I really couldn’t care less about getting a trade deal with the US because (a) this is unlikely to benefit us; (b) I simply don’t trust this government to negotiate one which would benefit us; and (c) they’d probably renege on it a few months later anyway.
But it’s fun seeing those who place such store by it realise that actions over NI might have consequences in the US.
On the food standards issue I read somewhere last night that the British government was going to provide all the necessary information (which as others have pointed out is no more than the current EU standards we have been following for years) as required. So, with luck, this should not be an issue. I hope so anyway.
After all this controversy the one thing is certain it has made it impossible for the EU to blockade GB to NI food and ironically may have helped to resolve this particular issue.
I've not really paid too much attention to the testing saga, but just watching BBC Breakfast this morning it's starting to make sense. Basically loads of people without symptoms want a test, just because they fancy getting a test. It's like the public's bizarre desire to sit in A&E on a Saturday night.
This is caused by children and young people getting a seasonal cold and the parents fear of covid. In my family my sons daughter (8) has had a cold and a test which was negative after a four day wait and my daughter's son (11) has also had a cold and been told to stay off school and if worse after 48 hours have a test
I was listening to 5 live this morning and an expert on testing provided a detailed explanation of the process and logistics and confirmed that over 200,000 tests a day were being conducted and 20 million completed. If that stat is correct nearly one third of the nation have had a test.
It is clear that the test rules need to be reviewed and tests prioritised across the UK. The idea of some to open hospital labs to these tests is the wrong thing to do as it is prioritising many unnecessary and non urgent tests over life threatening cancer and other essential non covid related tests.
Tests are something the anti HMG proponents can attack the government on but the simple truth is no government of any political persuasion would have any other answer than the one proposed by Hancock of prioritising tests
Well said.
My wife works on the front line of a care home. She's had a blood antibody test and is getting a swab antigen test every single week. The care home has boxes and boxes of swab kits and all staff and residents have to get tested every single week. They are getting prioritised.
For someone healthy who has the sniffles and wants to get tested not being able to do so may be irritating. If the care staff etc cease to be tested in order to add more capacity for "the worried well" then would that be an improvement? I think no.
Approximately a quarter of a million daily tests are happening but half of that is immediately accounted for by routine testing of NHS staff and care staff and residents.
It’s not just “irritating”, in some cases having a test or not is the difference between being able to go to work (and getting paid) or not.
If you have any symptoms, you have to report it to your employer. You then cant go to work unless you have a negative test or you wait the 10 days or whatever. Not every employer is paying full wages during that time. A lot will get nothing for the first few days, and then SSP (which is literally nothing) for the remainder.
Describing it as “irritating” is just showing how out of touch you are.
The person quoted before who lied on their form changing it from unemployed to key worker, what work were they going to?
Not being able to go to work is bad, I never said otherwise. But if care workers cease to be prioritised then thousands of residents could start dying again.
Lo st wages is bad, lost lives is surely worse?
Although I don't agree with a lot of your posts on testing Philip I have to say I agree re the unemployed person fiddling the test criteria was despicable when there is a struggling to cope. Just selfish. There was a worse example given in the same report. A family who had returned from a Spanish holiday, had self isolated for 10 days and were all perfectly well, but wanted a test just to be sure. What? Why the hell are you wasting the testing resources when others really do need them. They have no reason for being tested at all. And if you are that concerned then why the hell did you go on holiday to Spain in the first place. They should not have a test and when they do they should have to pay for it.
Very well said.
We take for granted in this country that we don't pay for healthcare but that leads to almost infinite demand and people taking the piss like this.
It is worth keeping some perspective: Currently close to a quarter of a million tests per day are being taken which is more per capita than almost any other major developed country in the entire world. Of those about half go to "the front line" and the other half are for everyone else, but people are saying that's not enough. Though when Boris spoke about getting capacity up to a million tests per day (the "moonshot") he was laughed at and everyone said that was ridiculous.
So if a quarter of a million daily tests in insufficient and a million tests per day is ludicrously expensive and ridiculous, then where should the line be drawn?
"Taking the piss" = wanting to be tested for a disease which the government tells you day in, day out you may very well have?
The insistence on their entirely irrelevant unemployed status puts you slap in the middle of UKIP/BNP territory.
People may or may not have many different diseases at any one time. We don't test everyone for every disease they may or may not have unlimitedly. Never have done, never will do.
There is a reason care staff and key workers are prioritised. That is not a UKIP/BNP reason.
If everyone in the country was tested then we would be much nearer to being able to go back to "normal".
Isn't that what the government wants and has been messaging* us about?
*ha haha hahahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahaha
And if we had the capacity to do 67 million tests then great.
We don't. Nobody does. No country can or has done that.
We've done 20m so far haven't we? So we're in the ballpark. No one has done it yet because we started with zero tests six months ago. And we're building up. And the govt has told us incessantly how important tests are. So it is entirely understandable that people think they should use their initiative and go and get one, especially if they have been exposed to different environments.
No we are not in the ballpark since its not a case of getting the test done once and you're done for life. There's a reason that eg care workers etc are getting routine testing every single week - it doesn't matter that they were negative a week ago, if they're positive now.
If we were to test everyone you'd need to test everyone simultaneously. That would require 67 million tests done simultaneously. We're not doing 20m daily tests or remotely in that ballpark, we're doing 1.2% of that daily.
On the food standards issue I read somewhere last night that the British government was going to provide all the necessary information (which as others have pointed out is no more than the current EU standards we have been following for years) as required. So, with luck, this should not be an issue. I hope so anyway.
I've not really paid too much attention to the testing saga, but just watching BBC Breakfast this morning it's starting to make sense. Basically loads of people without symptoms want a test, just because they fancy getting a test. It's like the public's bizarre desire to sit in A&E on a Saturday night.
This is caused by children and young people getting a seasonal cold and the parents fear of covid. In my family my sons daughter (8) has had a cold and a test which was negative after a four day wait and my daughter's son (11) has also had a cold and been told to stay off school and if worse after 48 hours have a test
I was listening to 5 live this morning and an expert on testing provided a detailed explanation of the process and logistics and confirmed that over 200,000 tests a day were being conducted and 20 million completed. If that stat is correct nearly one third of the nation have had a test.
It is clear that the test rules need to be reviewed and tests prioritised across the UK. The idea of some to open hospital labs to these tests is the wrong thing to do as it is prioritising many unnecessary and non urgent tests over life threatening cancer and other essential non covid related tests.
Tests are something the anti HMG proponents can attack the government on but the simple truth is no government of any political persuasion would have any other answer than the one proposed by Hancock of prioritising tests
Well said.
My wife works on the front line of a care home. She's had a blood antibody test and is getting a swab antigen test every single week. The care home has boxes and boxes of swab kits and all staff and residents have to get tested every single week. They are getting prioritised.
For someone healthy who has the sniffles and wants to get tested not being able to do so may be irritating. If the care staff etc cease to be tested in order to add more capacity for "the worried well" then would that be an improvement? I think no.
Approximately a quarter of a million daily tests are happening but half of that is immediately accounted for by routine testing of NHS staff and care staff and residents.
It’s not just “irritating”, in some cases having a test or not is the difference between being able to go to work (and getting paid) or not.
If you have any symptoms, you have to report it to your employer. You then cant go to work unless you have a negative test or you wait the 10 days or whatever. Not every employer is paying full wages during that time. A lot will get nothing for the first few days, and then SSP (which is literally nothing) for the remainder.
Describing it as “irritating” is just showing how out of touch you are.
The person quoted before who lied on their form changing it from unemployed to key worker, what work were they going to?
Not being able to go to work is bad, I never said otherwise. But if care workers cease to be prioritised then thousands of residents could start dying again.
Lost wages is bad, lost lives is surely worse?
Although I don't agree with a lot of your posts on testing Philip I have to say I agree re the unemployed person fiddling the test criteria was despicable when there is a struggling to cope. Just selfish. There was a worse example given in the same report. A family who had returned from a Spanish holiday, had self isolated for 10 days and were all perfectly well, but wanted a test just to be sure. What? Why the hell are you wasting the testing resources when others really do need them. They have no reason for being tested at all. And if you are that concerned then why the hell did you go on holiday to Spain in the first place. They should not have a test and when they do they should have to pay for it.
Pure Kafka: we'll prosecute you for behaving as if you did not have the virus, and also prosecute you for trying to establish whether you have it or not.
But for months we have been told by the govt that testing capacity is the most important thing and that increasing the number of tests is the overarching aim and test...test...test...
The public could be forgiven for gaining the impression that the govt wanted us to....test!
But no. To go out and test - because that would be 62m minus that family who can be accounted for - is now seen as anti-social as farting in a lift.
I agree with that. I am a critics of the Govt testing shambles (as I guess you know). But surely this twat knows this morning that it is currently a shambles and that people who really need tests can't get them, yet there he goes pootling along with his family to get a test when he has no reason whatsoever to believe he has it. In fact he has every reason to believe he hasn't having self isolated and having no symptoms whatsoever.
I can believe he thought something along the lines of: tests are in short supply so I doubt I'll get one but I'll give it a go - oh look! We can get one. Hurrah!
He probably didn't think that if he was given a test then that would be depriving someone else of one because he probably thought that the govt would ensure that those that needed them had them ahead of others or were prioritised.
He was whinging that he couldn't get a test.
It nevertheless contradicts the govt messaging these past six months.
PB-ers are now saying "how dare everyone ask to get a test?" when as we all knew from the outset, testing is key to everything and the govt has lead every prezzer with testing news.
Just like masks. Specialist kit that only key workers, nurses, those in hospital, etc should wear. Now everyone should wear one. The govt has created a mindset that we should all get tested.
Congress controls trade deals and Congress will never approve a trade deal with the UK while it sits outside international law. Even if the GOP magically take back the house it's a non-starter.
I really couldn’t care less about getting a trade deal with the US because (a) this is unlikely to benefit us; (b) I simply don’t trust this government to negotiate one which would benefit us; and (c) they’d probably renege on it a few months later anyway.
But it’s fun seeing those who place such store by it realise that actions over NI might have consequences in the US.
On the food standards issue I read somewhere last night that the British government was going to provide all the necessary information (which as others have pointed out is no more than the current EU standards we have been following for years) as required. So, with luck, this should not be an issue. I hope so anyway.
