed between the Liberals and Tories in October 1910
If you leave the club you can no longer use their facilities. You can't say you want to leave but would still like to play golf every other monday. You either have the facilities or you don't.
There seems a marked reluctance to admit you can't have the benefits of membership without membership.
Am I missing something?
16% vote radical right
11 % vote radical left
that's 27%. this has never happened in the history of modern Germany and the trend is upwards.
Merkel is bit by bit destroying the fabric of the Bundesrepublik and by extension the EU
She sounds almost defeated.
like lots of clubs non members can pay a rate and use certain facilities
really she should have stood down and gone out on a high
currently I think she'll end up like Cameron with the way she departed overshadowing any achievements
controlling immigration was the biggest issue
get out of your brexit prism and look at what is happening in the wider world
nobody gives a shit about DD or Boris
Millions of EU citizens will be here after we leave. What rights do they have? What rights do Brits in EU countries have?
Some of the things we did whilst in the club involved people who were not. We want, in some cases, to be one of those who are not. But what are the terms?
When you leave a club you don't normally go back. We will continue to interact with the EU in multiple ways after we have left.
So in a or the customs union or out of it?
FTA or WTO tariffs?
If FTA how much alignment with and oversight by EU law?
EAW or not?
ESA and Galileo or not?....
This is really nothing like leaving a club.
I thought it was all economic activity would stop on a yes vote
that's why me and Jezza voted leave
or do you just ignore data ?
Agree with the second part. Could have been worse though, I could have gone for March 1933.
Article 50 should be withdrawn, no dishonour would be admonished on the proponents of Leave. Simply, the argument for Leaving and the benefits cited by the advocates of Leave were unobtainable. There would be no gloating and Boris might actually have a longer political career and a chance to revive his substantial diminished reputation.
A precedent would be Churchill who made the mistake of taking sterling off the gold standard as C of E in the 1920s, only to rejuvenate his own political fortunes and that of a nation in the Second World War.
he knows where you live you know
Tory lead in last six polls before 2017 GE: 10, 7, 12, 1, 13, 8, mean 8.5%. Actual lead, 2.5%. Most recent polls in 2018: 3, 3, 0, 4, 0, 4, mean 2.3%. And the government looks even shiter now than it did last year. So a Lab lead of 3.7%?
I doubt it. I think if there were a GE now the Tory lead could be 5%. Labour won't have students and dementia tax. They'd be like a defence team trying to win at a retrial once the prosecution have heard all the defence evidence. That's a tough job. Everyone knows the Tories are utter crap on Brexit, but can Labour sell themselves as much better on the issue? The Tories are in with a chance of ridding themselves of the DUP by the end of the year if they boot May out and let a new leader call a GE. I don't think Gove has got enough friends. Johnson would be far too risky. It could just about be Javid who would leave the Labour leadership dizzy, but I'm still mostly on Rees-Mogg.
@TheScreamingEagles can you record this bet please?
And now that there is no road left, May is trying to put the best face on the civil service instruction that she totally capitulate on every item.
There is not going to be a 'deal'. There will be no deal, or surrender.
If the Brexiteers in the cabinet have a shred of integrity left, they need to resign. But they won't - they are Tories. They have sold the British out to the EU for decades and they are determined to do it again.
Also - on a really geeky point now - the current German Republic dates back to 23rd May 1949. The government in Bonn claimed de jure authority over all Germany, although it had de facto power only over the West of it. The DDR was wound up and the BRD claimed de facto authority over the whole country on 3rd October 1990. But that did not create a new republic.
Brexit is a process not an event
todays bit players will disappear, reality will set in and new players will sort out the crap
once out we will drift away to a place of our own choosing
Get the idea that politicians talk big and then struggle with the details ?
And BTW Churchill's mistake was in putting sterling ON the gold standard, the ERM of its day.
Though to be fair he was persuaded by the 'Sir Humphreys' in the BoE, Treasury etc.
well of course, but generally it works out cheaper since you only pay for what you want whenever and leaves you the option to use other clubs too
And if so why ? An attempt to match the spending of their 'friends' to the east ?
I left a link to where John Major made his Heart of Europe speech on the previous thread. It was indeed in 1991!
Though half of the EU countries don't do that either, rather they get paid to be a member of the club.
personally I think a minority of people do quite well out of it and don't want to see it go, but most brits don't hence the result.
As a non member, you have to be a rule taker rather than a rule maker. We are off the committee...