After all this controversy the one thing is certain it has made it impossible for the EU to blockade GB to NI food and ironically may have helped to resolve this particular issue.
Not ironically, they did this deliberately. Making it impossible was the intention, they called the EU's bluff.
I've not really paid too much attention to the testing saga, but just watching BBC Breakfast this morning it's starting to make sense. Basically loads of people without symptoms want a test, just because they fancy getting a test. It's like the public's bizarre desire to sit in A&E on a Saturday night.
This is caused by children and young people getting a seasonal cold and the parents fear of covid. In my family my sons daughter (8) has had a cold and a test which was negative after a four day wait and my daughter's son (11) has also had a cold and been told to stay off school and if worse after 48 hours have a test
I was listening to 5 live this morning and an expert on testing provided a detailed explanation of the process and logistics and confirmed that over 200,000 tests a day were being conducted and 20 million completed. If that stat is correct nearly one third of the nation have had a test.
It is clear that the test rules need to be reviewed and tests prioritised across the UK. The idea of some to open hospital labs to these tests is the wrong thing to do as it is prioritising many unnecessary and non urgent tests over life threatening cancer and other essential non covid related tests.
Tests are something the anti HMG proponents can attack the government on but the simple truth is no government of any political persuasion would have any other answer than the one proposed by Hancock of prioritising tests
Well said.
My wife works on the front line of a care home. She's had a blood antibody test and is getting a swab antigen test every single week. The care home has boxes and boxes of swab kits and all staff and residents have to get tested every single week. They are getting prioritised.
For someone healthy who has the sniffles and wants to get tested not being able to do so may be irritating. If the care staff etc cease to be tested in order to add more capacity for "the worried well" then would that be an improvement? I think no.
Approximately a quarter of a million daily tests are happening but half of that is immediately accounted for by routine testing of NHS staff and care staff and residents.
It’s not just “irritating”, in some cases having a test or not is the difference between being able to go to work (and getting paid) or not.
If you have any symptoms, you have to report it to your employer. You then cant go to work unless you have a negative test or you wait the 10 days or whatever. Not every employer is paying full wages during that time. A lot will get nothing for the first few days, and then SSP (which is literally nothing) for the remainder.
Describing it as “irritating” is just showing how out of touch you are.
The person quoted before who lied on their form changing it from unemployed to key worker, what work were they going to?
Not being able to go to work is bad, I never said otherwise. But if care workers cease to be prioritised then thousands of residents could start dying again.
Lo st wages is bad, lost lives is surely worse?
Although I don't agree with a lot of your posts on testing Philip I have to say I agree re the unemployed person fiddling the test criteria was despicable when there is a struggling to cope. Just selfish. There was a worse example given in the same report. A family who had returned from a Spanish holiday, had self isolated for 10 days and were all perfectly well, but wanted a test just to be sure. What? Why the hell are you wasting the testing resources when others really do need them. They have no reason for being tested at all. And if you are that concerned then why the hell did you go on holiday to Spain in the first place. They should not have a test and when they do they should have to pay for it.
Very well said.
We take for granted in this country that we don't pay for healthcare but that leads to almost infinite demand and people taking the piss like this.
It is worth keeping some perspective: Currently close to a quarter of a million tests per day are being taken which is more per capita than almost any other major developed country in the entire world. Of those about half go to "the front line" and the other half are for everyone else, but people are saying that's not enough. Though when Boris spoke about getting capacity up to a million tests per day (the "moonshot") he was laughed at and everyone said that was ridiculous.
So if a quarter of a million daily tests in insufficient and a million tests per day is ludicrously expensive and ridiculous, then where should the line be drawn?
"Taking the piss" = wanting to be tested for a disease which the government tells you day in, day out you may very well have?
The insistence on their entirely irrelevant unemployed status puts you slap in the middle of UKIP/BNP territory.
I think you misunderstand the unemployment issue. She lied by claiming to be a key worker to jump the queue thus depriving someone who might be needed to save lives or look after people in care homes and she had no moral qualms about doing this. You think this is acceptable?
That is my only criticism of her. I can't talk for other.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who generally agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features, and have no problem with accepting this ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great active and emotional loyalty to Britain, which will help us in the event of sailing free and trade negotiations on the great buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the european union ? Generally, no.
There's no votes in an election year upsetting the Irish lobby. But ultimately even if the NI Protocol is utterly destroyed alternative arrangements would ultimately be agreed and that would supercede and replace the need for the NI Protocol.
Alternative arrangements were always a viable solution but it takes a bit of pressure on the EU to get them to want to agree them. Boris is doing the right thing, he just needs to stick to his guns.
I am struggling to keep up. Is the oven ready deal back to being a masterful negotiation, or is it still a crap deal that no PM could agree to?
The oven ready deal was far better than May's deal but the way the EU is trying to abuse it could never be accepted - and so its entirely possible to walk away since in Boris's deal NI was legally recognised as being in the UK's customs arrangements (which wasn't the case in May's crappy deal)
They are trying to work out what type of oven can cook it
Not as far as I've read. What they've cleverly done is blown away any attention to the legalisation of same-sex civil partnerships which was also announced - which in that part of the world might be controversial.
As the queen has said of Australia - "it's entirely a matter for them".
Autobiographical note: I am alive today because I had a test for cancer which a consultant oncologist told me not to bother with because there was such a low risk that I had cancer. I had the test anyway. On the NHS. Scrounging c--t.
I'm not accusing them of scrounging I am accusing them of being selfish. The system is in melt down. There are many who actually need a test who can't get them. They are preventing these people from getting a test. Do you think we should all go and get a test and break the system completely. Why did they need a test? Their circumstances were actually lower than just about anyone in the country having self isolated after a holiday and having no symptoms.
Let's all go and get a test for no reason and really break the system.
If we get testing up to that level then fine, but it isn't currently. The person was a selfish prat.
I think the disagreement sits on this part of your post: "Let's all go and get a test for no reason".
Many have such a feeling of fear that when they go about their daily lives they constantly worry that "I might just have caught it". In this mindset they always have a reason to get tested.
I've not really paid too much attention to the testing saga, but just watching BBC Breakfast this morning it's starting to make sense. Basically loads of people without symptoms want a test, just because they fancy getting a test. It's like the public's bizarre desire to sit in A&E on a Saturday night.
This is caused by children and young people getting a seasonal cold and the parents fear of covid. In my family my sons daughter (8) has had a cold and a test which was negative after a four day wait and my daughter's son (11) has also had a cold and been told to stay off school and if worse after 48 hours have a test
I was listening to 5 live this morning and an expert on testing provided a detailed explanation of the process and logistics and confirmed that over 200,000 tests a day were being conducted and 20 million completed. If that stat is correct nearly one third of the nation have had a test.
It is clear that the test rules need to be reviewed and tests prioritised across the UK. The idea of some to open hospital labs to these tests is the wrong thing to do as it is prioritising many unnecessary and non urgent tests over life threatening cancer and other essential non covid related tests.
Tests are something the anti HMG proponents can attack the government on but the simple truth is no government of any political persuasion would have any other answer than the one proposed by Hancock of prioritising tests
Well said.
My wife works on the front line of a care home. She's had a blood antibody test and is getting a swab antigen test every single week. The care home has boxes and boxes of swab kits and all staff and residents have to get tested every single week. They are getting prioritised.
For someone healthy who has the sniffles and wants to get tested not being able to do so may be irritating. If the care staff etc cease to be tested in order to add more capacity for "the worried well" then would that be an improvement? I think no.
Approximately a quarter of a million daily tests are happening but half of that is immediately accounted for by routine testing of NHS staff and care staff and residents.
It’s not just “irritating”, in some cases having a test or not is the difference between being able to go to work (and getting paid) or not.
If you have any symptoms, you have to report it to your employer. You then cant go to work unless you have a negative test or you wait the 10 days or whatever. Not every employer is paying full wages during that time. A lot will get nothing for the first few days, and then SSP (which is literally nothing) for the remainder.
Describing it as “irritating” is just showing how out of touch you are.
The person quoted before who lied on their form changing it from unemployed to key worker, what work were they going to?
Not being able to go to work is bad, I never said otherwise. But if care workers cease to be prioritised then thousands of residents could start dying again.
Lost wages is bad, lost lives is surely worse?
Although I don't agree with a lot of your posts on testing Philip I have to say I agree re the unemployed person fiddling the test criteria was despicable when there is a struggling to cope. Just selfish. There was a worse example given in the same report. A family who had returned from a Spanish holiday, had self isolated for 10 days and were all perfectly well, but wanted a test just to be sure. What? Why the hell are you wasting the testing resources when others really do need them. They have no reason for being tested at all. And if you are that concerned then why the hell did you go on holiday to Spain in the first place. They should not have a test and when they do they should have to pay for it.
Pure Kafka: we'll prosecute you for behaving as if you did not have the virus, and also prosecute you for trying to establish whether you have it or not.
But for months we have been told by the govt that testing capacity is the most important thing and that increasing the number of tests is the overarching aim and test...test...test...
The public could be forgiven for gaining the impression that the govt wanted us to....test!
But no. To go out and test - because that would be 62m minus that family who can be accounted for - is now seen as anti-social as farting in a lift.
I agree with that. I am a critics of the Govt testing shambles (as I guess you know). But surely this twat knows this morning that it is currently a shambles and that people who really need tests can't get them, yet there he goes pootling along with his family to get a test when he has no reason whatsoever to believe he has it. In fact he has every reason to believe he hasn't having self isolated and having no symptoms whatsoever.
I can believe he thought something along the lines of: tests are in short supply so I doubt I'll get one but I'll give it a go - oh look! We can get one. Hurrah!
He probably didn't think that if he was given a test then that would be depriving someone else of one because he probably thought that the govt would ensure that those that needed them had them ahead of others or were prioritised.
He was whinging that he couldn't get a test.
It nevertheless contradicts the govt messaging these past six months.
PB-ers are now saying "how dare everyone ask to get a test?" when as we all knew from the outset, testing is key to everything and the govt has lead every prezzer with testing news.
Just like masks. Specialist kit that only key workers, nurses, those in hospital, etc should wear. Now everyone should wear one. The govt has created a mindset that we should all get tested.
I don't think they have, otherwise you'd be having millions requesting one every day.
But without a referendum. Have these peasants no clue whatsoever about determining therwilloftherpeople?
IIRC they keep on electing governments that plan to turn Barbados into a republic, so this is the will of the people.
For a major constitutional change like that the established precedent is to hold a referendum.
It's sad, and at the same time it's been on the agenda since 1998 (and I think they last commited to do it inside a year back in 2015) so if that's what they really want then that's that.
I really couldn’t care less about getting a trade deal with the US because (a) this is unlikely to benefit us; (b) I simply don’t trust this government to negotiate one which would benefit us; and (c) they’d probably renege on it a few months later anyway.
But it’s fun seeing those who place such store by it realise that actions over NI might have consequences in the US.
On the food standards issue I read somewhere last night that the British government was going to provide all the necessary information (which as others have pointed out is no more than the current EU standards we have been following for years) as required. So, with luck, this should not be an issue. I hope so anyway.
After all this controversy the one thing is certain it has made it impossible for the EU to blockade GB to NI food and ironically may have helped to resolve this particular issue.
Not ironically, they did this deliberately. Making it impossible was the intention, they called the EU's bluff.
Tory fan boys dream on , fantasy that EU will cave in is admirable
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from the evil e.u. ? Generally, no.
WWI GB declared war on behalf of the entire Empire (including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa) WWII GB declared war as the UK and colonies - with Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa making their own minds up.
The "Anglosphere" as a military force has not existed for a century.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Anyway, yesterday was the most gloriously beautiful day here. 25 degrees and sunny with one of the most spectacular evening skies I’ve ever seen. Today looks to be equally gorgeous.
As I have received in the last day - completely unprompted and out of the blue two very nice compliments from people I’ve worked with - I am feeling a bit happier. So out of the goodness of my heart I’m sharing these photos with you.
Re your comments on US Trade Deal, I agree. Put simply, Biden doesn't like Brexit and would see no reason to help us out of the quagmire.
Brexit fans better hope Trump wins.
What's your take on the current state of polling? It seems to be going nowhere to me. Every now and again Trump gets a small string of decent results and you start to think something is happening, then you get a couple of good Biden ones (like Monmouth for Florida yesterday) and it's 'as you were'. There seem to be so few 'undecideds' that it's hard to see much movement over the remaining weeks which is disappointingly dull if nothing else.
Can Trump sign a trade deal without Congress having a say (even if it is usually nodded through). As he can't, it actually doesn't matter who wins the election as there won't be a deal if Irish leaning congressmen hate the deal.
Trump probably doesn't give a toss about us and applauds Brexit only because it's the kind of thing his base likes to hear. In practice, I wouldn't expect to get much of a deal, if any, from him. I would expect a transactional approach and since the US would be in an exceptionally strong position vis a vis the UK, his scope for srewing us to the ground would be almost limitless.
I've not really paid too much attention to the testing saga, but just watching BBC Breakfast this morning it's starting to make sense. Basically loads of people without symptoms want a test, just because they fancy getting a test. It's like the public's bizarre desire to sit in A&E on a Saturday night.
This is caused by children and young people getting a seasonal cold and the parents fear of covid. In my family my sons daughter (8) has had a cold and a test which was negative after a four day wait and my daughter's son (11) has also had a cold and been told to stay off school and if worse after 48 hours have a test
I was listening to 5 live this morning and an expert on testing provided a detailed explanation of the process and logistics and confirmed that over 200,000 tests a day were being conducted and 20 million completed. If that stat is correct nearly one third of the nation have had a test.
It is clear that the test rules need to be reviewed and tests prioritised across the UK. The idea of some to open hospital labs to these tests is the wrong thing to do as it is prioritising many unnecessary and non urgent tests over life threatening cancer and other essential non covid related tests.
Tests are something the anti HMG proponents can attack the government on but the simple truth is no government of any political persuasion would have any other answer than the one proposed by Hancock of prioritising tests
Well said.
My wife works on the front line of a care home. She's had a blood antibody test and is getting a swab antigen test every single week. The care home has boxes and boxes of swab kits and all staff and residents have to get tested every single week. They are getting prioritised.
For someone healthy who has the sniffles and wants to get tested not being able to do so may be irritating. If the care staff etc cease to be tested in order to add more capacity for "the worried well" then would that be an improvement? I think no.
Approximately a quarter of a million daily tests are happening but half of that is immediately accounted for by routine testing of NHS staff and care staff and residents.
It’s not just “irritating”, in some cases having a test or not is the difference between being able to go to work (and getting paid) or not.
If you have any symptoms, you have to report it to your employer. You then cant go to work unless you have a negative test or you wait the 10 days or whatever. Not every employer is paying full wages during that time. A lot will get nothing for the first few days, and then SSP (which is literally nothing) for the remainder.
Describing it as “irritating” is just showing how out of touch you are.
The person quoted before who lied on their form changing it from unemployed to key worker, what work were they going to?
Not being able to go to work is bad, I never said otherwise. But if care workers cease to be prioritised then thousands of residents could start dying again.
Lost wages is bad, lost lives is surely worse?
Although I don't agree with a lot of your posts on testing Philip I have to say I agree re the unemployed person fiddling the test criteria was despicable when there is a struggling to cope. Just selfish. There was a worse example given in the same report. A family who had returned from a Spanish holiday, had self isolated for 10 days and were all perfectly well, but wanted a test just to be sure. What? Why the hell are you wasting the testing resources when others really do need them. They have no reason for being tested at all. And if you are that concerned then why the hell did you go on holiday to Spain in the first place. They should not have a test and when they do they should have to pay for it.
Pure Kafka: we'll prosecute you for behaving as if you did not have the virus, and also prosecute you for trying to establish whether you have it or not.
But for months we have been told by the govt that testing capacity is the most important thing and that increasing the number of tests is the overarching aim and test...test...test...
The public could be forgiven for gaining the impression that the govt wanted us to....test!
But no. To go out and test - because that would be 62m minus that family who can be accounted for - is now seen as anti-social as farting in a lift.
I agree with that. I am a critics of the Govt testing shambles (as I guess you know). But surely this twat knows this morning that it is currently a shambles and that people who really need tests can't get them, yet there he goes pootling along with his family to get a test when he has no reason whatsoever to believe he has it. In fact he has every reason to believe he hasn't having self isolated and having no symptoms whatsoever.
I can believe he thought something along the lines of: tests are in short supply so I doubt I'll get one but I'll give it a go - oh look! We can get one. Hurrah!
He probably didn't think that if he was given a test then that would be depriving someone else of one because he probably thought that the govt would ensure that those that needed them had them ahead of others or were prioritised.
He was whinging that he couldn't get a test.
It nevertheless contradicts the govt messaging these past six months.
PB-ers are now saying "how dare everyone ask to get a test?" when as we all knew from the outset, testing is key to everything and the govt has lead every prezzer with testing news.
Just like masks. Specialist kit that only key workers, nurses, those in hospital, etc should wear. Now everyone should wear one. The govt has created a mindset that we should all get tested.
As I have already said I agree with you on that. You must know from my posts I have been relentless in my criticism of the Govt on testing. I think it has been appalling. I quote every week from the more or less analysis. I can't believe I am having to defend myself on this front.
BUT these people reported this morning are just plain selfish prats. They know, as we all do the system is broken, yet they are happy to lie and jump queue when they don't really need to at the cost of people who are at a much higher priority.
I've not really paid too much attention to the testing saga, but just watching BBC Breakfast this morning it's starting to make sense. Basically loads of people without symptoms want a test, just because they fancy getting a test. It's like the public's bizarre desire to sit in A&E on a Saturday night.
This is caused by children and young people getting a seasonal cold and the parents fear of covid. In my family my sons daughter (8) has had a cold and a test which was negative after a four day wait and my daughter's son (11) has also had a cold and been told to stay off school and if worse after 48 hours have a test
I was listening to 5 live this morning and an expert on testing provided a detailed explanation of the process and logistics and confirmed that over 200,000 tests a day were being conducted and 20 million completed. If that stat is correct nearly one third of the nation have had a test.
It is clear that the test rules need to be reviewed and tests prioritised across the UK. The idea of some to open hospital labs to these tests is the wrong thing to do as it is prioritising many unnecessary and non urgent tests over life threatening cancer and other essential non covid related tests.
Tests are something the anti HMG proponents can attack the government on but the simple truth is no government of any political persuasion would have any other answer than the one proposed by Hancock of prioritising tests
Well said.
My wife works on the front line of a care home. She's had a blood antibody test and is getting a swab antigen test every single week. The care home has boxes and boxes of swab kits and all staff and residents have to get tested every single week. They are getting prioritised.
For someone healthy who has the sniffles and wants to get tested not being able to do so may be irritating. If the care staff etc cease to be tested in order to add more capacity for "the worried well" then would that be an improvement? I think no.
Approximately a quarter of a million daily tests are happening but half of that is immediately accounted for by routine testing of NHS staff and care staff and residents.
It’s not just “irritating”, in some cases having a test or not is the difference between being able to go to work (and getting paid) or not.
If you have any symptoms, you have to report it to your employer. You then cant go to work unless you have a negative test or you wait the 10 days or whatever. Not every employer is paying full wages during that time. A lot will get nothing for the first few days, and then SSP (which is literally nothing) for the remainder.
Describing it as “irritating” is just showing how out of touch you are.
The person quoted before who lied on their form changing it from unemployed to key worker, what work were they going to?
Not being able to go to work is bad, I never said otherwise. But if care workers cease to be prioritised then thousands of residents could start dying again.
Lost wages is bad, lost lives is surely worse?
Although I don't agree with a lot of your posts on testing Philip I have to say I agree re the unemployed person fiddling the test criteria was despicable when there is a struggling to cope. Just selfish. There was a worse example given in the same report. A family who had returned from a Spanish holiday, had self isolated for 10 days and were all perfectly well, but wanted a test just to be sure. What? Why the hell are you wasting the testing resources when others really do need them. They have no reason for being tested at all. And if you are that concerned then why the hell did you go on holiday to Spain in the first place. They should not have a test and when they do they should have to pay for it.
Pure Kafka: we'll prosecute you for behaving as if you did not have the virus, and also prosecute you for trying to establish whether you have it or not.
But for months we have been told by the govt that testing capacity is the most important thing and that increasing the number of tests is the overarching aim and test...test...test...
The public could be forgiven for gaining the impression that the govt wanted us to....test!
But no. To go out and test - because that would be 62m minus that family who can be accounted for - is now seen as anti-social as farting in a lift.
I agree with that. I am a critics of the Govt testing shambles (as I guess you know). But surely this twat knows this morning that it is currently a shambles and that people who really need tests can't get them, yet there he goes pootling along with his family to get a test when he has no reason whatsoever to believe he has it. In fact he has every reason to believe he hasn't having self isolated and having no symptoms whatsoever.
I can believe he thought something along the lines of: tests are in short supply so I doubt I'll get one but I'll give it a go - oh look! We can get one. Hurrah!
He probably didn't think that if he was given a test then that would be depriving someone else of one because he probably thought that the govt would ensure that those that needed them had them ahead of others or were prioritised.
He was whinging that he couldn't get a test.
It nevertheless contradicts the govt messaging these past six months.
PB-ers are now saying "how dare everyone ask to get a test?" when as we all knew from the outset, testing is key to everything and the govt has lead every prezzer with testing news.
Just like masks. Specialist kit that only key workers, nurses, those in hospital, etc should wear. Now everyone should wear one. The govt has created a mindset that we should all get tested.
I don't think they have, otherwise you'd be having millions requesting one every day.
I don't think they have created a mindset where people think they will get a bollocking for asking for a test.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
And yet leading Brexiters have described the USA as a key part of the "anglosphere" post-Brexit since the early 2000's.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
That's largely correct but it isn't true that Americans are ashamed of and disguise all of their English heritage.
They won't drink tea or fly a union flag but they will cheerfully trace back their ancestry to the Mayflower and their English ancestors where they have them.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
But without a referendum. Have these peasants no clue whatsoever about determining therwilloftherpeople?
IIRC they keep on electing governments that plan to turn Barbados into a republic, so this is the will of the people.
For a major constitutional change like that the established precedent is to hold a referendum.
It's sad, and at the same time it's been on the agenda since 1998 (and I think they last commited to do it inside a year back in 2015) so if that's what they really want then that's that.
They can pry the Lone Star out of my cold dead hands.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
And yet leading Brexiters have described the USA as a key part of the "anglosphere" post-Brexit since the early 2000's.
Some do. I think most Brexiteers rightly recognise CANZUK nations as being closer than the USA is.
This all ends with Irish reunification. Might as well get on with it.
Or a return to the troubles first. Which is POLITICALLY most unattractive to Johnson and Cummings? I would guess reunification.
I think cheering Irish reunification at this moment in time is the last thing anyone should be doing
It's inevitable. Brexit just compressed the timeline.
Irish reunification and Scottish Independence are the end game. Just get on with it, and do it as amicably as possible. We all have to live on these islands.
No trade deal Brexit followed by Scottish independence of course guarantees tariffs on all Scottish exports to England and Wales and vice versa if Scotland rejoins the EU and as there will also be tariffs on all goods and services from the Republic of Ireland to England and Wales too that would apply to Northern Ireland in the event of Irish unity too.
There's still a glitch in the smart new website: when you click for more comments at the bottom you get the expanded threads for each comment as used to happen for a while last year.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
That's largely correct but it isn't true that Americans are ashamed of and disguise all of their English heritage.
They won't drink tea or fly a union flag but they will cheerfully trace back their ancestry to the Mayflower and their English ancestors where they have them.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
That's a straw man. My post did not say that Americans "are ashamed of and disguise" their English heritage. It simply said that "English Americans" are not a cohesive voting bloc.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
22.8 million Americans self-identify as 'English Americans' according to the last US census with the top 5 states by English American heritage Utah, Maine, Vermont, Idaho and New Hampshire, so wrong
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Re your comments on US Trade Deal, I agree. Put simply, Biden doesn't like Brexit and would see no reason to help us out of the quagmire.
Brexit fans better hope Trump wins.
What's your take on the current state of polling? It seems to be going nowhere to me. Every now and again Trump gets a small string of decent results and you start to think something is happening, then you get a couple of good Biden ones (like Monmouth for Florida yesterday) and it's 'as you were'. There seem to be so few 'undecideds' that it's hard to see much movement over the remaining weeks which is disappointingly dull if nothing else.
Can Trump sign a trade deal without Congress having a say (even if it is usually nodded through). As he can't, it actually doesn't matter who wins the election as there won't be a deal if Irish leaning congressmen hate the deal.
Trump probably doesn't give a toss about us and applauds Brexit only because it's the kind of thing his base likes to hear. In practice, I wouldn't expect to get much of a deal, if any, from him. I would expect a transactional approach and since the US would be in an exceptionally strong position vis a vis the UK, his scope for srewing us to the ground would be almost limitless.
Trump would still do a deal with us, Biden and Pelosi would throw it in the bin from day 1 if as likely the internal market bill passes
Yes, but not as much as may appear. That the supposed rise in infections is not leading to a similar rise in hospitalisations is a head-scratcher and I have five possibles now on my list:
1) infections are not actually going up; the numbers are rising because of increased testing/particular cohort testing 2) the virus is mutating to a less serious form 3) variolation: infections caught via the increased use of masks is resulting in a lower dose which the body can cope with 4) some of the positive test results are picking up remnants of previous virus infections thus creating an incorrect assumption that the virus is spreading above R=1 5) hospitalisation numbers are the issue: medics are sending people home to manage the virus whereas in the spring they would have been admitted to hospital.
Any others? Could be a combination of these I guess.
6) age distribution; infection is spreading among younger cohorts, who are much less likely to be hospitalised
Autobiographical note: I am alive today because I had a test for cancer which a consultant oncologist told me not to bother with because there was such a low risk that I had cancer. I had the test anyway. On the NHS. Scrounging c--t.
I'm not accusing them of scrounging I am accusing them of being selfish. The system is in melt down. There are many who actually need a test who can't get them. They are preventing these people from getting a test. Do you think we should all go and get a test and break the system completely. Why did they need a test? Their circumstances were actually lower than just about anyone in the country having self isolated after a holiday and having no symptoms.
Let's all go and get a test for no reason and really break the system.
If we get testing up to that level then fine, but it isn't currently. The person was a selfish prat.
I think the disagreement sits on this part of your post: "Let's all go and get a test for no reason".
Many have such a feeling of fear that when they go about their daily lives they constantly worry that "I might just have caught it". In this mindset they always have a reason to get tested.
I am sure that is true for many, but let's look at the two I was raising:
a) Does this justify you pretending to be a key worker to jump the queue and specifically stating that you have no moral qualms about doing so.
b) If you are someone who is constantly worried about getting it in your daily life I doubt you would have gone on holiday to Spain in the middle of the pandemic.
The Democratic activist base hate Brexit because they equate it with Trump and the same phenomena that brought him about. But if it's in the interests of both the US and UK to do a deal post Brexit then one will be done. Even under Biden.
It's here I have my doubts. I had strong reservations one could be agreed that'd be mutually acceptable to pass both Congress and the UK Parliament even under Trump - as the investment/state aid/dispute/agricultural issues are too divergent - but neither side would give up negotiating in a hurry.
In reality, I expect a series of mini bilateral sector type deals to be done - not a big FTA.
Presumably these ancestry numbers are self-reported, in which case they probably tell us as much about the respondent's sense of identity as actual background. Most white Americans have a tangle of ancestors from a range of European countries as well as a bit of native American and African thrown in for some of them. I would hazard a guess that Americans self identifying as Irish are politically to the left of those identifying as English even when their actual ancestry is quite similar.
The Buzzfeed article shows that "Irish-Americans" are the most anti-Trump of white Americans (according to an analysis that doesn't separate Jews). I'd hazard a guess that's because Irish-Americans latched onto the Dems first and most successfully. Not necessarily because either group's left-wing, but because the Dems have looked after the Irish, both in job creation domestically and in backing the Irish Republic (and, if we're honest, Irish Republican terrorism) internationally, for 150 years.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Australia is England with sunnier weather, bigger homes and a greater love of sport.
73% of Australians would approve of a reciprocal CANZUK free trade and free movement agreement.
There's still a glitch in the smart new website: when you click for more comments at the bottom you get the expanded threads for each comment as used to happen for a while last year.
On Firefox I see no such option to click for more comments. It is hard to contribute sensibly if one cannot see what has already been posted.
Also, on Firefox the archive links to previous months' threads sprawl all over the bottom whereas in Chrome they are confined to the right hand side. It might be easier to have a single link to archives and then the months (or even individual threads) indexed on a new, separate page.
The new site is also very slow, taking several seconds to load the comments.
The EU'S main foreign policy issues will be to do with post Brexit Britain, and it is probably in our interest if these are settled by QMV rather than unanimity and national veto.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
22.8 million Americans self-identify as 'English Americans' according to the last US census with the top 5 states by English American heritage Utah, Maine, Vermont, Idaho and New Hampshire, so wrong
For once in your life @HYUFD use those things at the front of your head and read - I said they are not a voting bloc, not that they don't exist. They may identify as English-Americans, I do not deny that, but they are not a voting bloc. Utah and Idaho are reliably republican. Vermont is Bernie Sander's state. New Hampshire is a swing state. Maine (outside ME-2) reliably Democrat. If English-Americans were a voting bloc they would have a demonstrable effect on elections, such as Irish-Americans in MA, CT and MA, or Cubam-Americans in FL. They do not. Childish rejoinders like "...so wrong" which is debate of primary school standards, and typical of your party.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who generally agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features, and have no problem with accepting this ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great active and emotional loyalty to Britain, which will help us in the event of sailing free and trade negotiations on the great buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the european union ? Generally, no.
I don't think that's true. Five Eyes shows there's lots of trust across the Anglosphere. So does UK-US collaboration on foreign policy and defence. And Canada-UK were starting to move closer on foreign policy coordination under Hague and the Harper Government even before Brexit.
It's on shared economic interests and movement of people (incl professionals) where focus is now moving and it's less clear how coterminous these are.
However, world geopolitics will bump all those countries closer together regardless in the future. We will all have to huddle together more closely to protect our interests and democracy.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
I agree with this, but a sense of commonality isn't the same as a sense of loyalty. A number of English Brexiters, even those approaching Brexit primarily in free-trading terms, are under the profound illusion that nations like Australia and the US feel some active emotional loyalty rather than just commonality with Britain, which will be an island for us in this new world of sailing clear of the E.U.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Got any polling evidence to back that up?
I highly doubt that, its total bovine manure.
The Australians love to beat the POME Bastards in The Ashes and hate to lose to us but its good natured rivalry and genuine affection not hatred or anti-English sentiment that is behind it.
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
And their second biggest net contributer I believe?
Indeed. The smart thing for the EU to do would have been to move away from their one-size-fits-all model and allowed different forms of membership. Forget "two speed Europe" (code for same destination: just some fast and some slow) then needed concentric rings of integration and to then treatise this permanently.
They decided that was an absolute no-no. Hence, Brexit.
They could have had the decency to wait until she's dead like the Australians are doing.
Australians voted 55% to keep the monarchy in 1999, though 16 nations have already become republics which the Queen was Head of State of during her reign
Not as far as I've read. What they've cleverly done is blown away any attention to the legalisation of same-sex civil partnerships which was also announced - which in that part of the world might be controversial.
As the queen has said of Australia - "it's entirely a matter for them".
The Republic debate has been going on for some time. Like with Australia, there is a lot of affection for the Royal family among older people but for the young the UK mostly just seems a long way away and cultural ties with the US are of growing importance. It's certainly not driven by anti-British sentiment. I hadn't heard about the same sex civil union decision - good on them. Despite the influence of fundamental protestantism in general attitudes on this issue are more liberal in Barbados than in other parts of the anglophone Caribbean, notably Jamaica.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Got any polling evidence to back that up?
I can't find any polling either way so have to rely on anecdata and personal experience. Living in France is a far more welcoming experience for this particular Englishman than living in Australia. Our resident Aussie, Phil Thompson, is proof positive of a general disdain for the wellbeing of this country as a collective over and above his personal fortunes.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
That's largely correct but it isn't true that Americans are ashamed of and disguise all of their English heritage.
They won't drink tea or fly a union flag but they will cheerfully trace back their ancestry to the Mayflower and their English ancestors where they have them.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
That's a straw man. My post did not say that Americans "are ashamed of and disguise" their English heritage. It simply said that "English Americans" are not a cohesive voting bloc.
If that's your argument then I agree.
Your post read (to me) like English Americans don't identify with their heritage.
I think they do but not in an overt way because, like you say, it's meshed into the establishment of the USA.
22.8 million Americans self-identify as 'English Americans' according to the last US census with the top 5 states by English American heritage Utah, Maine, Vermont, Idaho and New Hampshire, so wrong
It's not a distinct cultural identity and hence political force in the way that Irish-American or Italian-American. I don't think I've ever met an American who overtly identified as English-American.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Then you're not thinking very hard.
Australia has great banter and sporting rivalry with England (naturally) but over 60% are of British and Irish descent.
There are huge cultural and ancestral ties to the UK.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Got any polling evidence to back that up?
I can't find any polling either way so have to rely on anecdata and personal experience. Living in France is a far more welcoming experience for this particular Englishman than living in Australia. Our resident Aussie, Phil Thompson, is proof positive of a general disdain for the wellbeing of this country as a collective over and above his personal fortunes.
Sounds as if you didn't get along well with the Aussies you met?
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
22.8 million Americans self-identify as 'English Americans' according to the last US census with the top 5 states by English American heritage Utah, Maine, Vermont, Idaho and New Hampshire, so wrong
For once in your life @HYUFD use those things at the front of your head and read - I said they are not a voting bloc, not that they don't exist. They may identify as English-Americans, I do not deny that, but they are not a voting bloc. Utah and Idaho are reliably republican. Vermont is Bernie Sander's state. New Hampshire is a swing state. Maine (outside ME-2) reliably Democrat. If English-Americans were a voting bloc they would have a demonstrable effect on elections, such as Irish-Americans in MA, CT and MA, or Cubam-Americans in FL. They do not. Childish rejoinders like "...so wrong" which is debate of primary school standards, and typical of your party.
As I said 22 million Americans identify as English American and most of them vote Republican, Irish Americans may be more vocal but they mostly vote Democrat, so as I said originally Democratic presidents from Obama back and Democratic nominees from Kerry to Biden have always favoured the EU and Ireland over the UK in recent years, Republican presidents from Reagan to Bush to Trump have favoured the UK and in Bush and Trump's case over the EU
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Got any polling evidence to back that up?
I highly doubt that, its total bovine manure.
The Australians love to beat the POME Bastards in The Ashes and hate to lose to us but its good natured rivalry and genuine affection not hatred or anti-English sentiment that is behind it.
When I lived in Victoria, and later in Christchuch it was quite amusing to hear Australians and Kiwis complain about what the English did to their country, or how the English let the ANZACS be slaughtered as cannon fodder at Gallipoli etc.
There seemed little insight that it was their own settler ancestors doing these things...
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
Ye gods, all this talk such as "the EU have been defeated" is so depressing. It's not a war. Most people, and governments, in the EU are immensely sad that the UK decided to leave, and a more noble interpretation is that they are trying to make the best of a bad job. It would have been much more straightforward without the Ireland/NI issue, and our departure could have been much smoother. But the history of the island of Ireland is hardly the EU's fault.
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
And their second biggest net contributer I believe?
Indeed. The smart thing for the EU to do would have been to move away from their one-size-fits-all model and allowed different forms of membership. Forget "two speed Europe" (code for same destination: just some fast and some slow) then needed concentric rings of integration and to then treatise this permanently.
They decided that was an absolute no-no. Hence, Brexit.
The fundamental problem is they think differently to us and don't understand us. That became clear post Cameron's failed renegotiation and weighed heavily in me switching from Remain to Leave.
That is what has bedevilled talks for the past decade. They didn't take Cameron's renegotiation seriously because they didn't think we would leave. So we voted to leave. They didn't take May's "no deal is better than a bad deal" seriously because they thought we wouldn't No Deal. So we got a bad deal Parliament rejected outright. They're still now not taking us seriously, so are shocked and horrified when Boris stands up for Britain in the talks.
Until they start taking us seriously, progress isn't going to be possible. I think the only way to do that is to introduce a shock bigger than any so far into the system - walk away No Deal at the end of Transition. It may be difficult, it may cause issues with transit etc but just work on fixing them and coming to "a new normal" next year. Then get into fresh talks as sovereign equals.
Re your comments on US Trade Deal, I agree. Put simply, Biden doesn't like Brexit and would see no reason to help us out of the quagmire.
Brexit fans better hope Trump wins.
What's your take on the current state of polling? It seems to be going nowhere to me. Every now and again Trump gets a small string of decent results and you start to think something is happening, then you get a couple of good Biden ones (like Monmouth for Florida yesterday) and it's 'as you were'. There seem to be so few 'undecideds' that it's hard to see much movement over the remaining weeks which is disappointingly dull if nothing else.
"Brexit fans better hope Trump wins." Why, the House of Representatives will still be in Democrat hands and they're the ones that matter. Trump doesn't really care and he's pretty powerless over trade negotiations
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
I suppose it is to the credit of US foreign policy how many different countries think they are the USA's closest ally. France, Canada, Australia and the UK all entertain that delusion to differing extents. Canada probably has the best claim as they have a level of defence integration through NORAD that normal NATO members can only dream of.
The row over whether the EU has threatened to 'blockade' NI is nonsense of course, but it does illustrate a real point, which is that there are essentially three options for the UK. In decreasing order of desirability:
1. A free trade agreement with the EU, giving us tariff-free trade and reducing trade frictions to a certain extent. This can be very comprehensive, or it can be quite limited, but either way it would certainly help and of course by definition mean that we were working amicably together. Of course it would require us to sign up to a lot of EU rules, but we've always known that.
2. An orderly, amicable transition to WTO terms. In this scenario we'd agree with them that we're not going to enter a trade deal, but we would work with them to reduce the chaos, for example by the UK applying to have its food standards regime recognised (which incidentally we haven't done yet). In this scenario we would obviously have to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the WA. We'd also still have to sign up to some EU rules, for example on data protection and GIs.
3. A disorderly, non-amicable crash out to WTO terms. This is the scenario of maximum economic and social damage, which no sentient government could possibly countenance. It would be absolutely disastrous for NI, and pretty disastrous for us. It is also quite likely.
The most worrying thing of all is that any of these options, even the first, needs months of preparation which has barely started. We don't have the 50,000 trained customs agents needed even for 1 or 2. We don't have the computer systems. Companies don't have the expertise. No one knows how supply chains can work. No importing or exporting business can plan properly because it doesn't know what regime will apply, or what tariffs. And all this kicks in in a few weeks' time.
The EU has been saying for years that they don't understand what the UK wants. They are right. It is still completely unclear, with the government still negotiating with itself as the clock ticks down.
There's still a glitch in the smart new website: when you click for more comments at the bottom you get the expanded threads for each comment as used to happen for a while last year.
On Firefox I see no such option to click for more comments. It is hard to contribute sensibly if one cannot see what has already been posted.
Also, on Firefox the archive links to previous months' threads sprawl all over the bottom whereas in Chrome they are confined to the right hand side. It might be easier to have a single link to archives and then the months (or even individual threads) indexed on a new, separate page.
The new site is also very slow, taking several seconds to load the comments.
I use Firefox (on a Macbook). But having just checked I now see the "More comments" button is no longer there. Perhaps there's some experimentation going on in the background.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
Am I interpreting this correctly? 30% of Kenyan`s see China as their most dependable ally?
Yep. China has been eating the West's lunch in much of Africa - all about resources. The Chinese go in, build impressive infrastructure and land the country with a load of debt which leaves them beholden to China:
I get the feeling the Leavers are shifting to: 'We never liked those rotten Americans anyway so stuff their trade deal. We love Australia. Australia's where it's at!'
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
Am I interpreting this correctly? 30% of Kenyan`s see China as their most dependable ally?
Yep. China has been eating the West's lunch in much of Africa - all about resources. The Chinese go in, build impressive infrastructure and land the country with a load of debt which leaves them beholden to China:
I really couldn’t care less about getting a trade deal with the US because (a) this is unlikely to benefit us; (b) I simply don’t trust this government to negotiate one which would benefit us; and (c) they’d probably renege on it a few months later anyway.
But it’s fun seeing those who place such store by it realise that actions over NI might have consequences in the US.
On the food standards issue I read somewhere last night that the British government was going to provide all the necessary information (which as others have pointed out is no more than the current EU standards we have been following for years) as required. So, with luck, this should not be an issue. I hope so anyway.
After all this controversy the one thing is certain it has made it impossible for the EU to blockade GB to NI food and ironically may have helped to resolve this particular issue.
You are quoting a Cummings fiction. Less of the "blockades" please.
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
Ye gods, all this talk such as "the EU have been defeated" is so depressing. It's not a war. Most people, and governments, in the EU are immensely sad that the UK decided to leave, and a more noble interpretation is that they are trying to make the best of a bad job. It would have been much more straightforward without the Ireland/NI issue, and our departure could have been much smoother. But the history of the island of Ireland is hardly the EU's fault.
The EU totally failed to understand sentiment in the UK.
Advocates in the UK for the EU totally failed to understand Euroscepticism: when people here expressed concern we were losing British sovereignty and identity through ever closer union in the EU lots of Remainers here said, "Too right! The UK is out of date and nothing to be proud of anyway! I'm European!!" thus confirming their prejudices.
They still haven't learned this lesson, both preferring instead to blame tabloid newspapers, and the right-wing of the Conservative Party, rather than ask themselves the difficult questions they'd prefer not to.
Your post read (to me) like English Americans don't identify with their heritage.
I think they do but not in an overt way because, like you say, it's meshed into the establishment of the USA.
What part of "...Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans"...." did you not understand? Where exactly, as you and @HYUFD appear to allege, have I suggested that people of English extraction deny it?
@HYUDF may want to note that his favoured source, Wikipedia, cites Lieberson, Stanley; Waters, Mary C. (1988). From Many Strands: Ethnic and Racial Groups in Contemporary America. Russell Sage Foundation as authority for the proposition that -
"Americans of English heritage are often seen, and identify, as simply "American" due to the many historic cultural ties between England and the U.S. and their influence on the country's population. Relative to ethnic groups of other European origins, this may be due to the early establishment of English settlements; as well as to non-English groups having emigrated in order to establish significant communities.
Since 1776, English-Americans have been less likely to proclaim their heritage, unlike African Americans, Irish Americans, Scottish Americans, Italian Americans or other ethnic groups. A leading specialist, Charlotte Erickson, found them to be ethnically "invisible," dismissing the occasional St. George Societies as ephemeral elite clubs that were not in touch with the larger ethnic community. In Canada, by contrast, the English organized far more ethnic activism, as the English competed sharply with the well-organized French and Irish elements. In the United States the Scottish immigrants were much better organized than the English in the 19th century, as are their descendants in the late 20th century."
Re your comments on US Trade Deal, I agree. Put simply, Biden doesn't like Brexit and would see no reason to help us out of the quagmire.
Brexit fans better hope Trump wins.
What's your take on the current state of polling? It seems to be going nowhere to me. Every now and again Trump gets a small string of decent results and you start to think something is happening, then you get a couple of good Biden ones (like Monmouth for Florida yesterday) and it's 'as you were'. There seem to be so few 'undecideds' that it's hard to see much movement over the remaining weeks which is disappointingly dull if nothing else.
"Brexit fans better hope Trump wins." Why, the House of Representatives will still be in Democrat hands and they're the ones that matter. Trump doesn't really care and he's pretty powerless over trade negotiations
Absolutely! Once again HYUFD showing his ignorance.
Best thing for a Brexit deal that can get through Congress is Biden winning.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who generally agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features, and have no problem with accepting this ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great active and emotional loyalty to Britain, which will help us in the event of sailing free and trade negotiations on the great buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the european union ? Generally, no.
I don't think that's true. Five Eyes shows there's lots of trust across the Anglosphere. So does UK-US collaboration on foreign policy and defence. And Canada-UK were starting to move closer on foreign policy coordination under Hague and the Harper Government even before Brexit.
It's on shared economic interests and movement of people (incl professionals) where focus is now moving and it's less clear how coterminous these are.
However, world geopolitics will bump all those countries closer together regardless in the future. We will all have to huddle together more closely to protect our interests and democracy.
Absolutely - the anglosphere exists in a neutral institutional sense, but not in an emotional sense. Leading Brexiters have played a key role in the last twenty years in perpetuating the idea of a loyal and emotionally motivated political and economic support, waiting for us to replace that of unreliable Europeans after Brexit, which in general does not exist.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Then you're not thinking very hard.
Australia has great banter and sporting rivalry with England (naturally) but over 60% are of British and Irish descent.
There are huge cultural and ancestral ties to the UK.
Irish and Scottish being highly relevant in this context. Australian and Kiwi Scots are a community not dissimilar in culture to Irish Americans.
A feeling of being expelled by Highland Clearances and famine by a perfidious English aristocracy may be in part myth, but it is a very strong one.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Then you're not thinking very hard.
Australia has great banter and sporting rivalry with England (naturally) but over 60% are of British and Irish descent.
There are huge cultural and ancestral ties to the UK.
As there are in most of the Western world. Australia is not unique in that regard. The very language we speak is an offshoot of German and French.
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
What is wrong with you people?
Firstly, don't address me as "you people" please - address me respectfully and the argument directly.
Secondly, I don't see the defeat of the EU as either an objective or desirable - I was replying provocatively to @SouthamObserver's first because I see that the EU's biggest loss has already occurred.
I don't see any need to "beat" them in subsequent negotiations - just to reach a fair deal.
The row over whether the EU has threatened to 'blockade' NI is nonsense of course, but it does illustrate a real point, which is that there are essentially three options for the UK. In decreasing order of desirability:
1. A free trade agreement with the EU, giving us tariff-free trade and reducing trade frictions to a certain extent. This can be very comprehensive, or it can be quite limited, but either way it would certainly help and of course by definition mean that we were working amicably together. Of course it would require us to sign up to a lot of EU rules, but we've always known that.
2. An orderly, amicable transition to WTO terms. In this scenario we'd agree with them that we're not going to enter a trade deal, but we would work with them to reduce the chaos, for example by the UK applying to have its food standards regime recognised (which incidentally we haven't done yet). In this scenario we would obviously have to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the WA. We'd also still have to sign up to some EU rules, for example on data protection and GIs.
3. A disorderly, non-amicable crash out to WTO terms. This is the scenario of maximum economic and social damage, which no sentient government could possibly countenance. It would be absolutely disastrous for NI, and pretty disastrous for us. It is also quite likely.
The most worrying thing of all is that any of these options, even the first, needs months of preparation which has barely started. We don't have the 50,000 trained customs agents needed even for 1 or 2. We don't have the computer systems. Companies don't have the expertise. No one knows how supply chains can work. No importing or exporting business can plan properly because it doesn't know what regime will apply, or what tariffs. And all this kicks in in a few weeks' time.
The EU has been saying for years that they don't understand what the UK wants. They are right. It is still completely unclear, with the government still negotiating with itself as the clock ticks down.
@Richard_Nabavi - please do not try and apply reason. The zealots are in charge and like all zealots, they will not countenance anything that runs counter to their beliefs no matter how unfounded those beliefs are. You said it yourself - "This is the scenario of maximum economic and social damage, which no sentient government could possibly countenance".
Our only hope is exterior pressure from other countries will force a minimal, grudging step towards sanity and a sense of bitterness and resentment towards the EU because "they did this to us" which they will take to their graves.
Britain's time on the World Stage is over - and it has been Brexit that has done it.
The row over whether the EU has threatened to 'blockade' NI is nonsense of course, but it does illustrate a real point, which is that there are essentially three options for the UK. In decreasing order of desirability:
1. A free trade agreement with the EU, giving us tariff-free trade and reducing trade frictions to a certain extent. This can be very comprehensive, or it can be quite limited, but either way it would certainly help and of course by definition mean that we were working amicably together. Of course it would require us to sign up to a lot of EU rules, but we've always known that.
2. An orderly, amicable transition to WTO terms. In this scenario we'd agree with them that we're not going to enter a trade deal, but we would work with them to reduce the chaos, for example by the UK applying to have its food standards regime recognised (which incidentally we haven't done yet). In this scenario we would obviously have to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the WA. We'd also still have to sign up to some EU rules, for example on data protection and GIs.
3. A disorderly, non-amicable crash out to WTO terms. This is the scenario of maximum economic and social damage, which no sentient government could possibly countenance. It would be absolutely disastrous for NI, and pretty disastrous for us. It is also quite likely.
The most worrying thing of all is that any of these options, even the first, needs months of preparation which has barely started. We don't have the 50,000 trained customs agents needed even for 1 or 2. We don't have the computer systems. Companies don't have the expertise. No one knows how supply chains can work. No importing or exporting business can plan properly because it doesn't know what regime will apply, or what tariffs. And all this kicks in in a few weeks' time.
The EU has been saying for years that they don't understand what the UK wants. They are right. It is still completely unclear, with the government still negotiating with itself as the clock ticks down.
What of the money we`ll save through not being in the EU? It`s going to cost a fortune isn`t it.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
I agree with this, but a sense of commonality isn't the same as a sense of loyalty. A number of English Brexiters, even those approaching Brexit primarily in free-trading terms, are under the profound illusion that nations like Australia and the US feel some active emotional loyalty rather than just commonality with Britain, which will be an island for us in this new world of sailing clear of the E.U.
This is just disguised geopolitics though.
You can't on the one hand make the argument that active emotional loyalty exists with the EU and doesn't exist at all within Australia, NZ, Canada or the USA. There are huge cultural, linguistic and family ties with the latter - as well as similar traditions, institutions and interests.
The reason people do, of course, is because they're trying to shift people's emotional sentiments from the Anglosphere to continental Europe because they see it as an obstacle to European federalism.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Then you're not thinking very hard.
Australia has great banter and sporting rivalry with England (naturally) but over 60% are of British and Irish descent.
There are huge cultural and ancestral ties to the UK.
As there are in most of the Western world. Australia is not unique in that regard. The very language we speak is an offshoot of German and French.
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great emotional loyalty to Britain, that will help in the event of sailing free on the buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the evil, and more foreign e.u. ? Generally, no.
Most people who speak about an Anglosphere refer to CANZUK for a reason.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
I struggle to think of a country more cheerfully and virulently anti-English than Australia. Scotland and Ireland are the only countries that come close.
Got any polling evidence to back that up?
I highly doubt that, its total bovine manure.
The Australians love to beat the POME Bastards in The Ashes and hate to lose to us but its good natured rivalry and genuine affection not hatred or anti-English sentiment that is behind it.
When I lived in Victoria, and later in Christchuch it was quite amusing to hear Australians and Kiwis complain about what the English did to their country, or how the English let the ANZACS be slaughtered as cannon fodder at Gallipoli etc.
There seemed little insight that it was their own settler ancestors doing these things...
Indeed. I grew up in Victoria and we studied Gallipoli every single year in history classes.
A good day out in Victoria which I did a few times while there is the Sovereign Hill gold museum in Ballarat. At night they do a performance about a rebellion of the miners against the English. The idea that both sides were Australian ancestors of course wouldn't enter it at all.
But still, there is very much a good hearted nature to it all. I was always called a POME Bastard the whole time I was there (1990s as an England Cricket fan wasn't the best) but it was always good natured. The actual relationship between England and Australia is and always has been very friendly.
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
Ye gods, all this talk such as "the EU have been defeated" is so depressing. It's not a war. Most people, and governments, in the EU are immensely sad that the UK decided to leave, and a more noble interpretation is that they are trying to make the best of a bad job. It would have been much more straightforward without the Ireland/NI issue, and our departure could have been much smoother. But the history of the island of Ireland is hardly the EU's fault.
The EU totally failed to understand sentiment in the UK.
Advocates in the UK for the EU totally failed to understand Euroscepticism: when people here expressed concern we were losing British sovereignty and identity through ever closer union in the EU lots of Remainers here said, "Too right! The UK is out of date and nothing to be proud of anyway! I'm European!!" thus confirming their prejudices.
They still haven't learned this lesson, both preferring instead to blame tabloid newspapers, and the right-wing of the Conservative Party, rather than ask themselves the difficult questions they'd prefer not to.
Fair enough, but I don't think your comment relates to what I'd written at all.
Basically the UK has to have BINO or else the nation to screwed.
Which really should have been the situation from the start. Free from the political integration of the EU, but part of the common and single market.
EFTA or EEA membership should have been the compromise.
Yup, but that didn’t give the hard Brexiteers what they wanted, which is some kind of nostalgic nationalist rebellion against the modern world.
More than anything, what the hard Brexiteers want is a defeat for the EU. And that is why they can never be happy with any deal.
The EU have been defeated.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
Ye gods, all this talk such as "the EU have been defeated" is so depressing. It's not a war. Most people, and governments, in the EU are immensely sad that the UK decided to leave, and a more noble interpretation is that they are trying to make the best of a bad job. It would have been much more straightforward without the Ireland/NI issue, and our departure could have been much smoother. But the history of the island of Ireland is hardly the EU's fault.
The EU totally failed to understand sentiment in the UK.
Advocates in the UK for the EU totally failed to understand Euroscepticism: when people here expressed concern we were losing British sovereignty and identity through ever closer union in the EU lots of Remainers here said, "Too right! The UK is out of date and nothing to be proud of anyway! I'm European!!" thus confirming their prejudices.
They still haven't learned this lesson, both preferring instead to blame tabloid newspapers, and the right-wing of the Conservative Party, rather than ask themselves the difficult questions they'd prefer not to.
While Brexiters put it much more simply: "we were always sovereign".
The English American lobby consists solely of Andrew Sullivan and John Oliver, and they cancel each other out. For whatever reason English American heritage isn't really a thing in the same way that Irish American is.
There is no such thing, as much as @HYUFD would like to pretend otherwise, as an "English American" voting bloc. Until the American Revolution most white Americans identified as "English" - in the leadup to the American Revolution they asserted their "natural rights of Englishmen". The majority of the Founding Fathers were of English extraction. By the time of the American Revolution, they decided not to identify as English anymore. England (the English/British state anyway) was the opressor.
The unified bloc that did continue to identify with England, the United Empire Loyalists, largely emigrated to what is now Ontario to create the nucleus of English-speaking Canada. Ontario residents will not be voting in the 2020 election. Back in the US, to identify as "English-American" could be, until well into the mid-19C, considered literally treasonous - the War of 1812 and a couple of close calls during the US Civil War proving that.
As a result English Americans form the bulk of those white respondents in census returns who identify as purely "American" even though they are not of Native American decent. English-Americans have never formed a cohesive voting bloc. The first four American Presidents were "English-Americans". When the 1812 War was declared, opposition to it was not determined on ethnic grounds. The president during the war of 1812, Madison, and its most enthusiastic proponent, Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans". By contrast, the US never fought an exestential war against Italy, Ireland or any country in Africa. Thus it is quite possible to be Italian-American, Irish-American and Afro-American and still be "American". It was hard to be Japanese or German-American after WW2, difficulties that still persist to this day. So there isn't really a "German-AMerican" bloc either.
I have some skin in this game. My wife's family strongly identifies Irish-American of Catholic decent (they converted to Congregationalism a generation or two ago due to witnessing some poor priestly behaviour but still consider themselves, as my Wife puts it, "culturally Irish Catholic") and I spend a lot of time there - pandemics permitting. My in-laws had generally been quite Anglophile, until Priti Patel's infamous comments. I have never, in all the many months I have spent in the States visiting family and friends, encountered an American Citizen that described themselves as English-American. Italian and Irish tricolours are commonplace on front lawns throughout the States. You will struggle, ever, to find a similarly placed Union Flag or Cross of St George. @HYUDF is simply wrong in his analysis here.
It's this kind of background that is so helpful in describing why concepts of the 'Anglosphere' beloved by Daniel Hannan and others are so self-deluding. Are there a group of nations who generally agree they share legal, constitutional, language and other features, and have no problem with accepting this ? Yes. Do they, beyond this, feel a great active and emotional loyalty to Britain, which will help us in the event of sailing free and trade negotiations on the great buccaneering adventure of Brexit, away from clutches of the european union ? Generally, no.
I don't think that's true. Five Eyes shows there's lots of trust across the Anglosphere. So does UK-US collaboration on foreign policy and defence. And Canada-UK were starting to move closer on foreign policy coordination under Hague and the Harper Government even before Brexit.
It's on shared economic interests and movement of people (incl professionals) where focus is now moving and it's less clear how coterminous these are.
However, world geopolitics will bump all those countries closer together regardless in the future. We will all have to huddle together more closely to protect our interests and democracy.
Absolutely - the anglosphere exists in a neutral institutional sense, but not in an emotional sense. Leading Brexiters have played a key role in the last twenty years in perpetuating the idea of a loyal and emotionally motivated political and economic support, waiting for us to replace that of unreliable Europeans after Brexit, which in general does not exist.
It does exist in an emotional sense.
Not in supine loyalty to the mother country but in affection and fondness.
Your post read (to me) like English Americans don't identify with their heritage.
I think they do but not in an overt way because, like you say, it's meshed into the establishment of the USA.
What part of "...Thomas Jefferson (a was a noted scholar and enthusiast of Old English and Anglo-Saxon history whose dad, Peter, named Jefferson's birthplace "Shadwell" after the East London district where he was christened) were "English Americans"...." did you not understand? Where exactly, as you and @HYUFD appear to allege, have I suggested that people of English extraction deny it?
@HYUDF may want to note that his favoured source, Wikipedia, cites Lieberson, Stanley; Waters, Mary C. (1988). From Many Strands: Ethnic and Racial Groups in Contemporary America. Russell Sage Foundation as authority for the proposition that -
"Americans of English heritage are often seen, and identify, as simply "American" due to the many historic cultural ties between England and the U.S. and their influence on the country's population. Relative to ethnic groups of other European origins, this may be due to the early establishment of English settlements; as well as to non-English groups having emigrated in order to establish significant communities.
Since 1776, English-Americans have been less likely to proclaim their heritage, unlike African Americans, Irish Americans, Scottish Americans, Italian Americans or other ethnic groups. A leading specialist, Charlotte Erickson, found them to be ethnically "invisible," dismissing the occasional St. George Societies as ephemeral elite clubs that were not in touch with the larger ethnic community. In Canada, by contrast, the English organized far more ethnic activism, as the English competed sharply with the well-organized French and Irish elements. In the United States the Scottish immigrants were much better organized than the English in the 19th century, as are their descendants in the late 20th century."
We're going round in circles here.
Childishly, you just don't want to concede any flaws in the argument in your post.
I've even said I largely agree with you - except for one aspect.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
Am I interpreting this correctly? 30% of Kenyan`s see China as their most dependable ally?
Yep. China has been eating the West's lunch in much of Africa - all about resources. The Chinese go in, build impressive infrastructure and land the country with a load of debt which leaves them beholden to China:
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Yes, the UK is seen by more Americans than any other country as a "dependable ally" (31%) - and the UK is ranked second, behind the US, in Canada and Australia.
I agree with this, but a sense of commonality isn't the same as a sense of loyalty. A number of English Brexiters, even those approaching Brexit primarily in free-trading terms, are under the profound illusion that nations like Australia and the US feel some active emotional loyalty rather than just commonality with Britain, which will be an island for us in this new world of sailing clear of the E.U.
This is just disguised geopolitics though.
You can't on the one hand make the argument that active emotional loyalty exists with the EU and doesn't exist at all within Australia, NZ, Canada or the USA. There are huge cultural, linguistic and family ties with the latter - as well as similar traditions, institutions and interests.
The reason people do, of course, is because they're trying to shift people's emotional sentiments from the Anglosphere to continental Europe because they see it as an obstacle to European federalism.
There are ties, but I would say an uncomfortable fact for Brexiters that is that a greater emotional loyalty exists between English-speaking nations like Australia and New Zealand than to Britain. Conversely, and somewhat against the grain of current thinking, my experience of some people from English-speaking African nations is strangely different.
I would say the EU is more about active emotional loyalty to the project of peace after a war and chaos, combined with a continental sense of pan-European culture, both of which the UK has always had trouble with accepting for reasons of a different historical point of view.
Comments
If we were to test everyone you'd need to test everyone simultaneously. That would require 67 million tests done simultaneously. We're not doing 20m daily tests or remotely in that ballpark, we're doing 1.2% of that daily.
https://twitter.com/nick_gutteridge/status/1305880816627658752?s=20
But:
https://twitter.com/nick_gutteridge/status/1305880824299085824?s=20
PB-ers are now saying "how dare everyone ask to get a test?" when as we all knew from the outset, testing is key to everything and the govt has lead every prezzer with testing news.
Just like masks. Specialist kit that only key workers, nurses, those in hospital, etc should wear. Now everyone should wear one. The govt has created a mindset that we should all get tested.
That is my only criticism of her. I can't talk for other.
Not as far as I've read. What they've cleverly done is blown away any attention to the legalisation of same-sex civil partnerships which was also announced - which in that part of the world might be controversial.
As the queen has said of Australia - "it's entirely a matter for them".
Many have such a feeling of fear that when they go about their daily lives they constantly worry that "I might just have caught it". In this mindset they always have a reason to get tested.
It's sad, and at the same time it's been on the agenda since 1998 (and I think they last commited to do it inside a year back in 2015) so if that's what they really want then that's that.
WWII GB declared war as the UK and colonies - with Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa making their own minds up.
The "Anglosphere" as a military force has not existed for a century.
Just a hint: the USA is not a CANZUK naton.
As I have received in the last day - completely unprompted and out of the blue two very nice compliments from people I’ve worked with - I am feeling a bit happier. So out of the goodness of my heart I’m sharing these photos with you.
https://twitter.com/cyclefree2/status/1305949542622298114?s=21
https://twitter.com/cyclefree2/status/1305948825882853377?s=21
Have a lovely day all.
BUT these people reported this morning are just plain selfish prats. They know, as we all do the system is broken, yet they are happy to lie and jump queue when they don't really need to at the cost of people who are at a much higher priority.
They won't drink tea or fly a union flag but they will cheerfully trace back their ancestry to the Mayflower and their English ancestors where they have them.
And most Americans still have an affection for the UK and consider us their closest ally.
Can't see any problems there - no siree.
They've lost their third most important member and about 20% of their heft.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Americans
a) Does this justify you pretending to be a key worker to jump the queue and specifically stating that you have no moral qualms about doing so.
b) If you are someone who is constantly worried about getting it in your daily life I doubt you would have gone on holiday to Spain in the middle of the pandemic.
Both these people were just plain selfish.
The Democratic activist base hate Brexit because they equate it with Trump and the same phenomena that brought him about. But if it's in the interests of both the US and UK to do a deal post Brexit then one will be done. Even under Biden.
It's here I have my doubts. I had strong reservations one could be agreed that'd be mutually acceptable to pass both Congress and the UK Parliament even under Trump - as the investment/state aid/dispute/agricultural issues are too divergent - but neither side would give up negotiating in a hurry.
In reality, I expect a series of mini bilateral sector type deals to be done - not a big FTA.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/12/05/u-s-is-seen-as-a-top-ally-in-many-countries-but-others-view-it-as-a-threat/
73% of Australians would approve of a reciprocal CANZUK free trade and free movement agreement.
https://www.canzukinternational.com/2018/04/poll-2018.html
Also, on Firefox the archive links to previous months' threads sprawl all over the bottom whereas in Chrome they are confined to the right hand side. It might be easier to have a single link to archives and then the months (or even individual threads) indexed on a new, separate page.
The new site is also very slow, taking several seconds to load the comments.
The EU'S main foreign policy issues will be to do with post Brexit Britain, and it is probably in our interest if these are settled by QMV rather than unanimity and national veto.
It's on shared economic interests and movement of people (incl professionals) where focus is now moving and it's less clear how coterminous these are.
However, world geopolitics will bump all those countries closer together regardless in the future. We will all have to huddle together more closely to protect our interests and democracy.
They could have had the decency to wait until she's dead like the Australians are doing.
The Australians love to beat the POME Bastards in The Ashes and hate to lose to us but its good natured rivalry and genuine affection not hatred or anti-English sentiment that is behind it.
They decided that was an absolute no-no. Hence, Brexit.
Australians voted 55% to keep the monarchy in 1999, though 16 nations have already become republics which the Queen was Head of State of during her reign
Your post read (to me) like English Americans don't identify with their heritage.
I think they do but not in an overt way because, like you say, it's meshed into the establishment of the USA.
Australia has great banter and sporting rivalry with England (naturally) but over 60% are of British and Irish descent.
There are huge cultural and ancestral ties to the UK.
There seemed little insight that it was their own settler ancestors doing these things...
That is what has bedevilled talks for the past decade. They didn't take Cameron's renegotiation seriously because they didn't think we would leave. So we voted to leave.
They didn't take May's "no deal is better than a bad deal" seriously because they thought we wouldn't No Deal. So we got a bad deal Parliament rejected outright.
They're still now not taking us seriously, so are shocked and horrified when Boris stands up for Britain in the talks.
Until they start taking us seriously, progress isn't going to be possible. I think the only way to do that is to introduce a shock bigger than any so far into the system - walk away No Deal at the end of Transition. It may be difficult, it may cause issues with transit etc but just work on fixing them and coming to "a new normal" next year. Then get into fresh talks as sovereign equals.
Why, the House of Representatives will still be in Democrat hands and they're the ones that matter.
Trump doesn't really care and he's pretty powerless over trade negotiations
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-54167908
Buckland's problem is those pesky interviewers won't stick to the script.
1. A free trade agreement with the EU, giving us tariff-free trade and reducing trade frictions to a certain extent. This can be very comprehensive, or it can be quite limited, but either way it would certainly help and of course by definition mean that we were working amicably together. Of course it would require us to sign up to a lot of EU rules, but we've always known that.
2. An orderly, amicable transition to WTO terms. In this scenario we'd agree with them that we're not going to enter a trade deal, but we would work with them to reduce the chaos, for example by the UK applying to have its food standards regime recognised (which incidentally we haven't done yet). In this scenario we would obviously have to adhere to both the letter and spirit of the WA. We'd also still have to sign up to some EU rules, for example on data protection and GIs.
3. A disorderly, non-amicable crash out to WTO terms. This is the scenario of maximum economic and social damage, which no sentient government could possibly countenance. It would be absolutely disastrous for NI, and pretty disastrous for us. It is also quite likely.
The most worrying thing of all is that any of these options, even the first, needs months of preparation which has barely started. We don't have the 50,000 trained customs agents needed even for 1 or 2. We don't have the computer systems. Companies don't have the expertise. No one knows how supply chains can work. No importing or exporting business can plan properly because it doesn't know what regime will apply, or what tariffs. And all this kicks in in a few weeks' time.
The EU has been saying for years that they don't understand what the UK wants. They are right. It is still completely unclear, with the government still negotiating with itself as the clock ticks down.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-kenya-railway-idUSKBN1WV0Z0
Advocates in the UK for the EU totally failed to understand Euroscepticism: when people here expressed concern we were losing British sovereignty and identity through ever closer union in the EU lots of Remainers here said, "Too right! The UK is out of date and nothing to be proud of anyway! I'm European!!" thus confirming their prejudices.
They still haven't learned this lesson, both preferring instead to blame tabloid newspapers, and the right-wing of the Conservative Party, rather than ask themselves the difficult questions they'd prefer not to.
@HYUDF may want to note that his favoured source, Wikipedia, cites Lieberson, Stanley; Waters, Mary C. (1988). From Many Strands: Ethnic and Racial Groups in Contemporary America. Russell Sage Foundation as authority for the proposition that -
"Americans of English heritage are often seen, and identify, as simply "American" due to the many historic cultural ties between England and the U.S. and their influence on the country's population. Relative to ethnic groups of other European origins, this may be due to the early establishment of English settlements; as well as to non-English groups having emigrated in order to establish significant communities.
Since 1776, English-Americans have been less likely to proclaim their heritage, unlike African Americans, Irish Americans, Scottish Americans, Italian Americans or other ethnic groups. A leading specialist, Charlotte Erickson, found them to be ethnically "invisible," dismissing the occasional St. George Societies as ephemeral elite clubs that were not in touch with the larger ethnic community. In Canada, by contrast, the English organized far more ethnic activism, as the English competed sharply with the well-organized French and Irish elements. In the United States the Scottish immigrants were much better organized than the English in the 19th century, as are their descendants in the late 20th century."
Best thing for a Brexit deal that can get through Congress is Biden winning.
A feeling of being expelled by Highland Clearances and famine by a perfidious English aristocracy may be in part myth, but it is a very strong one.
Secondly, I don't see the defeat of the EU as either an objective or desirable - I was replying provocatively to @SouthamObserver's first because I see that the EU's biggest loss has already occurred.
I don't see any need to "beat" them in subsequent negotiations - just to reach a fair deal.
Our only hope is exterior pressure from other countries will force a minimal, grudging step towards sanity and a sense of bitterness and resentment towards the EU because "they did this to us" which they will take to their graves.
Britain's time on the World Stage is over - and it has been Brexit that has done it.
You can't on the one hand make the argument that active emotional loyalty exists with the EU and doesn't exist at all within Australia, NZ, Canada or the USA. There are huge cultural, linguistic and family ties with the latter - as well as similar traditions, institutions and interests.
The reason people do, of course, is because they're trying to shift people's emotional sentiments from the Anglosphere to continental Europe because they see it as an obstacle to European federalism.
A good day out in Victoria which I did a few times while there is the Sovereign Hill gold museum in Ballarat. At night they do a performance about a rebellion of the miners against the English. The idea that both sides were Australian ancestors of course wouldn't enter it at all.
But still, there is very much a good hearted nature to it all. I was always called a POME Bastard the whole time I was there (1990s as an England Cricket fan wasn't the best) but it was always good natured. The actual relationship between England and Australia is and always has been very friendly.
Not in supine loyalty to the mother country but in affection and fondness.
This is simply a fact.
Childishly, you just don't want to concede any flaws in the argument in your post.
I've even said I largely agree with you - except for one aspect.
You've decided to respond by being rude.
https://theconversation.com/pandemic-dents-australians-views-of-both-china-and-the-united-states-138529
I would say the EU is more about active emotional loyalty to the project of peace after a war and chaos, combined with a continental sense of pan-European culture, both of which the UK has always had trouble with accepting for reasons of a different historical point of view.